Abandoning the Work I Hated
opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com
opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com
1. Working with a couple of colleagues to finish an integration, finishing it, then booking a last-minute tee time to go play golf in celebration. It was a rewarding moment.
2. Getting together with teammates every couple of days for "Halo-thirty," where we'd break, get together in the afternoons for some halo3 in our teamroom, goof off for a bit, then get back to work. That team was remarkably-fun to be in and around.
I've actually found it a bit liberating now that I know what i'm looking for. In certain contexts at work I speak my mind more freely, decline or accept certain assignments, etc, and Nothing Bad Has Happened (yet).
Anyone like this do it, and survive? I would love to see more motivational stories.
Those who transitioned to professional clown work appreciated!
I'm always interested in these stories, kids or none, but I think it changes the equation dramatically. Like you, I'd really like to read more stories about people who did this with the additional obligation of supporting children.
I'm not saying those are the choices you are making. But on the other hand, a lot of people are but cognitive dossonance prevents them from seeing that.
Lookup "The Banality of Systemic Evil" and "Matthew Effect" for more thoughts.
As a party clown/musician there is purpose - he can make kids happy, he knows that "something in his future is expected of him", his work is extremely meaningful to the kids, he catches glimpses of that (whether he actually understands that is hard to say, he'd have to be able to 100% become a child to see the child's point of view).
If the defendants were not found guilty then they are not "criminals". Unless you were in court then you really ought not to judge. (Though I am aware the the American justice system is probably way less perfect than it claims to be).
One does not have to be guilty of the crime for which one is being tried, to be a criminal.
Regardless of the result, if a repeat offender is on trial, then there is a criminal in the dock. If said repeat offender is found not guilty, then, regardless of actual guilt of the offence in question, a criminal has been found "not guilty".
However, it would be appropriate to take angdis to task on the claim that this is "MORE common than justice being served", as that would require one to chart the difference between actual guilt and verdict for a significant majority of trials. That would be very tricky information to come by.
Justice is the sum of all correct results. (i.e. where the accused is guilty and found guilty, and where the accused is innocent and found not guilty)
The number of Criminals found not guilty is the sum of all incorrect acquittals of all offenders (guilty but found not guilty), and correct acquittals of repeat offenders.
Consider an example: Given 10 trials of repeat offenders, made up of 5 guilty and 5 innocent.
If every trial ends with the correct result, then justice has been served 10 times, and 5 criminals have been found not guilty.
However, If they are all found not guilty, then justice has been served 5 times, but 10 criminals have been found not guilty.
I'm not saying that angdis isn't wrong, just that you seemed to be rebutting the wrong point. In fact, as I stated in my first response, proving the assertion requires information that one simply couldn't have, i.e. a chart of actual guilt vs verdict. Plenty of guilty convicts will protest their innocence, and no one, having been acquitted, will then go on to say, "Well, actually, I did it, so long suckers!" I'd add that, as you point out, this is a pretty outrageous claim, so the burden of proof truly lies with the one making it.
In fact, I've oversimplified, because there was actually another clause in angdis' original assertion, "or guilty and given probation (nothing)", this adds another set of results to the group that makes up the "more than justice" list: any probation sentence, which could be an appropriate sentence for the convict (which is justice, so it cancels out), repeat offenders being found guilty of a crime of which they are innocent, but sentenced appropriately for the charge (not justice, but also still a guilty verdict) or inappropriately lenient ( not justice). By making the latter claim, one is declaring oneself a greater authority on sentencing and its goals and outcomes than the judges whose business it is to know all about sentencing.
This means that false guilty verdicts for minor crimes could still go on the left, if the accused is a criminal.
> just that you seemed to be rebutting the wrong point
It's more that I'm questioning the interpretation you've put on angdis' initial comment. Your logic is impeccable, but it leads to conclusions that are so at odds with the tone of his/her post that I feel you are crediting him/her with too much coherence and consistency.
HOWEVER, having lived in cities and neighborhoods with crime problems (eg Baltimore,Philly), I am aghast at how dysfunctional the criminal justice system is. If you look at public court case records of offenders, you'll see a peculiar pattern. Robbery, Burglary and violent crime offenders are RARELY limited to ONE case. Usually, there are several or even more offenses. The outcome of these cases is almost never a clear-cut "guilty" followed by prison time. Instead they're a convoluted series of pleas, followed by a drastically reduced sentence or PBJ (probation before judgement). A PBJ is effectively nothing to a repeat offender, because many continue to be charged with crimes WHILE ON PROBATION, and there are virtually NO additional consequences for those violations of probation.
The kinds of problems I am talking about are described in detail by Paige Croyder (http://pagecroyder.blogspot.com/). If you're interested how criminal justice "works" in Baltimore, she's the best resource.
The angst felt by the laywer who quit to become a clown, is not a surprise. Anyone who has a conscious will have a difficult time with being a lawyer in a criminal case (this goes for both sides).
That's not a bad thing.
For some of us there isn't a choice. sad clown face
Guess it takes all kinds.
I don't know what school he graduated from. Why he ended up as a criminal attorney? How good/ethical of an attorney he was? (I throw in ethical because it's not judged by the typical client, like I feel it should? Maybe, their really isn't a good way to judge a person ethics?)
Anyway, he made a life change. He can always go back to law, so in reality it's not that heroic of an act. He still has his degree, and passed the bar in his state. He definetly has a fallback. A fallback most of us don't have? It's very common to lawyers to pass the bar, and never practice law.
Thriller of the century.
"So then I downed the fifth Red Bull that hour and wondered whether I better change that for loop into a while loop because the first operand was empty anyway."
Can't wait for the novel!