What is Justice?
Julia Goujiamanis
sometimes means going against the government when it is necessary, in order for reform in regards to equal treatment/fairness for all people
Advocating for certain causes/speaking out in our communities
justice is something that has been fought for all throughout history, we recognize certain figures today for aspects of equality/or freedom we now have: poetryfoundation.org
Ella Schroeder
- justice can be subjective, which can lead to tension between opposing groups
- individual justice can sometimes be at odds with societal justice
- a good definition of justice should not sacrifice the well-being of one group for the benefit of another
Paloma Bauwens
The definition of justice can have different meanings to different people. Additionally, there are multiple types and forms of justice that people fight for, such as environmental justice, racial justice, legal justice, etc. It can also be valuable to advocate for others who don't have the power to do so themselves. Often times, injustices occur when one group/person is underrepresented or given less credibility.
Hannah Martin
Justice is the result of fairness being perfectly enacted and executed, when all is just. It can be extremely difficult for justice “to be served” even if the solution seems excruciatingly simple. Similarly, the word karma, which stems from Buddhism and Hinduism, means “the sum of a person's actions in this and previous states of existence, viewed as deciding their fate in future existences”, which correlates to whether one performs positive or negative actions there will be karma, and justice can work in the same pattern, as it is fairness on both ends of the spectrum.
Lamar AlSubhi
Justice is a system where a set of moral rules is upheld.
When a society’s morality differs from the governing body’s morality, the society believes that justice is not present, and that encourages the society to “fight for justice”.
People have fought for justice for as long as societies existed.
Brian Chiu
Justice is the idea of enacting a code of morals in order to regulate a practice. Socially, this code is a set of agreed upon principles in a culture. Actions that break this code are justified to have consequences enacted in response, which is deemed "justice". On a smaller scale, personal justice exists based on an individual's own moral code. This code forms based on different interpretations of the individual's past and current philosophy and how they were raised. Breaches in this personal code may drive an individual to act against the aggressor even if it is against the larger, social justice.
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Riley Egan
Justice is when the most good (which can take many different forms) is created for the most people. For this reason, one person's or group's justice can never come at the expense of another's. In a just, utopian society, equality (giving everyone the same treatment) is the best way to uphold justice, and it is the ultimate goal. However, in an unjust and unequal society with institutional and social barriers--like the one we live in--equity (giving people different treatment and resources based on their obstacles, status, etc. to create the same level of fairness for all) is the proper way to uphold justice. Justice is not people being blindly treated the same, but it is everyone being given what they personally need to reach a common level of success, security, and happiness as all others. On an individual level, justice is every person getting what they deserve as a result of their actions and motivations--good or bad.
Kauther Mohammed
Justice is a system established within the parameters of ethics and morality; one cannot be just without being morally sound. This system is something that is enforced by oneself, family, community, and country. Justice, in one way or another defines Utopia- universal and consistent justice suggests an ideal world. Perceptive Utopia is not necessarily just, which calls for a universal Utopia.
Nat Pagliocco
Justice is often viewed as an entire subject of equality and fairness, however it can also be a more specific with issues regarding groups of people and how they personally are treated. For instance the conversation of justice is not an attempt to make situations equal, but instead give the oppressed group all the privileges and rights that were previously missing
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Zach Loeser
To me, justice is fairness, but to me that is not equality. It is equity. We do not all face the same hardships and circumstances so I believe that to achieve true justice, everyone must be compensated for based on the context of who they are.
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Justice
Feminism
How the definition of feminism has changed over the course of the movement
Early on the feminist movement only included white cis woman
As the movement progress it became more inclusive to women of color, different sexualities and trans woman as well
In 2010 it was seen as feminist if you were working and not a stay at home mom.
Now the new argument is being posed that it is equally as feminist to be a stay at home mom as it is to be a working mom
Emily Ratajkowski recently wrote a book called my body and it received a lot of various opinions on whether it was actually a feminist book
Early on in her career she thought she was in control of her power, career path, and body
As she got older she realized she was being subjected to the control of an industry dominated by white cis men
The book does not provide answers but rather poses questions around feminism and Emilys story
Is what she has done truley feminist?
Meera Rao
Justice is an ideology that serves as a benchmark for fairness. It is commonly used to assess what ‘one’ deserves. I think about this idea of justice in varying degrees from reparations to victims of slavery and/or their descendants to providing sufficient and universal health care to confronting food insecurity. Justice is the why for our actions. It is the moral compass for one's doings. Justice is tainted and misused when built on misinformation and ignorance; however, justice is upheld by growth of perspective and a presence of empathy.
