Opinion / Columnist
The dangers of giving in to impulse of revenge
27 Jan 2018 at 07:18hrs | Views
The Zimbabwean situation presents politician's quest for vindication.
the machinations in the Zimbabwean political landscape is immensely entertaining but a little over the top. While it is politically reasonable that new leaders always bring in their new team but common sense must be applied. For the sake of continuance mass retiring or firing of civil servants is a deceitful and counter productive measure.
It is perplexing to observe what appears to have been a ham-handed effort by the leaders to retaliate against the perceived enemies by transferring them or fire them for the belief that they were not for us.
The frenzy has given way to gossipers liars jealous and vindictive officers to feed the leaders with wrong information which divisive and not constructive.
If retaliation is what it is it will work only if the supposed offender knew he was being punished and why. And if the goal is also to set an example and persuade other local politicians to fall into line, they will have to know, too. That's why criminal trials and sentencing proceedings in this country are public. This closed door policy of firing and retiring is not doing any good to the reputation of the country.
Some people are being fired at a rally or a traditional ceremony. This reminds the country the days of madness where the former first lady would disregard decency and treat people as if its a child play. Civil service appointments should be done with dignity and respect to those in the receiving end. Can you imagine hearing on the news and social media that you are fired.
His excellency the president Hon ED narrated how his security was withdrawn and his life was in danger and he had to act responsibly and escape with his life. Surely the president should frown upon the same treatment being done on any of his subjects or subordinates. We are in an era of dignity and our actions must never be motivated by anger.
The spirit of revenge blinds fairness and is indeed irrational.
But once the politicians realize what was really going on and go to the news media, the result will be a scandal that eclipsed any effort at retaliation. Heads must roll.
So for the instigators of this scheme, whoever they turn out to be, this is a lose-lose proposition from the start, since there are only two possible outcomes: Embarrassment to the party and total decampaigning of the party.
The revenge crusade will harm a lot of innocent Zimbabweans including, no doubt, many voters, but otherwise will accomplish nothing.
The process is A major scandal, which is what The government will get.
Ethics, morality and legality aside, why would anyone do this?
It's not as if the Revenge scandal is an isolated example politics is filled with instances of ill-advised efforts at retaliation against competitors, supporters voters and the country at large. The courts are currently clogged with cases claiming unlawful retaliation against others while others are roaming the streets freely. The prosecution is not in a hurry to conclude high profile cases.
Retaliation is hardly unusual in politics. After the ensuing inept cover-up, The actions of the avengers causes administration to suffer an incalculable loss of credibility.
With elections coming we do not need any action which casts aspersions on the party. We need a behavior which is motivated by "observable" as opposed to "verifiable" facts, this may help explain the current affairs and other dubious instances of retaliation.
An "observable" fact is something that people may witness and believe to be true, but cannot prove. Many people seem to have concluded, for example, that all police officers were G40 They had the motive, and there is substantial evidence that they ran a tight ship and that they would not have freelanced on so delicate and risky a mission. So far it has not been verified. But the mass restructuring was carried on and indeed it was not a wise idea hence its reversal. If you are a politician with a desire to punish opponents and get away with it, you want to work in the world of observable but not verifiable actions. That would mean that your opponents would understand what you are doing, which is important if you actually want them to obey upfront so that you don't have to punish them later, but also you want to use a punishment where a third party can't be sure that you have acted for illegitimate reasons. That way you can get away with it and not pay a legal price for it.
The vindictive behavior might mean that a relatively small group of political insiders would figure out what is going on and fall into line with the reconciliation agenda. But everyone else would be perplexed or indifferent.
The scheme also depended on the targets figuring it out, but not anyone else, and especially not anyone in the new camp.
And the retaliation is serving no rational purpose, but may have nonetheless been emotionally satisfying to the perpetrators.
The people are angry with the child play behavior of just firing people even if they never knew why. Basically, if you hurt me, I hurt you back because I am angry (and maybe want to get it out of my system), and this is so even if it has no effect on your future behavior or that of others. In the behavioral economics literature, this is called negative reciprocity.
There is no way to know how many people get away with this kind of retaliation, but "it's a dangerous game the important thing would be to carefully assess the benefits and the risks. In this case, as we have seen, the risks to government's reputation are significant. Politicians and others sometimes play hardball, of course, and sometimes they have no choice, but they still have to be prudent about it.
Many forms of retaliation are lawful, even laudable, and can be a powerful motivator. ("Don't get mad, get even.") The impulse to retaliate for a perceived wrong seems deeply rooted in human nature. "The idea that people should be held responsible for their actions, and thus might sometimes have to be punished, apart from any good consequences of punishing them, has a pretty distinguished pedigree.
