Revenge vs Justice: Is There A Difference?

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On today's episode of Timeless Wisdom.

If there is any word that has a really bad rap, it is in fact revenge. And I want to talk to you about it because I want to tell you that it is, it is misunderstood. So let's try to explain what revenge is. And then talk about when it— is it always wrong? Is having a desire for revenge a bad, a bad thing in a human? And so on.

That's coming up on Timeless Wisdom with Dennis Prager.

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Welcome to Timeless Wisdom with Dennis Prager. Hear thousands of hours of Dennis's lectures, courses, and classic radio programs. And to purchase Dennis Prager's Rational Bibles, go to DennisPrager.com.

Alrighty everybody, welcome to the Dennis Prager Show and the Ultimate Issues Hour. Every, uh, let's see, every Tuesday at this time I take one of the great issues of life and discuss it with you to bring some clarity to it. And I welcome you indeed. And today the subject is revenge. If there is any word that has a really bad rap It is in fact revenge, and I want to talk to you about it because I want to tell you that it is, it is misunderstood. So let's try to explain what revenge is and then talk about when it— is it always wrong? Is having a desire for revenge a bad, a bad thing in a human? And so on. Now revenge is essentially doing to another, getting back at another as we would say, for something bad that that person has done. So I guess it would be if you, I guess, step on my toe and then I step on your toe, that's revenge. Now we say, and folks, this is a really complex subject and I want to simplify it as best as possible, but it is complex.

Dennis Prager.

Because when we say that we believe in punishment or justice but not revenge, I think we're fooling ourselves. If you put a man in prison for his lifetime, you're telling me that there's no element of revenge in that? What is the difference between punishment and revenge? Tell me. I, I'm, I'm serious. What is the difference? Now, there can be some differences. Punishment, you would say, well, the purpose of punishment is to teach. It teaches the person that they did wrong, and it teaches society that what that person did is wrong. If we did not punish speeding, then we would have no way of really saying to society that speeding is wrong. You're right. So there is a pedagogic or didactic, fancy words for teaching. There is a teaching element to punishment which does not exist in revenge. But there is a point in punishment where revenge is a factor. Come on, you put away somebody for a lifetime, you think that there are people who are in their 80s in prison right now that are threats to murder again? Of course not. Or in their 70s or even their 60s, if they committed a heinous murder, which is almost redundant, but you know what I mean, it's beyond murder, and then in their 20s, and they're now 40 years later in prison, you're telling me that this is only punishment, there's no element of revenge in that? So this is what I want to say to you about revenge. That the desire to do to the bad what the bad have done to the good, or at least to the innocent, is not a bad thing. I repeat, the desire to inflict upon the bad the suffering that they have inflicted upon the innocent is not a bad thing. In fact, I would go further. I would say that having no such desire to see the bad suffer— forget punishment, we're not talking now punishment— the desire to see the bad suffer is, I believe, put into us by God because God puts in us a certain basic, under a basic love of justice. It is unjust that somebody who has done horrific things to deliberately done horrific things to an innocent is now free from having to suffer that himself. It's the fact that I am bothered by that. I'm not saying we should do it. I am not for torturing torturers. But is there no part of me that would like to see the Nazi torturer tortured? Or to see those who did what they did to our American soldiers, the unspeakable barbaric tortures that they inflicted upon two captured American soldiers? Would I not like to see those people who did that suffer? Of course I would. And I, and I don't make any apologies for it. You should apologize if you don't want them to suffer. And that's my point, that there is something good in the human, in the human psyche, the human heart, and the human conscience, in wanting just revenge, not unjust revenge. And that's what I— that's the next part of this issue about revenge. The desire to have— that's why we have eye for an eye, the desire to have just revenge. If I deliberately take out your eye, I deserve to lose my eye. Now, it was never done and it can't be done. You can never have an exact replica of the crime done to the person. So eye for an eye never meant that literally, but Why is it there? Is it just primitive? That's the way a lot of people look at it. Ah, an eye for an eye, and they quote Gandhi, if we followed eye for an eye, we'd all be blind. No. It is a statement that that is what perfect justice would be. What you have inflicted improperly on others, unjustly on others, will be justly inflicted upon you. And I, I suspect that there are those listening who find this problematic, morally problematic. You shouldn't want others to suffer. Okay, what should I want them to do? Should I want them to repent? I would love them to repent, but I also have a belief that people who don't repent should have to, should have to feel some of the pain that they have inflicted upon others. And you have to tell me, why is that bad? Don't cite to me scripture. Mm-mm-mm. We're not debating theology. There are— this is not a theology hour this hour. There are times when I have a theology hour, absolutely. But I want to know from you I want you to be able to explain to me why is it bad if I would like to see the bad suffer in some way because of the suffering that they inflicted upon the innocent. That's what I would like to know. See, there is a movement against any notion like this in our society. They know you're primitive, this is base, this is, this is animalistic, this is whatever it is. I don't see it that way. That is why it's one of the reasons, one of the basic reasons that I am for capital punishment. You take a person's life deliberately, you don't deserve to keep your own. There's an element of revenge there, but it's just revenge. What is unjust revenge? Unjust revenge is you kill, you murder so-and-so, and then so-and-so's family murders your family. No, that's, that's, that's when revenge gets correctly a bad name. But I don't even know if revenge should even be the term for what was done then. That's just barbarity. Because what you have not— it's not a matter of revenge alone. You have done the same exact injustice. You have murdered the innocent. So, so what kind of nonsense is that? That we have, that humanity has had a great deal. That is why, by the way, eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth was such a moral, was a fact of moral progress. Because it said one eye is only worth one eye, not two eyes, not a whole body, not a whole clan. It was in fact one of the great moral advances of history, what's called in Latin lex talionis, the, the, the law of eye for an eye. One eye is worth one eye. The eye of a nobleman is worth the eye of a poor person. It was a spectacular movement forward. 1-800-PRAGER-776, and we go to Christina in Tucson, Arizona. Christina, Dennis Prager, hi.

