Hero or Murderer?

[DS Star]

'They deserved to die': Vigilante who gunned down two registered sex offenders is unrepentant as judge sentences him to life in prison

Patrick Drum, 34, the Vigilante hunt down and shot 2 "rapists" i.e. Gary Lee Blanton, 28, and Jerry Wayne Ray, 57,  in their homes near Port Angeles, Washington. He shot them multiple times...

Gary Lee Blanton, 28, was convicted of raping a 17-year-old girl and Jerry Wayne Ray, 57, admitted to raping two children, age 7 and 4.

Some see Patrick Drum as "Hero" for killing the rapists whereas the family of the murdered victims viewed Drum as cold-blood "Murderer"

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2205288/Patrick-Drum-Vigilante-killed-sex-offenders-sentenced-life-prison.html

http://youtu.be/ENa_Xh-4n7A
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Drum is doing what he believed as his 'duty' for the society; he said: "it had to be done."

Do you think Patrick Drum did the right thing?

[dondrup]

No.  Drum had done wrong!

Even though Drum may have the intention to save others from becoming victims to these two rapists, he is not above the law in Washington.  Hence Drum is punishable for killing two human lives.  In accordance with Karma, for killing, he will suffer the consequences of being killed or having short life-span in his future lives.  Drum had caused suffering to the families of the rapists as well as the rapists themselves.  The rapists have no chance to redeem themselves and to lead a normal life anymore. Also the families concerned had lost and being deprived of their loved ones forever!

[bambi]

Sigh... What is the world becoming into? Vigilante, murderer or not, nobody has the right to take another life. But at the same time, karma has its way of 'getting' back at these people. This is not the right way to help the victims and their family. In the end, everyone connected to the incident are deeply affected which makes it much worse.

[Dorje Pakmo]

I am agree with dondrup's point of view. No one has the right to take another person's life. In Buddhism, whatever sins one may have done, one will have to pay back somehow, this is the law of Karma.

Drum if sympathizes the victims pain and agony, then he should have thought the same before taking the lives of the 2 rapists. Who also have family and loved ones (although what they've done are really evil and do not deserve to be loved). Their actions will have its repercussions. Killing the rapist may have stopped them from repeating their actions, but the Karma for the HERO is no better than the rapist as he has killed 2 (not so innocent) lives, which he has no right to judge and sentence .

That is the reason why one should study the law of Karma in Buddhism. It is to make us a more responsible person to ourselves and others. What Drum has done is definitely cruel and, he IS a dangerous murderer who may have watched too much Hollywood movies. Resulting with him thinking that it's right to go around killing people in the name of justice. 

[psylotripitaka]

This is always such a tricky subject when you get into the thick of it because their are different points of view depending on the context of the teaching. Our common understanding is the law of karma, that we are encouraged to abandon killing. Then there is the story of Buddha Shakyamuni in a previous life (when he was a Bodhisattva) as the captain of a merchant ship where he saw with his clairvoyance that one merchant was going to kill all the others so he killed this merchant. #11 of the Secondary Downfalls of the Bodhisattva vows is 'Not believing that Bodhisattvas' compassion ensures that all their actions are pure', and ultimately we do not know the midstream of others, so, it's a little complicated. It is not commonly known to the public that Bodhisattvas and Buddhas do whatever is necessary even if it involves killing, and for good reason. But it is the truth. The skillful means of holy beings is beyond the comprehension of ordinary beings!!

In Lama Chopa it says: "I seek your blessings to make this freedom and endowment extremely meaningful, by immediately applying meditation to whatever I meet..." Therefore, most important thing for each of us individually is to decide what Dharma view to apply at each particular moment. There is no such thing as inherently existent good or bad, hero or murderer. That's the beauty of it. We are free to view the appearance in whatever way is going to effect our mind in the most beneficial way. This thread about Mr.Drum teaches many things: karma, impermanence, the disadvantages of murder and  sexual misconduct, loss, having to encounter what we don't like, or maybe it's a Bodhisattva or Buddha engaged in wrathful actions because it was more beneficial for their spiritual journey to lose their life and purify huge negative karma now so they would have the opportunity to practice in the future without such obstacles. We don't know for sure, so better to develop a Dharma perspective and meditate on it so that the appearance stimulates profound realization in us, for that is the only reason it is appearing anyways!

Use the appearance to gain realization, not to judge or try to box an appearance into some inherently existent fixed right/wrong. To a Buddha, Drum is a Daka of the Heruka body mandala. Is that perception wrong?

[yontenjamyang]

Murderer. One cannot undo a wrong with another wrong. That is the basic of the law of cause and effect. Both acts do not contra each other and it does no one any good. For me even if the law sentence the offenders/rapists to death and the the offenders were executed I do not support that law for the same reason as above. This is samsara. At this moment we should realise the first noble truth. The truth of Suffering. Suffering is in samsara. And the Second Noble Truth. That the cause is delusions ie the 3 poisons. Ignorance, Attachment and Hatred.

For the rapist the delusions is lust ie attachment and the ignorance of committing rape to satisfy their lust. For the murderer the delusions is all 3. Ignorance that this is a heroic/right act, to satisfy his hatred and ignorance of the results of his murders.

Actually, if we look around we can see many examples albeit less "controversial" acts in our daily lives that resembles this example. We can see the delusions that all our friends, family and ourselves have that caused sufferings to oneself and others. We must realise that and we must have the aspiration to liberate oneself and others from these sufferings. And the best way is to practice Dharma to achieve Buddhahood to benefit all sentient beings. That is the meaning of our refuge and boddhicitta motivation that we generate as Buddhist every day and night.

[jessicajameson]

If educated with the teachings of karma, he would have understood that the "rapist's" would face the consequences of their actions. So really, he only created negative karma for himself.

