issus17 by Eroko

ErokoUID: 2659745

特意不限时一次，正确先把好习惯养成了再追求速度。求狠拍。

TOPIC: 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."
WORDS: 652
TIME: 00:52:16
DATE: 2009-8-7 19:24:21

Laws, legislated under certain social environment, are always inevitably receiving statements of just or unjust. However, there is usually not a clear standard to distinguish if the law is just. More over, even if the laws are defined as unjust indubitably, to resist them remains questionable.

First of all, the law is defined as just or not differently by different groups involved, since in most laws there is individual interest involved. Once the law is judged by one of the groups only, the ones whose interest is impaired due to the law, they are more likely to consider it to be unjust, while the group receiving advantages may hold the supporting attitude. Take the law about the laboring contract for example, if the law requires employers to sign contract with employees, and once the employers dismiss the employee during the contract period, they would have to pay extra money to the dismissed. Such a law may receive the judgment of unjust among the companies, but it is more likely to receive support from the employees. In such a condition, the question that the law is just or not can not be easily answered by either of the groups.

Additionally, even there is not any interest involved, the judging remains difficult, because of the complexity of behaviors. In most situations, the judgment of behavior is complex enough to become a conundrum, so are the relevant laws. In China, when patients are sent to hospital, it's unnecessary to make them informed consent; only the family members are required to be informed consent, which means the patients can be easily kept back from knowing the detailed information or even diagnosis of their diseases, such as cancers. In this case, to decide what to do requires more pondering. If the law stipulates that the patient should receive all the information and get fully informed consent, the patients who cannot afford such an impact may undergo despair, which may make the therapy less effective and exerts more conflict to the patients. On the other hand, facing the patients who are tough enough, concealing such information seems to be unreasonable, and allowance of this may lead to more problems. Considering all of above, few people can tell this law is just or not by the first glance, to adjust it requires more contemplation.

Even if some laws is definitely unjust, to resist them is not prudent, and it seems to solve no problems but give rise to chaos instead.
During our history, the existence of unjust laws is out of question, but few of them were eliminated by simply resisting. The laws about human rights of Negroes in United States before 1960s, which was accepted during that period without considered to be unjust,
was notorious about its racial discrimination. To fight against this law, Martin Luther King led a boycott to show their attitude against the laws, and he accepted the fate of being arrested instead of resisting. Only by this way of struggling for human rights can he receive achievement and respect, even after his death. If he led the blacks fought against the government, it will only lead to further oppression and deeper racial rancor. The way performed by him is social disobedience, started from Mahatma Gandhi,
requiring its followers that when refusing to obey certain laws they still have to accept the punishment to show the attitude of opposing. Only by this way, declaiming the attitude without breaking the rules of society and leading to the amendment of the law, can one achieve the goal of ending up the unjust laws.

Basing on the discussion above, one should realize the complexity of making a standard distinguishing just and unjust, and abandon the idea that simply resisting the laws can make changes. Only under the respect of social rules, the proclaiming idea can be accepted by majority, and the unjust laws can be corrected.