I’m not talking like the laws of physics, yes those exist in nature. I’m talking about manmade laws.
Laws are a social construct! They mean nothing unless someone enforces them!
In the book Lord of the Flies, when the kids are on a desert island with no adults, there’s some inertia initially where they still behave as if adults are watching. Until it dawns on them that nobody is there to enforce the rules and they can do whatever the fuck they want, then there’s chaos.
People still behave as if the law is just some natural force that exists regardless of enforcement. No matter how many times they see the law broken without consequences. No matter how many times cops ignore crimes or prosecutors drop cases they shouldn’t or judges make a bad ruling, some people still have this blind faith that when something illegal happens, it will be punished. Or some even seem to think people in power physically can’t break the law.
I had a fight with someone cause they were posting some shit about how ICE “can’t” enter houses without a warrant and I replied with the meme about how robbers can’t legally take your stuff without your consent. Sorry but ICE can and do do things the law says they “can’t”.
And sorry, but Trump can and probably will interfere with elections and stay in office for as long as he lives and invade other countries and commit full on genocide if nobody stops him.
And people act like it’s an inevitability that Trump and the other fascists will face nuremberg trials. Sorry but it’s not an inevitability. The nuremberg trials happened when other countries successfully invaded Germany and put an end to the regime. It’s not going to happen automatically. It’s only going to happen if there’s revolution or war. Maybe a newly elected government will prosecute these clowns, but I doubt it.
The law is made up. It doesn’t exist in nature. The only thing protecting your rights is a social contract. It is not inevitable that justice will be served. This isn’t just in the Untied States. All over the world, laws are enforced inconsistently. Nothing guarantees the law will work as it is supposed to.
I agree with the sentiment generally, but not your reasoning in this post. Although to be fair to you, I can’t really put my gut feeling into a cohesive argument here either.
However I did notice as well people seem to overestimate what law can do. I joined an ecoactivist group in my community, yet everything they do is petition the local government to pass or veto something, which obviously then get ignored.
But really even IF those petitions weren’t ignored, drafting a petition is the easier part.
The harder part is aligning power structure incentives with yours, or building your own superior power structures. Otherwise law isn’t worth shit, because power structures such as police or media or courts or Big Tech will prevail using more money, media influence, and thugs with weapons than you ever did.
I am not a tankie, but I believe Stalin was right on this one: “the only power comes out of a long rifle”