Is Righteous Anger Righteous?

Well, is it? Maybe. It all depends. But first a little about anger in general.

Anger is a natural human emotion. Part of the “flight or fight” syndrome, it is an evolutionary response to a very dangerous existence in our distant past. Today most of us are ambivalent about anger. Sometimes we see it as damaging, and sometimes understandable, even helpful. But at its base, most anger is about resistance to the way things are going or others are acting.

A student whose self-directed anger for doing poorly on an exam could spark her improvement. But if that anger causes only to enduring self-recrimination, then it is damaging. Anger causing emotional or physical abuse is clearly very bad. But anger arising from an insult or wrong we have experienced is understandable. As will that coming from a terrible shock, perhaps an auto injury to a spouse. But it is less understandable if we dwell endlessly on the trouble, or lash out uncontrollably at others.

Regardless of the reason for anger, it is very dangerous if ungoverned or not properly directed. Some even think it is completely unhelpful, as Thich Nhat Hanh implies, “Anger is the energy people use in order to act. But when you are angry, you are not lucid, and you might do wrong things. That is why compassion is a better energy.” Doing wrong things means more than making poor decisions, important though that is. It is also about the harm we do to others when we are not in control of our emotions or actions.

Righteous anger is a bit different from “everyday” anger. It implies a moral need to correct something wrong, evil, unfair. In religious terms, God’s anger---think Sodom and Gomorrah---is always righteous, involving punishment for sins. While we can use the term in a lot of situations, it is often applied to a perceived worthy cause, perhaps a social justice issue. Some argue that righteous anger is needed because of the seriousness of the injustice or wrong.

But Buddhism suggests not, as Alan Wallace says in his fine book, Tibetan Buddhism From the Ground Up:

“Righteous hatred” is in the same category as “righteous cancer” or “righteous tuberculosis.” All of them are absurd concepts. This does not mean that one should never take action against aggression or injustice! Instead, one should try to develop an inner calmness and insight to deal with these situations in an appropriate way. We all know that anger and aggression give rise to anger and aggression.

While Wallace uses “righteous hatred,” it is easy to apply to anger, a lesser form of emotional upset. Having a righteous cause is one thing, and often a very good thing. Seeing ourselves as being righteous and acting righteously in relation to that cause may be very different. Self-righteousness, the sense of moral superiority, can lead to harmful expressions of anger, often reciprocated, as Wallace suggests. The anger is justified by the positive nature of the goal and the “moral backwardness” of those others who cannot see as we do. Being completely right and energized by anger, the self-righteous may well lack humility, undermining compassion and respect. 

Further, constant and unhealthy focusing on the perceived wrong or injustice may cause the righteous anger to become endless and self-justifying, feeding on itself and growing. This can be exacerbated by our becoming attached to both the idea of righteous anger and to the anger itself. Worse, the anger may be seen as the cohesiveness binding a focused group together. Insufficient anger may be seen by group members as a weak commitment to the goal. Outrage easily becomes a virtue, a goal in and of itself---a dangerous condition for both group members and outsiders. For some, righteousness is like an addiction, needing to be fed often with anger and outrage. Aldous Huxley saw the danger: “To be able to destroy with good conscience, to be able to behave badly and call your bad behavior ‘righteous indignation’ is the height of psychological luxury, the most delicious of moral treats.”

So, what is my answer to the title question? I believe that all anger, including righteous anger, is harmful. Why is anger necessary to right a social wrong? Can we not see an injustice and act calmly, if determinedly, on that? Wallace counsels us to acquire “inner calmness and insight” when confronted such a challenge. Some may argue that righteous anger energizes them. Fine. Except that when the energizing force has done its job (moving them to helpful action), the hostile emotion may stay in the person’s repertoire of emoting and acting. Naturally, the anger is visited upon those seen as perpetrators of the wrong, or upon those who do not agree about the wrong or the methods to deal with it.

Martin Luther King, Jr, said, “Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.” His life was dedicated to overcoming enormous hate-filled obstacles and people, to changing society for the good. His impact, even today, is immeasurable. Did he rage against the horrors of racial injustice and those who perpetrated it, a righteous cause if ever there was one? No, he did not. He approached everything and everyone with peace and non-violence. He understood, as those captured by righteous anger may not, that like darkness and hate, anger begets only anger. His lack of anger certainly did not enervate or incapacitate him, nor did it keep him from accomplishing great things.

Someone once posed a dilemma scenario for The Dalai Lama, a man as committed to non-violence as anyone. He is in a hut meditating. A man enters who wants to harm him, perhaps even kill him. The Dalai Lama happens to have a pistol (I love that, but it’s only a scenario). The question is posed, “Your Holiness, what would you do?” As he was being attacked, the Dalai Lama says he would remain calm and shoot the man in the leg, and then go bandage his wound. Anger is not needed even to save his life; he is hardly paralyzed without it.

