[lbo-talk] Free Martha!

nathanne at nathannewman.org nathanne at nathannewman.org
Tue Jan 20 18:42:58 PST 2004



> Nathan Newman wrote:
>
>>But why should we care about Martha when there are hundreds of thousands
>> of
>>other stories of poorer, less famous folks railroaded into jail?
>
> Oh, right. We can only care about one thing at a time. Sorry!

We can care about thousands of things at a time-- I just think there are thousands of folks railroaded into jail who should have more attention than Martha.


> And forget the part about how her prosecution is an attempt to
> legitimate Wall Street, which doesn't deserve such treatment.

No, I understand that point, but in some ways the "Free Martha" line distracts from that message. If she's innocent, the story isn't legitimation of the system but merely perversion of justice.

True legitimation only comes from policing actual violations of the norms of a system, real crimes in a system that itself may be a crime, but can define degrees of felony.

--Nathan



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