When life gets tough, it’s often pretty liberating to just scream to the sky, “Where is the justice in this world?”
Good question. Because that is exactly what I wonder.
I wonder, throughout the countless years in human history, what exactly has justice been? I wonder, where does it exist, even in the modern world?
I wonder if truth truly triumphs over falsehood. Humanity says that knowledge always wins over superstition. If this is true, I wonder why a 21-year-old woman died of suffocation in a “menstruation hut” after she lit a fire to keep warm. I wonder if the girl found justice in this course of action her village took. I wonder if girls in Nepal find justice in their tradition of exiling women.
I wonder if civilization is always better than chaos. Humanity says that chaos and order are opposites. If this is true, I wonder why 6 million Jews being killed by the Nazi was considered as chaos, while today it is estimated that 36 million people will die from hunger, while 26 men owned the same as the 3.8 billion people who make up the poorest half of humanity. I wonder if those people find justice in their fate. I wonder if chaos is really that different from our so-called civilization.
I wonder if slavery is worth fighting against. Martin Luther King and Maya Angelou have inspired thousands of black men to stand up for freedom. If this is justifiable, I wonder why the great Greek philosopher Aristotle believed that slavery was part of justice, that those born to their station had the duty to fulfill it, even if it were as a slave. I wonder if black men today would find justice in being slaves as those who did centuries ago. I wonder if slavery is actually… justice.
I wonder, what is justice? The definition of justice has changed, repeatedly, throughout the dimensions of time and geography. I wonder, what is justice, what is right and what is wrong, what is moral and immoral?
I wonder if that girl, as she lay in her menstruation hut, felt perfectly justified in her death? If it was a traditional practice, and she was used to her village’s ways, would she feel what we in Hong Kong do?
I wonder if civilization and chaos are so different. If the culling of the Jews in World War II is injustice, then injustice reigns even more in today’s world, today’s world in which we call equality.
I wonder if slavery and torment is more about deserving. I wonder if our refusal to accept slavery in the modern world means that it has always been an outrage, a taboo, in some other corner of history and the world.
We call our world equal. We call our world free. We call our laws justice.
I wonder again: Where is the justice in this world?
Some people have chosen to accept what they believe is injustice, believing that there is no true justice in the world.
Some people continue to wonder how injustices, despite our every effort, is still flung in the face of humanity.
Do you accept?
Or do you wonder?
The choice is yours.
