I took a Ministry Leadership course through Calvin College this semester in the Calvin Prison Initiative. During our first class, Professor Kathy Smith made the statement, "Identity precedes activity." This statement struck me forcefully because of the applicability to every man and woman in prison.
While Professor Smith was referring to the formation of leaders, I was impressed with the notion that most of us in prison are here because our activity flowed directly from how we viewed ourselves. We had formed identities in our own minds, right or wrong, that reinforced behaviors that led us to prison. These identities may have included feelings of worthlessness or over-inflated egos, abusive pasts or histories of codependency; they may have been based on the belief that money or power were necessary for significance, or founded on delusions of grandeur or feelings of hopelessness.
To commit our crimes, many of us had to believe ourselves to be invincible. This misconception of invincibility is a failure to deal only with the truth. According to author Max De Spree, "The first responsibility of a leader is to define reality" (11). The problem for many prisoners is that reality, as it is, is difficult to bear, so it is easier to manufacture a fantasy world to dwell in. Ending up in prison often does not help prisoners to gain a clear understanding of their identities. Prison only casts a deeper shadow on what is already a difficult thing to define. Dealing only with the truth, about ourselves, our crime, and the harms we have done to others, is a great start for those who choose to define reality with truth.
If identity precedes activity, those who have committed crimes must learn how to properly see themselves before they can begin to behave in healthy ways. One doesn't have to be a leader to form a healthy identity that leads to productive behaviors. Prisoners simply need to learn that regardless of past mistakes, we have dignity as human beings and can go on to be valued by our communities. Perhaps then we can go on to be transformative leaders who help others avoid the same destructive choices we made that led us to prison in the first place.
Source Cited: De Spree, Max, Leadership is an Art, NY: Dell Publishing, 1989.
Wednesday, November 29, 2017
Tuesday, November 21, 2017
All Victims Matter
The recent barrage of sexual misconduct allegations surfacing is disturbing, especially because they demonstrate a culture of sexual abuse and harassment that has gone on unchecked for decades or longer. Revelations about movie directors Harvey Weinstein and James Toback, actor Kevin Spacey, and politicians All Franken and Roy Moore (to name just several recently accused) go back decades in some cases and involve dozens of victims.
If these allegations are true, it is easy to wonder why some victims have not come forward earlier, but it is not our place to question why they didn't have the courage or ability to do so before now. What we ought to do is applaud their courage now, and celebrate the strength many have found to finally face the demons that have haunted them for years. The public has largely rallied around these victims in our collective disgust at such abhorrent behavior.
What bothers me the most, though, is that it took famous victims for the public to be outraged. Every victim, famous or not, has the same value and ought to spark the same level of outrage when they are sexually abused. There is a certain added value celebrity gives to exposing the harms these victims of sexual assault and abuse experienced, but let's not ignore the victims who don't have a national stage on which to use their experiences for healing. Instead, let's rally around those who have experienced sexual abuse or harassment in any form. And let's not wait until we see newspapers covered in salacious ink about sexual abuse allegations or hear news commentators give in-depth coverage of these sensational stories before we speak up. When we see harassment in any form, let's say something. When we hear inappropriate jokes meant to demean, let's call the joker out. Let's hold others accountable for the bad behavior we see rather than turn a blind eye in hopes that our perceptions are wrong or that we are being too sensitive. Doing so may prevent future abuse from happening and save other potential victims.
We don't need to simply be consumers of sensational news. We can become a part of the solution by addressing these problems right where we are; no place in America is immune to the problem of sexual harassment and abuse. We can begin by refusing to support television and movies that turn abuse into entertainment and by becoming advocates for victims. Let's stop being simply consumers of titillating stories that raise our ire but nothing more and begin being voices for justice that restores victims, holds offenders accountable, and seeks to heal wounds and prevent future abuse.
(Please visit Women At Risk (WAR) International to find out how you can advocate for victims of sexual abuse and exploitation.) Women at Risk (WAR) International
If these allegations are true, it is easy to wonder why some victims have not come forward earlier, but it is not our place to question why they didn't have the courage or ability to do so before now. What we ought to do is applaud their courage now, and celebrate the strength many have found to finally face the demons that have haunted them for years. The public has largely rallied around these victims in our collective disgust at such abhorrent behavior.
What bothers me the most, though, is that it took famous victims for the public to be outraged. Every victim, famous or not, has the same value and ought to spark the same level of outrage when they are sexually abused. There is a certain added value celebrity gives to exposing the harms these victims of sexual assault and abuse experienced, but let's not ignore the victims who don't have a national stage on which to use their experiences for healing. Instead, let's rally around those who have experienced sexual abuse or harassment in any form. And let's not wait until we see newspapers covered in salacious ink about sexual abuse allegations or hear news commentators give in-depth coverage of these sensational stories before we speak up. When we see harassment in any form, let's say something. When we hear inappropriate jokes meant to demean, let's call the joker out. Let's hold others accountable for the bad behavior we see rather than turn a blind eye in hopes that our perceptions are wrong or that we are being too sensitive. Doing so may prevent future abuse from happening and save other potential victims.
