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Whether it's a child getting in trouble at home for breaking a vase or an adult in a TV show being arrested for committing a crime, we've all heard someone say, "But I didn't mean to!" or "I was just trying to help!"
But when a person fails in execution, no matter how pure their intentions were, they might end up creating a problem that's far worse than if they had just left well enough alone.
Unfortunately, that's especially true in major historical moments.
Already cringing at what was to come, Redditor sheerduckinghubris asked:
"'The road to Hell was paved with good intentions...' What moment in history does this quote ring true?"
Cue the Old 'Parkay! ...Butter' Commercials
"Pushing margarine to reduced saturated fat intake, from butter, only to realize trans fats are awful for you."
- MissKDC
"And margarine is straight up A**. Fake-a** butter. It ain't fooling me!"
- monotoonz
"You mean you CAN believe it’s not butter?!?!"
- Beta-Pope
No One Regrets Like Galston
"A little niche but…"
"Arthur Galston was a Ph.D. student in 1943 who did his research on getting soybeans to germinate faster. He noted that at higher concentrations the compound he discovered (TIBA) caused the soybeans to defoliate (it killed them)."
"Fast forward to the 1960s and the Department of Defense wanted an herbicide to destroy mangroves in Vietnam."
"They dusted off Galston’s research, noted the part about defoliation, and contracted with DuPont (and I think Monsanto?) to manufacture the stuff. Those contractors f**ked up the mixture by overcooking it which introduced a comically awful compound (TCDD), and the Department of Defense promptly sprayed it all over Southeast Asia."
"Arthur Galston never had any intention of unleashing what became known as Agent Orange; he was just trying to get soybeans to germinate a little faster."
"And he had to watch in horror as his Frankenstein was used in eco warfare and gave countless people cancer."
"He ended up traveling to Vietnam at one point to see the ghosted mangrove groves firsthand. I can only imagine that feeling."
"Galston ended up teaching bioethics for decades."
- Semirgy
The Wrong Target
"The Chinese anti-sparrow campaign that was part of the Four Pests Campaign."
"From 1958 to 1960, people were asked to kill as many sparrows as possible so that there would be more grain for the masses because sparrows wouldn't eat so much before it was harvested."
"The problem was, that sparrows were important for keeping locusts in check, so in the following years, there were huge swarms of locusts that decimated grain crops."
"This was one of the reasons for the mass starvation in the years of the Great Leap Forward."
- SuLiaoDai
A Total Backfire
"Eli Whitney wanted to decrease the demand for slavery in late 18th century America with his invention of the cotton gin. He hoped that the efficiency of the machine would drive down labor and eventually lead to the end of slavery altogether."
"Instead, it revitalized slavery for another 70 years leading right up to the Civil War."
- Kerberos_256
Snakes in a (Bad) Plan
"The Cobra Effect. In India, the British put a bounty on cobras to fight against deaths by snake bites. People started to raise them to sell."
"Then the British dropped the bounty and the snake ranchers just let them go. There were more deaths by cobras than ever."
- bg77577
No Nuclear Anything
"The environmentalists' movement against nuclear power without clean alternatives, leading to more coal and natural gas power plants."
- colio69
"I swear to god that a lot of opposition to nuclear power is because it has the word 'nuclear' in it, just like 'nuclear bombs,' which are extremely bad, and thus, nuclear power must also be bad."
"I legit think that peoples’ minds really do work that simplistically."
- Tripwire3
More Debilitatingly Depressing the Longer You Think About It
"Strangely enough, lobotomies were intended to be an alternative to keeping people in asylums for the rest of their lives, as when it was invented drug therapy wasn't quite there yet and most therapy was a padded cell for the rest of your life."
"Of course, lobotomies didn't actually cure the mental illness, it mostly made the recipient quiet and docile enough they could rot away in some side room for decades."
"This then became worse as it became more popular, being used to treat badly behaved children or 'easily excitable and hysteric prone' persons."
- Trapen1
Student Loan Trouble
"Federally funded student loans in the United States."
"They created a huge amount of money for colleges and a huge increase in demand for colleges. This led to catastrophic cost increases and a great deal of poor decision-making on the part of students."
- Throw13579
"Also the fact that you cannot get out of student debt by declaring bankruptcy is ludicrous."
- Tripwire3
More Access. More Problems
"Prohibition. alcoholism was a serious problem affecting the United States at the time, and it was indeed a gendered issue given the relationship between alcoholism and domestic violence."
"Of course, it just ended up leading to the growth of organized crime, violence, and oddly enough, more alcoholism."
- SweatCleansTheSuit
So Haunting
"Fritz Haber, the inventor of a process for synthesizing ammonia. He pulled billions out of starvation by leading the way for modern industrial farming. His process was also used for synthesizing chlorine gas which was used to kill millions."
- destroyer1134
Anti-Lower Prices
"Margaret Thatcher privatised much of the industry as it would encourage competition which would lead to lower pricing."
"The only problem now is many of the CEOs and companies realized that everyone needs the essentials and so jacked up the pricing of goods and services and have created a cost of living crisis and worse living standards since WW2."
- drfusterenstein
Success at What Cost?
"The creation of the Suez and Panama Canal."
"The Suez Canal’s building process went great."
"The Panama’s? Not so much. A lot of people died of disease, injury, and generally horrible conditions. This was during the beginning, before it was even America’s project, and was the French who were running it. And by the time it was completed by the Americans, WW1 was kicking off."
"Ferdinand De Lesseps was even imprisoned after his efforts, due to apparent mismanagement of funds, and lack of ability. And he was the one who built the Suez, and started Panama."
"A lot of work that just didn’t get appreciated. It’s been overlooked and taken for granted today, but is genuinely one of the most important feats of mining, architecture, and trade-route creation."
- IceColdCocaCola545
Always Overkill
"Oppenheimer creating the atomic bomb."
"For those who didn't watch the movie, Oppie intended to use the bomb against the nazis, but the project to create the bomb took too long and they ended up using it to kill the Japanese."
"In Oppie's view, the Japanese were already defeated, and using an atomic bomb was overkill. With the nazis, he viewed them as a bigger and more dangerous threat to the world."
"He ended up being haunted by this throughout his life. Despite the sides, war is always a b***h and the innocent are the ones who get f**ked over the most."
- DantethePunk
The Worst of Good Intentions
"I think all of the most egregious atrocities in history can be said to have this applied. Nothing is more dangerous than someone doing what they think is right."
"Most people don't set out with the intention to be evil, they typically have some idealistic vision wherein they believe their ends will justify their means. Like some have said, Pol Pot, Hitler, Mao, and Stalin. All these figures set out with the intention of making the world better in their eyes."
"The same could be said about early colonialism, anthropology, and eventually, the slave trade. The same goes for the forced assimilation of native populations in North America during colonization."
"Ultimately, the issue is being so certain once perspective is the only true one is what causes the problem. Religion is perhaps the most obvious and best example of this. Look at the crusades."
- d0rf47
It's haunting to think about the intentions and goals behind some of these historical moments, only for them to result in absolute, heartbreaking disaster.
It just goes to show, having good intentions doesn't make a bad situation any better. It only serves to make it more tragic.