Philosophy Discussion Forums | A Humans-Only Club for Open-Minded Discussion & Debate

[Stoppelmann]

Are you equating the machinations of the formal Justice system with vengeance?

I am assuming that the machinations of the formal Justice system developed from vengeance, and is the civilised form of retribution, which now doesn't trouble our conscience as much as previous methods of retribution.

[LuckyR]

Are you equating the machinations of the formal Justice system with vengeance?

I am assuming that the machinations of the formal Justice system developed from vengeance, and is the civilised form of retribution, which now doesn't trouble our conscience as much as previous methods of retribution.

I don't doubt your explanation of the origins of the justice system, though for the sake of accurate communication many, if not most currently use the word vengeance to specifically describe actions outside of the justice system.

[Stoppelmann]

I don't doubt your explanation of the origins of the justice system, though for the sake of accurate communication many, if not most currently use the word vengeance to specifically describe actions outside of the justice system.

Is there a problem with mentioning this side of justice, especially when I see an advocate for execution in America say in a documentary that he feels that the death penalty should also be painful? This is an act of retribution above and beyond the word of the law, which simply requires the loss of life, and yet there are those who are not prevented from doing this.

I also mentioned in my previous post that we have changed our ways towards retribution, which I said was barbaric, through a process that became increasingly lenient to the point where some victims or families of victims have questioned the justice done. The number of films that have been produced about vigilantes and were popular suggests that vengeance is still regarded as justice by many.

If it is important, I don't. I feel the rush of anger at some crimes, but I feel that we must have a justice system that is above such emotions.

[LuckyR]

I don't doubt your explanation of the origins of the justice system, though for the sake of accurate communication many, if not most currently use the word vengeance to specifically describe actions outside of the justice system.

Is there a problem with mentioning this side of justice, especially when I see an advocate for execution in America say in a documentary that he feels that the death penalty should also be painful? This is an act of retribution above and beyond the word of the law, which simply requires the loss of life, and yet there are those who are not prevented from doing this.

I also mentioned in my previous post that we have changed our ways towards retribution, which I said was barbaric, through a process that became increasingly lenient to the point where some victims or families of victims have questioned the justice done. The number of films that have been produced about vigilantes and were popular suggests that vengeance is still regarded as justice by many.

If it is important, I don't. I feel the rush of anger at some crimes, but I feel that we must have a justice system that is above such emotions.

Each of your comments is true. And your topic of citizens requesting the justice system to go beyond the letter of the law does (in my opinion) cross the line, philosophically, into the realm of vengeance. Something I don't believe has been touched upon previously in the thread.

[Pattern-chaser]

Is there a problem with mentioning this side of justice, especially when I see an advocate for execution in America say in a documentary that he feels that the death penalty should also be painful? This is an act of retribution above and beyond the word of the law, which simply requires the loss of life, and yet there are those who are not prevented from doing this.

Yes, but isn't it the case that the aim(s) of our law-enforcement are not explicitly described or agreed? Some assume vengeance, others assume rehabilitation, but I am not aware of these purposes having been agreed or set down anywhere. Are you?

[Stoppelmann]

Is there a problem with mentioning this side of justice, especially when I see an advocate for execution in America say in a documentary that he feels that the death penalty should also be painful? This is an act of retribution above and beyond the word of the law, which simply requires the loss of life, and yet there are those who are not prevented from doing this.

Yes, but isn't it the case that the aim(s) of our law-enforcement are not explicitly described or agreed? Some assume vengeance, others assume rehabilitation, but I am not aware of these purposes having been agreed or set down anywhere. Are you?

It is one thing to formulate the law and another to enforce it, as we see in several western countries, and not only in authoritarian regimes. If people are allowed to get away with interpreting the law more drastically than intended, the formulation is perhaps not clear, but in some cases it may be intended to have loopholes. Those responsible for the death penalty in the documentary were quite sure they were within their rights to prevent the criminal having a painless death.

[Pattern-chaser]

Is there a problem with mentioning this side of justice, especially when I see an advocate for execution in America say in a documentary that he feels that the death penalty should also be painful? This is an act of retribution above and beyond the word of the law, which simply requires the loss of life, and yet there are those who are not prevented from doing this.

