Over the past few months, I have grown to loathe the term “deserve”. Most of the time, I hear it at work, when customers will whine and complain that they “deserve” 6 months of their bill refunded to them, as their service wasnt working exactly as they had hoped it would, or because they werent aware of a fee or charge on their account. The ironic part is that, in reality, they dont deserve a penny-when they signed up for service, they signed a document entitled “Terms of service”. When they sign this, they agree to accept whatever service they get, with no guarantees that anything will actually work. In other words, if their service was terrible, all they deserve is laughter, for choosing the wrong company to buy from.
Although “deserve” amuses me when used at work, it annoys me when used morally. I think that almost every civil movement that I disagree with is based on the assumption that somebody or some group of people deserves something that they are not receiving. The problem with this concept is defining what people “deserve”-in my opinion, we tend to give way too much credit!
I believe that ultimately, a person can deserve one of 2 things-the vindication of perfection, or the damnation of imperfection. Outside of these moral absolutes, things tend to get hazy-a thief in Canada is typically seen as “deserving” a few months in prison, while a thief in Saudi Arabia is seen as “deserving” an amputated hand. An abortion doctor is seen to liberals as “deserving” a medal for empowering women, while to religious conservatives (myself included) he is seen as “deserving” to stand before a court of law under a conviction of murder. An undercover cop is seen as “deserving” a medal to an average civilian, or death to the members of the gang he works for. However, its clear that those who are perfect deserve a reward for their perfection, while those who are imperfect deserve a punishment for their imperfection. There is only one problem with this judgement-none of us deserve the rewards of perfection.
It doesnt take a Bible to convince us that were not perfect-our own hearts are well aware of it! We know how often we fall very short of the standard of perfection! And, if were not perfect, we do not deserve the rewards of perfection. It would be stupid for us to start drawing lines on what is small enough to go unpunished and what isnt, because there is no moral absolute on which we can base that line. Should stealing be allowed to go unpunished? What about lying, or cheating? There is no firm foundation for any line other than the one I started with-perfection, or imperfection. Following this, all we really deserve is the results of imperfection-punishment.
Usually, we have 2 separate ways to use the term “deserve”-there is what others that we do not like deserve, like the murderer who deserves to be on death row, and there is what we deserve, like a promotion, or new car. Dividing between these 2 just doesnt work-really, all we deserve is the same thing as the murderer-punishment. Its a hard thing to admit, but it is only when we admit that we deserve nothing good that we can move onto the only way that we can receive something good-grace.
