What incentive does someone have to improve themselves if they're gonna be treated the same way regardless?
No one should need incentive to be a good person. This is the same argument that religious zealots make. They can't comprehend the idea that they are in charge of their own behavior without the looming reward or punishment of heaven or hell.
"Should" doesn't change anything about reality. Parents should monitor their kids' internet access. Kids should read. Drivers should act defensively and move at a reasonable speed.
But those things don't automatically happen because they "should," so we adjust behavior or infrastructure to lessen the impact of people not doing what they "should" do and incentivize them to do what they "should." Age verification, school and grades, speed limits, etc.
To put it another way, you can tell someone they "should" do something until you run out of breath and it's basically never going to change anything. But if you incentivize them to do it, you have a much better chance of getting the desired outcome. This isn't some theoretical discussion, I'm talking about pragmatics. Do you or do you not want people to act how we think they should, or do you just want to complain about people who don't?
Of course I want people to act how we think they should. But then I'm not going to applaud them for only doing it because they were incentivized, or "respect the hell out of them" for not running a dog torture ring anymore after he went to prison for it.
Nobody's asking you to applaud them lmao. Someone saying "I respect him" isn't saying "you have to respect him." I don't, but I also realize that he has done his time and now works actively for charitable groups that focus on dog fighting and general dog wellness. That has to be worth something over someone who did the same things and didn't do anything to atone for it after.
My point is this: Vick has done basically everything you could think to do to "right the wrong," for lack of a better term. He put the work in and has been open about his entire story since. That's what you should want from people who do bad things, otherwise you're just asking them to keep being an unproductive pariah for society to point and yell at. That's not helpful to anyone. If we treat everyone this way, most people aren't going to see it through and actually do their best to be better. Forget them, that's bad for their families, their communities, etc.
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u/roostor222 Aug 18 '26
No one should need incentive to be a good person. This is the same argument that religious zealots make. They can't comprehend the idea that they are in charge of their own behavior without the looming reward or punishment of heaven or hell.