Good morning, Dennis. I apologize if I sound out of breath. I'm getting ready to have baby number 7 in a few weeks.

Oh, it sounded like a few minutes.

No, I just got off the treadmill, but I had to call you to say, um, I, I deal with this issue with my children, and let me tell you how I approach it. Part of this issue is consequence for action. The problem is when a peer acts the revenge or whatever. When they try to take care of it themselves, it becomes an act of revenge. But when a proper authority takes care of the injustice or whatever, then it becomes not an issue of revenge. But an issue of korruptura.

Oh, that's so interesting. Such an intelligent point, but I don't agree. All you have done is deferred who is the vengeance taker from the individual to the state. We'll be back in a moment.

This episode of Timeless Wisdom will continue right after this.

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Now back to more of Dennis Prager's Timeless Wisdom.

Welcome back, everybody. You're listening to The Dennis Prager Show, the Ultimate Issues Hour. This is the hour each week I devote to to some ultimate issue of life, some great question. Revenge is the subject today, and I am arguing that the desire for revenge is a good one. The desire that if you do not— and, and how do I define it? The desire to get back at somebody who did something bad, deliberately bad. Now, there are many forms of revenge that are evil. For example, if somebody didn't do it intentionally. For example, if you do far more or anything more to the person than what was done to you or done to somebody else. We cannot kill a murderer's family no matter how many people the murderer has murdered. That's wrong. You don't take revenge on a person. In other words, if a Somebody murders your child, you don't murder his child. That's unjust. But there is just revenge, and there is also the desire for it. And the desire is to see that people who deliberately inflict harm have harm inflicted on them.

That—

now, we can't act it out. We have to have a, a form of government and so on. But the desire For it is a noble one, and I am afraid of people who do not have any, or who have— well, everybody has it— the people who have done whatever they can to remove, to dig out like some cavity, to drill out of themselves this desire. Now, Christina in Tucson, who's about to give birth, Christina said the difference is that revenge is when the individual does it and punishment and justice is when an authority does it, right, Christina?

