Blog #192--Inequality Prevents Justice

Many people ponder why there’s so little justice in this world. Some do receive rewards for a job well done. Some see their attackers punished. Some get back items stolen from them. Some receive handsome settlements from those who did them wrong. But many of us lament scales of justice which seem unbalanced.

Common dictionary definitions of the word "justice" are fairness and equality. Unfortunately, we all have difficulty agreeing on what is fair and what isn’t fair. It can be difficult to equate the harm done to us with the options for punishing offenders that are available to us under the law.

How do we compare a violent act with a monetary remuneration or jail time for the criminal? We are not comparing apples with apples, so whether we feel justice is served depends on our definition of the term and the degree to which we have been abused. And how can we ever add a precise value to emotional distress? After all, logic and emotions are opposites.

We may say we want to balance a crime with an equal response, but that may be impossible. Equality isn’t even considered by those who wish a punishment for their offender that is significantly worse than the original act. Instead of an eye for an eye, they may want an eye for 500 eyes. That certainly isn’t equality. Equality is also impossible for cases where crimes are influenced by our own biases.

For instance, if a poor person from an inner city environment commits a robbery to feed his family, he often receives a much harsher legal judgment than a hedge fund manager who misrepresents himself and absconds with the investments of 1000 people. The former may receive hard time in a maximum security prison, while the latter, with money to buy the best legal defense team and a favorable bias from most courts of law, may spend only a short time in a minimum security facility. Or, jail time might be avoided entirely.

If justice was served equally, the hedge fund manager would face as many counts of theft as the number of clients who lost money due to illegal acts. Jail time would be consecutive for each count, and it would also be in a maximum security prison with hardened criminals in adjacent cells. For example, if a person received a three year prison sentence for one count of robbery, the hedge fund manager should receive a sentence of 3000 years (3 years X 1000 clients).

The person in need of food for his family felt he had no choice, so he might have to do it again at some point if absolutely necessary regardless of the threat of punishment. But a lot of white collar financiers would think twice before stealing from others if they knew they would be jailed with those they fear most. That is, if justice was served equally and fairly for all concerned.

But white collar criminals, along with many courts of law, assume educated people can be rehabilitated and should get off easier than those who must survive harsh conditions. That may be true for some of them, but if there is no deterrent like the threat of major jail time, their crimes may continue unabated. If they are too big to be jailed, equality and justice are both impossible.

Domestic abuse situations have been in the news a lot lately, and with good reason. Men who hit or otherwise harm women are judged harshly by society, and their punishments can be severe, especially when accompanied by the long-term stigma of being an abuser of women. Men are often seen as the stronger of the two genders, so taking out their frustrations on females can produce injuries and even death. Society will not accept this, and rightfully so.

However, some women physically abuse men without reprisal. Most men won’t even admit to this problem, perhaps because they are embarrassed, and perhaps because they know they won’t receive sympathy from the public or courts. But when emotions well up inside, it matters not whether we are male or female. Eventually that pressure must be released.

I have never hit a woman, but I have had a woman slap me and another throw a cup of hot coffee at me. In both cases, a simple disagreement came at a difficult time, and both of us overreacted to the situation. A chain reaction of accusations and counteraccusations created a downward spiral. Neither woman wanted to harm me, but they reacted aggressively as their frustrations increased. I didn’t respond in kind, and the problems were resolved amicably after the pressure valve release.

But some women can become violent toward others. If there is equal justice under the law, shouldn’t they be held as responsible as men for harm caused? Even if a man appeals to a police department to help stop the violence, a number of these women will be judged less harshly than a man under the same situation. Equal treatment is unlikely if not impossible.

Equality is as difficult for the human ego to visualize as eternity or infinity. After all, our egos judge others based on what they like and dislike about themselves. We want to know if others are better or worse than us; we rarely if ever conclude we are exactly equal to someone else. We may wish to strive for that, but we continue to notice differences.

Matters are made worse by any justice system where lawyers and judges can’t always be trusted to understand let alone apply equality and fairness in all situations. Political, religious and other biases, financial kickbacks and other self-serving agendas interfere with justice and can prevent it intentionally. It is rare indeed to find judges who can apply all legal decisions fairly and impartially since they are as governed by their egos as those they are judging. Even if they want true fairness, their own knowledge of how the world works may prevent it at times.

Balancing the scales of justice is possible but difficult within one lifetime. Many of us will go to our graves convinced we have been slighted or others favored over us. But there are philosophies of living that can help us heal our wounds. Some do it by assuming a supreme being will reward righteousness and punish criminals in the afterlife. Some do it by believing we live many lives and can experience a balancing of our karma eventually. A rare few live in the Here and Now where everyone and everything exists simultaneously, where both the insult and the remedy are mere reflections of the whole and create no imbalance.

Many of us will remain bitter and confused as we proceed through our lives, convinced we have been treated unfairly or not given our just rewards for excellence. If that is your choice, then I wish you the best of luck tolerating the emotional pain it brings. But if you are looking for a more positive alternative, accept you may not receive an exactly equal balancing of an injustice done to you and consider your alternatives.

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