[i习作temp] issue17 改过一遍了 [复制链接]

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电梯直达

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发表于 2005-8-19 13:03:07 |只看该作者 |倒序浏览

Issue17:
There are two types of laws: just and unjust. Every individual in a society has a responsibility to obey just laws and, even more importantly, to disobey and resist unjust laws.

Is everyone responsible for obeying just laws and even more importantly, disobeying and resisting unjust laws? The speaker claims so. It seems that, since laws are made by authority of a society instead of the majority, it is valid for people to complain about the unjust laws. However, I do not quite agree with the speaker, for the reasons that (1) laws are carried out to guarantee the stability of a whole society and protect the rights of majority thus it is hard to divide laws into the above two groups; (2) laws are supported by compulsory of the nation; (3) everyone is equal in front of laws, as is illustrated by following discussions.

To begin with, laws, with its functions in guarantee the stability of a whole society and protect the right of majority, cannot simply be divided into groups of just and unjust. Since laws are based on a few principles and have been improved after being used for a certain time, nearly all of them proved to be valid. Some may argue that there are some of the laws that are unjust for them because there benefits are undermined. For example, the regulation of charge for parking cars in some big cities seems to be unjust for the drivers. However, they neglect the fact that such laws and regulations are useful to protect the environment and control the total amount of the automobiles in some large cities, thereby contribute a lot to protect a normal life for majority (in some sense even for the drivers). If people only focus on the short term profits and disobey ‘unjust’ laws, the stability of a society may be gradually diminished. As is often point out, stable laws are symbols of a stable society.

Additionally, in order to assure its laws being applied to people everyday life properly, government try out series of ways, such as compulsory and so on. As a result, it is fairly dangerous for anyone who wants to disobey laws, even he considers is unjust. Government of modern society realized that it is almost impossible for them to reach a stable and thriving society only through ways of morality, because morality, which appeared as a production of a culture, merely encourage what to do, but do not ban what not to do, which is more important in societies that ceaselessly pursue maximum profits. It is only tribal people who can maintain a life through morality, but unfortunately they could not enjoy the prosperity of modern production. Consider the conditions of those developed country, none of them do not possess a stable and powerful system of laws (for instance, America). In short, simply disobeying laws that are considered to be ‘unjust’ is not a wise behavior for common people. It is highly possible that one who disobeys some of the ‘unjust’ laws could only receive punishment but not ‘justice’.

Moreover, as is so often pointed out, everyone, as well as the authority, is equal in front of laws, because it is essential to keep the laws being just as a whole. If anyone, who thought there are a few laws which are unjust, resists obeying such laws, how would other people think of him and the laws? Perhaps lots of people could find lots of laws that are considered to be "unjust" and thus resist accepting it. After that, a catastrophe will come, for criminals has "just" reasons to do "unjust" things simply because they could also find laws unjust for them, and it is natural for them to disobey it.

To draw a conclusion, on balance, I suggest we try our best to obey every law if we can not find method to improve those which we call "unjust laws", because each of the laws is worked out compulsorily and ensures our quotidian lives to some extent. Without the stability of laws, we cannot necessarily reach the stability of our society.