6: The Darkest Child 249-303

"They did not wait until the wee hours of the morning to retaliate. The first fire broke out on Tuesday evening long before midnight, but we did not stand gazing into darkenss as we had done before. These flames were visible, too high, and too close."

This passage from page 280 shows how violence starts, from retaliation. "They did not wait until the wee hours of the morning to retaliate." This quote shows how quick people are to want revenge. Maybe it is because if their actions are for revenge people feel justified in hurting someone. Often even after retaliating people don't feel better about themselves but only feel better because they can see the other people feel worse. If everyone didn't always have this need to have revenge there would be a lot less violence and war in this world. In The Darkest Child it seems that many of people's actions are based on revenge.

I can relate to this passage because I know that I have done many things out of spite. In middle school and high school there isn't much physical retaliation but there is definitely verbal retaliation. In middle school my friends sometimes felt that if someone gossiped or was mean to one of our friends it was our duty to be mean back. I know that this was not the right way to think no matter how horrible our friend was being treated. I like to think now that I have learned from middle school experiences and now don't get involved in the drama of gossip and backstabbing. I've learned that its always better to ignore it.