24 May 2007

RV: Driving with Alcohol

I have often heard people excuse behaviors of individuals because an individual was under the influence of a drug. An example would be someone cheating on his or her girlfriend or boyfriend while drunk. There are obvious problems with excusing someone’s horrible actions with intoxication. Can bad actions ever truly be excused? I will prove that shirking responsibility by blaming alcohol is illogical and completely incorrect.

The following must be the case surrounding an individual’s action, regardless of whether or not he or she is sober: Either an individual knows what he or she is doing, or an individual does not know what he or she is doing.

·An example of an individual not knowing what he or she is doing might be myself attempting to fix a car radiator. If I damage the car further, I can attribute blame to the fact that I truly do not know what I am doing. A child stealing from a store might be another example, where a child has not yet grown a mature set of morals or responsibilities to discern right from wrong. Someone who is drunk, however, is not a child. That individual has an already developed moral core, whatever it may be.

·An example of someone knowing what he or she is doing is when I take a drink of water. I know that I am clutching the frosted glass, opening my mouth, and allowing gravity and my esophageal muscles to deliver the tasteless chemical to my body.

So, it has been established that an individual must either know or not know what he or she is doing. This leads to two categories, categories A and B. Category A for those who know what they are doing, and Category B for those who do not. Anyone in Category A can only attribute blame to himself or herself. They can decide to or not to do something. They have freedom over their action. If an individual drunkenly makes a decision and is aware that he or she is making it, then they are in Category A and thus are completely guilty of that action, whatever it may be.

This leads to the area which most people feel is gray, Category B. The idea is that since someone does not know what he or she is doing that he or she cannot be blamed for his or her action. This is sometimes the case, such as in the examples given above. However, I will show that alcohol is a different form altogether, and is blamable, unlike the two given examples above.

A person who is drunk was initially in Category A to get drunk. We can agree that he or she is guilty of that much. Now, if someone makes a bad decision because of alcohol, then either alcohol at any amount caused the person to enter Category B, or a certain amount of alcohol caused the person to enter Category B. We will call the first of two necessary possibilities Part 1, and the second part 2.

Part 1

Now, if one knows that he or she is capable of making bad decisions while in Category B, and then continues to make the decision to enter Category B it is entirely irresponsible. If I know that I am capable of murder while drunk, and I get drunk and murder, then I willingly put myself into the only situation where I would murder. Thus, my initial action is the cause of all later actions. My decision to get drunk is the reason I murdered.

It is quite obvious that one can be blamed for the end result because they necessarily caused the end result to occur by entering Category B. Therefore, someone in Part 1 is fully blamed for his or her drunken action.

Part 2

If one does not know what he or she is capable of, then it is still irresponsible to enter Category B. To willingly enter a state of Category B should only be done if one is willing to accept full responsibility of whatever Category B entails. After all, to enter into Category B one has to be in Category A. When one makes a decision in Category A, whatever follows is one’s responsibility. If the decision made in Category A was to move to Category B, whatever that might entail, then whatever follows is still the entrant’s full responsibility. Not knowing what one might do while drunk is not an excuse either. Someone in Part 2 is fully blamed.

Now, since it has been shown that a bad decision made in Category A is entirely blamable, and a decision made in Category B (either Part 1 or Part 2) is entirely blamable, then there is no situation where one cannot be blamed for his or her action. It is necessary that one knowingly caused a chain of events that led to a bad decision, and the initial decision is the Prime Mover, the cause for all results. That first action is the reason all bad decisions occurred, and that first action, as shown in the above, is always made in the knowing, the Category A. It is always the case that one is entirely and utterly to be blamed for any decision he or she makes while intoxicated.

We are always responsible for our actions, and shirking off responsibility in the guise of the same helplessness a child makes the act that much worse. If you make a bad choice, own up to it. If you get drunk and cheat or fight, own up to it. Being drunk is not an excuse to make any action, and is not an excuse for any action made.



-Based on the thoughts and discussions between the two recreational vehicles, the minds, of Randall Joseph Vale and themanicexpressive.