Justice: The New Reparations

Blog Critics Magazine ^ | January 19, 2010

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Imagine for a second that someone stabbed you. Would justice call for you to stab someone else who had nothing to do with the crime perpatrated against you? Most reasoned people would suggest not. Yet it seems that these days, the term justice is thrown around to mean exactly that. Environmental justice, social justice, racial justice, and even economic justice speaks to a system that takes from some in society, regardless of their guilt in whatever actual or perceived crime, and gives to others regardless of their injury. When I was growing up, the term justice referred to what happened when a criminal committed a crime, was captured and subsequently punished by society. Back then (not ancient history by any means), aside from the most radical, most black people didn't at least publicly agree with the concept of reparations. While they might have still been angry about slavery, racism and segregation (and rightfully so), and demanded equal rights, most agreed that reparations were a bridge too far.

So the radical fringe on the left, following the Alinsky playbook and in an effort to continue to move our equally free country in the direction of the equally miserable, disposed of the term reparations, along with it's negative connotations, in favor of a much more common and already accepted term, "justice." After all, while reparations sounds like something is broken that needs fixing, who can question a person's right to Justice? The so-called "Center for Economic and Social Justice" which goes to great pains to try and distinguish their definition of justice from charity, defines justice as "giving to each what he or she is due." Notice that there is no mention of who will be doing the giving.

But this isn't justice at all.(continued)

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Three page article.