Great thread D&C. I firmly believe that forgiveness is for the forgiver. I think you are right that forgiveness is often twisted in meaning to somehow let the people that hurt you off the hook, or somehow forgive and forget but I do not believe that. Forgiveness to me is freeing yourself from the pain that you have experienced by reconciling events, feeling the feelings and being able to gain clarity. I do not believe it is a must to heal although I do believe that healing can be more fulfilling when this takes place. Not everyone can or wants to forgive. We have all managed to "stew in our own *****" at some point. Sometimes we want to keep that pain fresh and alive for whatever reason until we get to a point where the pain is greater than we are willing to bear. I am terrible with grudges but there are a handful of things that even now gets me fired up.
Some people cant forgive or are to traumatized to forgive and thats ok. In a way some people forgive to easily, or forgive the bad person and beat themselves up for a long while. Forgiving oneself is very important.
Think about some of the bad things that have happened to us- how quickly have we taken the blame upon ourselves instead of the person that has harmed us? Forgiveness of oneself is as hard or even harder than forgiving a bad person.
The main point is imo forgiveness has almost nothing to do with the person who harmed you. They do not need to know you have done it, they are not owed forgiveness and its for your own benefit not theirs.