More Musings

In Zen we are cautioned not to mistake the pointing finger for the moon. Or the map for the terrain. To become more self-aware or spiritual many of us have attended retreats, listened to fine speakers, or read helpful books. My penchant was for the last---I read all kinds of books on Zen, various aspects of Buddhism, and generally on Eastern wisdom, much of it dealing with respect and compassion for others. The latter concepts had a great intellectual impact on me, except for one thing---I did not change my behavior a bit, at least not for 30 years. Neither did most others I know. Talk (or reading) is cheap.

What passes for conversations these days is sad. Not perfect 50 years ago, things seem to have gotten considerably worse. As self-concern and narcissism have increased, people see themselves as more important than the person opposite them. The unspoken message is, “You exist only as listening post or a foil for my next story, observation or opinion.” Of course, this is deniable, but still prevalent even among very nice people. When I was teaching college, one such person would greet me with, “How are you?” Early on, thinking he was actually interested, I talked a bit about what was going on. He could barely suppress his urge to start talking about himself. Once I was finished, he launched into a monologue lasting as long as we were interacting. It took two of these “conversations” for me to start looking for someone else to chat with.

I have heard for decades that each person has her own truth, valid in and of itself, and for which she is answerable to no one. At one level this seems reasonable because of human subjectivity. But at another, perhaps not. If I accept that you have a complete right to your unique truth, then I have nothing to say about it. You could call me any horrid thing you want, short of libel, and I must accept your truth. Carrying this a bit further, as a devoted post-modernist (which I’m not), I should actually welcome this display of individual “truth uniqueness.” But my moral high ground collapses, and hypocrisy raises its ugly head, as I exercise the unfortunately normal response to a perceived attack---counter-attack or defend.

“The stupidity of people comes from having an answer for everything.” A quote from the fine Czech writer Milan Kundera. The more uncertain the world, the more some people need Answers, utopian silver bullets that temporarily soothe their angst and “explain” the world and its unstable condition. Overall societal uncertainty breeds fear and causes many to look desperately for structure. Answers and people who think the same way provide this, albeit at the expense of reality. Fear also arises from those with a personal need to have Answers, a dynamic generally arising from childhood, where not having the Answer meant very big trouble. And fear also comes, usually in conflict settings, when folks are confronted with others having a different view of something, anything. When fear generates the need for Answers, for whatever reason, people usually live in a constant state of agitation. They see slights, insults and problems everywhere which, in utopian fashion, they want gone. But the world and people in it stubbornly resist fitting into a defined and rigid structure. Intentionally blind to reality, they redouble their efforts, magnifying their anxiety, and often inducing rage. Not a healthy picture for society or for interpersonal relations.

You may have been on the receiving end of some harsh words by a friend, relative, or even total stranger. Perhaps that person apologizes, but does so with the “but” caveat. Whenever you hear someone say, “I’m sorry that I trashed your mother, but…,” run for the hills. This is a cheap trick to avoid real responsibility for an unkindness or a loss of temper. Following the “but” is the supposed rationale for the outburst, negating the apology. It means, “In spite of my token apology, I will tell you why I was completely justified in calling your mother an idiot.” Simply apologize. No justifications, no denials, no explanations.

“Via negativa” is a Latin phrase originally used to explain what God is by looking at what He is not, as opposed to what He is. Non-theologically, it can be used to improve our lives by subtraction rather than by addition. Akin to the “less is more” idea, the most obvious action is to reduce material goods. Fine. But more subtlely, suppose we give up something in our relations with others, like our unhealthy needs---to be right, to win, to be loved, to be perfect, to punish, etc? An obvious benefit to us and others. Of course, even conceiving of such an effort itself requires a “give up.” Disposing of the ardently positive thinking we have about ourselves is a good start. Accepting that we have these unhealthy needs must precede the subtraction of those needs and their unpleasant outcomes from our behavior. Addition through subtraction.

Definitional Patterns and Beneficial Communication

There are words that are accepted by most people as having “sort of” one meaning, and about which there is little disagreement. Car, house, clouds, keys, and room are examples.

Then there are words that have multiple meanings depending on each person’s subjective view. Consider the following: love, respect, character, generosity, harmony, greed, openness, pride, compassion, assertiveness, honor, beauty, clarity, courtesy, wonder, hate, enthusiasm, honesty, flexibility, humility. All of these allow for different interpretations, often substantial, and agreement on definitions is difficult.