We don't need to simply be consumers of sensational news. We can become a part of the solution by addressing these problems right where we are; no place in America is immune to the problem of sexual harassment and abuse. We can begin by refusing to support television and movies that turn abuse into entertainment and by becoming advocates for victims. Let's stop being simply consumers of titillating stories that raise our ire but nothing more and begin being voices for justice that restores victims, holds offenders accountable, and seeks to heal wounds and prevent future abuse.
(Please visit Women At Risk (WAR) International to find out how you can advocate for victims of sexual abuse and exploitation.) Women at Risk (WAR) International
Thursday, November 16, 2017
An Eye for an Eye and a Fork for a Fork
Someone recently sent me a rather humorous article titled, "An Eye for an Eye and a Fork for a Fork Never Ends Well." In this article the author, Lori Borgman, recounts an interaction with her 4-year-old granddaughter where the little girl told of a friend who had "forked" her, stabbing her in the shoulder with a fork. She wisely told her "gwamma" that she didn't fork her back because, "I don't pay evil with evil."
I am sure that this precocious 4-year-old doesn't know the history of lex talionis, the ancient formula of retributive justice found in the Babylonian Code of Hammurapi and in Jewish laws in Exodus 21:24, but she certainly knew of the Apostle Paul's interpretation of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount teaching (see Romans 12:17 and Matthew 5:39). That's quite a lot of wisdom for a preschooler, even if she is simply parroting what her parents taught her.
Most people don't know that the retributive models of justice we find in our criminal justice system today find their origins in these ancient Near East laws. "Justice" then was too often carried out by the family of the injured party, so lex talionis was put into place to limit the consequences of a crime to equal that of the harm done. These laws were designed to ensure equal justice, not to validate revenge or retaliation. As researcher Kathryn Getek Soltis says, lex talionis "gives rights to those who have had their rights violated through crime. The law restores power to victims by offering them a claim to the equivalent suffering of the offender" (115). This restored power was designed to benefit and protect the poor and vulnerable of society.
This principle of righting the imbalances caused by crime makes sense. It appeals to our human desire for fairness. So, why did Jesus reject this law in the Sermon on the Mount, and why does our so-called Christian nation model the ancient Near East law rather than Jesus' teaching? In other teachings Jesus encouraged people to follow the laws, but His teaching to not repay evil for evil and to turn the other cheek defined justice anew. Perhaps He recognized that following "an eye for an eye" would result in nothing more than a lot of blind citizens. Perhaps He wanted to prepare us for the concept of grace that He ushered in by His substitutionary act of radical love on the cross.
Whether we live by "an eye for an eye" or by Jesus' teaching of radical love, we don't have to stop holding people accountable for their actions. The little girl who forked her friend needed to learn that her behavior was wrong, and she needed to learn how to make that wrong right. But if we begin with a mind towards restoration rather than equaling harms, we would all be better off.
Sources cited:
The Borgman article came from the Herald Palladium, date unknown.
Soltis, Kathryn Getek, "Mass Incarceration and Theological Images of Justice," Journal of the Society of Christian Ethics, Vol. 31, No. 2 (2011), pp. 113-130.
I am sure that this precocious 4-year-old doesn't know the history of lex talionis, the ancient formula of retributive justice found in the Babylonian Code of Hammurapi and in Jewish laws in Exodus 21:24, but she certainly knew of the Apostle Paul's interpretation of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount teaching (see Romans 12:17 and Matthew 5:39). That's quite a lot of wisdom for a preschooler, even if she is simply parroting what her parents taught her.
Most people don't know that the retributive models of justice we find in our criminal justice system today find their origins in these ancient Near East laws. "Justice" then was too often carried out by the family of the injured party, so lex talionis was put into place to limit the consequences of a crime to equal that of the harm done. These laws were designed to ensure equal justice, not to validate revenge or retaliation. As researcher Kathryn Getek Soltis says, lex talionis "gives rights to those who have had their rights violated through crime. The law restores power to victims by offering them a claim to the equivalent suffering of the offender" (115). This restored power was designed to benefit and protect the poor and vulnerable of society.
This principle of righting the imbalances caused by crime makes sense. It appeals to our human desire for fairness. So, why did Jesus reject this law in the Sermon on the Mount, and why does our so-called Christian nation model the ancient Near East law rather than Jesus' teaching? In other teachings Jesus encouraged people to follow the laws, but His teaching to not repay evil for evil and to turn the other cheek defined justice anew. Perhaps He recognized that following "an eye for an eye" would result in nothing more than a lot of blind citizens. Perhaps He wanted to prepare us for the concept of grace that He ushered in by His substitutionary act of radical love on the cross.
