Federalist Publisher Ben Domenech said the left doesn’t understand how true justice works.
“Most adults know what [justice] was, and you don’t have to be a judge, a prosecutor, a defense attorney, or police officer to have had to deal it out,” Domenech said while hosting Fox News Primetime on Thursday night. “Anyone who has been a parent has had to dispense with childish ideas of what’s fair and parse between aggrieved parties, work through ideas of right and wrong, make a call on what ought to happen for those who are wronged and often to those who did wrong.”
Justice, Domenech said, is difficult to prioritize when “you or someone you love has been hurt, has been taken, has been wronged,” but reacting poorly is not fair or just. And while philosophers and even poet Seamus Heaney seem to have a good idea of what justice means, Domenech said politicians such as President Joe Biden “give no evidence of understanding the words” solidified throughout history.
“Justice is as old as the ideas that built our society,” Domenech said. “From the Garden of Eden on, God distributed justice and he gave laws by which to live. Christianity, Judaism, and Islam all trace their understanding of justice back through Abraham. We understand it here in the West as the idea that man has rights: The things that we own, the life that we have, and that we ought to be protected from crime, being hurt or killed, and the decision must be blind because it must not matter if you are poor, rich, young, old, weak, or powerful, a society that is just protects your rights.”
George Floyd’s death, Domenech said, deserved justice, but for some, justice doesn’t seem to be enough.
“We look at a knee on the back of George Floyd, and we feel something is wrong. We want justice for the victim, the families, and yes, for the officer, for all parties,” Domenech explained. “Civilized people like you know that no matter how angry we are, burning down small stores and restaurants, looting and stealing, assaulting random policemen, attacking motorists and children, shooting down elderly men, we know that is not justice. But there are people who embrace all of these things.”
"We look at a knee on the back of George Floyd and we feel something is wrong. We want justice for the victim, the families, and for the officer… burning down stores and restaurants, looting and stealing, assaulting random policemen… we know that is not justice." @bdomenech pic.twitter.com/rjD2EWCXDb
— The Federalist (@FDRLST) April 23, 2021
The reaction from rioters every time there is an injustice, Domenech said, results in “an incredible amount of terrible wrongdoing.”
“On display is how Western justice works and would have been, regardless of the decision the jurors had come to,” he said. “A wrongdoing was identified; the party was held accountable. No amount of money or penance or apologies from that person could undo that wrong, but a jury verdict and a jail sentence are the best justice our flawed human nature allows. Only God can raise the dead.”
Demanding more than justice, Domenech said, goes against every definition of it.
“This is not justice, we heard, because it does not restore George Floyd to us. This might sound strange. The end of this might not be happy because a death still happened, but it is justice as we all understood until recently, as we as a society understand it,” Domenech said. “Unless we collectively prevent all human mistakes and tragedies going forward, we don’t get to call any attempt at restoration justice.”
