As I touched on in the above dialogue, a very pressing issue in American today concerns politician – created laws and their effect upon the poor.

    In ancient Athens, one could have slaves and women were property. This seems very unjust in America today, but those were different times. To most foreign first world countries, capital punishment is considered to be grossly unjust, but not to most Americans. Thus, one begins to see that laws have less to do with morals and more to do with their relevance to the particular society, culture and history. For example, in Iran or Afghanistan if a woman wears shorts and has premarital sex she is considered a criminal, but this is not the case in America and Europe. Hence, I might decide, “well, I guess being a criminal doesn’t have any real or moral or ethical status”. But, then I must ask myself, “How do I know what is right and wrong?” I might answer, “murder is wrong”, but how do I know it is wrong? Is it just because I have been told it is wrong? Soldiers and Law Enforcement agents murder millions of men, women and children – and are given medals for doing the murders, as well as pensions.

    Obviously, other societies with different laws think that their laws are right and good, but since I might not agree, I have to admit – as a reasonable man – that perhaps my notions of right and wrong are just as ungrounded as other peoples are. And so, my conclusion might be that “there is no universal good or bad, and it is unreasonable for me to pass judgment on others since I do not even know why I have the ethics I do”.

    But, what if I then ask “what about a society where it is permissible to cut off the hands of little children under the age of five?” Or, “what about a society that finds no ethical dilemma with punishing the poor because they are poor?” “What about a society where the laws only server the wealthy?” “Are all morals relative?” Is the notion of justice only an illusion?”

    Socrates, Plato, or Aristotle would not have a problem with these issues, but the ancient Greeks did not have a conception of history quite like we do. Questions of these kind lead one reasonably to conclude, as I did in the preceding dialogue that the laws should only restrict people from hurting others and should intrude as little as possible on the individual’s life for the reason that the laws written by rich politicians and lawyers cannot possible know what is the good life for the under-class and working poor. The laws must intrude only where one has harmed another [which is clearly not good for the victim]. Practically speaking, we must as a free society agree that we cannot drive our cars over other people’s children, but if we want to spend out time worshipping a snake god and consuming hallucinogenic mushrooms, that’s our business.

    Perhaps some readers might want to ask Roland and Tim, “Since most people in America are not employed by the Justice System [more precisely speaking – the Injustice System], why do they permit this ‘evil’ system to continue?”  One indication might be taken from Roland’s statement, “It’s as if scales are falling from my eyes, Tim!”— the inference being that Americans permit this system to continue because they don’t know how bad it really is, and have not considered the moral implications of targeting the under-class for “punishment”.

1.    Deterrent
2.    Revenge
3. Punishment
4. Making society safe
5.    Upholding the laws

I believe that Roland and Tim argue convincingly for the fact that victimless “crimes” do not satisfy numbers 2 and 4 since there are no victims and they aren’t a threat to society to begin with—but what other reasons might be argued for number 4? A common logical fallacy [something which sounds right but is in fact bad reasoning] is employed by politicians who are “getting tough on crime”, or in the media to feed a general hysteria about crime, namely that drug use and crime “go hand in hand”. This [goes this argument] even if a drug user isn’t a violent offender today, one days he/she will be. Here is the basic underlying argument:

Premise One: Group #1: we find that violent offenders often use drugs or have used drugs.
Premise Two: Group #2: We also find a group of people who just use drugs, but aren’t violent offenders.

Premise Three: If you are in group #2, you are the pool from which group #1 comes.

Conclusion: Therefore, all drug users are potential violent offenders.

    Even if we reasonably agree – for the sake of the argument – that premises one and two are correct, the error is revealed in premise three and the conclusion. This fallacy [which the politicians employ] is called “AFFIRMING THE CONSEQUENT”. Any argument of the following form is unsound, IF A, THEN B; B, THEREFORE A. This fallacy is what logicians call a non-sequitur [Latin meaning: “it does not follow”]. Hence, this argument is wrong:

•    If you are violent offender, you do or have used drugs.
•    Roland uses drugs.
•    Therefore, Roland is, or will be a violent offender.

The truth, of course, is that while past behavior might point to a generality, it is not predictive of the future.

So even if we agree with the first two statements, we are in no way impelled to say that the conclusion is true. It is faulty reasoning, but unfortunately many people believe it to be a good argument. Thus, many politicians argue that even if Roland just does drugs by himself in the privacy of his home, one day sooner or later Roland will go crazy on drugs and shoot people so they may as well lock him up now [and throw away the key]. This of course does not follow, since you would have to prove a necessary connection between drug use and violence. In reality, the only logical correlation is the environment that drug deals operate in, which is caused by drugs being illegal – hence the problem [drug-related-violence] has been created – manufactured – by the politicians – lawyers who write the laws. If you remove the laws criminalizing drug use, then the violence would end. This logic is inescapable.

