A worldview one holds organizes, focuses and filters our perception of the world we live in, determining what we will notice and concentrate on, and what we won't. A person who feels a need to focus on the perceived wrongdoings of others is doing so because of a particular worldview.
All people have good and bad qualities, yet in almost all cases the good far outweighs the bad. When noticing a “negative” behavior and casting a particular person in an unfavorable light, we are narrowing our focus to one point and possibly filtering in a manner that could damage us and the person on the receiving end. To avoid the tendency to see things in a negative light, and to filter in this way, we need to realize that every human being has altruism and quality at their core, however buried under inaccurate beliefs. Such a realization will give the mind a chance to notice or look for positives in others, thus protecting us and others from unfair unbalanced perception, and misguided treatment.
Those whose minds have laxed into habitual filtering don't realize it, or have any idea what they are doing. What they see and think is bad and deserving of punishment in another may be a result of a mind open only to negative signals, or interpretations, highly prejudiced due to very strong beliefs that appear self-evident. It can also be a way to justify cruelty from denial of opportunity to incarceration. One can't rationalize mistreatment of a good person, for example, but the wicked seem to deserve it. Therefore, those who control others have avested interest in seeing them in the poorest light.
A police officer, a rude person or an inmate can all justify their attitude and hurtful actions due to philosophical values which simply do not hold humanity in high standing—seeing man as cynical, selfish, perverted, sinful, and/or a spoiler of the planet. His or her second thought will typically be “that humanity should not be so.” He'll naturally find a target to blame, to give face to humanity's evil or seeming evil. He may also see himself as being a victim of a society or the segment of the population he's blamed. He or she may see lawbreakers as to blame, and may be quick to judge and mistreat those he or she misunderstands. Prosecutors, for example, often improperly categorize those who do not properly fit the criminal “mold” he or she forces them into.
As a protector, in justifying his punishment or restriction of those whom to him represent the problem, he has a vested interest in perceiving reality in such a way as to filter out all their redeeming or positive qualities. In his bleak view, built up by this process, soon only negative interpretations will seem rational. He then reacts extravagantly, often targeting and releasing the wrath of his righteous condemnation or charges on a stunned, sometimes innocent other, thus completing the cycle. By completing the cycle, we mean that now he has his seeming evidence of man's corruption—a seemingly guilty other. (As a philanthropist called public enemy number one for trying to help others, I understand the process first hand.)
It's as easy for a prosecutor as it is for a criminal to fall into such negative ways. It's all about and comes down to misanthropic or similar worldviews. Such a negative view of human nature goes unnoticed under the polite clothing of conventionally accepted scientific and religious beliefs that see man as a predator, sinful, etc. These are self-perpetuating and self-fulfilling prophesies because once accepted they become our subconscious programs determining how we treat others. How we treat others brings out a similar reaction (behavior) in them. This behavior thus spreads like a plague, and our Criminal Justice System (CJS) is an instrument of its dissemination.
Condemning others or society is the tree's leaf condemning the tree. We see prosecutors, media and politicians at it all the time. This doesn't make it right, and it doesn't do anything positive for a single person or the collective whole. And especially for those who have made mistakes—usually due to similar thinking patterns.
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The phenomena of projection and its enema effect are not exclusive to individuals, but occur with entire nations also. When the source of large scale frustration is not understood, great mock symbolic battles take place in the social arena, and innocent others are sacrificed by society. Relief is temporary, and soon a new target must be found, to attack, and rid the society of.
In the case of anyone being so targeted, eventually the target is found out not to be “evil,” and then society enacts protections for the targeted. Once the target was women, then blacks, then homosexuals. While the old targets tend to re-circulate, fresh new ones are always being created. If you look to see who's in the prisons you'll find out who they are.
We are not saying that there are no real and dangerous criminals. But we are saying that a society with negative beliefs about human nature has a greater emotionally felt and emotionally driven need to keep a steady flow into prisons, again—irregardless of real threat. The incarcerated could be nuns, it doesn't matter.
