The law isn’t about morality or social good or promoting the general order; it’s about power and who wields it. The law is fundamentally a vehicle through which those who stand atop social hierarchies can command, exploit, and do violence to those less powerful. A CEO can kill tens of thousands of Americans every year with a pen and that isn’t murder: a coal company can poison generations and that isn’t murder: a police department can force homeless people to flee from place to place until they die from exposure and that isn’t murder. The law exists to protect and promote the interests of the powerful, because that is what legal systems are designed to do.
The law isn’t about morality or social good or promoting the general order; it’s about power and who wields it. The law is fundamentally a vehicle through which those who stand atop social hierarchies can command, exploit, and do violence to those less powerful. A CEO can kill tens of thousands of Americans every year with a pen and that isn’t murder: a coal company can poison generations and that isn’t murder: a police department can force homeless people to flee from place to place until they die from exposure and that isn’t murder. The law exists to protect and promote the interests of the powerful, because that is what legal systems are designed to do.