Zimbabwe needs team work now not revenge politics. We have the economy to deal with. We need every available head to push the country forward.
We need to hit the ground running not to hit the ground diving the foot soldiers.
Vazet2000@yahoo.co.uk
the machinations in the Zimbabwean political landscape is immensely entertaining but a little over the top. While it is politically reasonable that new leaders always bring in their new team but common sense must be applied. For the sake of continuance mass retiring or firing of civil servants is a deceitful and counter productive measure.
It is perplexing to observe what appears to have been a ham-handed effort by the leaders to retaliate against the perceived enemies by transferring them or fire them for the belief that they were not for us.
The frenzy has given way to gossipers liars jealous and vindictive officers to feed the leaders with wrong information which divisive and not constructive.
If retaliation is what it is it will work only if the supposed offender knew he was being punished and why. And if the goal is also to set an example and persuade other local politicians to fall into line, they will have to know, too. That's why criminal trials and sentencing proceedings in this country are public. This closed door policy of firing and retiring is not doing any good to the reputation of the country.
Some people are being fired at a rally or a traditional ceremony. This reminds the country the days of madness where the former first lady would disregard decency and treat people as if its a child play. Civil service appointments should be done with dignity and respect to those in the receiving end. Can you imagine hearing on the news and social media that you are fired.
His excellency the president Hon ED narrated how his security was withdrawn and his life was in danger and he had to act responsibly and escape with his life. Surely the president should frown upon the same treatment being done on any of his subjects or subordinates. We are in an era of dignity and our actions must never be motivated by anger.
The spirit of revenge blinds fairness and is indeed irrational.
But once the politicians realize what was really going on and go to the news media, the result will be a scandal that eclipsed any effort at retaliation. Heads must roll.
So for the instigators of this scheme, whoever they turn out to be, this is a lose-lose proposition from the start, since there are only two possible outcomes: Embarrassment to the party and total decampaigning of the party.
The revenge crusade will harm a lot of innocent Zimbabweans including, no doubt, many voters, but otherwise will accomplish nothing.
The process is A major scandal, which is what The government will get.
Ethics, morality and legality aside, why would anyone do this?
Retaliation is hardly unusual in politics. After the ensuing inept cover-up, The actions of the avengers causes administration to suffer an incalculable loss of credibility.
With elections coming we do not need any action which casts aspersions on the party. We need a behavior which is motivated by "observable" as opposed to "verifiable" facts, this may help explain the current affairs and other dubious instances of retaliation.
An "observable" fact is something that people may witness and believe to be true, but cannot prove. Many people seem to have concluded, for example, that all police officers were G40 They had the motive, and there is substantial evidence that they ran a tight ship and that they would not have freelanced on so delicate and risky a mission. So far it has not been verified. But the mass restructuring was carried on and indeed it was not a wise idea hence its reversal. If you are a politician with a desire to punish opponents and get away with it, you want to work in the world of observable but not verifiable actions. That would mean that your opponents would understand what you are doing, which is important if you actually want them to obey upfront so that you don't have to punish them later, but also you want to use a punishment where a third party can't be sure that you have acted for illegitimate reasons. That way you can get away with it and not pay a legal price for it.
The vindictive behavior might mean that a relatively small group of political insiders would figure out what is going on and fall into line with the reconciliation agenda. But everyone else would be perplexed or indifferent.
The scheme also depended on the targets figuring it out, but not anyone else, and especially not anyone in the new camp.
And the retaliation is serving no rational purpose, but may have nonetheless been emotionally satisfying to the perpetrators.
The people are angry with the child play behavior of just firing people even if they never knew why. Basically, if you hurt me, I hurt you back because I am angry (and maybe want to get it out of my system), and this is so even if it has no effect on your future behavior or that of others. In the behavioral economics literature, this is called negative reciprocity.
There is no way to know how many people get away with this kind of retaliation, but "it's a dangerous game the important thing would be to carefully assess the benefits and the risks. In this case, as we have seen, the risks to government's reputation are significant. Politicians and others sometimes play hardball, of course, and sometimes they have no choice, but they still have to be prudent about it.
Many forms of retaliation are lawful, even laudable, and can be a powerful motivator. ("Don't get mad, get even.") The impulse to retaliate for a perceived wrong seems deeply rooted in human nature. "The idea that people should be held responsible for their actions, and thus might sometimes have to be punished, apart from any good consequences of punishing them, has a pretty distinguished pedigree.
Zimbabwe needs team work now not revenge politics. We have the economy to deal with. We need every available head to push the country forward.
We need to hit the ground running not to hit the ground diving the foot soldiers.
Vazet2000@yahoo.co.uk
Source - Dr Masimba Mavaza
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