# Justice or Vengence **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [November 1, 2010, 10:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-or-vengence/559136 "2010-11-01T22:21:12Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![smileybastard](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b3f665/32.png) [@smileybastard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smileybastard)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2010, 5:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-or-vengence/559136/21 "2010-11-02T05:10:08Z")
> [@Blake](#): > > So your definition of justice doesn’t allow society to extract compensation or deter future acts? All that you require for justice is that the person is kept locked up? > > How is that just? It doesn’t require they lock him or her up. It requires they try to resolve the issues at hand. Try to help him rehabilitate. Locking someone up does not do that. > [@](#): > > How did you ascertain this? A person who has never had so much as a speeding ticket before, how did you ascertain that “obviously something is not right”? As with all these idealistic schemes, there’s a massive problem with the little detail of who decides these things. What are your grounds for saying that this man poses any risk at all to society? I didn’t ascertain this. It is my speculation. It would be an expert in psychology would would ascertain it. > [@](#): > > So you are seriously arguing that if stores could not prosecute people for shoplifting, the rate of shoplifting wouldn’t increase at all? That if anyone could grab any item off the shelf of any store and openly walk out of the store without paying for it with no penalty whatsoever, then the rate of shoplifting would remain exactly as it is now? You are also arguing that if it weren’t illegal to drive an unsafe vehicle, or drive drunk or any other act at all, then the rates of such crimes would not increase? I am not saying that nor am I suggesting that. Obviously without any repercussion it would increase. I guess what I really meant was > [@](#): > > If you honestly believe this then you are so far detached from reality that I doubt that anybody here will have much to discuss with you when it comes to justice. This idea that there is no deterrence doesn’t work is real Peter Pan stuff. You are certainly entitled to your opinion. May I ask what direct experience you have with the legal system? > [@](#): > > Once again, how can you believe this? If someone steals my car, and as a result I lose my $80, 000 a year job and spend a year looking for another, you don’t see how I can be helped by taking $80, 000 and the cost of a replacement car off the perpetrator? This currently happens all the time. Litigation is entirely a different matter. > [@](#): > > If you really don’t see how that is really going to help then once again, I doubt that anybody here will have much to discuss with you when it comes to justice. SO you are saying no one will debate me because my opinion differs from their’s? Hmmm. > [@](#): > > No, you spoke to one small aspect of it. Or don’t you believe that an ability to deter crime and an ability to compensate victims of crime protect society? Not believing in something is still speaking to it and as far as I know compensation is not part of sytem that deals with breaking laws. That would be litigation. > [@](#): > > That is somewhat scary How so? > [@](#): > > It’s surprising that someone over the age of 25 needs to see [this](http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1465-7295.1984.tb00703.x/abstract), but anyway. I have no access and am not going to pay for access for that. All the reports I have looked into have questionable methodology or assumptions, but for this one I can’t tell without access. > [@](#): > > So you seriously believe that when anybody at all can walk into any store in the country and walk out with whatever they like with no punishment at all, there would be no increase in theft? > > While I have heard such views expressed by young people before, it astounds me that someone could cling to such beliefs after the age of 25. It is just so obviously incorrect in addition to contradicting all the research and all the examples in world history. The very idea that you could remove all punishments for criminal activities and see no increase in criminal activity borders on lunacy. Again there are repercussions and I have not seen the evidence. > [@](#): > > No, I don’t misunderstand you. You said they would be locked up until they posed no threat. That is serving time. You may not like that, but that is the fact, and serving time is the correct descriptor. It is not serving time. Serving time is simply being locked up for a specific time as that is what is proscribed. I am talking about active rehabilitation with no set time. > [@](#): > > And you still didn’t answer the question. Since both men had the exact same motivations and will be rehabilitated at exactly the same time, why would one be locked up for longer? You are still looking at is as a set time. Current jails and prisons do really no rehabilitate. They lock people up until they have served their time. I am suggesting active rehabilitation until they are rehabilitated. > [@](#): > > Your belief that without any punishments at all for any crimes crime rates would not rise belies that claim. > > Your belief that victims of crime would gain nothing from being compensated for the losses caused by crime belies that claim. > > Your belief that punishing people for committing crimes does not reduce the arte of commission of crimes belies that. > > All those beliefs are just bizarre and they certainly don’t speak of even an intuitive understanding of the justice system. They simply differ from common opinions and that does not make them wrong. ---
**Author:** ![smileybastard](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b3f665/32.png) [@smileybastard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smileybastard)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2010, 5:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-or-vengence/559136/22 "2010-11-02T05:12:25Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > The point of “eye for an eye” in Hammurabi’s Code (later adopted into Mosaic Law) was to draw back from the punishment being WORSE than the crime. It was an eye for an eye instead of a life for an eye. It wasn’t amping punishments up, it was pulling them back and saying they should not be disproportionately _severe_. I see. I suggest simply doing more harm is not the best approach. I agree it is better that vigilante justice, feuds or killings that often proceeded it. ---
**Author:** ![Odesio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/odesio/32/20003_2.png) [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2010, 5:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-or-vengence/559136/23 "2010-11-02T05:35:39Z")
> [@smileybastard](#): > > Why must the punishment be doled out in proportion to the crime? From a philosophical standpoint fairness is the foundation of any concept of justice. (We may quibble about what is fair or