Should we abide by unjust laws?

Taraz · #1 06-23-2007, 08:07 PM

One of my old roommates was a pretty hardcore Christian. I had always thought that he didn't drink because he thought drinking was bad. When he turned 21 a few years ago he started drinking all of a sudden and I was real confused. From our conversations it had seemed like he was appalled that everyone was drinking in school and that it was immoral, so I naturally assumed he thought intoxicants were just bad.

Apparently he just thought underage drinking was wrong and that it was terrible to break the law. I had also noticed that he never sped on the freeway, but I just assumed he was a bad driver. I asked him about what he would do in the case that he was forbidden by law to talk to females or something equally ridiculous. I assumed he would see that just because something is made law doesn't mean that it is righteous. To my surprise he said that he would stop talking to girls, but that he would do all he could to change the law by working within our system.

I thought this was absurd, but then he made a semi-compelling point. Who gets to decide what laws are unjust? If someone feels like a law is wrong, should they just have the right to break it? Why is my moral code so superior to our legal system? I didn't really have any good response to that other than I guess I would be willing to take the punishment if I got caught. But that's not entirely true because I would feel jobbed if I actually incurred some kind of penalty for breaking a BS law.

I'm not sure what I'm looking for with this post, but does anyone have any better answer to his questions? I've never really encountered his viewpoint, so I didn't know how to deal with it.

gull · #2 06-23-2007, 08:39 PM

Is the justness of the law even relevant to the cost-benefit analysis of breaking it?

Taraz · #3 06-23-2007, 08:47 PM

[ QUOTE ]
Is the justness of the law even relevant to the cost-benefit analysis of breaking it?

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Only if you don't want to go to hell [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

bkholdem · #4 06-24-2007, 12:09 AM

Your friend is brainwashed. He has been assimilated into the borg of the authoritarian regime.

I don't need a substitute mommy and daddy in washington d.c. making decisions for how I will act and behave. People drawn to government have control issues and unfortunately a fair portion of the populace likes to be controlled. Too many people find it acceptable, or even desirable to have others controlling them, to having others structure their lives and their outlook on the world and what they 'should' and 'should not' do.

JuntMonkey · #5 06-24-2007, 02:42 AM

[ QUOTE ]
Your friend is brainwashed. He has been assimilated into the borg of the authoritarian regime.

I don't need a substitute mommy and daddy in washington d.c. making decisions for how I will act and behave. People drawn to government have control issues and unfortunately a fair portion of the populace likes to be controlled. Too many people find it acceptable, or even desirable to have others controlling them, to having others structure their lives and their outlook on the world and what they 'should' and 'should not' do.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is why the book "Summerhill" changed me into an anarchist for good. It's written by a guy who ran a "free school" where the children can essentially do as they please (without harming others). Lessons are not mandatory, playing all day is fine.

The kids turn out normal and happy. They have supreme and unwavering self-confidence and pwn job interviews because they were never forced to fear authority figures.

A lot of people think that humans inherently need structure, but the only reason many of us "need" it is because we were indoctrinated into a rigid structure at some point between the ages of 3-5 for the next 15 years of our lives (at least). I loved structure and believed completely in the legitimacy and the beauty of the system of the U.S. government until some point in college when I matured and woke the [censored] up.

Mr. Philosophy · #6 06-24-2007, 12:32 PM

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Your friend is brainwashed. He has been assimilated into the borg of the authoritarian regime.

I don't need a substitute mommy and daddy in washington d.c. making decisions for how I will act and behave. People drawn to government have control issues and unfortunately a fair portion of the populace likes to be controlled. Too many people find it acceptable, or even desirable to have others controlling them, to having others structure their lives and their outlook on the world and what they 'should' and 'should not' do.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is why the book "Summerhill" changed me into an anarchist for good. It's written by a guy who ran a "free school" where the children can essentially do as they please (without harming others). Lessons are not mandatory, playing all day is fine.

The kids turn out normal and happy. They have supreme and unwavering self-confidence and pwn job interviews because they were never forced to fear authority figures.

A lot of people think that humans inherently need structure, but the only reason many of us "need" it is because we were indoctrinated into a rigid structure at some point between the ages of 3-5 for the next 15 years of our lives (at least). I loved structure and believed completely in the legitimacy and the beauty of the system of the U.S. government until some point in college when I matured and woke the [censored] up.

[/ QUOTE ]

Are there any studies that show these kids turn out fine? And how old are these children when they started going to this school? I can see a 12 year-old possibly succeeding in this environment, but I think a younger child would need some structure.

chezlaw · #7 06-23-2007, 08:49 PM

[ QUOTE ]
Who gets to decide what laws are unjust? If someone feels like a law is wrong, should they just have the right to break it? Why is my moral code so superior to our legal system?

[/ QUOTE ]
Superiority has little to do with it but I detest the idea of a society where everyone obeyed laws they disagree with and suspect that the only way to have a system with good laws is for people to break bad laws.

chez

PairTheBoard · #8 06-23-2007, 09:48 PM

I think there is more than one force at work here. Society generally benefits if there is a healthy respect for the law. I want to enjoy those benefits and my decision is to do my part by exercising a healthy respect for the law myself. This means obeying laws which are personally inconvenient for me. So this is one Force at work.

However, the Law is often too rigid to efficiently accomplish what it intends to. So society can sometimes be improved when its members obey the spirit of the law while adapting it to peculiarities of specific situations. Sometimes society benefits if we fudge on the law. Sometimes rigid adherence to the law is just downright counterproductive. So this is another Force at work.

Then there is the Boston Tea Party kind of situation. We sometimes have to recognize that the authority behind the law is simply corrupt and it is our duty to apply the principle of civil disobedience.

That's how I see it.

PairTheBoard

ShakeZula06 · #9 06-23-2007, 11:38 PM

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Society generally benefits if there is a healthy respect for the law.

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I'd admend your statement to say "society generally benefits from respect for others". Do you think that would be better? I don't think society benefitted from the results of the Dred Scott trial for instance.

Metric · #10 06-23-2007, 10:32 PM

I don't claim that this is the "right answer" for everyone, but I personally have far more confidence in my own judgement of reasonable behavior than I have in the "rule makers." Most of the time I'm easily within the bounds of law, but when I'm not, my only concern is related to the consequences of being caught.