Justice? Just us.

I’m not quite sure I know what it is anymore. It certainly isn’t tit for tat or eye for an eye, however logical that may seem. The culture of greed in this country has distorted what justice really means it would seem.

Recently a personal injury case I investigated go in front of jury, a case where common sense would dictate that an individual that caused their own accident and injuries, a person that did something wrong and ended up hurting themselves, would then be held responsible for their own actions. Apparently common sense is completely dead as a 12 person jury decided that even though this person caused their own accident they aren’t “really” responsible for their own actions and therefore are entitled to vast sums of money; oh and her husband gets money too because he alleged that because of the accident they weren’t able to act as husband and wife.

This verdict is shocking and shows the ineptitude of Americans and I am disgusted with them for it. They are probably all the same people that cry “socialism” and “Communism”, at President Obama but also feel large corporations should take care of the people, even when they are not at fault. So who’s creating the socialism now jerks?

I’ll admit that if an individual suffers a legitimate accident and there is an at fault party then they should offer some compensation to the injured party. It’s the decent thing to do. But it should be tempered with reason and accountability, not wild guesses about the moral duty of corporations to take care of the little guy who cut their finger while looking at a box of cookies. (Oh the humanity! How ever will that poor man survive this horrific ordeal....whimper, whimper)

Where’s the justice in that? When a jury awards a monster verdict to a person it affects us all. Stores or businesses have to raise prices to cover their bottom line, in some cases businesses have been forced to shut their doors. Who is that helping? It only helps the greedy person that could have had a few thousand dollars to take care of their hospital bills and put back at 100% pre-injury status but wants, nay, demands hundreds of thousands of dollars for their alleged, “peace of mind”.  Is that justice?

And why does this happen, because no one feels they have to take responsibility for their own actions. If I knock a box off a shelf and it hits me in the face, it’s my fault. Not anyone else's, I should have been more careful. But No, that’s just not the case anymore, no one is responsible for themselves, no personal accountability. It’s always someone else’s fault and that’s why America is so weak in the eyes of the world. We are complainers and soft bellied whiners who want everything without doing anything to earn it.  

I hope and pray that someday, common sense returns to the American Psyche and we start taking care of ourselves and responsibility for our own actions.  That would be amazing, then the world would really have to marvel at the Americans again, our roll up our sleeves and get the job done ethic would return and I bet the economy would stabilize and poverty would vanish. And maybe, just maybe a real sense of what justice is would return. Perhaps it’s a pipe dream, but it’s nice to dream.