Researchers have not yet figured out who exactly first said the famous phrase: "The road to hell is paved with good intentions," but almost all of them agree on one thing - this sentence is damn true! For thousands of years that humanity has existed, there have always been people who sincerely wished to benefit others - all or only partially. The concept, as always, was nothing but wonderful, but the results were much worse.
This happens at all levels, from, for example, Thanos, who, in order to implement a truly brilliant and outstanding idea of solving the issue associated with overpopulation in the universe, chose the most unsuccessful means to achieve it, up to your neighbor, who, in their frantic desire to improve their surroundings, comes into conflict with those around them. In fact, doing good deeds is not that easy.
When a few days ago in the AskReddit community the user u/WorldsBiggestNarcist asked readers the question: "'The road to hell is paved with good intentions,' what is a real life example of this?", they probably didn't even expect such popularity. Now the resulting thread has over 36.2K upvotes and almost 15.6K various comments, where the given examples are immediately and heatedly discussed. In other words, all the signs of a viral thread are present.
Out of pure good intentions as well, Bored Panda has collected the most popular, interesting and unexpected examples and stories of the original thread in this brilliant compilation, so all you have to do now is to scroll it to the very end, upvote the narratives and ideas you like best, and of course add your own real-life or historic examples in the comments below. And we, on our part, genuinely hope these good intentions will bring no less good things to readers this time!
More info: Reddit
#22
A company in a town I used to live in “employed” a lot of people from the local disability support center, these people had mental disabilities such as Down syndrome and this company “employed them” to come in a few hours a week and “work” - and by work I mean little tasks that gave these employees lives a sense of meaning, purpose and structure. Things like folding pamphlets and stamping papers and they would be paid a small amount for their time, not minimum wage but enough for them to be absolutely thrilled with their “pay” from working.
The government made some changes so that these people HAD to be paid minimum wage (I assume to avoid people being taking advantage of), I am sure they had the best intentions but this company, and many others could not afford to pay all of these people minimum wage and so they had to cut back to only letting 1-2 people work instead of all of the people who were benefiting from “working” for them initially.
It was really sad especially because these people did not understand why they were not allowed to work anymore.
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65points
#23
Thomas Midgley
A Great scientist. He help to get rid of the problem of petrol causing 'knocking' in engines.... By adding lead to Gasoline
Then he turned his endevours to reducing the amount of Toxic and flammable gases used in Air con and refrigeration systems....... and invented CFC's
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61points
#24
My mom called my Christian university (that 17 year old me attended by my parents behest) to inform the school that I was smoking weed, drinking, and having sex. She thought because it was a Christian university, they would put me into a counseling program to get me “back on track.” The school told me to pack my bags, leave immediately and they rescinded the 80% scholarship I obtained, causing me to owe the full 100% for that semester which I’m still paying off a decade later.
- Edit: this comment is getting a lot of traction so I figured I’d add another nugget. After getting kicked out of college, my 18th birthday was the next month. My parents somehow (my dad is a tech nerd so he could hack any account I had) found out that I was going to have a party at a friend’s house to celebrate. There was alcohol and weed at the party. Low and behold my parents called the state police and alerted them of the party. I and 3 other friends got arrested that night. Most charges were dropped or expunged eventually.
- Edit 2: thank you to everyone for your responses! There’s too many comments and dms to reply to so I will answer some here:
- For those saying I got what I deserved or my mom was justified - It takes 2 to tango. My choices played a role for sure. This story was a response to the prompt about good intentions going sideways. My mom had good intentions when she alerted the school of my activity. She didn’t want me to get kicked out and still be paying for it years later but that’s what happened. I don’t claim sainthood in this scenario. I broke the rules knowingly.
- How did my mom know about the partying/sex? I visited home for a weekend and she went through my bags while I was in the shower. She found condoms and a bottle of liquor. She already knew I’d been smoking weed here and there for a couple years at this point.
- I said my dad “hacked” my online accounts to discover I was throwing a party. Excuse my lack of intelligent tech vocabulary there. He had a program or software where he could track key strokes to then discover passwords to my accounts or something along those lines. Similar to what they used to monitor the computers in my high school.
- How is my relationship with my parents now? It’s great. I have forgiven them completely. That doesn’t mean I don’t feel some resentment now and again. Their choices (and mine even more so) made my life very difficult. At my lowest point, I made a plan to kill myself. All of my dreams and potential seemed crippled by debt and a lack of gainful employment opportunities. I lived in a town (technically a village) of 300 people in rural north east, USA. Thankfully, before I was able to harm myself too badly or permanently, I had a “mystical” experience. During that experience, I saw my situation, my parents, myself, and reality from a perspective that was not my own regular waking consciousness. I saw that I could choose to perpetuate pain and suffering by holding onto anger, hate, and resentment for my parents and myself for the choices we made. I saw it was possible to feel joy, to forgive, to repair, to heal. My life didn’t instantly become better the next day, but my perspective shifted to where I wanted to repair the damage that was done. “Anger is the 2nd wound your enemy inflicts upon you” was very applicable in my situation. I could let the anger and hurt dictate what my life would look like or I could choose to cultivate joy, come what may. Holding onto anger and resentment was another form of allowing my parents to control me. The real “power move” is to forgive. To release the hold your “enemy” (for lack of a better term) has over your life through your unhappiness. Behind true forgiveness is where we find freedom. Much love, Reddit.
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60points
#25
On a personal scale trying to help a really drunk person. I'm a woman and talkative and I started talking to another woman at a bar who was really really drunk. She told me her friends deserted her so I said she could hang out with me and my friends as it was my birthday (to keep an eye on her and because she seemed fun). Then she started falling off of chairs and spilling drinks so I encouraged her to get a cab. She started crying how everyone hates her as I was helping her outside but agreed to go home. I got a cab, paid for it because she was a mess, and all of the sudden she got really violent and ended up kicking me in the face trying to get out of the cab because she 'wasn't done'. She pushed me and told me to f**k off but ultimately sat back down in the cab crying.
We had already exchanged numbers so the next day she texted me apologizing profusely and asking if we could stay friends. I told her I appreciated her apology but no thanks.
I will always try to help people where I can but that turned me off from going above and beyond. Plus, you can rarely rationalize with really drunk and upset people.
51points
#28
Keeping on trying to help someone so desperately that you lose sight of your own actions and end up hurting everyone around you by neglecting your own health and becoming overly defensive of that person, even insulting and attacking others for them.
This can happen too fast when you fall in love with a bad person
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45points
#30
People giving up all their rights because they believe it will solve problems
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41points