justice is blind...

Or it's supposed to be. It's so sad how some cases in the news get so much airtime when others don't get any at all. A teenager in my area disappeared recently (they just found her, and while I think it's tragic that she was dead that isn't the point of this post) and the story has gotten about 20 minutes of every hour newscast. Every hour.

Now I'm not saying I live in a bad area but we have a lot of kids who disappear every month. They don't get that much airtime. Some of them aren't mentioned at all. And it makes me wonder... just who was this girl that all we've heard about since she disappeared is her disappearance?

I'm not saying that it isn't sad, either. She just graduated and yes, that's sad. But so is every other child's disappearance and murder. We don't hear about those. Hearing about this one so much has made me wonder how many kids disappeared today whose parents are suffering in silence and how many people will never hear that their friend is dead because they weren't important enough to warrant a 5 second mention on the news?

It would help so much if the news channels would make nothing more than a small announcement of every child that has gone missing in, say, the past week or so. I'm not asking for this on a federal level, or even a state level. It would help if maybe they just took out two minutes of their newscast, maybe on the five o'clock and then the nine o'clock news, and offered a chance for parents to send in a picture of their missing children, along with a name and a "last seen" location. It wouldn't be that difficult.

This kid disappeared five days ago and they've already found her body, arrested, and charged someone. I'm not saying that's not great. I'm saying that I can't help but think it was so quick because the media was so involved.

It just seems like a mockery of justice to show preferential treatment in cases like this. They're kids. They didn't ask to be stolen or murdered and we should take that into account. No child deserves this. No person deserves this, regardless of his or her age. They all deserve to be found quickly, and safely.

Equal treatment. Isn't that what justice is all about?

distorted justice

There has been a barrage of finger-pointing in my neck of the woods recently.

A guy crashed his car for driving drunk and whose fault is it? The bartender's, for selling him the liquor. Um... I'm sorry, but did the bartender put you behind the wheel of a car? Did the bartender force you to buy that liquor?

"Oh, but his judgment is impaired, because he's drunk."

Whose fault is that? Oh, let me think... Budweiser, for selling their beer in 12 oz cans instead of 10 oz, right? Or maybe Wal-Mart, for selling Budweiser. Maybe Columbus, since if he'd never discovered America it would have taken a lot longer for us to figure out beer-making on our own. Hell, let's just sue God for giving us alcohol in the first place.

And two kids sadly lost their lives recently, but the mother's not blaming the thief who stole a bunch of crap, put the kids in the car, and evaded the law. She's blaming the police. Yeah. Because people doing their job is going to solve this problem the next time it comes around, right?

Justice has been sidelined because people can't accept responsibility for their own actions. And that's just unacceptable.

Quick Note

Freedom of speech seems to be sadly compromised lately. Sad that it would be compromised-- same with any of our rights, really. Why have them if they're just going to be taken away?

Stealing

1994 Edvard Munch's painting "The Scream" recovered 3 months after stolen

Okay seriously, why would you steal a painting? I realize they're worth a lot, and that it's probably thrilling to be able to actually pull it off, but come on. How do you hide that? It's not like you stole a million in cash and can ferret it off to various banks in Switzerland for a while. It's massive and you can't really put it in storage, or in a bank somewhere, because probably everybody's been informed that it's stolen. You can't even pretend like it's been in your family for a long time.

You'd have to have the best contacts in the world to pull that off. I'm marveling at how this person managed to hide it for three months.

justice is so hard sometimes

It's like fighting a losing battle sometimes, because nobody cares. And what if it's all for nothing, anyway? What if it just doesn't matter in the end?

Wrong.

On this day in 1953, scientists identified DNA. While DNA in and of itself isn't really justice-related, all the things we can do with it definitely have some leverage on convictions. DNA evidence is fairly new as far as science goes, but I love forensics, so I thought all this was worth a mention.

Today in 1989, a father was exonerated after 21 years in prison.

We recently had a Miscarriages of Justice conference here at the university and I had to attend it for classes, but I'm not complaining. I enjoy conferences. Luckily for us, we have one at least once a year that's criminal justice related. Anyway, this one made me feel very sad because of all the stories told about the falsely accused. It's so upsetting that they have to spend time paying for something they didn't do. That someone who did something evil is walking free.

It's terrible because justice is supposed to be blind, but not like this. Justice is supposed to be blind to race, class, economic standing, not blind in a way that means someone innocent is punished for doing something wrong. The system was designed to catch the evil ones and to protect the innocent, not the other way around. Sometimes it seems like it's the other way around.

But this is inspiring, too-- they caught the mistake (albeit late, and I know they can never make up for what this man suffered in prison, but that's not the point of this post) and fixed it. Doesn't that show that our justice system is evolving, changing with the times, getting better? It's great to be involved with something like this-- something that's changing, and for the better.

Opinions

We have a right to formulate our own opinion and we have a right to let that opinion be known. People understand this and they use it all the time. (As they say in grade school, "It's a free country!")

Adversely, we also have the right to reject any and all opinions we read or listen to. That's where the problem comes in. Why is it that we have this huge need to shoot down everyone who has a differing opinion until they're essentially browbeaten into believing you?

Take for example the abortion thing. Whether or not you believe in abortion is not the issue here. This is the issue: a pro-lifer and a pro-choicer are having a conversation about their favorite subject. So the pro-choicer says "I have a right to do what I want with my body and I don't like [the government, etc] stepping in and telling me what I can or can't do" to which the pro-lifer says "Well, abortion is murder! You are a murderer! Do you agree with murder laws?"

Both the pro-lifer and the pro-choicer are perfectly entitled to their opinion, but they are also entitled to reject the other's opinion. There is no need to stoop to name-calling. There isn't any need to make the opposition feel terrible about their opinion. It's an opinion. It's not law, or not yet, anyway.

It's not just abortion and I'm not trying to pick on the pro-lifers. I'm just picking a subject that is receiving a little bit of attention. It happens in everything... people need to exercise more caution when they are exercising their right to free speech.