Yes, but isn't it the case that the aim(s) of our law-enforcement are not explicitly described or agreed? Some assume vengeance, others assume rehabilitation, but I am not aware of these purposes having been agreed or set down anywhere. Are you?

It is one thing to formulate the law and another to enforce it, as we see in several western countries, and not only in authoritarian regimes. If people are allowed to get away with interpreting the law more drastically than intended, the formulation is perhaps not clear, but in some cases it may be intended to have loopholes. Those responsible for the death penalty in the documentary were quite sure they were within their rights to prevent the criminal having a painless death.

I don't dispute what you have written, but I do observe that it does not answer the questions I asked; it doesn't even come close. So,

Isn't it the case that the aim(s) of our law-enforcement are not explicitly described or agreed?

Some assume vengeance, others assume rehabilitation, but I am not aware of these purposes having been agreed or set down anywhere. Are you?

[Stoppelmann]

Is there a problem with mentioning this side of justice, especially when I see an advocate for execution in America say in a documentary that he feels that the death penalty should also be painful? This is an act of retribution above and beyond the word of the law, which simply requires the loss of life, and yet there are those who are not prevented from doing this.

Yes, but isn't it the case that the aim(s) of our law-enforcement are not explicitly described or agreed? Some assume vengeance, others assume rehabilitation, but I am not aware of these purposes having been agreed or set down anywhere. Are you?

It is one thing to formulate the law and another to enforce it, as we see in several western countries, and not only in authoritarian regimes. If people are allowed to get away with interpreting the law more drastically than intended, the formulation is perhaps not clear, but in some cases it may be intended to have loopholes. Those responsible for the death penalty in the documentary were quite sure they were within their rights to prevent the criminal having a painless death.

I don't dispute what you have written, but I do observe that it does not answer the questions I asked; it doesn't even come close. So,

Isn't it the case that the aim(s) of our law-enforcement are not explicitly described or agreed?

Some assume vengeance, others assume rehabilitation, but I am not aware of these purposes having been agreed or set down anywhere. Are you?

I'll reformulate your question: "Is it the case that the aim(s) of our law-enforcement are explicitly described or agreed?"
Answer: In theory, yes. In practice, I'm not so sure. We are seeing a breakdown in expected moral standards of the police, so that the Metropolitan Police Force, for example, seems inherently corrupt and incapable. There is a whole range of problems in many countries with racism, misogyny, brutality and even rape by police officers.

Second answer: The UK police force is organised around two legal entities: the ‘Office of Constable’ and the police force. Police officers (no matter their rank) each individually hold the Office of Constable. The Office of Constable grants them powers to detect, prevent and investigate crime.

When police are required to use force to achieve a lawful objective, such as making a lawful arrest, acting in self-defence or protecting others, all force used must be reasonable in the circumstances. Use of force by police officers can result in judicial proceedings in both the criminal and civil courts.

The Criminal Law Act 1967, the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 and common law apply to all uses of force by the police and require that any use of force should be ‘reasonable’ in the circumstances. Reasonable in these circumstances means: absolutely necessary for a purpose permitted by law.
(https://www.college.police.uk/app/armed ... -framework)

It sounds like it is a bit open to interpretation.

[Pattern-chaser]

I'll reformulate your question: "Is it the case that the aim(s) of our law-enforcement are explicitly described or agreed?"
Answer: In theory, yes. In practice, I'm not so sure. We are seeing a breakdown in expected moral standards of the police, so that the Metropolitan Police Force, for example, seems inherently corrupt and incapable. There is a whole range of problems in many countries with racism, misogyny, brutality and even rape by police officers.

Excuse me; I am a fool. The question I posed was mis-worded. I meant to aim at the penalties/consequences dispensed by courts to those they find guilty, not the earlier parts of our law-enforcement processes. <blush>

I meant to ask if the purpose of these penalties (for law-breaking) is agreed or set down in writing anywhere? Is it our intention to aim for rehabilitation? Vengeance? Restitution? The protection of potential victims not yet harmed? ...