unfair.) If something is unfair, then, by definition, it is not just. From a practical standpoint if the state is going to have a monopoly on criminal justice then it has a responsibility to ensure fairness. If it fails to do so there are several practical problems. #1: If punishment is overly lenient then people will lose confidence in the justice system and will start taking the law into their own hands. If I know the hypothetical murderer of my wife is likely to receive a sentence of only one or two years in prison then I will have no qualms about serving my own year or two in prison after I murder him. Worse yet, it might be easy to get a bunch of people in the neighborhood together to have a good old fashioned lynching. Moderators: I am not advocating vigilante justice nor do I advocate any form of extra-legal executions. I am simply illustrating a point. #2: If the punishment is overly harsh then people will lose confidence in the justice system and might just start ignoring all the laws. During Prohibition and the years leading up to it many juries simply refused to convict violators of the law because the punishment was so harsh for what they viewed as an innocuous activity. If someone was looking at 20 years for stealing bicycle I wouldn’t vote for a conviction no matter how damning the evidence was. I’m not sending someone to prison for that long for a relatively minor infraction. ---
**Author:** ![Blake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@Blake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blake)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2010, 6:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-or-vengence/559136/24 "2010-11-02T06:17:29Z")
> [@smileybastard](#): > > It doesn’t require they lock him or her up. It requires they try to resolve the issues at hand. Try to help him rehabilitate. Locking someone up does not do that. So in your system of Justice a man who murdered his wife wouldn’t be locked up, he wouldn’t be fined, he wouldn’t be asked to pay compensation. Again, I am waiting for you to explain in what way this is just to either the victim or her family and friends or society in general. > [@](#): > > I didn’t ascertain this. It is my speculation. It would be an expert in psychology would would ascertain it. And how would they do that? > [@](#): > > I am not saying that nor am I suggesting that. Obviously without any repercussion it would increase. I guess what I really meant was So you do believe that deterent punishment is an important function of the justice system. So you’ve already pulled back a hell of along way from your initial assertion that punishment isn’t part of an effective justice system. > [@](#): > > You are certainly entitled to your opinion. I didn’t make the statement o ascertain whether I was entitled to an opinion. I made the statement to gauge whether you had any concept of how your ideas would work out in real life. The answer appears to be “No”. > [@](#): > > This currently happens all the time. Litigation is entirely a different matter. So litigation isn’t a part of your justice system either? This gets better and better. No fines, no imprisonment, no compensation, no danger of being sued. Why exactly would people avoid committing crimes under your system? > [@](#): > > SO you are saying no one will debate me because my opinion differs from their’s? Hmmm. No, I am saying that it is impossible to debate someone when they won’t even agree on basic premises. You don’t believe that provision of compensation should be part of a justice system, you don’t believe that punishment should be part of it. You don’t believe that a man who murders his wife should be locked up or punished in any way. At this stage your concept of justice is so divergent from that of anyone else that debate becomes effectively impossible. > [@](#): > > Not believing in something is still speaking to it and as far as I know compensation is not part of sytem that deals with breaking laws. That would be litigation. So you really don’t believe that litiagtion is part of the justice system? > [@](#): > > How so? Because you have the vote. > [@](#): > > I have no access and am not going to pay for access for that. Not my problem if you can not do the research. > [@](#): > > All the reports I have looked into have questionable methodology or assumptions, but for this one I can’t tell without access. So all the reports disagree with you, and they all have questionable methodology. Well since you apparently have no evidence and I have it all, I guess that my case carries the debate, no? > [@](#): > > Again there are repercussions and I have not seen the evidence. I have shown you the evidence. How about you pony up the evidence that supports your position that removing all punishments has no effect on crime rates. I really would pay money to see that. > [@](#): > > It is not serving time. Serving time is simply being locked up for a specific time as that is what is proscribed. I am talking about active rehabilitation with no set time. Are they locked up or not? If they are locked up they are serving time > [@](#): > > You are still looking at is as a set time. Current jails and prisons do really no rehabilitate. They lock people up until they have served their time. I am suggesting active rehabilitation until they are rehabilitated. 1. No I am not looking at it as set time. I specifically said that. 2. Since both men have the exact same motivation and both will be rehabilitated at the same time, why will they not both be released on the same day? > [@](#): > > They simply differ from common opinions and that does not make them wrong. No, it is the contradiction of the evidence and the inability to support them with logical argument that makes them wrong. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2010, 11:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-or-vengence/559136/25 "2010-11-02T11:59:29Z")
> [@Blake](#): > > 1. You are using the word “justice” incorrectly. Justice is about doing what is just. In simplified terms that means assuring everybody gets what is coming to them. Keeping someone locked up until they are no longer a threat to society is not just in any sense of the word. To use the cliched example, imagine that a man who has been a model citizen all his life murders his unfaithful wife in a fit of passion when he walks in on her and her lover. That man would pose absolutely no threat to society the very second he finished killing his wife. None whatsoever. According to your concept of justice, the police should attend the scene, put the corpse in a body bag and let the man walk free. Can you lease explain to us how that would be just? Which brings us to the next massive flaw in your post What is missing from the OP are the concepts of making restitution for one’s actions and deterrent. The man who murders his wife may not be a threat to society (unless presumably he gets murdously angry at someone else), however he has permenantly wronged two people by killing them. How does he make restitution for that in any meaningful way? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-or-vengence/559136.md?page=1)