In the Jan. 17, 2011 edition of The New Yorker, the journalist James Surowiecki writes that the “recession has… magnified the gap between unionized and non-unionized workers.” He goes on to say that “[t]his resentment is most evident in the backlash against public-sector workers (who now make up a majority of union members).”

Here we have a clear case of resentment. In what follows, I’d like to draw our attention to the concept of resentment. When we say that “John is resentful,” we mean that John has a high sense of justice (or fairness), a sense that has been violated. And justice, as it’s understood here, seems to mean “getting one’s just desserts.”

We feel resentment, then, when we ought to get something we don’t or when we get something we shouldn’t. That is,

1. We resent the person who gets something that we should have gotten as well or instead. (We might also envy him.)

2. We resent the person who or the institution that gives us something we think we don’t merit.  (Over time, our resentment may slide into bitterness.)

Resentment implies that we have some claim, reasonable or not, to a portion of the world’s resources, yet in reality it often makes us look mean and ugly, makes us prone to anger, seething with the wrongs of the past. Our injuries, we think, run deep like tracks that, once laid down, can’t be pulled up. Someone must be held to account: we want blood.

What’s more, resentment wears away at our will, setting us up for a life of self-pitying. Nothing can be done, we console ourselves. My fate is sealed. My life, wasted, was never my own.

Under the influence of resentment, we can feel–and observe–the withering away of our powers.

What might we do in order to ward off resentment before it arises or to swear off resentment once it seeks to take over our lives? What consolation might philosophy actually provide? Consider the following arguments and see whether any appeal to your entire being–to your reason and your passion.

1. On Fortune. Fortune shines on some but not on others. Or it shines on some some days and on others–sometimes us–on others. Let’s celebrate the good fortune of others–workers getting paid a living wage for a hard day’s work; classmates getting praised for their worthwhile efforts; mothers smiling on daughters simply because they exist–while learning to joke about the paltry cards lying limply in our hands. Funny how things shake out, isn’t it?

2. On Large-mindedness. When others get their due and we do not, would we rather like to look and feel small-minded or large-minded? Think of liberality in Aristotle or of the expansive quality of Whitman. Imagine how large we’d feel. No matter, we might say. We are so expansive, so magnanimous, that we can celebrate the good fortune of others with elan.  There’s joy to be had in giving this much.

3. On our Criterion of Justice. Set the standard of justice high enough, and watch how many fall short. Angry yet? Look at all the fools and hypocrites, dolts and morons who can’t seem to do what’s obviously right. On the one hand, we seem to be overly optimistic about the shape and course of the world as if there were some pre-established harmony governing nature. You really believe this? That everything happens for the best? Have you forgotten the pogroms, the Great Leap Forward, the Haitian earthquake? On the other hand, we seem to be shot through with cynicism almost from the start. If no one can reach the mark we (or God or whoever) has set, then the world, this world, is blasted and sinful. Perhaps we could entertain the suggestion that we lower the bar, in keeping with fickle Fortune, and see how this lightens our metaphysical load. I think it will.

4. On Equality. Resentment begins from the premise that our cases are comparable. You and I are equals in all or most respects, but you get more of a good thing (or less of a bad thing) than I. Suppose, though, that we shift our attention to circumstance, context, and the variety of human character. From this vantage point, might we see that there are fundamental differences between us? That you are this way and I am that? And if we discover that there are such differences dividing us, then we’ll also find, fortuitously, that resentment has lost its grip

5. On the fallibility of human judgment. One of the great insights of the Western tradition is that human beings are fallible. For Christians, this is so by definition. For the Greek tragic poets, it was so by the gods. For Montaigne and Kant, fallibility was built into human reason. If it is an ineradicable feature of being human, then it follows that those occupying positions of authority–managers, committees, legislators…–and those aspirants like us will both be susceptible to erring in their judgment. This is not to imply that judges aren’t responsible for their pronouncements and agents for their actions, only that we should be more disposed to “giving them slack,” taking a second look, mulling things over, and momentarily suspending judgment. “In raising us, my mother did the best she could,” reasons the grown-up hitherto eaten away by resentment. “I can see that now.”

Reader, let me leave you with a question: what would we need to do in order to be the kind of creatures capable of forgiveness?