[Eckhart Aurelius Hughes]

I think the stories in my book Justice: A Novella obliterate the utterly false idea that any of the following three things are remotely one in the same, or even have any significant overlap:

(1) morality/"justice", or other superstitions

(2) vengeance

(3) the laws issued by violent governments and/or the lawful violent enforcement of those laws, be it by police, detectives, courts, prison guards or other government agents


Martin Luther King was arrested 29 times. Hitler was democratically elected. Most of our favorite criminals (e.g. Socrates, Jesus, etc.) were legally executed by their government. It's not ancient history; Martin Luther King wouldn't even be 100 years old if he was still alive. There's presumably members of these forums who were born before Martin Luther King was born. Not just before he died, but before he was even born.

Laws just represent the violent dictates of the violent ones issuing the decrees. Each one's purpose is as superficially varied and fundamentally the same as all coercive human dictates and acts of violence: self-interest, mostly in the form of selfishness.

Falsely, conflating 'vengeance' with 'justice' is a strawman, and so is conflating the violence ordered by the powers that be as being either 'vengeance' or 'justice'.

Greedy self-interested violence is simply greedy self-interested violence. Even when it's also superstitious (e.g. burning a witch at a stake), it's still fundamentally greedy self-interested violence. Some burn witches at the stake because they are honestly truly think it will keep them safer from real live magic by real live witch's; others dishonestly use the superstition for selfish reasons, but bother are self-serving acts of violence. The truly superstitious, while dangerous, are too incompetent to steer big government and big business and entire series of witch trials. The ones really deciding who burns at the stake as a witch are just as selfish and greedy and violent, but they also tend to be more dishonest and less truly superstitious. For example, the master's don't themselves tend to actually believe in what Nietzsche referred to as 'slave morality', even if they pretend to.

It's no less true in the contemporary than it is in the historical. (Granted, calling things like Nazism and the jailing of Gandhi and Martin Luther King historical is a huge overstatement since they were so very recent.)

Today, in the USA at least, most inmates are not even accused of committing an act of violence. They are in jail or prison accused only of things like smoking marijuana on their own private property. It's no more a matter of vengeance or 'justice' (whatever that means) then legally burning witches at the stake or legally executing pacifists for committing non-violent consensual crimes.

The existence of victimless crimes is not a bug; it's a feature. It's never not been the case since Kings, Queens, and other big and/or non-local governments first formed. Even now, the royal family in England is sitting on piles of violently stolen wealth. Rich mob bosses and such can pay to violently protect their violently stolen goods, and that's essentially all a law or law-enforcer is. A mob boss declares someone (or something) untouchable, and if you touch the declared untouchable thing, his armed enforced kill you, or maybe just break your legs. It's something and it exists, but it's not vengeance. And it's not 'justice', which presumably doesn't even exist and is just superstition.

Voltaire's words as just as true today as they were in his day, and for thousands of years before that, "The art of government consists of taking as much money as possible from one class of citizens to give to another."

How might we infer the objective of a so-called "law enforcement" agency or other militant group armed fighters if they went to the royal family in England and took back all the stolen goods and then shoved the royal family into a coal mine to do some real labor? Would it be different or the same as the current objective of the "law enforcement" in England now, or the ones who legally raped people in times past? It's something and it exists, but it's not vengeance. And it's definitely not 'justice', because unlike justice and morality, it actually exists. The legal murders, legal rapes, and other similar legal non-defensive exist; not as a bug of big government, but as a feature, a defining feature.

Perhaps many people just like to makeup all sorts of misnomers for non-defensive violence so they don't have to call it what it simply is. Instead of calling a murder or rape by its correct simply true name, one can confusingly mislabel it with a label that refers to some irrelevant superstition (e.g. "justice") or give it simply an incorrect label (e.g. "vengeance"). It's absurd, of course. Throwing a pacifist in prison is not vengeance. Legal martial rape wasn't legal for the sake of vengeance. The profitable invasion of America by the Europeans and the raping and murder of the natives by the invading European monarchies that took place during that invasion was not a matter of vengeance. Gandhi wasn't jailed by England's government as vengeance.

Follow the money. Humans aren't that complicated. They are often superstitious, they are even more often dishonest, and they are even more often than that simply selfish. Most are all three, some even more than others. But they aren't that complicated.

For more on those ideas, here are some related topics of mine:

Who is your favorite criminal from history?

Macro-Criminalization of Consensual Crimes [a.k.a. Non-Violent Victimless Crimes]

Did Martin Luther King consent to being arrested and jailed?