Yes, that would be where I'm coming from.

Right, and now what you're really— see, here is— and I gave you my answer, but I'll say it again. What you are doing, in my view, is you are simply removing revenge from the individual and giving it to the state. Or to the authority figure in the case of the school.

Right. And I think in that case what you do is you are preserving order.

I agree with you.

Okay.

I don't want people going around doing it. We agree, Christina.

Okay.

But, but, but don't deny that there's an element of revenge when the state or the authority does it.

I would, I would agree that there is an element of revenge in that. Like if one of my kids shoots someone else with a rubber band, yep, I may turn around, do the same thing back to them.

That's right.

So that they understand.

That's exactly right.

It feels like—

that's right. You won't, you won't merely take away their allowance, right? That's right.

I do that, it preserves the order in my family because I am the one exacting it and not Kit upon Kit.

Okay, but the question arises, and here's the toughie, what if there is no authority to do it?

That would be a tough question.

Okay, but that is frequently the case, Christina. That's the problem, because the author— what if, what if the parent in that case or the teacher wouldn't do it? What if the parent or teacher says, I don't care who started, just stop? That's a very common thing for people to say. So I thank you very much and good luck with the baby. Appreciate your calling. 1-800-PRAGER-776 is 877-PRAGER- 1-800-777-243-7776. I, I want people who have inflicted terrible suffering to suffer, and I wonder if you think that that's a bad sign or a good sign about me. Jay, uh, in St. Paul, Minnesota. Jay, female?

Yes.

How'd you get your name, JJ?

It's short for Jace Lynn.

Oh, okay, fair enough. Okay.

Um, I had a situation where my boyfriend was murdered at 19. Oh, that's terrible. I grew up with a mother that suffered a lot, a lot of disappointments in her life and never got over them. And I just really felt at the time that it was not my responsibility, and that if I didn't let the situation go, I would be just like my mom. So I think it harms, kind of like with the With the last caller, I said it harms you because if you have an emotional spin on the revenge, you know, it affects your heart.

So therefore what? You should give up any desire to have that person suffer?

You know, I did. I mean, I just didn't even— it wasn't going to bring the person back. I felt like it wasn't my responsibility. Yes, it was someone else's fault.

Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. It wasn't your responsibility to do what?

Um, to even, to even care whatever happened to him, to even— it wasn't, it wasn't, uh—

I don't agree with that. I don't want you to ruin your life, but I don't want you to have a blasé attitude toward the murderer of your boyfriend.

Well, I had to, I had to move on. I had to. I had— well, all right, but someone else would—

why is that noble? I, I'm not— I'm trying— I know I'm giving you a hard time, and you know that's not what I intend to do, but I'm challenging you. Why I understand psychologically why you did that, but why is that— I'm asking what the noble thing— revenge, proper— the desire for revenge is noble.

Uh-huh.

That's what I'm arguing. The desire to move on is understandable, but not necessarily noble.

You know, I think that the person, you know, needs to get off the streets. Would be for other people, you know.

But so that's all you cared was that you— so the— so you're saying that all you cared about the murderer of your boyfriend was that he'd be incapable of murdering again? You had no desire that he suffered?

Uh, it, it wouldn't mean any difference. It would not have brought him—

no, I didn't— no, I never claim it'll bring anybody back. It does bring some justice onto earth, but it doesn't bring the person back. I agree with that, Jay. Thank you so much for calling. It's very important because I, I hear that all the time. Well, look, it's not going to bring the person back. Of course not. Nothing brings the person back. So therefore what? It's a non sequitur. It's not related to my point. Since I'm not arguing it brings the person back, telling me it doesn't is no refutation of anything I'm saying. I'm saying that there is a nobility in the desire to have the deliberate inflictors of harm have harm inflicted on them. Okay, that's what I am arguing. And let's go to JD in West Covina, California. JD, Dennis Prager.

