So, I posted yesterday about being wrong. Since I actually tend to be writing these things days before they appear, I can’t say what the reaction to that post is going to be. I can guess, but as of right now I don’t know, so I’ll worry about it later.

This post is about something I talked about yesterday. I said that I figured it was better to do the wrong thing, rather than to do nothing. I wanna talk about that a bit more.

Some people like to think that you should only act if you’re sure you’re doing the right thing. Of course, figuring out what is the right thing is kinda hard. Some like to think they have the right answer, because they have training, or because of their religion, or their lack of religion, and so forth. But really, none of us really know if we have the right answer to something. All we really got is answers we think or believe are right, for various reasons.

I don’t know how many people have seen the movie Kick Ass, but there’s a scene where the title character is out in his superhero costume, trying to get back a lost cat, and he sees three guys beating up a fourth man. He doesn’t know the situation, doesn’t know if the fourth guy did something to deserve the beating. But he goes over and gets the crap beat out of him defending the guy. Because he believed it was better to jump in and stop it, than to let it keep going.

Was he the right person doing the right thing? I don’t know. What I do know is that he is a person who did something.The guy might have deserved it, been a rapist, or a mugger, or anything. But the title character still jumped in and stopped the beating.

If you saw someone being abused, what would you do? We all like to think that we’d step up and stop it, but to be honest we don’t. What if you didn’t because you knew, in your heart, that i would just make the next round worse on the victim. So you didn’t do anything. Because there’s others who were better qualified to deal with it. Even if they weren’t there.

I don’t think I’m all that heroic. But I do think it’s better to do something, even the wrong thing, than to do nothing. I look at it like this. Even if you make the situation worse later, stepping up, stepping in then, when you’re there, might just give the person being hurt the chance to face what comes later. Might give them the strength, the knowledge that they are not alone, so that even if the next round is worse, they have the hope and the will to move themselves, and get away.

That’s why I tend to be harsh on the monotheistic religions, and even atheism at times. It’s why in the past I’ve been hard on my fellow Pagans, when they stopped being tolerant and started being cruel to paths they didn’t like. Because it’s a chance to step in and maybe not do the right thing, but try to do something. And some people might think me ignorant, or a bully, or wrong, but I do it. And if I bully the bullies, at least I can say I’m trying to do something.

Because I figure it’s better than not doing anything.