4S1 blog

January 28, 2010
Was justice served by the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki?

Although Japan collectively is to be blamed for starting the war, it was an injustice to kill the civillians in the two cities as they are innocent. The common people did nothing wrong and yet were made to pay for the crimes of the generals and politicians who supported the war.

It is worth noting that the war would have dragged on without the atomic bombings as nationalistic pride would motivate those military officials and politicians to continue fighting, hence resulting in larger casualties and damages.

Therefore, while the bombings were considered a necessary evil that brought justice to the countries occupied by Japan, they were unjust to the Japanese civillians.

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January 28, 2010
"Justice is about restoring the balance of the moral order of things."

This definition of justice is sufficient but idealistic because it is often difficult to measure or quantify the "imbalance of moral order" and thus the fair compensation.

It also subtly assumes universal moral standards always exist, which is questionable. What one party perceives to be right may be wrong for another. In other words, value judgment can be subjective.

For example, recently some Muslim groups in Malaysia have cast the use of the word "Allah" by Christians as a surreptitious effort to try to seduce Muslims away from Islam, and attacked some churches. On the other hand, church officials assert that the wrod has been used for centuries to refer generally to God.