by Lord Serious
Justice cannot be arrested by law. Justice cannot be confined to any statute. Whenever lawmakers attempt to codify justice, justice ceases to exist. The framers thought they captured it in the constitution, but that is no justice. That is only the imitation of justice. The narrow scope of the law is only a cheap replica of what lawmakers think justice should be. Do these man made laws truly serve the greater good? If so, then why do these public safety policies result in disparate treatment that makes disadvantage groups feel unsafe? When the law being implemented in the interest of justice serves only special interest; these laws aren’t just, they’re just the law.
Justice is an art, the law is a science. One is abstract and infinite while the other concrete and finite. It is justice that established the four seasons and equally divided time between day and night. It is the law that caused global warming and decides daylight savings time. The law’s limitation is that it can only impose penalties. But justice is boundless in its ability to grant rewards. The nature of law is to discriminate. But justice will befriend an enemy, because it’s nature is to be indiscriminate. The law can be used to condemn and incriminate the innocent. Justice has fulfilled its purpose when it redeems and liberates the guilty.
The criminal justice system is a system of laws governing institutions to punish those who have violated the law. This system is so structured that it has an inherent bias towards the social conditions of the impoverished. Those who are being marginalized and excluded from mainstream society are disproportionately underemployed. They disproportionately suffer from mental health issues. Furthermore, their environmental conditions disproportionately exposes them to traumatic experiences within their homes and in their community.
As a direct result of these conditions, a major disparity exists between which socioeconomic class receives heavy scrutiny under the law and which receives a slap on the wrist. There are disparities in how the law penalizes the white collar and corporate crimes predominantly committed by the upper class. Versus how the law punishes the property crime, substance abuse, and violent crimes that are caused by poverty. Justice will always correct imbalance wherever it may exist. But the laws inhibit justice, because they are what cause the imbalances within this society to increase: the wage gap, the shrinking middle class, the opioid crisis. All of these social conditions are symptoms of the larger class conflict. These are the effects caused by laws that reflect the predatory behavior of the capitalist elite.
It is the law that permits the capitalist elite to cause an economic crisis that disproportionately harms middle class and lower class Americans. Increasing layoffs and unemployment nationwide. It is the law that provides government bailouts to the wealthy, but provides no relief to the member of the middle class facing foreclosure. It is the law that allows the institutional investor to buy these single family homes for pennies on the dollar and gentrify impoverished neighborhoods. Then put these properties back on the rental market and raise rent on the underprivileged. It is the law that permits the increase of evictions and then passes new laws to ban homeless encampments.
For this system to be just, it must stop punishing its citizens for being victimized by the very social conditions the laws create. Until lawmakers see those of us on the bottom of the social hierarchy, the laws will continue to protect the capital interest of their donors and special interest groups. Until legislators open their eyes to the social disorder being caused by the predatory behavior of the upper class, the law will continue to be wielded as a weapon to criminalize every member of the American underclass who accepts defeat. The law imposes retribution and it demands deterrence, but justice repairs harm and it restores balance. Laws penalizing those responsible for structuring this society in a way that causes the conditions influencing criminal behavior do not exist and they never will. These conditions are only allowed to exist, because there is no justice in the law.
P.E.A.C.E
Proper Education Always Corrects Error
Lord Serious Hakim Allah
(aka James Boughton # 1404741)
Lawrenceville Correctional Center
Brilliance Behind Bars 