Liberals so dearly love that quote that they've had it printed up as a bumper sticker and adorn their Priuses with it. Of course they do, because it is not only completely wrong, it's completely backwards.
Why do people wear safety glasses? In my case, I do it to protect my vision. To lessen the chances of damage to one or both of my eyes. I fully understand the connection between my actions and potential eye damage, especially when operating machinery. But what if one of the ways for my eye to be damaged was as a repercussion for me damaging someone else's vision? Suddenly, instantly, everyone else's eyes become exactly as precious as my own- because they literally are.
Now let's turn that around: Here in the US, there's no "eye for an eye." If the injury was willful you can try to get the DA to press criminal charges which they may or may not. Even if they do, it's likely to get pled down to simple assault.
That leaves the civil courts as one's only recourse. You can sue the guilty party and hopefully collect some money from them. Did you know that in Washington, D.C. the median award value for loss of an eye is a paltry $162K? Nearby Maryland is a little better with $231K, which is closer to the national average. Remember that your lawyer will take a third of that and the Feds half of what's left. You could end up with much less than $100K for a life-altering event. Having vision in only one eye can severely limit job prospects, romantic prospects, and in some states make it very hard to get a driver's license.
And this assumes that the person who blinded you is a homeowner with insurance! What if they're not? What if it's just a homeless person with a pencil? You will never receive any sort of compensation and if they're caught your attacker will get at most a few years in prison. In California not even that.
Here is the point at which the liberals ask "yeah, so? How is blinding some homeless guy going to help anyone?" They ask this because they know it wouldn't help the attacker or his victim (except possibly in a Schadenfreude way) and thus proves their point that Gandhi was right. What they're completely missing (and willfully so) is the effect proportional justice has in preventing crimes to begin with. With our current system, why shouldn't a career criminal go downtown, pick out a yuppie, and poke their eye out? No reason at all other than innate human squeamishness. And that squeamishness is perhaps being overcome considering the recent spate of attacks that have left victims blind:
Brooklyn Teen Blinded
Mother Blinded By Drunken Thug
Woman Blinded By Boyfriend
Man Blinded and Paralyzed In Bar Fight
Those criminals might very well have thought twice about committing these crimes if they knew it was their own eyes they were effectively destroying.
Perhaps I should put this bumper sticker on my car: "An eye for an eye guarantees personal accountability and thus ensures the fewest people possible are blinded." Not quite as catchy-sounding, certainly won't appeal to the libs, but it is at least true.
So, which world do YOU wish to live in? Gandhi's world where vast numbers of people can poke your eye out with little repercussion or my world where everyone treasures everyone else's eyes as much as their own? The bad news is that you already live in the former- you never even got to choose because decades ago legions of drug-addled brain-damaged hippies came along and made the choice for you.
No comments:
Post a Comment