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What would a justice system look like in a Taoist society?

Treks

Well-Known Member
If there was a Taoist society, how do you think it's criminal justice system would work? Is it possible to be non-dual and practice undiscriminating virtue AND have laws, penalties and a criminal justice system with an entirely Taoist population?

Many thanks :namaste
 

crossfire

LHP Mercuræn Feminist Heretic ☿
Premium Member
If there was a Taoist society, how do you think it's criminal justice system would work? Is it possible to be non-dual and practice undiscriminating virtue AND have laws, penalties and a criminal justice system with an entirely Taoist population?

Many thanks :namaste
With the development of an elaborate legalistic criminal justice system, being agenda driven, the people will put more effort and cunning into their criminal behavior. See Tao Te Ching chapters 18, 19, and 38.
 

Sunstone

De Diablo Del Fora
Premium Member
Perhaps the closest thing to a Taoist society has been China, and the Chinese legal system has never in history been much more than a joke because of corruption, and because it never evolved legal principles like due process and no one is above the law.
 
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Treks

Well-Known Member
With the development of an elaborate legalistic criminal justice system, being agenda driven, the people will put more effort and cunning into their criminal behavior. See Tao Te Ching chapters 18, 19, and 38.

So... in a Taoist society there would be no such system? Ordinary people would exist happily being taken advantage of by the cunning criminals with no repercussions. The more highly evovled people would be OK with this, but those less evolved people would probably perceive suffering and injustice.
 

bobhikes

Nondetermined
Premium Member
So... in a Taoist society there would be no such system? Ordinary people would exist happily being taken advantage of by the cunning criminals with no repercussions. The more highly evovled people would be OK with this, but those less evolved people would probably perceive suffering and injustice.

Tao is understanding not evolving, if you understand can you suffer injustice, if you understand can you do injustice.

You ask about a perfect Taoist society and then give it imperfections. The great thing about Tao is that it is for the individual not the society.
 

Treks

Well-Known Member
Tao is understanding not evolving, if you understand can you suffer injustice, if you understand can you do injustice.

You ask about a perfect Taoist society and then give it imperfections. The great thing about Tao is that it is for the individual not the society.

No, I did not ask about a perfect Taoist society. If I did please show me where.

A perfect Taoist society wouldn't be 'perfect' anyway, it would just 'be'.

If the Tao is for the individual and not the society then do Taoist's expect society to function around them like the mud around the lotus? If you take "the mud" away, how does the lotus survive?
 

Treks

Well-Known Member
I'll put it another way. A Taoist society would have a secular government with secular justice system for the people who aren't able to achieve the mental state of someone who goes with the Tao?
 

crossfire

LHP Mercuræn Feminist Heretic ☿
Premium Member
With the development of an elaborate legalistic criminal justice system, being agenda driven, the people will put more effort and cunning into their criminal behavior. See Tao Te Ching chapters 18, 19, and 38.

So... in a Taoist society there would be no such system? Ordinary people would exist happily being taken advantage of by the cunning criminals with no repercussions. The more highly evovled people would be OK with this, but those less evolved people would probably perceive suffering and injustice.
No, it would be a lackluster system rather than an elaborate system.
 

LuisDantas

Aura of atheification
Premium Member
Perhaps the closest thing to a Taoist society has been China, and the Chinese legal system has never in history been much more than a joke because of corruption, and because it never evolved legal principles like due process and no one is above the law.

I think it is rather the other way around, personally.

It is the expectation that legal principles deserve much consideration that lends them importance, when such attention would be much better employed in consideration of actual ethical principles.

Law tends to incorporate and redress corruption, but it does not help in solving it. Quite on the contrary actually. It ends up protecting and rewarding the more sophisticated forms of it.
 

LuisDantas

Aura of atheification
Premium Member
I'll put it another way. A Taoist society would have a secular government with secular justice system for the people who aren't able to achieve the mental state of someone who goes with the Tao?

Sure, but it would never think of it as important IMO. Because it could not possibly be. It would be mostly a regrettable curio, almost a circus house of horrors.

There is little in the way of even hope of a justice system (secular or otherwise) to be worth a lot of bother unless it is joined by a solid ethical and societal system to make the true work for it to confirm.
 

DreadFish

Cosmic Vagabond
If by "Taoist society" we are talking about a society that is in harmony with the way (as opposed to a society that just subscribes to the ideas of Taoism), then I would say there would be no use for a legal system.
 

Alceste

Vagabond
If there was a Taoist society, how do you think it's criminal justice system would work? Is it possible to be non-dual and practice undiscriminating virtue AND have laws, penalties and a criminal justice system with an entirely Taoist population?

Many thanks :namaste

You can get a sense of what the approach might be from reading taoist fiction, like seven taoist masters, zatoichi or chronicles of tao. In short, taoists have a very libertarian approach to law and order, but are also willing to exercise judgment and punishment - including executions - for pragmatic reasons, when it is the right thing to do.

So, while Taoists would not bother to write a law prohibiting exploitation and brutality, a brutal exploiter may still find himself on the wrong end of some magical organ liquifying punch from a master who simply desires to see harmony and contentment restored.
 
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