While reading
Kant, I found his last discussion about taking another person’s life in the
event that your life is threatened, particularly applicable to today’s society.
To begin his
argument Kant states that “the question under discussion is whether I am
permitted to use violence against some who himself has not used it against me”
(Kant, 156). Kant then goes on to
describe two men who have been shipwrecked. He argues that, if a man, who is fearful of his own life,
pushes the other man off the ship, in order to save his own life, there is no
penal law against this action. He
believes in this situation, survival instincts kick in, and any concept of the
law and right and wrong, goes out the window. Kant backs this claim up by
stating “a penal law applying to such a situation could never have the effected
intended, for the threat of an evil that is still uncertain (being condemned to
death by a judge) cannot outweigh the fear of an evil that is certain (being
drowned.” (Kant, 156)
Therefore Kant
comes to the conclusion that although the act is not without blame, it is
unpunishable. He states “this subjective immunity from punishment, through a
strange confusing among jurists, is identified with an objective (legal) immunity
from punishment.” For Kant, while there will be no legal repercussions for your
actions, there will be moral punishment. He believes that once taken out of the
situation where your life is being threatened, and rationality has resumed, the
person will be forced to face the consequences of taking another person’s life.
For me, this seems like a worse punishment, having to constantly know that I
took another person’s life for my own personal survival. And I believe, that
unless you’re a severe sociopath, most people would feel extreme pain after
taking another man’s life.
However, today,
we have laws that mirror Kant’s view on this subject. For example, most states
in the United States have Stand Your Ground Laws, which enables you to “prevent death or great bodily harm to himself or
herself or another or to prevent the commission of a forcible felony.”
(Washington Post). Here’s an article about Florida’s Stand your Ground
Law: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2013/07/15/everything-you-need-to-know-about-stand-your-ground-laws/
What I found interesting about all
of this is the objectivity of the law. While I may think I am acting in self
defense, what if the law and the public see it differently? How do we define
self defense? Recently, there was much uproar about the murder Trayvon Martin.
George Zimmerman, the defendant in the case, claimed that he shot Trayvon, who
was unarmed, after Trayvon “knocked him to the
ground, punched him, straddled him and slammed his head into the concrete”
(NYTIMES ). Here is more on Zimmerman: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/15/us/in-zimmerman-case-self-defense-was-hard-to-topple.html?pagewanted=all
Would Kant agree that Zimmerman acted in a way that he feared
for his own life, and thus is not punishable by law? Mr. Zimmerman eventually was found not guilty, however a
California woman, who claimed self defense was found guilty. (To read more on
Susan Polk : http://crime.about.com/od/current/a/susan_polk.htm) In her case, she
claimed that her husband abused her and on the night in question he attacked
her and she stabbed him for fear of her life. When police examined Susan, they
found the presence of self defense wounds. However, she did not call the police immediately after the
murder and she allegedly cleaned up after the murder. Thus, is it because she did not admit to her actions right
away that we don’t view it as self-defense? What if she had called right away
and admitted to what she had done, then would people believed her story? Is it
because we have self-defense laws in place, that perhaps self consciously, we think that we can get away
with murder by claiming the person we killed was threatening our life? In Susan
Polk’s case, she claimed her husband was abusive and had fits of rage. We don’t
know what happens behind closed doors and we don’t know their dynamic for sure,
thus, how can you ever convict someone who claims self defense? I think Kant
provides an interesting point and raises questions that are applicable to our
lives today. How do we define self defense? When is it acceptable to lose
rationality, save your own life, and take someone else’s? Are the moral
consequences of taking a life greater than any punishment brought down by the
law? Why is that some people who claim self defense get convicted while others
do not? I think these are all questions that I find myself asking after reading
Kant’s idea of justice and comparing it to our laws and cases we see today.
Here is a final case, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/19/marissa-alexander-gets-20_n_1530035.html
, in
which a Florida woman fired warning shots at
her husband because she thought he was threatening her life. She got 20 years
and all she did was fire a warning shot. Is that just?
It is quite true that Kant's line between self-defense and murder is somewhat blurred. In fact the way I see it, what goes on in scenarios such as these are are similar to a basic "survival of the fittest" situation. Unless I've missed something somewhere, I'm still curious as to what deems an individual applicable to be the one to act out in self-defense. As you stated with the two men being shipwreck, what proves that the sailor who committed the act was in the right. The way I see it, shouldn't the individual who can contribute more to society. However such a rule wouldn't actually hold in such a situation, as you also said that the act of "self-defense" was initiated by the sailors instincts and his fear of his personal death. Therefore, the amount one contributes to society would be render meaningless to either sailor. All that ends up occurring is a competition for survival, nothing all that different from societies formed by other philosophers. But I digress, what it comes down to is probably that when the sailor pushes the other sailor off the ship, he ends up justifying this means to an end, which is his own survival at the cost of the other sailors life. I feel like such an analysis of the situation could be similar to that of the Zimmerman case, where Zimmarman shot Trayvon, and claimed self-defense, resulting in his own reassurance that it wasn't his fault, and killing him was his only option. Now the case with the woman who fired the warning shot, feels quite ludicrous when compared with the other situations. First of all, there were no injuries or fatalities, all there was was the intent to survive. The only reason I can figure for her arrest was the fact that there was the use of a gun. This brings up the question of what the verdict would have been given she instead threatened her husband with a knife or something. What I saw when I read about the case was a lot of what if's, which resulted in her 20 year sentence. Sometimes it disturbs me how powerful an assumption can be not only with the assumptions from the case, but the type of situation that Kant provides. The assumption that one's life is in peril can drive them to drastic measures in order to survive, and if one continues to delude oneself, he will only end up believing in his assumption as the truth, whether it be true or not, leading to this act called "self-defense." So do I see "self-defense" as just, I'm still not quite sure, but the whole thing seems more or less context sensitive
ReplyDeleteRosemary,
ReplyDeleteGreat examples of cases that have been in the media recently. I agree with you that Kant's endorsement of self-defense is fine in theory, but in practice, as we have seen with Florida's Stand Your Ground laws, there is a lot of room for interpretation when it comes to deciding whether someone was acting in self-defense or with murderous intentions.
The obvious inconsistency in the rulings between the Zimmerman case and the case of the woman who fired warning shots at her husband reminds me of a concept that psychologists call "the fundamental attribution error." In short, this theory states that individuals are more likely to attribute their own actions to unique circumstances but are more likely to attribute others' behavior to their moral character. An example that's often used to illustrate this phenomenon is a situation where someone cuts you off in traffic. You are likely to think to yourself, "That person has road rage! They drive dangerously and have no regard for the lives of others!" or something to that effect. However, in the event that you cut someone off in traffic, you will attribute your behavior to the circumstances rather than your character, saying something like, "I'll be late for work if I don't get in front of this person."
The fundamental attribution error can also apply to situations where we are making judgments about others similar to us. This line of thinking highlights how problematic Kant's endorsement of self-defense is because, as in the two cases Rosemary mentioned involving Florida's Stand Your Ground laws, individuals are more likely to believe people similar to them (Zimmerman, who was a white, middle-class male) when they say they were acting in self defense and are more likely to attribute the actions of those different from them (Marissa Alexander, black, female) to their character, thus having more reason to find them guilty.
That being said, are Kant's ideas about using violence against someone when they haven't used it against you just? He submits that even though a person will not be punished by the law, their conscience will weigh on them for their immoral act. Should we as a society legislate based on this "safety net" of guilt? Is it enough to suffer mental anguish while still being free from jail?