chinaA schoolyard bully is raised to think that hitting people is perfectly acceptable. His parents hit him and so, in his mind, it is ok for him to hit other kids at school. Should this child be punished less for hitting children than a child whose parents taught in word and example not to hit others?
How about a Chinese man who thought it was acceptable to kill his wife because she had cheated on him? In a recent case involving a Chinese immigrant to New York named Chen, Mr. Chen killed his wife because he found out about her adultery. Here's the quote from an email I received from Sarah Song of CHINALAW that started me thinking: "an American anthropologist testified (in this trial) that in China adultery is incredibly dishonorable and suggested that contemporary Chinese criminal law would show sympathy for such a cuckolded man. This testimony appears to have influenced the judge during sentencing."
Though the anthropologist did not provide any direct support for his statements, some other members of CHINALAW came up with some interesting information. During the Qing Dynasty of China (1644-1911), the Qing Code stated that a man who caught his wife and her lover in the act could kill them both "with impunity." However, adultery was not always punished by death in Imperial China and it was not always "such an immense blot on one's hnor as to justify murder" (Don Clarke).
So in Imperial China it was acceptable, though not necessary, to kill adulterers. This is assumably because being cheated on causes a massive loss of face or honor. Now if we assume that Mr. Chen continued to hold the Qing Dynasty attitude towards adultery, we can ask, do we punish Mr. Chen less because he felt it was culturally acceptable to kill his wife? Or do we punish everyone the same across the board?
In my mind these questions lead to two more questions: Is justice truly blind? Is morality or truth objective or subjective?
Here's my perspective: justice does not need to be blind (i.e. ignore extenuating circumstances) but truth is objective (i.e. does not change according to one's perspective). A judge can show mercy on Mr. Chen, lessening his sentence because of his cultural understandings, without saying that murder is less wrong in his case. It is always wrong to murder, but an understanding of the situation and motivation of the person in the wrong can increase or decrease the sentence.
What do you think? I want to hear your opinion.
On a wider scale, it is very clear that the Chinese and Americans see the world differently. For example, the concept of owning an idea that I've written so much about. The Chinese don't have the same concept of intellectual property as Americans. Or something else as simple as "hello." Americans and Europeans say good morning to their mother every morning, to their friends on the street, to strangers if the setting is right. The Chinese generally don't say anything in the form of greeting. At hotels they need to be trained to say "hello" to guests. Do these different perspectives change the rightness or wrongness of using someone elses' ideas to make a profit or the politeness of saying hello?