Yes, Dennis, I'm Muslim, and I think first of all it's the motivation, because we learn in Islam that deeds are by intention. Whatever you intend is what you get for that deed. So if you're doing it for the sake of justice, you're punishing someone, uh, yes, then there's a nobility in it. If you're doing it just for the sake of punishing because you want to see them suffer as someone else has suffered, uh, this is not correct.

Because why is it not— why is it not correct?

Because this is the purview of Allah. This is the purview of God, that no one can punish like God.

No, no, but wait, wait, you're right, nobody can punish like God, but we have to punish in order to have civilization.

We—

but you and I We both agree.

For just purposes.

For just purposes. So I said just revenge. I said I don't want unjust revenge.

Okay, now on to the act.

But I want to know what about the desire? I'm not talking about the act. The desire to have those who inflict deliberate suffering taste of the suffering. Is that a bad thing?

It's a human thing.

I know. Is it bad or good?

I think it's whatever the intention is makes it bad or good.

Yeah, the intention is that the person feel some of the suffering that he inflicted. I know my intention totally here. Clear as a bell. Maybe wrong, but clear. We'll be back in a moment. I'm Dennis Prager.

This episode of Timeless Wisdom will continue right after this.

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Now back to more of Dennis Prager's timeless wisdom.

You are listening to The Dennis Prager Show, specifically the Ultimate Issues Hour. An hour each week at this time devoted to the questions of ultimate issues, the great questions of life. I'm talking to you this hour about revenge, and I am arguing that the desire— and that's what revenge is about. I give you here the— from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia on the internet. Let's see here. The vengeful wish consists of forcing the perceived wrongdoer to suffer the same pain that they inflicted in the first place. Exactly. I have a vengeful wish, and it's got a bad name to have a vengeful wish. I want to give it a good name. I admit it. If you don't wish to see people who deliberately make others suffer suffer any of what they have inflicted, I find that frankly a bit scary. I'm sure that there are those of you who find what I'm saying scary. That's okay, you know the old motto on this show, we prefer clarity to agreement. I'm just being clear with you. I don't want to get rid of my primal instinct, which I admit it is, it's a primal human instinct put in, in my opinion, by God. It's one of the better ones. It is, it's one of our better instincts that we would like to see those who inflict deliberate suffering feel some of the suffering that they have inflicted. Fine with me. And believe— and let's be honest that there are many punishments, many are simply legal revenge, which is okay with me. I'm not— what I am not for is unjust or immoral revenge. X kills Y's son and then Y kills X's son, that's immoral revenge. Because what he said is, "I want you to feel what it's like to lose a child." Ah, but it's not right to the child. 1-800-PRAGER-776 is 877-243-7776. And let's go to San Diego, California, and John. Hello, John. Dennis Prager.

Hi Dennis Prager. Hi. I think that part of the problem comes in the fact that there really isn't any difference in the definition between vengeance and avenging and revenge. Because I think what you're talking about—

Well, there isn't any difference. They're all the same root.

But shouldn't there be?

No.

Isn't there a difference between vengeance and avenging somebody?

No.

No.

Avenging is simply the verb of revenge.

Okay, well then I have no point because I was always thinking that revenge was something that was taken upon a person after they had already suffered the social consequences of their action and somebody still took action against them even further.

Yeah, yes, you're right when it becomes an action. I'm not even talking here about actions. I'm talking about the human desire. That desire is a good one. I don't want it extirpated from our conscience. That's, that's my argument here.

Oh, well, I would agree with you.

Okay, wonderful. Thank you for calling. Yeah, that's my argument because it's gotten a bad name and I'd like to give it a good name. Just revenge as opposed to unjust revenge. I'd like somebody to call me up who believes that if that my desire to see that the torturers of those American soldiers, or the Nazi torturer, or a whole host of people, or someone, or a child molester, not feel some of the pain that they have inflicted, that you think that that desire of mine represents a somewhat of a low form of humanity, if you will. Apple Valley, Minnesota. Rochelle. Hello, Rochelle. Dennis Prager.

Hi, Dennis. Thanks for taking my call.