Whether we live by "an eye for an eye" or by Jesus' teaching of radical love, we don't have to stop holding people accountable for their actions. The little girl who forked her friend needed to learn that her behavior was wrong, and she needed to learn how to make that wrong right. But if we begin with a mind towards restoration rather than equaling harms, we would all be better off.
Sources cited:
The Borgman article came from the Herald Palladium, date unknown.
Soltis, Kathryn Getek, "Mass Incarceration and Theological Images of Justice," Journal of the Society of Christian Ethics, Vol. 31, No. 2 (2011), pp. 113-130.
Wednesday, November 8, 2017
The Broken Criminal Justice System
After a home-grown terrorist attacked civilians in lower Manhattan New York, killing eight and wounding at least a dozen more, President Trump indicated that he would support sending this domestic terrorist to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. He has since backed away from this statement, but within a day of making it, Trump followed up his comments by condemning the U.S. justice system as a "joke" and a "laughingstock."
While I do agree that the U.S. justice system is broken, I philosophically disagree with President Trump as to why it is broken. Trump claims that our justice system is not swift enough nor severe enough despite the fact that the United States has the highest incarceration rate per capita in the world, at the same time that crime rates have fallen roughly 45% between 1990 and 2012. Furthermore, the United States is the only industrialized country still using the death penalty and sentencing its prisoners to much longer sentences than any other industrialized nation, contradicting Trump's claim that our justice system is not severe enough.
Trump's comments reveal a complete lack of understanding about the justice system, and he ignores the results of numerous studies that have repudiated tough-on-crime policies of criminal justice that led to the mass incarceration we have today. Trump, like other U.S. citizens, no doubt has strong opinions about crime, especially the kind of crime this domestic terrorist committed. Crime ought to be punished, and those who commit such heinous acts out to be held accountable for their barbaric behavior. But when a sitting President publicly calls for the death penalty before the justice system has even had a chance to perform its function, we can clearly see what sort of "justice" he is advocating for. Due process was important enough to our county's founders that those Constitutional protections extended even to the most hated among us. If we are to discard the protections the Constitution affords even barbaric killers, we will soon find due process and other rights are no longer rights for all, but only for those who are rich or powerful enough to benefit from them.
The President has a duty to speak to the anxiety our country feels after a terrorist attack or other national tragedy, and he is right to demand justice for the victims. But the President also has a duty to uphold our Constitution and to fight for justice, not vengeance.
Let's fix the broken criminal justice system. But let's not "fix" it by tweeting out emotionally charged proposals. Let's address the tough-on-crime policies that have led to the world's highest incarceration rate, in a country that prides itself on freedom and human rights. Let's start listening to expert research that shows lengthy prison sentences do not lead to reformed lives. Let's not respond with knee-jerk reactions to the atrocities committed by one crazed lunatic by reinforcing a system that has perpetuated atrocities for generations.
While I do agree that the U.S. justice system is broken, I philosophically disagree with President Trump as to why it is broken. Trump claims that our justice system is not swift enough nor severe enough despite the fact that the United States has the highest incarceration rate per capita in the world, at the same time that crime rates have fallen roughly 45% between 1990 and 2012. Furthermore, the United States is the only industrialized country still using the death penalty and sentencing its prisoners to much longer sentences than any other industrialized nation, contradicting Trump's claim that our justice system is not severe enough.
Trump's comments reveal a complete lack of understanding about the justice system, and he ignores the results of numerous studies that have repudiated tough-on-crime policies of criminal justice that led to the mass incarceration we have today. Trump, like other U.S. citizens, no doubt has strong opinions about crime, especially the kind of crime this domestic terrorist committed. Crime ought to be punished, and those who commit such heinous acts out to be held accountable for their barbaric behavior. But when a sitting President publicly calls for the death penalty before the justice system has even had a chance to perform its function, we can clearly see what sort of "justice" he is advocating for. Due process was important enough to our county's founders that those Constitutional protections extended even to the most hated among us. If we are to discard the protections the Constitution affords even barbaric killers, we will soon find due process and other rights are no longer rights for all, but only for those who are rich or powerful enough to benefit from them.
The President has a duty to speak to the anxiety our country feels after a terrorist attack or other national tragedy, and he is right to demand justice for the victims. But the President also has a duty to uphold our Constitution and to fight for justice, not vengeance.
Let's fix the broken criminal justice system. But let's not "fix" it by tweeting out emotionally charged proposals. Let's address the tough-on-crime policies that have led to the world's highest incarceration rate, in a country that prides itself on freedom and human rights. Let's start listening to expert research that shows lengthy prison sentences do not lead to reformed lives. Let's not respond with knee-jerk reactions to the atrocities committed by one crazed lunatic by reinforcing a system that has perpetuated atrocities for generations.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)