Atticus principle
What it says about you when you can’t be angry with anyone
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Do you rarely get angry and rarely hold anything against others in the long term? Maybe it’s because you have something in common with Atticus Finch.
Atticus Finch is a fictional character from the novel “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee. He lives in a time and world in which there are many good reasons for him to be angry with his fellow human beings and to despair of them: Atticus lives in the southern United States in the 1930s. Here people are openly excluded, disrespected and judged if and because they are black. Women only have a marginal say. The stronger and privileged live at the expense of the weaker, oppressing them instead of promoting them. The world is unfair and the majority of people are far from recognizing and changing it.
As a single father and lawyer, Atticus Finch faces this injustice every day. He takes on the defense of a black man who… is accused of rape and has to face hatred and threats from his fellow citizens. He tries to raise his children to be decent as they learn in school that there are better people and inferior people and that some have already lost as soon as they are born.
Still, Atticus Finch isn’t angry. He’s not desperate. He is one of the few who recognizes the injustice that the people around him commit every day and still forgives them. How come?
The Atticus Philosophy
A central aspect of Atticus’ attitude is the idea that we “could never truly know a person until we have worn his shoes and walked in them.” From our perspective, the way a person behaves may seem wrong and bad. But unless we have found ourselves in exactly the same situation – with the same biographical experiences and influences – we cannot be sure that we would have behaved differently.
People have motivations that we don’t know about. If we always knew everyone’s motives, we might be able to understand many things that outrage us. It does not follow that we should not condemn anyone legally or morally. However, it follows that it is pointless to be angry and angry. Because how could we be mad at a person who probably can’t help it?
To assume good intentions or not?
In an episode of her podcast “Unlocking Us,” the American podcaster Brené Brown addresses the question of whether or not she generally assumes other people are always doing their best. Do people always act according to their conscience and with good intentions – and don’t achieve more – or do they not care? We don’t know the answer and we get to decide for ourselves what we want to believe. If we prefer to assume that others have good intentions, we will probably, like Atticus, rarely be angry or angry with those around us. But all the more deeply disappointed and sad. If we believe that people can be better if they wanted to, we will feel less sad but more likely to be frustrated and angry. Our world is still unfair and the majority of people are far from recognizing it and changing it.
However, just as we cannot rule out that we would act equally wrongly and badly if we walked around in the shoes of a person whose behavior we perceive as wrong and bad, there is a possibility that we can be an Atticus if we are his Wearing shoes. Peaceful, decent and forgiving. And firmly believes that “most people are ‘really nice’ when we finally see them.”