WHY IS IT WRONG TO JUDGE – the grey line before laws7 min read

It is very tempting to say Mr so and so is bad, while Mrs so and so is such a good person. In most cases, we see ourselves as good people, but all these distinctions are a distorted way of looking at things. So, why is it wrong to judge people

There is something in psychology known as Actor-Observer Bias, it basically means we are all biased and won’t admit it (a nice way of saying that we are all assholes).

For example, if we were to stand in a queue and someone was to find their way into the line ahead of us, we would most likely see the person as insensitive and say all sort of mean things to the person if we could, but if we were to do that exact thing, we would justify ourselves, saying we were in a hurry, and as a matter of fact we would feel good about it and prolly thank the deity we serve for the divine provision

My point?

Life is not black and white. we all say killing is bad, yet most people would yell “kill him” when watching a movie or when they see a terrorist being captured, in fact, given a gun some would most likely shoot their fellow human who they have labeled “a thief”.

But what if he is doing it to feed his starving daughter who is not only hungry but very, very feverish. maybe she just went through a surgery that wrecked his “life” financially. I know he’s still a “thief” and no one likes putting themselves in such shoes, but the thing is, he got better reason than his captors who shot him for trying to steal just a phone (they are still good people though)

Lions kill zebras every day to feed their young not minding if the zebra was itself  young or trying to feed its own young, the Zebra eats beautiful flower not considering their beauty or “life”, these same plants even devours insects(carnivorous plants), and some of them establish parasitic relationships with other plants – killing them, but who cares, once we don’t feel their pain, they might just as well serve as our food ( I mean we raise billions of chickens and livestock every single year just to have them milked, wooled, and finally slaughtered)

Some very popular religions have a God who instructs humans to kill their fellow humans, and no I am not just talking about the terrorist ,even the Christian deity instructed them to take part in killing, and even though they might argue that they do not support killing these days they would yet argue that their God never changes, thus the one who supported the killing still supports the killing, He simply hasn’t ordered it yet( remember he never changes, not that killing is such a bad thing, right? crusaders did it for years and called it a holy war)

Thus from God, man, animals down to plants, we all seem to be in an endless loop of doing things based on our own better perspective and labeling others wrong and bad, painting them black , blacker than charcoal (but that’s a good thing, who are we to question a god or the struggle for survival)

CONSIDER THIS

If there was truly a distinction between good and evil like black and white then why do we have courts of law…If everyone knew that murder deserved a death penalty or life imprisonment why go to courts?

well it appears humans love order and that comes with authority, even though that authority is flawed and can be corrupted

This is the reason most rich people always get away with crimes they commit, they have the ability to hire a lawyer who can paint them “white”, just like you would justify cutting in line, so  they walk scot-free, smiling and waving the little girl they just raped farewell

Yet It is delusional to start saying the “rich” are evil while the “poor” are helpless and nice, I don’t know of any millionaire that has ever robbed a bank and shot dozens of people just for a briefcase full of notes

SO WHAT THE HELL IS THIS ARTICLE TRYING TO SAY

Don’t be hasty to make judgments

Once upon a time, a “wise man” was walking down the street and witnessed a scene where a mob was trying to execute a lady, accusing her of being a whore

He saw men standing with stones, the women spitting and calling her all sorts of names, and children just watching in limbo.

In course of the turmoil, one of the “whores’” friend spotted this “wise man”, knowing she couldn’t help her friend because the people also considered her a prostitute pleaded with a bystander to persuade the “wise man” to come and intervene because she felt unworthy to approach him ( of course the “wise man” was greatly respected and feared )

the Young man agreed and asked the “wise man” to come over and give his opinion concerning the matter.

The “wise man” gently walked towards the center of the fuss. as he approached the people made way for him until he got to the lady that was about to be stoned to death.

By this time her clothes had already been ripped off, she was lying on the floor, dust on her hair, a little bit of nose bleed and several bruises all over her body. Soon the turmoil died down, they were ready to listen to the words of this wise man.

He looked at the almost naked lady, shook his head, looked at the people who looked at the lady in disgust and again he shook his head. Finally, he said “ He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her ”, then he stepped aside so that anyone who deemed himself worthy of stoning the woman would have a nice shot at hitting her, then he bent down and started writing on the floor, waiting for the stoning to commence as the lady kept on weeping

Everyone dropped their stones and left

CONCLUSION

You might be wondering, “how can we maintain law and order if we do not judge?”

The answer is simple, ask the lawyers, they have made up all the fancy laws to keep us safe, even though they keep reviewing it, modifying it and then once in a while forgetting them

Human society is just like a fluid, nothing is distinct, everything is mixed, Gay marriage may be legal in your country but as of the time of publishing this article simply being identified as gay could land you in fourteen years imprisonment in my country, smoking and drinking are not legal in every country and at Singapore as of the time of writing this article it was illegal to chew gum

laws are fragile, they change and they bend, some may sound ridiculous, but as a human, you should prolly come to terms with the fact that we are all biased, and thus so are the laws,

So hopefully, the next time someone does something you consider bad, try putting yourself in their shoes, this is called Empathy. After empathy has been exercised, then questioning can follow to know what was the motive of this individual, after which decisions to punish or pardon can be reached

FOOT NOTE

The story of the woman that was almost stoned for adultery https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesus_and_the_woman_taken_in_adultery