Monday, June 06, 2005
WHY STUDY CRIMINAL LAW? Is this a question with an obvious answer? Perhaps there are too many obvious answers to it: one studies it because one wants to help those convicted of a crime, one studies it because one is fascinated with the evil men do, or about broader philosophical problems having to do with punishment, action, or coercion. So I guess I should rephrase my question, what makes criminal law not just interesting, but personally gripping?
I have a hard time answering this. I don’t imagine that I’ll ever commit a crime myself, nor do I think that many of my friends have or will. At least not a major crime. If I did commit a crime, I probably wouldn’t recognize myself; I would have changed so much as to be a different person. I may be speaking too soon, but I don’t see it now. This is important because it limits the ability of the study of criminal law to illuminate things about myself. Now, it may be that I see in criminal behavior in extremis some things I see in myself. Maybe. But even here it is still a stretch; we are reasoning by analogy. We are not saying that I am such that, deep down, I may be a criminal. The bad things I do don’t raise to the level of criminal liability.
Compare this with the study of tort law, which has as its focus the things we do by mistake, negligently, without meaning to. It is about the harm we cause without intending to, or even how we are responsible for harms we cause without even be so much as negligent. Now here is something that seems to relate to the things I cause in my own life: most of the bad we do is inadvertent badness. We are preoccupied with our own pain, so we don’t attend well enough to the pain of others, for example. Or we are careless, in a hurry, and get into an accident. It seems that most people’s moral lives, or at least people like me, involve wrestling with these issues: how responsible am I for those things I accidentally cause? How should I feel about them? To what extent are they about me and my life’s story? To what extent can I separate them from myself? When studying tort law these are the questions I find myself asking, and they are questions about myself and my moral life as I mostly conceive of it.
So the tort/crime law distinction for me has more than analytic meaning. It is more than just separating distinct parts of the law. For me, the distinction divides those parts of the law which grip me personally, and those parts of the law that might be necessary to learn and even philosophically fascinate me, but which leave me personally cold.
- posted by Chad @ Monday, June 06, 2005
Comments:
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Those who study and practice criminal law can be divided in to two main groups: prosecutors and defenders. For those of us who have practiced defense work, many of us find it personally gripping because the reality of being falsely accused of a crime is very real and more common than most people realize. Those who prosecute generally find it personally gripping because they want to punish those who have hurt loved ones and people in similar situations as loved ones.
# posted by 
: September 13, 2005 3:49 PM
: September 13, 2005 3:49 PM
The reason that I would study law would be to help defend people that are not in a postion to defend them selves. Although The more that I study the law I begin to see that justice is not blind, infact I belive that she sees very well. Lets just take for example the people that were convicted of crimes all over. Out of all the people that were falsley accussed where black americans.
# posted by : November 19, 2005 4:02 PM
: November 19, 2005 4:02 PM
Gar
I study criminal law searching for meaning to the things that have happened to me personally...
I am no saint at 48, but as an 11 year old, I was without sin or blame and when I tell my story, nobody seems to realize the anguish that I survived...
The prisons and jails and graveyards are filled with people much like myself, and there but for the Grace of God, go I... I know this now only after several decades of introspection and much study of the criminal mind, and still, I can make no sense or reason...
As far as being falsely accused, I can only say that it makes me stronger than most, because I know I am completely innocent, and I have found that the truth eventually wins out with all matters and circumstances...
I believe I am very intelligent because my dear, dear father taught me how to read at the age of three, and did read, for forty-five years...
Now, I write, and I know that I write well, and can communicate in a variety of ways; written, verbally, and physically... I am a survivor in the strictest meaning of the word... and here I am; somebody, after many, many years of being a nobody...
I have never been the first one to throw the first punch- I have never molested anyone: Man, woman or child... very proud am I...
I also know that the level of angst directed at me is the direct result of the success of my book, which took 21 years and many thousands of dollars to produce. Soon, very soon, it will reach critical mass, and I will, and am, the most powerful man on this Earth because of my book, which reveals the skeletons in the closets of several very powerful persons, who have tried to marginalize, criminalize and otherwise destroy this man, who has learned to fight back with the only weapon I know- the truth, which has set me free...
My friends know the truth about me, and my enemies have had to bow down in shame for what was done to me, a victim, a fighter and a worthy foe of the lies of thousands of years- They haven't told the truth for thousands of years, and why would they stop now? I went into this prepared and standing tall, and looking good...
By the time I am 50, I will be very wealthy, powerful, and knowledgable and capable of love...
Their is a young lady that has shown an interest in me and my good and just nature...
She may already know I have plans to marry her, and that is good... It's the way it was always meant to be, and my life will be complete...
She is an angel, brought to me by fate, after decades of torment and lonliness, she is God's reward for my suffering... I think she is the lovliest creature on the planet, and she thinks I am quite a man, too. I adore her... she is my gift from The Almighty- a helpmate, comparable to me, just as Eve was to Adam, according to the Sciptures...
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I study criminal law searching for meaning to the things that have happened to me personally...
I am no saint at 48, but as an 11 year old, I was without sin or blame and when I tell my story, nobody seems to realize the anguish that I survived...
The prisons and jails and graveyards are filled with people much like myself, and there but for the Grace of God, go I... I know this now only after several decades of introspection and much study of the criminal mind, and still, I can make no sense or reason...
As far as being falsely accused, I can only say that it makes me stronger than most, because I know I am completely innocent, and I have found that the truth eventually wins out with all matters and circumstances...
I believe I am very intelligent because my dear, dear father taught me how to read at the age of three, and did read, for forty-five years...
Now, I write, and I know that I write well, and can communicate in a variety of ways; written, verbally, and physically... I am a survivor in the strictest meaning of the word... and here I am; somebody, after many, many years of being a nobody...
I have never been the first one to throw the first punch- I have never molested anyone: Man, woman or child... very proud am I...
I also know that the level of angst directed at me is the direct result of the success of my book, which took 21 years and many thousands of dollars to produce. Soon, very soon, it will reach critical mass, and I will, and am, the most powerful man on this Earth because of my book, which reveals the skeletons in the closets of several very powerful persons, who have tried to marginalize, criminalize and otherwise destroy this man, who has learned to fight back with the only weapon I know- the truth, which has set me free...
My friends know the truth about me, and my enemies have had to bow down in shame for what was done to me, a victim, a fighter and a worthy foe of the lies of thousands of years- They haven't told the truth for thousands of years, and why would they stop now? I went into this prepared and standing tall, and looking good...
By the time I am 50, I will be very wealthy, powerful, and knowledgable and capable of love...
Their is a young lady that has shown an interest in me and my good and just nature...
She may already know I have plans to marry her, and that is good... It's the way it was always meant to be, and my life will be complete...
She is an angel, brought to me by fate, after decades of torment and lonliness, she is God's reward for my suffering... I think she is the lovliest creature on the planet, and she thinks I am quite a man, too. I adore her... she is my gift from The Almighty- a helpmate, comparable to me, just as Eve was to Adam, according to the Sciptures...
# posted by : November 21, 2006 11:08 PM
: November 21, 2006 11:08 PM<< Home