Thank you.

This very topic has been a topic of conversation in our family over the last couple weeks because we have a son who wants to join the military because he's interested in that type of life and wants to learn how to be a special ops cop's person so that when he gets out of the military, he can then inflict— well, bring justice to people such as an African general who takes children into slavery there and uses them in the sex industry or just for his own tribe. And it makes my son so angry.

I love your son.

Well, we do too, but I don't know if this is— if it's the right motive to do that. He's afraid that if he just stays in the military, he'll never get a chance to wipe out these guys.

Yes, that's right. But he won't get a chance to wipe out these guys if he becomes an accountant either.

No.

He has a better chance in the military, no?

I— well, I agree.

Okay, that's all— that sounds good to me. We'll be back in a moment.

Are you enjoying Timeless Wisdom? We'd love to hear from you. Call 877-243-7776 and leave a review you share your thoughts or just even an encouraging word for Dennis. Your voicemail might just make it on the show. That's 877-243-7776. That's 877-243-7776. Thanks for listening and for your support.

I'm Dennis Prager. I welcome you back to the Ultimate Issues Hour, the hour each week at this time on Tuesdays when I talk about the great issues of life, and I title it The Ultimate Issues Hour. The ultimate issue today is revenge, and I am arguing that the desire to see that a person who has deliberately inflicted suffering on an innocent suffer some of that suffering, endure it, that is a noble urge in the human being, and that in fact a lot of punishment is a form of just revenge. So I want to give revenge when it is done justly a good name. There's certainly the desire for it. I want to give a good name. Let's put it that way. And we go to Costa Mesa, California. Jason, Dennis Prager. Hi, Jason.

Hi, Dennis. Hi.

First of all, let me just say that you're an intellectual father of mine, but that I got to disagree with you.

Great.

I mean, it's just a— it's an inconsistency that I found in your reasoning that you're supposed to fight your animal urges, but in this case you're saying go with it.

Yeah, that's right. There are urges that we have to fight, and there are urges that we shouldn't fight, or we should channel correctly. Now, I mean, love is an animal urge, and I don't want to fight it. Although, I mean, even that can have expressions that are not good, need to be fought, but that's a separate issue. But The fact that it is a— I said it's a primal urge. I think it's put in there by God. I think we need to channel our urges so that the desire for revenge be a great desire for justice.

But in this case, you're actually having someone else dictate what you would normally do.

Who was the other— who was the someone else?

Like if someone you're revenging for. Or revenging against. You're having them dictate who you are, as opposed to, would you normally do that act anyway?

Well, yeah, but context determines what acts I would do. So yes, I, I mean, we spoke to a woman earlier whose boyfriend had been murdered when she was 19, right? She said that the thing that she was most concerned with was moving on in life, and I I fully appreciate that fact, but I asked what is— and therefore she really didn't care what happened to him except she wanted to make sure he didn't kill again.

Well, that seems to me a noble thing.

I don't think it's noble at all. It's not noble to me. What's noble about it?

What's noble about it is that he will not be doing it again.

Yeah, that's noble. Yes, but I care what happens to him too.

And she didn't fall into the trap of having to commit or carry this, um, ill will around with her the rest of her life.

Yeah, I don't consider it a trap. Did you ever hear of a man— and I don't assume you did, I'm not trying to catch you, obviously— did you ever hear of Simon Wiesenthal?

No.

Simon Wiesenthal, uh, it was— who just passed away recently, was— spent his life tracking down Nazi war criminals. Okay, nobody assumed that any of these Nazi war criminals were going to, uh, were going to build gas chambers again, for example, or torture chambers, right? And there were people who dismissed him as one, you know, move on, you know, get over, get over the Holocaust, it's over, man, get a life, what are you spending your life tracking down these Nazi war criminals? And, and yet You know, he said he was, he was, uh, animated by the cries of the dead, uh, and I believe that. And you know, if the purpose of life is to have no ill will or nothing bother you, then you're right. But I don't think that that's the purpose of life.

