Who is to "blame"?

Question

When you make moral or cognitive decision as to who is to "blame", responsible or accountable for a situation, what process do you use?

Or, in determining fault, how do you determine who is at fault in a situation?

(could be legal, moral, social, etc.)

Answer 1

Either...

The weakest...

The most authortative...

The least liked...

Or,

The most likely to be believed that they did it.




g-day!

Answer 2

This is such a broad question with so many unknowns that may, or may not, factor into the answer to the question

What "process" do you use? I may or may not use some or all of the following: Intellect, life experience, education, gut instinct, my set of values, my moral compass, my conscience, etc.
Everything is not cut and dry or black and white. In some situations, it's obvious who's at fault. In others, there are a lot more gray areas..

For instance, if a parent tells their six year old child not to play with matches and explains to the child that it's dangerous to play with matches, then later that day, the child lights a match and sets a bush in the backyard on fire which spreads to the house so that the fire department has to be called, whose fault is it? Is it the parent's fault for not supervising the child? Or is it the child's fault for disobeying his parent? I say it's the parent's fault for not supervising their six year old child. But if you ask someone else, you'll probably get a different answer.

If a pedestrian is walking on the sidewalk and a mass transit bus jumps the curb, because in the back of the bus, two thugs are beating up another passenger which distracts the bus driver to the point where he loses control of the bus and rides up onto the sidewalk and kills a pedestrian, is the bus driver at fault for losing control of the bus, or are the thugs in the back of the bus who distracted him at fault? I say it's a tragedy. Ultimately, someone is going to be held accountable. Is it the bus driver? Or the thugs that caused the distraction that caused the bus driver to lose control of the bus? You could argue that the bus driver shouldn't have allowed himself to be distracted to the extent that he loses control of the bus, but he's only human. You could argue that the thugs are ultimately responsible since they were assaulting another passenger, committed a crime, which caused a chain reaction (the bus driver being distracted then losing control of the bus). So in answer to your question, I say it depends on the circumstances in determing who, if anyone, is to blame. And also, if you ask this question to others, you're likely to get a variety of different responses. Point being: When deciding who's to blame, there is often more subjectivity than objectivity for a myriad of reasons. A jury may be sympathetic to the bus driver, because there dad was a bus driver. Others on the jury may not be sympathetic to the bus driver, because their grannie got run over by a bus.

Answer 3

Good question. *4u!. Well, I don't believe most people use a fair system when it comes to determining who is at fault in a situation (especially if the situation involves the person making the decision), but, the fairest way to decide, I believe, is to carefully and thoroughly weigh all aspects of the situation, give each party a chance to explain their actions, and hopefully come to the right conclusion together. Unfortunately, that happens rarely because people tend to defend themselves even when they know they are wrong. But, if you get a group of confident, secure individuals together this process will take place without a hitch.

Answer 4

Blame? Uncertainty saturates me behind this question because to me there's always cause and effect (or action and reaction). One may be positive and the other negative, or the other way around. Regardless if the one who decides is directly involved I would say that he who judges should be the wisest so the most proper decision is made. Self scrutiny is important to this. I try to stay away from the blame game and focus on positive reconstruction as best that I can...

Answer 5

The source of the problem is the one to blame. For example: You left a bowl of carrots on the kitchen table. Your dog jumbs up on the chair, then onto the table and knocks the bowl off the table. The dog is to blame.

There is ALWAYS a source of a problem. Someone, something, some action that started the ball rolling on the entire situation.

Answer 6

Any decision about anything must be based on the accessible information of events/conditions which put it into motion and/or lead to its end. The one shown by evidence to be causing the event/condition to unfold must be the perpetrator to the best of anyone's knowledge! However the concept of beyond reasonable doubt must be present in any selection of this nature! The possibility of insufficient information to conclude is always present!

Answer 7

I don't think it's fair to put all the blame in one direction in most cases, true that it might have been the lead cause but there are usually other factors involved. In the end I don't think it really matters who or what made things fall apart as it is who or what put them back together.

Answer 8

Woman

Answer 9

First... All the Facts
Second...Past experience...as in has it happened before
Third...Knowledge or intelligence
Fourth...Attitude
Obviously a myriad of other factors can come into play but these basic ones usually get to the bottom of it. ;)

Answer 10

I back track until I get to the peron or reason that first caused or spread the problem...but remember thats just me..

Answer 11

Blaming is just a stupid thing humans do lol. What happened HAPPENED! Blaming someone (yourself or another) won't change what happened or who did it.