Society and media are projecting all the time. Prosecution and projection are sometimes similar actions. Taking someone whom society sees as representing a threat or evil off his street acts, somewhat like an enema. Such acts serve to relieve society of internally-generated emotional fears irregardless of the guilt of those removed from society. Socrates, for example, or Jews in Hitler's Germany, as another example, were condemned to death for no better reason.
What we are saying is that prosecution of “criminals” serves a second purpose as a social enema which gives society a false sense of safety, control, and a conception of having plucked out the evil. It's a collective way to throw off the poison (toxic guilt in each person in such a society which holds particular negative and inaccurate beliefs) by giving it to a targeted other, and then manipulating and isolating them.
In doing this we partially escape our own inner sense of guilt. And we feel better through comparison to this projected or imagined greater evil, which has now been subdued—or so wethink. In actuality we are creating more of what we try to control in this doomed-to-fail methodology.
More often than not, ironically, the conundrum goes as follows: those who blame are the one's to blame. Blamers often inaccurately and unfairly target, profile, stereotype and scapegoat in order to vilify. This IS the root of the whole problem.
In terms of filtering or projecting according to a negative or bias worldview, what side of the law you are on is irrelevant. This is a result of a value system sometimes held by those on both sides of the prison bars. Our thinking and our actions tell us who we are. Execution involves justification of murder (or so we think). We justify murder to teach the criminal that he can't justify murder. We infringe on people's rights in order to teach them that they can't infringe on people's rights.
The world needs more than just education. People of good intent sometimes need a helping hand. Many are caught in a system that requires that they feel guilt for years for an honest mistake, drug problem or whatever. Furthermore, they are told to accept a criminal self-image! They are told to accept the negative beliefs of their society, accept punishment, degradation and restriction, so that their life, productivity and possibly their family are destroyed. Typically, those treated in this way become anti-social and criminal. It's actually very difficult, if not impossible, for them to not be so effected.
In this way—to the degree that the CJS condemns—it does the opposite of what it is supposed to do, or what the majority in society want it to do. It does not make anyone safer or correct behavior at all. Instead it is a dissemination agent of distrust of human nature, the seed of criminal mentality.
There are few, if any “evil” people, and this is because behavior is a result of beliefs (which can change) and which do not define the nature of the spirit or core of a human being. If we think otherwise we are likely projecting. The great myth of “the basically bad person” gives us our current practice in which we prescribe ineffective doses of guilt and punishment. Only a deranged person prescribes guilt and punishment.
Extreme examples can illustrate the effect of a worldview which casts man in a depreciating light. Just look at what Hitler or Bin Laden did, or justified doing. Those who blame or point the finger are the ones in error, and in so doing perpetuate “evil.” This is true to whatever degree we do it. Therefore, what we do to criminals tells us more about ourselves than it does about those in our prisons. It very clearly shows the faults of those who condemn. And as a percentage of the population, the United States incarcerates more people than any other nation on earth. So what does this say about the worldviews and thinking patterns of Americans?
NOTE:
To focus on an individual's goodness can't help but create positive changes in them. Whatever we focus on in a person we draw out. If we focus on a person's seeming evil, it will grow and spread, whereas if we focus on their good, accomplishments, talents and virtues, all of that and their natural goodness will expand to the exact degree we give it attention.
It is time to completely reform the CJS. Please help us to do so by voicing your support of these concepts. You will prove your (evolved) altruistic and philanthropic state of consciousness in doing so.
We need to put an end to the guilt-punishment trap and begin to heal the world. It's time to stop hurting others and start healing. If we trusted human nature we wouldn't condemn and give up on others. Our prison populations are really a statement about thenation's distrust of human nature. Distrust of human nature will be our global downfall if we do not wake up! EN curriculum very clearly educates us as to the original cause of the distrust which is operating in our deepest beliefs and thinking.