I am not suggesting that there are no standards at all for such words, but those standards often remain unique to each person or group. For example, some art critics view post-modernism as abysmal, and some who find it wonderful. Each group has its own standards defining what art is good and what is not, and those basic definitions are in opposition. If each group accepts its views as being absolute, there will be no dialogue and no meeting of the minds---which does not mean they have to agree. But for quality thinking and debate, they do need to clearly understand the other group’s views and the reasoning behind those. If the two groups hold their views rigidly, the chance that any beneficial conversation will occur approximates zero.

Like some art critics, we as individuals often hold rigid views of the meaning of words, with the same undesirable outcome---hostility and unpleasant personal interactions arising from our need to refute and punish those who differ. We are certainly entitled to our definition, as is the other person. And there is no obligation to give up that, short of the demands of intellectual honesty. The issue is not disagreement, but the way it is carried out. Rigid views mean rigid responses, with mutual understanding and quality interactions the victims.

Quality communicating means not only that we accept that another has a different definition than we do, but that there may well be at least some legitimacy to his view. That means we have to explore with them the meaning of their definition without the overt or hidden agenda of trying to change them or to punish them. I have developed a technique to conduct this type of interaction, a process of developing definitional patterns.

As a consultant I once worked with an organization that wanted to develop a set of operating values. The executives brought representatives from all over the firm, top to bottom, to help with the development. One of the important values the group enthusiastically agreed on was respect. But back at work trouble arose almost immediate because participants never explored how each defined the new value. There was apparently an unknown assumption that everyone had the same definition. It was my mistake not to have questioned this at the start. For example, some participants saw respect as telling others directly what they thought of them and their work. At one level has redeeming aspects, but at another can cause difficulties. Others saw respect as being more careful and indirect when stating opinions to another, a view that also has both beneficial and problematic aspects.

Because of that experience, I started to use the concept of definitional patterns. These help us see and accept that multiple valid definitions exist for many words, and that the differences can be very useful in obtaining a deeper understanding of complex issues, and of people’s behavior surrounding those. This understanding is vital for the health of our relations with others, and for the thinking that is part and parcel of that. Quality thinking cannot arise from an inadequate understanding of the opponent’s view, nor can it arise when definitions are held rigidly.

A definitional pattern can be imagined as an empty balloon on a piece of paper, or on a white board. With a small group (not very useful for large groups) the consultant in an organization slowly and carefully teases out the various interpretations of the value which have beneficial operating meaning, with these going inside the balloon. The unworkable ones are left outside the balloon (done by the facilitator with due respect for the contributor). Now we have a clearer picture of how people see the value. The next step is to examine how the value, with its various interpretations, will work in the organization as each person acts out his definition. The value of “top-flight customer care,” for example, can play itself out in numerous acceptable ways. Appreciating this prevents a fixation on one interpretation. The conversation leads everyone to understand, and accept, that others in the firm will see and operate somewhat differently regarding customer care, but that everyone will generally be on the same page. Potential problems are addressed up front, with management also leaving open the need for more conversations to crystallize the value further.

Friends, relatives and spouses can also use this type of discussion to examine how they might think differently about an issue or action, especially in dealing better with conflict. Early in our marriage my wife would sometimes react with “Why did you get soooooo angry?” This was a mystery to me because I saw my reaction as a rather light-weight 3 on a scale of 1-10. After a lot of mis-steps and spats over this type of thing, I asked her about her response. She explained that her mother had very dangerous anger, leading my wife to see all anger as a 10, lacking any gradations. I realized then I had a big obligation---to ensure she felt safe during disagreement. My expression of anger had to be modified, and in many cases dispensed with. Not easy, considering anger was part of my “normal” repertoire. But without our conversation about our unique views of anger, I would not have known what to do.

I hope the message is clear. Definitional pattern or no, rational and at least relatively unbiased thinking only happens when we clearly understand the other person’s views on their terms, not ours. Further, we have to treat both the person and her views with respect, whether we agree or not. It would have been easy for me to dismiss my wife’s views because they did not mesh with mine, a very common problem in most relationships. But with her input, I realized that I could not continue to exist in the rigidity of my own views’ rightness. For our relationship to continue to grow, I had to pay very close attention to her views and needs, and to act on those. For her part, she met me more than half-way, for which I am hugely grateful.

One last thing: what if what the other person says is wrong, or delivers his view with sarcasm or victimization, or refuses to play fair? No matter. The conversation still goes on. Things will be more awkward and challenging for the one playing beneficially, but that is still the only helpful choice left. Allowing ourselves to become consumed with frustration or anger because the other is not in the game accomplishes less than nothing. We owe it to ourselves to maintain our own self-respect and that of the other.