A Riff on Justice
In church this year, we have been cruising through the Old Testament, one book a week. Needless to say, we have broached the subject of justice more than once. The leader of our small group (Billy, I love you) dug into this, shedding light on how broad of a term justice can be. When different people are asked what justice means, they will take it in different directions, sometimes almost paradoxical directions.
A vivid example of this happens to be drawn on American political lines. One side points to justice as righteous judgment - consider the courts and the criminal justice system in general. On the other side of the line, justice is often thought of in the context of social justice - supporting, protecting, and advocating for the vulnerable. If someone from either group was asked if the other side of justice was fake or unnecessary, the answer would invariably be no. No one is claiming that the vulnerable shouldn’t be helped or that the criminal justice system shouldn’t exist; but each group finds the opposing side, as they see it, bloated and overgrown. Without considering Hanlon’s Razor, they consider it corrupt.
Those favoring righteousness want harsher punishments for lawbreakers. While vengeance may be part of this desire for punishment, there is an element of fairness that drives these thoughts. These people often think that if themselves or others obey the rules, everyone else should have to as well. Righteousness>compassion.
When social justice is the focus, the conversation often centers on giving to the needy or improving the social safety net. Fairness drives this as well. When we see billionaires flying private jets but the homeless sleeping in tents along the road, we cringe. Both groups cringe, but they each focus on different causes for these situations, and each group attributes varied amounts of autonomy to the disparate social groups. The often politically conservative/libertarian group applies high amounts of agency, of free will, to the homeless and the billionaire. While the politically liberal group assumes the homeless and billionaire each have less control: Elon Musk came from wealth and was almost “too big to fail.” Or: The systemic racism, generational trauma, and mental illness destroyed any chance the homeless individual had for success before he was even born.
The inverse of this would be the conservative folks sharing stories of people who succeeded against insurmountable odds or, less commonly, stories of those who had every reason to thrive yet floundered. While these stories would provide a helpful nuance, they seldom happen.
So we’ve already established that there isn’t one type of justice that is right while the other is wrong. But is one overdone while the other is neglected? Again, both sides would say yes.
Are we enabling folks and wasting taxpayer money through an overgrown social safety net? Maybe, but should money be our chief focus?
Or how can we punish someone for a crime when that is all they learned from their broken home while they were growing up? Then, practically, isn’t putting them in the prison system just setting them up to learn more maladaptive behavior and perpetuate the cycle? This is where the concept of providing rehabilitation rather than punishment stems from. Maybe punishment as a whole isn’t the answer. If only we can teach the offenders and provide adequate mental health care, then they will be rehabilitated, able to reintegrate into society.
The cynic in me lets out a deriding laugh and shakes my head. I’m disappointed in my response, but I know it stems from what I’ve seen working in mental health, the recidivism/relapse/revolving-door of care, the research showing that antisocial personality disorder and narcissistic personality disorder don’t really get better with treatments. In a somewhat hypocritical way, the conservative belief in free will and ability to change (and my own belief) seems to disappear when considering the plight of convicted criminals. In my attempt to rationalize this thought process, I wonder if their idealism was slowly ground down into oblivion by years of perceived lack of improvement in homelessness and the overcrowded jails. Perhaps if the media focused more on individual success stories and the real improvements in crime rates over the decades, there would be more hope in the general public. But sensationalized brokenness and injustice sells. More people will read about chaos in the streets than about a lady’s path from heroin and prostitution to having a home and a job.
Speaking of negativity, let’s switch gears to the topic of righteousness versus compassion. I use those two terms intentionally rather than pitting conservatives against liberals. You see, most people don’t see liberals and conservatives as compatible, especially as polarization has grown in the last couple decades. But before giving up on our political system and America in general, realize that America has been more polarized in the past, and we have overcome.
When righteousness and compassion are taken out of the context of this article, people would assume that righteousness and compassion are possible. But why can’t they be in the context of justice as well? I would argue that they are symbiotic or complementary; righteousness is most true, most moral, when it is acted out with compassion. This is best exemplified in a father’s love while disciplining their child. In my experience, I take an emotional hit when I discipline my daughter. I do my best to communicate that I am punishing my child because I want them to become a better person, to learn what is right and wrong. While I don’t spank my children, the old adage “this is hurting me more than it is hurting you” almost certainly carried immense truth for many parents. That is righteousness in the context of compassion.
But compassion has to be immersed in righteousness as well, in a righteous justice with healthy boundaries and expectations. Boundaries and expectations foster this growth; they are the difference between giving someone fish and teaching them to fish, between enabling and empowering. They put responsibility back on the person to better their own situation rather than just waiting for everyone to give them things. They can then grow from dependence to independence, from child to adult.
Unfortunately, this type of helping is more tedious, more complex. It requires getting involved in someone’s life. And this isn’t something most people, in or out of the church, think they have time for. They feel like they have the time or money to give financially to someone or some organization, but they don’t feel like they have the time to consistently volunteer with an organization or, heaven forbid, to foster or adopt a child. But what could be a better way of living out a righteous and compassionate justice? I’m in this camp. I’m too frightened, too lazy, too selfish to adopt a child.
So where am I going with all this? Maybe it’s a challenge to myself and others to ask ourselves how we are living these things out. Every chance I get, I want to fight the polarization in our country, especially when it is antagonistic and hate-filled. Chances are you are in one of two camps. Do you hate the woke social justice warriors? Or do you shake with anger at the “blue lives matter” OreGUNians? Consider the “other.” Reach deep down and dust off that rarely-used ball of empathy. Why do they believe the way they do? Rather than thinking about why they are wrong, think about why they care and who they care about? What does their ideal situation look like? Maybe they have a personal story that makes them so passionate - someone they love.
You have heard that it was said, 'Love your neighbor and hate your enemy. ' But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven.
Matthew 5:43-45