Paid enforcers only have literal blood on their hands.

Pirates and Emperors: Does size matter?

Henry David Thoreau, Martin Luther King... and the imprisonment of pacifists



As for this topic, let's remember, it's simply about vengeance. It's not about 'justice'/morality or other similar superstitions, and it's not about governments and their laws which tend to have absolutely nothing to do with vengeance.

I already have plenty of topics about those other topics.


Thank you,
Scott

[Stoppelmann]

Excuse me; I am a fool. The question I posed was mis-worded. I meant to aim at the penalties/consequences dispensed by courts to those they find guilty, not the earlier parts of our law-enforcement processes. <blush>

I meant to ask if the purpose of these penalties (for law-breaking) is agreed or set down in writing anywhere? Is it our intention to aim for rehabilitation? Vengeance? Restitution? The protection of potential victims not yet harmed? ...

First things first: You are anything but a fool!

I think we can see that in some ways, we in Europe live in a completely different concept of justice than in America. In other ways it is very similar, and still, we grew out of an idea of vengeance for perceived injustice and attempted to formulate a system of justice by first of all limiting the spread of weapons, the gathering of which was fundamental, and the only people allowed to use weapons were the police. This has had an obvious advantage, and if you compare the number of gun-related crimes in America and any other Western nation, especially Europe, you see a vast difference.

The second development was to encourage trust towards the police force, and in England (as in several other states), we had for a while the “friend and helper” myth, which was soon lost, and it was clear that corruption was difficult to contain. However, in view of the desperate situation in jails in many Latin-American countries, but also in America, an attempt to prevent similar development was made by aiming for rehabilitation, although this began early, and the British penal system underwent a transition from harsh punishment to reform, education, and training for post-prison livelihoods. Of course, the reforms were controversial and contested. In 1877–1914 era a series of major legislative reforms were intended to create significant improvement in the penal system.

Like I said earlier, there is still a deep and emotionally grounded desire for the punishment to fit the crime, and the idea of vengeance is still in the minds of many. The lack of trust in the justice system is the first step towards anarchy, and for gun-toting Americans, it may seem to be an alternative, but would fall quickly back into retributive action, as we already see in way criminal organisations like the Mafia have interpreted justice. We have, of course, clans growing in European cities, and they are responsible for some of the harshest crimes, including retribution in the case of an assumed betrayal, but at present the laws prevent them from legally having an arsenal with which they could be a threat to the state.

It is a sign of a deterioration of civil order when people actively oppose the justice system, but in America it may be that it is not as obvious as in Europe. The return to vengeance instead of a justice system, in which the attempt is made to rehabilitate people who haven’t committed violent crime, would be the collapse of social cohesion and could fall into a free-for-all, with many victims. It would also be an invitation for authoritarian powers to use this as an advantage in the attempt to undermine any liberal society, including the diversity of rights that we have obtained.

[Pattern-chaser]

Excuse me; I am a fool. The question I posed was mis-worded. I meant to aim at the penalties/consequences dispensed by courts to those they find guilty, not the earlier parts of our law-enforcement processes. <blush>

I meant to ask if the purpose of these penalties (for law-breaking) is agreed or set down in writing anywhere? Is it our intention to aim for rehabilitation? Vengeance? Restitution? The protection of potential victims not yet harmed? ...

First things first: You are anything but a fool!

I think we can see that in some ways, we in Europe live in a completely different concept of justice than in America. In other ways it is very similar, and still, we grew out of an idea of vengeance for perceived injustice and attempted to formulate a system of justice by first of all limiting the spread of weapons, the gathering of which was fundamental, and the only people allowed to use weapons were the police. This has had an obvious advantage, and if you compare the number of gun-related crimes in America and any other Western nation, especially Europe, you see a vast difference.

The second development was to encourage trust towards the police force, and in England (as in several other states), we had for a while the “friend and helper” myth, which was soon lost, and it was clear that corruption was difficult to contain. However, in view of the desperate situation in jails in many Latin-American countries, but also in America, an attempt to prevent similar development was made by aiming for rehabilitation, although this began early, and the British penal system underwent a transition from harsh punishment to reform, education, and training for post-prison livelihoods. Of course, the reforms were controversial and contested. In 1877–1914 era a series of major legislative reforms were intended to create significant improvement in the penal system.