Kauther Mohammed
Justice is a Utopian concept, however, it is consistently attempted and reached for. Justice is so closely associated with punishment, as we can see in In the Penal Colony and White Bear, and as we continue to strive fore it, it becomes a "notion of utility" rather than a universally accepted form of justice (Mill).
Hop-Frog shows the difference between individual justice being at odds with societal justice. First, it must be said that while Hop-Frog actions were not justice as they were vengeance, his actions were justified. His personal justice was giving the king what he deserved for the stealing, abuse, and humiliation of he and Trippetta. Watching Trippetta be kicked prompted him to brutally murder the king and those who looked on laughing. While this restored a sense of justice in Hop-Frog, it did not enforce justice in society as a whole. The king did not receive adequate and equal punishment and moral reckoning for his crimes, and his unfair murder and Hop-Frog's escape left a gap for justice in society. Further, Hop-Frog taking justice into his own hands caused no one else's justice to be taken into account aside from his own. Even though he knew the king was undeniably guilty, acting as judge, juror, and executioner kept the king from proper trial and prevented justice from being properly distributed to the whole. One man deciding what justice is can never be true justice.
Focusing on the point of individual vs. societal justice, we can look at Hop-Frog as an example of the contrast these two have. In the story, what Hop-Frog constitutes to be just--torturing the king who has wronged him--is different from what is universally just in a society. Morally, killing someone regardless is unjust, and therefore there is a difference here between societal and individual desires. Additionally in Hop-Frog, we see that the King's vision of what is just is much different than Hop-Frog's. While the King believes he is joking around and having fun, Hop-Frog feels he has been wronged and harmed. The King's perspective is described in the beginning of the story, where Poe writes, "He seemed to live only for joking...Whether people grow fat by joking, or whether there is something in fat itself which predisposes to a joke, I have never been able to determine". In questioning the King's perspective, Poe is emphasizing that each individual has their own beliefs, which makes it somewhat difficult to come to a consensus on what is right vs. wrong. While Hop-Frog has obviously been harmed in his eyes, the King believes that he is simply fulfilling his role as a jester.
Justice on a social scale is also deeply tied to public punishment. Justice is enacted through punishment to compromsie between inequalities, which Aristotle descriebs in a very general sense, "the judge tries to equalize it [inequality]". The wrongdoer is punished, but it's important to note that a silent punishment is seldom considered a worthy punishment. For a punishment to feel complete, it not only needs to address the person who was wronged, but the greater society which lusts for revenge. They tend to take the side of the wronged, and themselves are thus slighted as well. To correct it, the audience wants the wrongdoer to be humiliated for their entertainment.
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As long as people disagree on different topics, people will never believe that justice will ever be served. A lot of disagreement stems from how people are content with what serves them, for example, in "The Lottery" , Tessie only disagreed with the "justice" when she was victimized by it. On page 289, Tessie screams "It wasn't fair!", yet the people still pelt her with the stones. However, earlier in the story, Tessie arrived late and was insensitive towards the lottery process, making jokes and hurrying others to pick their scrap of paper, yet claimed her husband was not given enough time to choose his own fate.
In Hop-Frog, there's a line that discusses how the unjust act objectively differs from that of the "civilized world." There's a line that states, "in any part of the civilized world; and as the imitations made by the dwarf were sufficiently beast-like...their truthfulness to nature was thus thought to be secure." Even though Hop-Frog's act can be deemed as justified, his act is not just as it morally contradicts a universally just society. These two opposing forces make one question how Hop-Frog was able to escape in the end even though he had committed a public, inhumane, and cruel murder. How can one justify an act that is not equal, how do you judge whether a punishment "fits the crime" for an individual versus a group of people within a society? There was an imbalance of power and physical strength from the Hop-frog to the King and his seven ministers, yet that was overlooked and ignored.
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Nat Pagliocco's Loop
Justice is seen as a form of punishment that esseentially targets the actions that are perceived to be "unjust."
Hopfrog sacrificed societal justice to fulfill his own personal vengeance. The brutality of the punishment, where the 8 men were left as "a fetid, blackened, hideous, and indistinguishable [masses]," did not serve the proper justice that would have beenfitted the society. The 8 men should have been tried from their crimes, which would have been more productive justice for that "civilized" society. Although the King did deserve to be punished, the society is going to view Hopfrog as the wrongerdoer in this situation because he took such brutal measures that robbed others of their own justice.