What you loved was the cruelty.

The meanness, the spite, the ability to say whatever you wanted, to hurt anyone you wanted. Without retribution.

The chance to show your true heart. To call them ugly names. To shame them. Because it’s what you’ve wanted to do all along.

You didn’t have to hide your ugliness anymore.

Now you could hurt people with impunity. You did it with pleasure.

The cruelty was the point.

What you loved was the bullying.

The mocking of people other than you.

Tormenting people who didn’t look like you. Denying people who didn’t sound like you. Hurting people who didn’t believe like you.

You loved brutalizing people. You took joy in it.

The bullying was the point.

What you loved was the power.

The power to hurt. To harm. To feel bigger than someone else. To take something away from them. To keep them from ever having it.

Knowing that someone couldn’t have what you had. It felt good, and it made you feel powerful.

That they had worked so hard just for the chance to achieve, but it could be taken away at the last minute.

You loved it when someone they loved was stolen from them, and they could do nothing about it.

You loved the power to hurt people. You took pleasure from it.

The power was the point.

What you loved was the mob.

Feeling like a big shot because there were other people surrounding you, carrying torches, sticks, and guns.

Knowing you could shout in someone’s face and push them around.

That a group of you could hurt, bully, and be cruel to anyone you wanted, and that they wouldn’t fight back, because there were more of you than there were of them.

You hid behind the crowd, striking anonymously. You were excited by it.

The mob was the point.

Now you fear everything will be returned.

You worry that your sins will be visited upon you.

That you will be treated the way you treated others. That they will demand an eye for an eye, instead of turning the other cheek.

You hope that the people you hurt have forgiven and forgotten. You pray that they’re better than you, more forgiving than you.

You ask for reconciliation and say now we should come together.

You ask that we treat you the way we wanted to be treated. Now you want a balance, now you want a reconciliation.

Now, and only now, you want to be treated like Equals. To let bygones be bygones.

But you don’t want to be treated equally. Not to meet wrong with wrong, hurt with hurt.

Because you’re no longer in power. You can’t be the bully.

Because you’re afraid we’ll remember you, the things you said, the things you did.

Trust me, we’ll remember.


Photo by Russ Rowland on rrsnapshop (© Russ Rowland)

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