Conflict – The Desire to Right a Wrong
that insults the notion of social order VERSUS disdain for social institutions.
That’s what conflict is; the juxtaposition between what we know is right, and what we want to do to make things right. There are times when that conflict is insurmountable, or at least, that’s how it appears. The conflict of someone who has always abided by the rules of law and the society they live in, who then becomes a victim, or who lose all they had, or who has waited so long for things to happen – for the bad to be fixed – that they chose the other side.
The dark side. We call it that. When someone chooses to enact vengeance, or payback, or to rectify a problem. Retribution.
This is where Van starts in Moordenaar. She kept in touch with the investigation into the rape and murder of her 12yo step-sister. The case is declared a ‘cold’ case. What does that mean? To Van, it means her mother committed suicide – because she failed as a mother, because she can’t make it right.
Now, Van has nothing and no one who cares about her, no one alive she can care about, share with. She has no community left. She failed her family.
What can she do? As a highly skilled IT security officer, she can use her professional skills to find detailed information about the list she saw – the POI list that fell out of the files in the Detective’s office. To track them down, to pass the information back to the police, to do something, anything, to fill that hole.
Did she do the right thing? If it’s the right thing for her, why didn’t someone else do it?
Why do [wo]men feel they can justify their actions? Read Moordenaar, to get the rest of the story.
***
The truf
I saw it. I really did. I saw it all. That big man, you know, the one who did it? He spoke to me, even. I was there. I know what happened.
No, you say? Not possible? I tell you, it happened. It really did. I was there, not you.
You must’ve seen someone who looked like me. I wasn’t me. I was somewhere else – I was where it happened.
It was my street – I was there.
It was all yellin’ an’ shoutin’ an’ the cops were shootin’ and usin’ those loud speaker things. That big bloke, you know, three doors down, but across the road – it was ‘im.
He did it. I was there. I saw it all.
I’ll be a witness, you know, like on telly – called up to say what really happened. Everyone will wanta talk wiv’ me.
***
I don’t know where the above came from, so if it’s yours, let me know and I’ll acknowledge it. I think it might be an original, done while in a course, but not a clear recollection (courses are full of stuff you’re supposed to be learning, but instead . . . well, the mind wanders off through the open window and out there, elsewhere, on a different journey).
