Understandable, Comprehensible

A huge problem in society is how easy it is for people to be lenient, in a discriminating way on crimes where the perp has some familiarity.

We see this in fiction, where the Main Villain gets a moment of redemption but his soldiers get mowed down without blinking. Because the Main Villain has a face and a name.

We see this in real life where people are treated very differently, for the same circumstances, but based how they look. “They’re just boys being boys, they have a promising career ahead of them, they promise to not do it again.” This is why Black Lives Matters started. Because contrary to how it sometimes may seem in the eyes of the American justice system, Black Lives are actually real and Matter; they also have careers ahead of them. Shooting someone for wearing a hoodie or w/e is messed up.

Two ways out of this messed up situation immediately comes to mind.

One is to apply the same harshness across the board. The other is to apply the same leniency across the board.

I want to write more about crime and punishments in future posts. But, if you see me arguing for what might seem like harshness or seem like leniency, please don’t think I want to forget about the problem in this post. Please don’t think I want to apply that harshness or that leniency in a way that’s systematically unfair. That’s messed up.