Notion of Justice in Modern Society

Probably the longest and most disputed argument since the dawn of humanity revolves around the topic, justice. However, I do not wish to paint the grey matters of justice neither black nor white today. I just want to share, in my humble opinion, what gives shapes and colors to justice, individually then consequently as a society itself.

Besides the obvious counterexamples, such as murder, steal, and etc., what do we use to define justice? Straightforwardly speaking, I think what we are used to or accustomed to frames our notion of justice. I hold certain values within which my personal experiences have allowed me to prioritize. These accumulated experiences are possible only through the environment I am directly or indirectly exposed to, thus what I am gradually accustomed to. Then these priorities of values emerging from the experiences comprise my notion of justice.

For example, we live in a society where an individual suffers no hierarchy of blood types. No person is unequally treated or more susceptible to injustice depending on blood types. Why? Besides the absurdity of such criteria to discriminate groups of peoples, we are well aware of the fact that blood types are insignificant factor in constituting our differences. How so? Because, we are not accustomed to such differences posing any significant considerations to elicit justice or injustice. Hence, we do not hold any values in such discrepancy. But say, hypothetically with permission of some irrationality, one is born and raised in a quarantined society where such physical trait is undeniable factor determining superiority over others, he or she will perceive such system of hierarchy as justice. Similar to caste system in India, any revolt or challenge brought up by lower class to upper class might be seriously deemed as injustice, therefore justice must be served by penalizing the revolter. By my personal notion of justice, all this sound ridiculous and maybe to you too, if you are living in similar society as mine. Nonetheless, have you ever wondered, why some people, according to your own notion of justice, are so oblivious to the fact that what they are doing is injustice? The same people you point finger to, can be pointing at you with the same rationale.

So justice seems dependent on collective actions which the society permits, especially in democracy. What society permits or prohibits are dependent on what people agree upon among themselves to allow or disallow, therefore becoming accustomed to them. As time progresses, this continuity of actions or inactions shape our values and finally, perceived as notion of justice.

Then the next question is, is justice directly shaped by our collective preferences? It seems that there are some matters of justice which are immutable, such as killing of another strictly prohibited. However, although extreme, it is possible that anything about what we define justice can be altered, due to influence of collective preference in a society (e.g. premarital sex was strictly prohibited in biblical times, but not so much in modern society). There might be arguments against such opinion, proposing that there are foundational black and white spectrums of justice, and anything in between (grey area) can be suitably altered by the changing environments of society. But then, this argument brings the debate back to zero, if not supporting the idea that collective preference shapes justice. In order for one to consider what's black and white and grey about justice, one must have had such belief instilled by the environment he or she is exposed to. So what is justice? Justice, especially in modern society, is a sketch book, which the hands of individuals within the society all grab a piece of crayon (collective preference) and draw as they see fit.

(Note: I was doing LSAT prep test at a coffee shop. I apparently took a longer break than my intention. Please have the generosity to give me some leeway in my unfurnished thoughts and writing. I really didn't feel like spending sufficient time to carefully craft this.)   ; )