#39

#39-Part of "being human" is doing something you know is wrong, but still want to do it anyway.

I completely agree with this statement. I believe that humans have some bizarre desire to get away with things, no matter what the consequences could be. Our race loves to stretch our minds and are abilities to the limit, even exceeding it just to prove we can. It's sort of like having a substitute teacher for a class. The students goof off and do things they normally wouldn't do if the regular teacher was there, just to test the boundaries of the sub. I'm not saying everyone does this, but it is a common pattern among the majority of students, and to a further extent, the human population.

I've also read several accounts of people who have committed a small crime. For instance, one girl shoplifted because of the thrill of undermining the system. She seemed normal enough as she described her incidents. She said that she started off by stealing relativelly small itms like lip gloss from the drugstore, but it evetually escalated into bigger ticket items. It was a vicious cycle for her because she started taking more risk as she got away with stealing more stuff. It isn't the most severe infraction of the law, but it must have produced that certain feeling that occurs somewhere in your stomach and at the same time in your throat. Come on, everyone knows what I'm talking about, even if I didn't describe it the same way you feel it!

So, are criminals really bad people at the core or are they just in for the fun of it? Unfortunatley, I think both types exist. For the "bad" people, like terrorists, it comes back to the idea of pushing something to its limit. I know that terrorism is more complex than that because sometimes, those people want to be caught. They want to say that they were the ones who caused all of this terror and destruction, that they did something that goes against the social norm, that they were able to stand out for one moment and get away with it. Most of us don't understand why someone would want to do such a thing, but all of us can kind of relate to the desire to brag about something that we did that our conscience screams at us not to do. It's just human nature.