Why would you throw your life away?

It’s been all over the news, how they finally caught up to and captured George and Jennifer Hyatte. It comes as no great surprise – the things Mrs. Hyatte allegedly did to break her husband out of prison were nothing less than stupid, if they are truly as presented by various sources. It was inevitable that they get tracked down and caught…I can only say I’m happy to see it didn’t happen with further bloodshed and loss of life. I’ll reserve judgement on Mrs. Hyatte’s intelligence, because, frankly, stupid acts don’t necessarily mean stupidity. But why would anyone even consider such things? Her husband was imprisoned for robbery, but not knowing the details of his criminal history (and being uninclined to look it up), I would venture a guess he would have eventually gotten out, and likely not terribly long from now. Their relationship developed while he was in jail, including their marriage. Why couldn’t it continue that way until he was released? Now he has a prison break on his record, and his wife is facing murder charges. If she is convicted, instead of being together, the couple is almost certainly destined to seperate cells for a long, long time.
If she had thought much about it, Hyatte almost certainly would have realized that this was the least likely way to “be together” she could have thought up. She got a few days with her man, and it may very well be all she will ever get with him for most of the rest of their lives. There is really one one answer I can think of: she let her emotions get the better of her, and she acted on them. Thought and careful consideration had little to do with it.
It’s a sad story, and no way to get your “15 minutes of fame.” But I am willing to bet that although most people would not take the kind of extreme actions Mrs. Hyatte is alleged to have taken, a fair amount of people act on their emotions in a frighteningly similar way.
Let me digress a moment, to tell you a story of long past. When I was a young lad (we are talking the 1960’s here, to put it in context), I was watching a movie with my Dad. One of the characters in the movie killed a man; I don’t recall the plot at all, but I do remember thinking he was justified to kill the person. My Dad commented, almost casually, “Well, he’s going to die now too.” I was nonplussed. I indignantly asked him how he could think that – well sure, it was technically murder, but there was good reason for it! Dad’s answer didn’t help me out at all. “That’s the way it is in the movies. You kill someone, you are going to die. It may be heroic, it may be tragic, but if you aren’t a soldier in battle, and you take a life in the movies, you will pay with your own by the end.” He was right. That character did something noble in the end that got him killed. I began to expect it in movies from then on.
But it’s not how the movies do it today. If you are in love, practically anything is justified: murder, kidnapping, robbery, whatever. If your family is threatened, or those you care about, the same goes. If it’s too late for them, well then, you have a right to vengeance, and practically any heinous deed you pursue to attain it is all right. Sure, there are limits, and it doesn’t always work out well for such folk, but often enough it does. I won’t say whether Hollywood instilled this kind of attitude in us or is simply reflecting it; that’s a “chicken or egg” question that is beyond me. But the attitude exists. It is an emotional conditioning. And, unfortunately, the conditioning amounts to something like this: if I feel strongly enough about something, anything I do about it is the right thing to do.
And if it gets too strong, we might all of us someday find ourselves in a position Mrs. Hyatte is accused of: letting our emotions override our sense. And, like Mrs. Hyatte, we are almost certain to regret it.