Like what yontenjamyang says, one cannot undo a wrong with another wrong.

He may have felt that killing the rapists helped the world by having one less horrible being in it - or that he was protecting his people. However, they would have just reincarnated back with the imprints to rape again. Whether it'd be an animal, spirit etc.

Would have been better for him to put efforts into making them repent, then shoot them if he really had to. But then again, he'd have to repent for his actions. Bleh, would be best to not do any negative actions whatsoever. More trouble to correct wrongdoings! 

[thor]

Similar to the Jataka Tale of the Compassionate Captain:

Once the Buddha was a ship's captain, and he learned that one of the passengers planned to kill the other passengers.  He thought that if he warned the other passengers, they would get angry and kill the homicidal passenger in a fit of rage, and this would create all manner of unfortunate karma for them. So he killed the would-be murderer himself, but he did so without anger.

So did Buddha generate merit by acting out of compassion? Or did he take on the negative karma of killing so that other passengers would be spared? There is no question that Buddha acted out of compassion - but the question here is: Was it merit or negative karma that was accrued from this act?

A visiting Buddhist teacher once gave a commentary on this teaching, and he said that by his act, the Buddha accrued some negative karma and took a negative rebirth. However, because his motivation was good, the amount of time he spent in a negative state was extremely short, and thereafter he once again took a positive rebirth to continue his compassionate deeds.

Thus, if the Buddha can also accrue negative karma despite the best of motivations and clairvoyance, Patrick Drum has definitely accrued much more negativity. However, did Patrick do wrong? Similarly, did Buddha do wrong?

If we judge right and wrong by karma, then definitely Patrick and Buddha both committed wrong deeds. But to lessen the suffering of others, does it become right? A difficult debate right to the end.

[psylotripitaka]

Thor - "A difficult debate right to the end."

Indeed. Same goes with the subject of veganism vs. carnivore. Millions of living beings are killed in the harvesting and consumption of vegetables (not the vegetable itself but the insects and such). In samsara killing is impossible to avoid completely. We need to abandon the intention to kill, and expend great energy to realize emptiness and get out of samsara.

[dsiluvu]

Judge we shall not. If there was no karma... I'd say go right ahead! Unfortunately there is. Karma is a cause for whatever actions we created so yes however "good" Patrick's intentions were, he must have collected some negative karma from doing what he did. How he did it, out of compassion or out of anger, revenge etc... is also another question of the heaviness of his karma unfortunately. Like the Buddha experience the cause of his actions for killing, though he saved so many on board.... and I am most certain He did it out of great compassion for not just the passengers but also the murderer. Yet he still had to experience the consequences of his actions. A lesson for us to also understand karma.

My question would be why did Buddha do it even after knowingly He would suffer the consequences??? Out of great Bodhichitta for sure. Question is would we be able... knowingly... out of great Bodhichitta if we were that attained? Could Patrick be a Bodhisattva in disguise? Only the Buddhas would know.

So conclusion Patrick is a Hero as well as a murderer. Hopefully his good actions are more so that He may not suffer too much from his consequence.

[buddhalovely]

For the guys who are cheering and applauding the shootings- you need to bring pressure to bear on your elected representatives to make sentencing laws much tougher. If the current sentencing laws don't put the sex offenders in prison long enough, or if sexual offenses should all carry the death penalty, then make that the law and punish these guys under that law. There isn't any excuse for vigilantism.

Don't forget that the term "sex offender" can be applied in cases of radically different severity. If a kid two days beyond his 19th birthday gets caught in the back seat of a car with some girl two days short of her 16th birthday, he may wind up registered as a "sex offender" even if the encounter was entirely consensual. (She could not have given consent, legally, for another two days). In this day and age, if we were going to hunt down and kill every teenager who ever had sex with a girl before she was officially able to consent, we'd have to run a second shift at the bullet factory.

[Big Uncle]

He is not a hero because he is not really thinking about the victims of the sex-offenders but rather the feeling of having avenged the victims of the sex-offenders. If one really want to be vigilante, one would spend more time and effort towards tracking and catching the offenders down and handling them to the police instead of killing them.

I don't see him having that great of an intention when his only cause is to kill even more people. Unlike any other action, the action of killing is inherently bad and has nothing but terrible negative consequences. The big problem about negative karma is that it multiplies over time and you never know when it will open up and hit you bad.

[Jessie Fong]

I would consider him a Murderer rather than a Hero.

He took the law into his own hands when he shot the rapists mutiple times.  He should have done right by handing them over to the law to have them punished for the crime.

In taking these men's lives, he had inadvertently created the karma for him to suffer from the act of killing.  Well, he said ... It had to be done : he should have known what would happen to him after he shot them.

[rossoneri]

He's definitely not a hero to me. Just because his victim was a sex offenders does not mean that he has the right to take their life based on what he feels. Although his motivation is to seek for justice but his action is out of anger and selfishness. To me, all of them (the victims, the rapists & Patrick drum) were some how have unfinished karma in their past life which brought over to this life and manifested in such an ugly manner.

[tsangpakarpo]

I think no matter how good a person's motivation is, killing will cause us to receive lots of negative karma. For Buddhism, it is said in our refuge vows that we have to refrain from killing. so this guy is definitely no hero.

Killing someone else sets a very bad example to the public especially children. They will think it is okay to do so. This will go on and on and our negative karma will just multiply. It is insane to think that it is okay to kill although the other party isn't a good person.

We are very fortunate to be born with the eighteen opportune conditions, so why not use the conditions fully for doing good and for the benefit of others? Practicing Dharma and going all the way with it is the best way to fully utilize our eighteen opportune conditions.