A Few Notes on an Inconvenient Universe, part IV

[The Good Reverend Roger]

A lot of people think America is addicted to McDonalds, or TV, or porn.  And we may very well be...But America's number one addiction, the 500 pound monkey on our backs, is punishment.  We LOVE punishment, we love to see no-good shits get theirs, even - especially - if we do or at one time did the very same thing we're hollering about.

This ranges from the public to the personal.  Publicly speaking, we have 5% of the world's population, and 25% of the world's incarcerated population.  We lock kids up (as recently happened in Alabama) for TWENTY-SIX YEARS for a pound of pot.  Given that the kid is 19, he'll be middle-aged when, or if, he gets out.  His whole life is gone.  For a pound of pot.

A large minority of the population believes that this is reasonable.

We arrest 6 year olds on felony charges for acting out in class...Then Facebook and Twitter and all the other social media sites fill up with outrage that would be appropriate if the people expressing that outrage hadn't spent their entire lives voting for asshats who promise to "Get Tough On Crime" in a system that is already VERY tough on anything even remotely resembling a crime.  Hell, they RAN OUT of crimes, so now they're after 6 year olds. 

THIS IS WHAT YOU SCREAMED FOR, AMERICA!  THIS IS WHAT YOU DEMANDED!  WHY ARE YOU COMPLAINING NOW?

In the private sector, we punish people by firing them.  Not just for things like non-performance or being drunk on the job, but also for posting things we don't like on social media.  Or for having the wrong friends and/or political beliefs.  Or for expecting a living wage.

Hell, we even punish our own friends and families.  And not always by obvious physical abuse, but also by withholding attention or affection, to show them WHAT.  By deciding that they need to feel your disdain for a while, so they won't do whatever it was they did to give you the urge to punish them.  Then we wake up one day, wondering where everyone went and why we're so alone.

It's not a mystery where they went, really.  They're in jail.  Or under a bridge, eating from garbage cans.  Or they got sick of our emotional manipulation and just, you know, went away.  But we console ourselves that they deserved the punishment they got, because they were no-good shits anyway, and we are an island, we are better off without their company.

And THAT, friends, is how you get the utterly psychotic society that frightens and depresses you so much.

[Eater of Clowns]

If only there was some guy, some important historical figure maybe, who was renowned for teaching people about forgiveness.

[LMNO]

If a guy like that existed, they'd nail him to a tree.

[Cain]

I don't remember the Buddha being nailed to a tree.

Of course, the question that arises from this is why?  What is it about America in particular that makes it love the whip, and not only love the whip but dream about inflicting it on others.

Obviously, that's not a small question.  There's a lot of angles to consider.  Puritanism, capitalism, frontier life, slavery...all of these and more certainly form part of the picture.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

I don't remember the Buddha being nailed to a tree.

Of course, the question that arises from this is why?  What is it about America in particular that makes it love the whip, and not only love the whip but dream about inflicting it on others.

Obviously, that's not a small question.  There's a lot of angles to consider.  Puritanism, capitalism, frontier life, slavery...all of these and more certainly form part of the picture.

It's the rugged individualist thing again.  It's basically one of the main causes for most of our societal insanity.

[Q. G. Pennyworth]

So many mittens, Roger.

[Ben Shapiro]

The gospel of RWHN.

[Cramulus]

You could argue we got obsessed with punishment in part because the Masters tricked us into thinking we were the ones doing the punishing.

It used to be that we cheered for the Sovereign who punishes the Criminal because we wanted a strong authority to protect us from lawlessness and chaos. But when Power manifests itself into a physical space, like a public execution, that power can be resisted. After the French Revolution people wanted a legal structure which wasn't (a) so dependent on the whims of a sovereign and (b) vulnerable to resistance. That's where Judges come from. And oddly enough, people still wanted to lynch judges. So that's where Juries come from.

The Jury and the Chain Gang serve the same purpose - so that the public feels it is somehow responsible for authorizing the control and punishment of a criminal's body (and therefore soul). The chain gang was invented so that criminals could labor in public, making the public feel that they were being served by the justice system. It exposed the criminal to the gaze and judgment of the public, which as we know, is a normalizing force. The compulsion to be a good citizen comes not from the president, but from our fellow citizens. So we cheer for prisons, punishment, discipline. We all want a disciplined society, right? Sure we do. So do us all a favor, and if you see somebody breaking the law, help ruin them forever.

[Eater of Clowns]

Funny thing about chain gangs:  they are now considered too soft. Why should they get to be outside, in the sun, enjoying the day and getting an honest day's work? Let 'em sit inside and rot.

No shit.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

You could argue we got obsessed with punishment in part because the Masters tricked us into thinking we were the ones doing the punishing.

It used to be that we cheered for the Sovereign who punishes the Criminal because we wanted a strong authority to protect us from lawlessness and chaos. But when Power manifests itself into a physical space, like a public execution, that power can be resisted. After the French Revolution people wanted a legal structure which wasn't (a) so dependent on the whims of a sovereign and (b) vulnerable to resistance. That's where Judges come from. And oddly enough, people still wanted to lynch judges. So that's where Juries come from.

The Jury and the Chain Gang serve the same purpose - so that the public feels it is somehow responsible for authorizing the control and punishment of a criminal's body (and therefore soul). The chain gang was invented so that criminals could labor in public, making the public feel that they were being served by the justice system. It exposed the criminal to the gaze and judgment of the public, which as we know, is a normalizing force. The compulsion to be a good citizen comes not from the president, but from our fellow citizens. So we cheer for prisons, punishment, discipline. We all want a disciplined society, right? Sure we do. So do us all a favor, and if you see somebody breaking the law, help ruin them forever.

This.  Exactly this.  Can I repost this with attribution?

[Q. G. Pennyworth]

Roger, would it be okay to use the Notes on and Inconvenient Universe series for something like a half page or big words with attribution? You keep being in my brain and saying things better than I could hope to.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Roger, would it be okay to use the Notes on and Inconvenient Universe series for something like a half page or big words with attribution? You keep being in my brain and saying things better than I could hope to.

Sure.

I've been saving the big one for #5, which will be posted tomorrow.  It's the one I've been building up to.

[hooplala]

I've been arguing this with people a lot in the last few months, and let me tell you, they can get really fucking angry when you challenge them on exactly why punishment is acceptable.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

I've been arguing this with people a lot in the last few months, and let me tell you, they can get really fucking angry when you challenge them on exactly why punishment is acceptable.

You're challenging a lifetime of conditioning...Both that punishment is the only approach, and that punishment is something that happens - and SHOULD happen as much as possible - to other people.

A conservative is a liberal who has been mugged.

A liberal is a conservative who  has been arrested.

[hooplala]

I've been arguing this with people a lot in the last few months, and let me tell you, they can get really fucking angry when you challenge them on exactly why punishment is acceptable.

You're challenging a lifetime of conditioning...Both that punishment is the only approach, and that punishment is something that happens - and SHOULD happen as much as possible - to other people.

A conservative is a liberal who has been mugged.

A liberal is a conservative who  has been arrested.

It started for me about fourteen years ago when I had my first office job.  I had done something wrong, can't remember what now, and my employer said verbatim "I need to punish you", which was such a frankly ludicrous thing to hear that I began to laugh.  It didn't go over well.


But yeah, that's me...

Hoopla
-challenging people's lifetime of conditioning since 1975