The Icelandic legal system
Ah, that is probably too ambitious of a title for this blog. My other thought was "The Twinky Defense" but that is a little too irreverent, since what I actually want to talk about is differing cultural attitudes about being judgmental.
Last night at the franka party, us girls (who were planning on drinking) all arranged to have various men (who were not invited to the party and staying sober on a Friday night) drop us off and pick us up. This was a nice little demonstration of women's equality I would say. So, along comes Stefan to pick up Hjördís. He knows all of us, and we start chatting. He mentioned a news item, the one about the man who had broken his wife's finger as she tried to call the police for help, he was in the process of beating her up. Stefan informed us that the man had had received three years probation "ekki einu nótt í fangelsi!" even though the woman was bruised all over.*
Hjördís commented on how that was typical of Iceland, where everybody knows everybody, it is impossible to actually throw anyone in jail, if they are connected in any way to anyone important (and most people are). I chimed in that I was still really surprised no one was in jail from the whole banking disaster. In the US there is NO WAY that would be the case. Although not wanting to act too superior, I also mentioned on the other hand that with a good lawyer, a person can get out of just about anything in the US too, like the famous murder case where the lawyers argued diminished capacity and used how many twinkies the man had eaten as part of the evidence for that.
But now this morning I am thinking more generally about cultural attitudes about being judgmental. The US legal system judges that people have done something wrong, but gives people a lot of chances to explain their behavior. The Icelandic legal system seems to give people no chance what so ever to explain their behavior, and thus people sort of have to just assume they have not done anything wrong. I actually have a really crazy theory that David Oddson took on the position at Morgunblaðið just to give Icelanders some means of talking to him about his behavior, a court of public opinion in a system that does not allow a legal means to do this.
*And since I am already spouting all sorts of random thoughts this morning, I might as well mention that in linguistic performative terms, it is interesting that the topic Stefan chose to bring up during his very short step into the house was linked to the unstated nature of the feminist dynamic of the evening.
Last night at the franka party, us girls (who were planning on drinking) all arranged to have various men (who were not invited to the party and staying sober on a Friday night) drop us off and pick us up. This was a nice little demonstration of women's equality I would say. So, along comes Stefan to pick up Hjördís. He knows all of us, and we start chatting. He mentioned a news item, the one about the man who had broken his wife's finger as she tried to call the police for help, he was in the process of beating her up. Stefan informed us that the man had had received three years probation "ekki einu nótt í fangelsi!" even though the woman was bruised all over.*
Hjördís commented on how that was typical of Iceland, where everybody knows everybody, it is impossible to actually throw anyone in jail, if they are connected in any way to anyone important (and most people are). I chimed in that I was still really surprised no one was in jail from the whole banking disaster. In the US there is NO WAY that would be the case. Although not wanting to act too superior, I also mentioned on the other hand that with a good lawyer, a person can get out of just about anything in the US too, like the famous murder case where the lawyers argued diminished capacity and used how many twinkies the man had eaten as part of the evidence for that.
But now this morning I am thinking more generally about cultural attitudes about being judgmental. The US legal system judges that people have done something wrong, but gives people a lot of chances to explain their behavior. The Icelandic legal system seems to give people no chance what so ever to explain their behavior, and thus people sort of have to just assume they have not done anything wrong. I actually have a really crazy theory that David Oddson took on the position at Morgunblaðið just to give Icelanders some means of talking to him about his behavior, a court of public opinion in a system that does not allow a legal means to do this.
*And since I am already spouting all sorts of random thoughts this morning, I might as well mention that in linguistic performative terms, it is interesting that the topic Stefan chose to bring up during his very short step into the house was linked to the unstated nature of the feminist dynamic of the evening.
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