Author Robert Jordan once said, “Men often mistake killing and revenge for justice. They seldom have the stomach for justice.” We see it every day, we glamorize and profit off it; we publicize celebrity court cases and sit around a bowl of popcorn to watch “justice” unveil, Batman is idolized by youth and adults alike. But what does justice mean to you? What should happen when an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth just aren’t enough? There are legal systems weaved into our culture to attain justice yet so often we see people take advantage, disregard, and disrespect the supposed fundamental idea that we deserve our due process. Discussions about what this means have been happening since even before the United States Constitution was needed to “establish Justice.” Fairness and rationality are meant to draw the line that separate acting justly and acting vindictively, however it isn’t possible to judge the specific actions of an individual on a universal idea of justice because there is not just one. To achieve true justice, bias and feeling must be removed. Since that isn’t achievable as inherently emotional beings, I believe justice and vengeance will always remain on the same spectrum of restorative counteraction regardless of if, as a culture, we perceive them as two completely different concepts.
Justice is often looked at as acting rationally and vengeance adversely. Suggesting that justice can happen without emotion or bias is a large cause of the disparities that lead to inequality in our judicial system. Even with general beliefs of circumstances that are always wrong, for example murder, rape, or child abuse; inequity still happens in our society. Charges can be dropped, criminals are often set free, and the wealthy can afford to challenge the criminal justice system. If injustice occurs in the courts we rely on for fairness, does the issue lie in the system itself or the people who created it thinking that it could solve every problem equally? The people. American philosopher and professor Robert C. Solomon talks about the connection between human emotions and our perception of justice in “Sympathy and Vengeance: The Role of Emotions in Justice,” an essay from Emotions: Essays on Emotion Theory. Solomon explains, “Our sense of justice emerges as a generalization and a rationalization (..) of a personal sense of injustice” (Solomon 304). In other words, Solomon is suggesting that that our idea of justice is not shaped by what we believe to be fair but instead what we feel is unfair. He continues to say, “injustice begins with a personal slight, a perceived inequity” (Solomon 304). Basically, Robert Solomon is saying that our true sense of justice stems from our personal experience of such. To say that feeling and justice cannot coexist is stripping the purpose of obtaining justice when in reality, we need it because we feel. Balance and equality has no meaning if it cannot be felt by the people it is meant for. That is why we know something like murder isn’t acceptable, because it is taking away our freedom to exist, our freedom to feel. Vengeance is acting similarly, although it’s generally is thought of as disgraceful, with a few exceptions.
The sympathetic nature of humans often overpowers our learned idea of right of wrong, and that speaks to why we cannot pinpoint an exact definition of vengeance or justice, and why the act of getting revenge isn’t always perceived as inherently wrong. Revenge can be to any extent, too, yet it is generally agreed that actions which cause more harm than harm done are unacceptable. In Akira Kurosawa’s film The Bad Sleep Well, we see the character Kôichi Nishi embark on his own personal journey to avenge his father’s wrongful death. Nishi said himself, “It’s not easy hating evil. You have to stoke your own fury until you become evil yourself” (1:31:00). Even though Nishi adopts a false identity, marries falsely, nearly commits murder, and even kidnaps, viewers still find themselves rooting for him. Why is that? Ideas of vengeance become muddled once we ask ourselves, what if that were us? It is only considered appropriate to take justice into your own hands if others can understand why but these actions could still be punished by law. In addition to this, vengeance can cultivate a dangerous cycle of always trying to get revenge. Robert Solomon explains that to some extent, it is necessary. Also in “Sympathy and Vengeance,” Solomon says, “Vengeance is not the antagonist to rationality but its natural manifestation” (Solomon 307). Vengeance itself isn’t coming from a place of ignorance, it isn’t a unconscious feeling, it is an action motivated by emotions we all feel. It is our own personal understanding of what is fair to us, and that itself is the guide which makes justice and retribution so essential to our lives. Because we are social beings, our instinct to feel one with others can make vengeance seem okay in some instances. This notion needs to be included in our definition of justice as a whole.
As inconsistent as thoughts about justice and vengeance may be, many people have tried to define and defend it. The theme of justice appears in popular culture now more than ever, fictional and real. From Justice League to Judge Judy, our fascination with what is right and wrong is inescapable.