No, I'm not talking about having, um, I'm not talking about having ill will, but are you suggesting those were your words? Are you suggesting Rosenthal should— or is that his name, Rosenthal?

Wiesenthal.

Wiesenthal should hunt these people down and put them in gas chambers, eye for an eye? Or are you saying that—

no, I'm not—

just bring them to justice?

Yes, but the very—

but something be done.

Yeah, but you— the woman was not speaking about, about that. She was speaking about making sure he doesn't kill again. Wiesenthal wasn't getting these people to make sure they don't kill again. Nobody thought they'd kill again, right?

He was trying to bring a completeness.

That's right. Yes, and that's right. And an element of it was he wanted them to suffer. It wasn't— what does justice mean? Justice means— part of justice is that what X does to Y happens to X. That's what I'm saying, that you can't fully distinguish between, separate between punishment and revenge. You can't. And because revenge has a bad name, punishment has gotten a bad name. That's why the Western Europeans don't punish people almost at all. They give terrorists a few years in prison. They give murderers a few years in prison. The man who came over to— was it to, uh, to which was it? Which, uh, Monica Seles? Remember that? The tennis star? He was a Steffi Graf fan, a German tennis fan, so he put a big kitchen knife through the shoulder blade of Monica Seles. And then the guy was never put in prison. Well, we have to understand, and we know, we're not vengeful here in Europe. We're not like Americans who believe in vengeance. Eh, we're enlightened. So what they do is they don't end up punishing because they understand that punishment is a form of vengeance. Of course it is. Let's go to, uh, thank you so much by the way, appreciate your calling, Jason. Philadelphia, Kevin. Hello, Kevin. Dennis Prager.

Hey, Dennis. How are you today?

Okay, thank you.

All right, well, 2 years and 4 months ago, my best friend, closest person— I mean, he was— I mean, I'm not gay, but he was my soulmate in a sense.

I totally understand that. I have that with men. I understand it. Go ahead.

Well, Easter Sunday in 2004, he was walking home when 2 guys ended up shooting at each other, and one of them hit him. The kid I hit him got away through help of his mother, by the way. And now since then he's run over a police officer with his car and he has done a couple other crimes as well. And for anybody to believe that they should forgive him is disgusting because the uncivilized do not live by the civilized rules and therefore they can't be, you know, regulated. They can't be controlled by the same standards as—

Yeah, alright, you're— Kevin, you're right and my heart goes out to you. The loss of a close friend is horrific.

Horrific.

But we're not talking forgiveness here. I'm trying to be as narrowly focused as possible so that we, we don't stray onto that other subject. And Alan, we should put down forgiveness as a subject for an Ultimate Issues Hour. I thank you, Kevin. No one— the issue here is not forgiveness. It is whether or not the, the desire to to see suffer— the bad suffer what they have done, is that a bad desire?

This episode of Timeless Wisdom will continue right after this.

If you're eating less, staying disciplined, and the weight still isn't coming off, the problem may not be your effort, it may be your metabolism. After years of stress, dieting, and lack of sleep, the body adapts. It slows down and holds on to fat. That's why PhD Weight Loss focuses on your metabolism first. So your body stops working against you. Mention Prager today and receive 2 free weeks plus free food, a $1,500 value. Call 864-644-1900. That's 864-644-1900.

Now back to more of Dennis Prager's timeless wisdom.

You're listening to The Dennis Prager Show, and I thank you for doing so. Final segment of this edition of the Ultimate Issues Hour, where we talk about a great subject in life. Revenge is the one here, the desire to see people who inflict, deliberately inflict suffering, suffer themselves. I think it's a good desire, and we can act on it most of the time. We do through legal, regal punishment, which is often partially revenge. Life imprisonment without the possibility of parole is is not just punishment and is not just keeping the dangerous off the street. It's an element of revenge. All righty, Chicago, Andre. Hello, Andre. Dennis Prager.

Yes, hello. Okay, if I'm understanding correctly, your argument is that the inclination for revenge is correct. Not the act of, right?

