A lot of people die every day but not all of them are murdered. Murder is when a person kills another for selfish reasons. The definition in law may be different and includes malice. But what could be those selfish reasons for which someone might kill someone? Jealousy? Greed? Love? Hatred?  There have been a lot of discussions over this question and many experts, psychiatrists, and defense attorneys and genius people have studied the criminals and came across a lot of reasons for killing someone. There are a lot of answers to this question and the very common reasons are discussed below: I will try to explain from my studies what could or might happen.

1. Domestic reasons:

Cases for killing someone because of domestic reason have grown a lot during the past few years. Domestic killings involve both the men and women as victims, but mostly it is the female kind that falls victim of the domestic violence. The reason for more female victims is the age-old systems in the Indian culture of dowry and the fights between the daughter-in-law and mother-in-law, and also the fights between husband and wife leading to domestic violence. Another common reason for domestic violence is the love percentage. The law must be such that it punishes the murderer and not the victim for not loving his/her partner. Sometimes people kill because they love the other one and cannot tolerate the thought of seeing that loved one with someone else.

2. Money:

Isn’t money an obvious reason to kill someone? No, it isn’t, but it is indeed the most common reason to kill others. Money influences a lot of people and in fact, I would say money influences all of us but in different ways. All of us are fond of money and want to have a lot of it. But some people can go up to any extent to save money. Sometimes people kill the one who has lots of money and sometimes they kill someone because they are getting a lot of money for doing so. People plan on attacking a bank to take away all the money and do not care about the number of people getting killed in the process.

3. Revenge:

Revenge is a very strong feeling that can even make non-criminals kill others. If someone did wrong to you, then revenge is the feeling that where you want the other person to experience the same, experience everything you went through. People dealing with the feeling of revenge always end up hurting people. Such people do not believe in the legal system and try to solve things on their own and by solving things I mean punishing others and killing them. They always take the matter into their own hands and try to make others suffer just like they did. They also consider it a valid thing to do. They justify themselves saying, “you get what you give”. Every community had witnessed some form of revenge killing in their lives. In many cases, some innocent people have fallen at the hands of the wicked.

4. Alcohol and drugs:

One of the reasons for killing someone is just that the person is high. People lose their sense when they are loaded with alcohol and drugs. Drugs have a very powerful effect on the brain of a person irrespective of the age and sex. Same is the case with alcohol and same is the effect. While they are high, they forget the difference between right and wrong. Everything they do while being drunk seems rational to them. Some people believe that whatever mistakes they do are justified if they were not in control at that time. Many people have died only because the other person was drunk and did not realize what he or she was doing. If a person is drunk, then a single statement can make you dead. You may witness a case of a drunken driver who shouldn’t have gotten under the wheel of a vehicle. I have seen it in my employment and heard a lot of stories. St. Vincent and the Grenadines should put laws in place to deal with the culprits, if and whenever they show their heads.

5. Religion arguments:

Although this is not a very common reason in all the countries, it does exist very prominently in India. The best example of this is that a secular nation as India might have many religions and various followers; there are still wars between Hindus and Muslims. One can never hear anything against one’s religion. This is a tendency of humans to love the Gods whom they worship and so there is nothing wrong with this. One can worship anyone they want and anytime they desire and in any manner they like. But the thing that is wrong is that they should not oppose what others are doing. If the government allows you to worship in your way, then you should not object to the way others are worshiping. This is the problem with the population that they do not ignore and always interfere. This leads to a lot of fights, in turn, leading to the death of a person or death of the whole group believing in that religion. In other countries, there are similar ways to cope with religion which does not end in the murder of another.

6. Self-defense:

Self-defense is another very common reason for killing someone. If you are alone walking on the street and someone tries to hurt you for getting away with your purse or wallet, then if you attack that person for your protection and for protecting your property, then this is called self-defense. In the eyes of the law, self-defense is a valid and just thing to do. But in the process of self-defense, you may even kill that person trying to rob you or kill you. Courts in our country handle such cases on a weekly basis. There are a lot of cases when people have been killed because of self-defense. Self-defense is not natural only on the streets, but also, in the domestic life, for instance, if you are being tortured by your mother-in-law or husband. Self-defense can be in any form and anywhere. This can cover those that are being “BULLY” each day and parents can get involved in protecting their children.

7. Anger:

Anger is another reason to kill someone. Many have died just because the murderer was in an angry mood and could think rationally. Being angry means nothing more than being out of control. The mind focuses only on those things that have been the root causes of anger; in other words, the mind pays attention to whatever you think is the reason for anger. The main reason for anger is that things are not the way you want them to be. If anything goes unexpected and you don’t like it, you may get angry. And if a particular person is responsible for your anger, then you start hating that person and want him off this planet and you don’t want to see his/her face any longer. In such situations, the person loses the capacity to think of the consequences and simply focuses on killing that person.

8. Greed:

Greedy is again one of those people who will kill. Just as anger shapes into killings, greed also does the same. Majority of the times it is the inheritance factor that involves killing and murdering people. Suppose you have an uncle who has a large business and a big property. You may think that before this uncle changes his mind about sharing the property with someone else and change the will, let us get rid of him. Another example of greed is that you are an eligible candidate for getting promoted in the office and so is one of your colleagues. So you might want to get rid of the colleague so that only you will be eligible for promotion and you will definitely get it.

9. Road discipline:

Despite many policies to control the traffic, the problem is not yet solved. Many people die in road accidents. The accident is not a specific reason to kill someone until and unless planning of. Other cases of road rage are examples where a person may overtake and you don’t like and try to overtake instead even if no space to do so. Another such example is killing someone while having a road race and if it seems that he/she cannot win, and then they will not let the other party win and kill them instead. Sometimes, it is just the drunk driver who does not like if someone blows a horn and kill him or maybe he is drunk and so cannot see those people walking in front of his car and kill them.

10. Mercy killing:

Mercy killings are not very common but prevail in every society by a certain percentage. Mercy killings are those categories of killing when the person being killed has asked to do so. If a person is extremely ill and sick and cannot be cured, he/she is lying all day on the bed, suffering the pain each second and bear it even if it is worse; then the doctor injects something and all of a sudden the patient is free from all the pain and free from the painful life and rests in peace. If not the doctor, it can be someone who was a loved one to the patient and could not see the patient in that painful condition and kill the patient to bring peace to the body and soul. Mercy killings are also known as the easier and faster way to die from the old age diseases and also considered as peaceful, unnatural deaths in some places.