In my dialogue, it was argued that the system was evil – and yet, most people support it! Obviously, America being the most violent first world country with the most citizens in prison demonstrate that putting the poor in cages does nothing to deter crime. In Europe, very few offenses will get more than a year and it is rare even for a murderer to spend a lifetime behind bars. However, this does not mean that Europe is run amuck with murderers and drug users! As a matter of fact, the murder rate in Europe is negligible compared to America’s! Therefore, for non-violent offenses, we might agree that #1 – deterrent –cannot be argued for and #2 and #4 [revenge and making society safe] also cannot be argued for. That leaves us with #3 – punishment – and #5 – upholding the laws.

As for #5, many argue that the law will never be convenient for poor people, the point being that we each give up some of our personal freedom to live in a stable society. Without laws [the argument goes] anarchy would be the norm – hence even if the laws are unfair and evil for the under-class, it is more important to uphold the laws than that the poor receive justice, because stability is more important to society “contributing members”. On point to this effect, Plato in his masterpiece REPUBLIC argues that politicians should lie to the populace to keep them “in their places” in order for the society to be well-functioning. And in a similar vein, the British philosopher and political
theorist, Thomas Hobbes, in his masterpiece LEVIATHAN, argues that our personal natures are so selfish and “brutish” that without a strict government the poor would kill one another. To many people the idea that the majority under-class is subject to the laws written by the lawyers and politicians for benefit of the middle and upper classes provide a sense of stability in a society where the under-class are so many and varied in numbers.

    Nevertheless, even if one agreed that some kind of laws are necessary – which of course I do agree to—one can still argue that if the laws are not fair and just to everyone then it cannot really be stabilizing – instead, as has happened to America’s poor, the laws have become a real threat to life and limb. If the upper-class are the only ones really protected by the laws, then stability in America is a pipe-dream that one day must evaporate when the majority under-class wake up.

And what about #3 – punishment? I think this is the most peculiar aspect of America’s love for prisons. Even though most Americans don’t work in the criminal injustice system [and thus have no economic reason to support it] they seem to love to think about the poor being punished. My idea about this is that poor “criminals” become the focus of externalization of negative internal anxiety on the parts of the middle and upper classes. What I mean is, that as Tim points out in the dialogue at pages 7-9 human existence is wonderful on our beautiful planet earth, but it is fleeting and we have very little, if any control about what happens to us or to the people we love. Thus, mankind has a great sense of anxiety in the face of this life. “How will I protect those I love from tragedy?” “How can I protect myself?” “Why am I born into this situation of American prosperity while in hell-holes around the world babies slowly starve to death?”

    The notion of an evil “criminal” running around with no conscience committing offenses for gain is like the devil himself walking the streets for a lot of people. “This is what is responsible for my feelings of being out-of-control” the upper-classes think. In fact, this is what Sigmund Freud calls externalization. A person has a feeling – affect – within and he/she looks to without to put the origin of this affect because it is more threatening to come from within. For if pain or discomfort comes from without, one might be able to avoid it. But, if it stems from within, avoidance becomes impossible. “If only we could look-up all of the criminals, I could finally feel safe!” Thus do the poor under-class operate as something – an object – which the middle and upper classes can control [unlike life and existence], since, after all, they can throw us into prisons!

    I also think that “criminals” are the focus of personal feelings of helplessness in the face of an indifferent world. One hears the media and the politicians, and other empty-headed fools, speak of the victimization of the poor by the injustice system as if it were a war going on, i.e. “In a war, innocents die,” “collateral damage”, etc. Indeed, it is a “war on drugs” going on! They calmly say, smugly secure with nice clothes, a bank account, warm homes, full bellies, “most of them are guilty! The rest haven’t been caught yet!” But the truth is that imprisoning the poor for victimless offenses is hardly something one can compare to a war.

    Or perhaps, as with Tim’s notion of time being the most precious and valuable thing, in the dialogue, punishing the under-class gives the upper-class the feeling of exerting control over time which stops for no one – perhaps it is an attempt to control time by controlling the life-times of the poor through prison sentences.

Tim Greenlee

PCF #865760

PO Box 30

Pendleton, IN 46064

© Copyright 2003 Timothy Greenlee

The truth about Supermax by Timothy Greenlee

A Conversation with Timothy Greenlee

Comments regarding the Conversation Timothy Greenlee

Days in the life of  SHU inmate Timothy Greenlee

Life in SHU - Malfeasance, Revenge and The Tour

Life in SHU - Strip Search and Walk of Shame

Phylosophy Truth, Life and Death

Site Map