That's right.

Okay.

Oh, the act of is also correct if we understand that part of punishment really is revenge and we'd be honest with ourselves, like life imprisonment without the possibility of parole.

But how can—

That's to make the murderer suffer because nobody believes that a 70-year-old who committed murder when he was 25 is going to commit murder again.

Yes, but how do you properly separate the act from the inclination for what you believe? Do you not act on it? So if you believe—

if I acted on all my inclinations, I would be in prison.

Yes, but there are people out there that act upon their inclinations. I mean, I'm not disagreeing with you that the thought of revenge—

that's why we have to teach people how to control their behavior. But I am not going to ask people to control their behavior by rooting out all of their inclinations. Then we've become— we're less human. I want to remain— sorry.

You become an automaton.

That's right. Excellent, Andre. That's exactly right. We become automatons.

But, okay, but if you weed, okay, if you do what you're saying and you weed out and you become automatons, society would be better per se, but the act of revolting—

Well, it would be better per se if we all became flowers. You know, nobody would hurt anybody. You're good, Andre. Very good. I appreciate that call a lot. Kathy in Minnesota says when her son was in 5th grade, a bully kept hitting him. School wouldn't do anything, so I told my son to hit the bully back, and that ended the bullying. Kathy, I would hug you if your husband allowed it. It's exactly right. Uh, you see, we've gone to the other extreme. That's what's happened, because we so hate crazy vengeance, we have acted like, oh, you can't do anything, everything is just, you know, We go to the authorities and let them handle it and so on. Jack, Kevin again, Jim, I did Andre and Kathy, Rick, sorry I didn't get to your calls. I hope you'll think about this and the whole issue of our instincts. There is a nobility to many of our instincts. Doesn't mean we can always act on them. This is Dennis Prager, this is the Ultimate Issues Hour.

Tomorrow on Timeless Wisdom with Dennis Prager.

Folks, when you were dating the person that you married, did you do everything possible— if you wanted that person, obviously— did you do everything possible to win their love? It's a rhetorical question. The answer is yes. You acted nicely, you were kind, You looked your best, just to give 3 examples.

Why?

Because you knew if you didn't work on all those things plus more, then you wouldn't win that person whom you wanted to be your husband or your wife. Question, question number 2, rhetorical question number 2 for that matter. Why did you stop doing that once you were married? Letting you think about it. That's the reason for the silence. Why do people stop trying to win over the affection of the person they married?

I listen to your show quite regularly, and I don't always agree with you. Uh, today you're spot on with a lot of things you're saying.

Good.

Um, I'm speaking from someone who is, uh, approaching a divorce at this point in time.

I'm sorry.

A couple of the things, um, that I think you left out that are very important— and, and the, the adherence to the fact that you, you were mentioning there is really, really very important. And I don't know if it's as important to females as it is to males, as you, you kind of alluded to, uh, and for some reason or other, I think females find it difficult to I think that their theory is not only that they've caught the man, but that if the man truly loves them, he'll accept them for whoever they are, even though they did their best, as you said, to attract them by looking their best initially.

My comment is I think it's unrealistic to expect a couple to maintain the level of intensity that they have while dating, mostly because during dating, it's, it's really fueled by a lustful excitement to discover the unknown. And that I think in any case, be it an athlete, be it any— it's unrealistic to expect somebody to maintain a level of that level of intensity all the time.

Well, I think the answer is, I think most people are lazy and selfish. And, um, you know, people just want to do what they want to do. Marriage is extremely hard work. When my wife and I first were married, we were both extremely selfish, spoiled people, and we went to marriage counseling on and off for 8 years. Sometimes twice a month, sometimes once a month, and then it became more of like a maintenance thing after 5 or 6 years. But we've learned how to resolve conflict in a respectful way, and we've become great partners out of it. Great friends out of it. We both take care of ourselves, and we do, uh, we, you know, we keep the romance up there. And if, you know, if you're just going to be lazy and just—

that's right—

you're going to be divorced.

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