Like I said earlier, there is still a deep and emotionally grounded desire for the punishment to fit the crime, and the idea of vengeance is still in the minds of many. The lack of trust in the justice system is the first step towards anarchy, and for gun-toting Americans, it may seem to be an alternative, but would fall quickly back into retributive action, as we already see in way criminal organisations like the Mafia have interpreted justice. We have, of course, clans growing in European cities, and they are responsible for some of the harshest crimes, including retribution in the case of an assumed betrayal, but at present the laws prevent them from legally having an arsenal with which they could be a threat to the state.

It is a sign of a deterioration of civil order when people actively oppose the justice system, but in America it may be that it is not as obvious as in Europe. The return to vengeance instead of a justice system, in which the attempt is made to rehabilitate people who haven’t committed violent crime, would be the collapse of social cohesion and could fall into a free-for-all, with many victims. It would also be an invitation for authoritarian powers to use this as an advantage in the attempt to undermine any liberal society, including the diversity of rights that we have obtained.

I think we agree. We have laws, and these laws lay down consequences for those who break them. The intended purpose of these consequences is not written down, and not clear. I agree with you, that it seems to have begun as vengeance, but these days, it remains unclear if this is still the reason, or if other aims have been added or substituted.

It is my opinion that the biggest improvement we could make to our legal systems is to explicitly state what the intended purpose of prison, for example, is.

[Stoppelmann]

I think we agree. We have laws, and these laws lay down consequences for those who break them. The intended purpose of these consequences is not written down, and not clear. I agree with you, that it seems to have begun as vengeance, but these days, it remains unclear if this is still the reason, or if other aims have been added or substituted.

It is my opinion that the biggest improvement we could make to our legal systems is to explicitly state what the intended purpose of prison, for example, is.

We do agree, especially on the last point you made. The strange thing is that in institutions where we protect people, the intention is often named and checked in inspections. It would make sense in the legal area as well.

[Leontiskos]

I think we agree. We have laws, and these laws lay down consequences for those who break them. The intended purpose of these consequences is not written down, and not clear. I agree with you, that it seems to have begun as vengeance, but these days, it remains unclear if this is still the reason, or if other aims have been added or substituted.

It is my opinion that the biggest improvement we could make to our legal systems is to explicitly state what the intended purpose of prison, for example, is.

The trouble is that there are different and competing moral theories used to explain law, and law is in one sense a natural phenomenon rather than a merely positive phenomenon. Law is not a fully rationally transparent construction. It is an amorphous amalgamation of historical human governance.

Yet vengeance, properly defined, is an essential part of law and justice. I might recommend C.S. Lewis' famous essay, "The Humanitarian Theory of Punishment." *

* http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/journals/ResJud/1954/30.pdf

[Stoppelmann]

The trouble is that there are different and competing moral theories used to explain law, and law is in one sense a natural phenomenon rather than a merely positive phenomenon. Law is not a fully rationally transparent construction. It is an amorphous amalgamation of historical human governance.

Yet vengeance, properly defined, is an essential part of law and justice. I might recommend C.S. Lewis' famous essay, "The Humanitarian Theory of Punishment." *

* http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/journals/ResJud/1954/30.pdf

Reading what Lewis has to say is really interesting, and the fact that the criminal is no longer punished for what he morally “deserves,” (retributive justice) because he should have known better, which is judged by someone who interprets the law, instead his punishment is a deterrent, making him an example for others or a means to an end. Or his punishment is a means to “cure” him (or her) of a supposed disorder is truly a change to what was initially intended. It shifts the expertise from the judge to a psychologist or psychiatrist, and lumps the criminal together with infants, imbeciles, and domestic animals, who do not know better, instead of being seen a human being who behaved erroneously and to the detriment of society.

Lewis makes the point that such measures make his punishment morally questionable, if there is no question of him “deserving” it, because he, as a fully responsible human being, should have known better. And, as we have sometimes had reason to ask, is making someone an example and a deterrent for others dependant upon them having committed the crime? We have had reason to ask when the evidence was flimsy, but a racial or political bias apparent, or the police were looking for a quick conclusion of the investigation and excessive sentences were issued.
Thank you, it is an important aspect.