…”like zoning commissions, and therefore, I cannot quite see what you are envisioning.”
Right. I am not envisioning anything that would fix the ‘system’ at this point. That would be like looking at the code underlying MicroSoft Word and trying to adapt it to holographic virtual interaction. I am trying to look at the underlying assumptions to find some clarity. I am wondering if we are at a period in time when the old assumptions about how to build a system are even adequate.
When we see extreme social upheaval, it is usually based on the some element of the librea of justice as I have juxta-positioned them becoming out of whack.
Problems? For example: The social upheaval of Watts in 1965 exploded in a chaotic violent demonstration of anger and frustration. It was sparked by the routine arrest of a drunk driver. Obviously we should look further than that scenario to understand the event. Where as, there were complex and multiple reasons to explain the behavior of the individuals involved, there were also some underlying conditions that enculturated the event.
It was a general sense of living in an oppressive and unjust culture that entitled victims to force a change, even at the violent and chaotic level of anarchy. So, from their point of view violence, looting, and marauding through town, looking for ways to satisfy their frustration became ‘justified.’ Was it? It can be justified via our current understanding of justice, which may have begun with things like throwing tea overboard.
The most common justification of violence and abuse used by people who are jailed is, “I was right, the other was wrong, so I had to slug’em or what ever.” Often times, as in the Watts Riot, the abusers are reacting to victim hood. Victim hood by definition entitles people to ‘get even’.
Our system has come to represent entitlements that shift from group to group or cause to cause. Why? Because of the way we define liberty and justice… which systematically does not end up being ‘for all.’
If it were ‘just for all,’ then one person’s issues would not impose on the freedoms or the just coexistence of another individual or group.
So….
I am NOT trying, at this point, to look at how the system operates, or what it would take to fix it. We recognize the unfixableness of our justice system… right?
At this point I only want to explore the underlying assumptions. I have tried to redefine Freedom in a way that is holistic and just…at least at the conceptual level, if this definition was underlying our human endeavors, I do not see how anyone could feel that it wasn’t just for all. In otherwords “With Liberty and Justice for All” is a nice goal but needs some definition. |
