Kim- Blog Post 6

    In her paper "Bright Lines in Juvenile Justice," professor Berg defends her argument for bright lines in juvenile criminal cases.  She uses bright lines in criminal cases to claim that bright lines are not solely apart of the "non-ideal theory of justice" but also a part of ideal theory. (pg. 1) 

She explains how we have epistemic limitations: "even when we're making an honest effort" to figure out the culpability of juveniles we can not, including "experts of juvenile psychology." And due to these limitations, she explains that we "have a prima facie case for a bright line." (pg. 10) She makes this claim on the basis that it is better to under punish than it is to over punish: especially when "we're in a bad epistemic position and there are asymmetrical moral risks involved if we get it wrong." 

Another example she gives of a case in which we use bright lines is affirmative action. She explains how assuming affirmative action is justified, " the epistemic obstacles of judging on a case-by-case basis means we will need a bright line somewhere," considering that "there are moral risks in giving unfair advantages to people who have suffered less." (pg. 11)

The bright lines used for affirmative action and juvenile justice seemed different or they could be argued to be different. Under the assumption that those who are being underpunished will not commit the same crime once introduced back into society, the bright lines used for affirmative action and justice cases are different. When a juvenile is underpunished it does not come at the expense of another person, since we are assuming that the under punishment of a juvenile will not result in the harm of another person once he or she is out. However, I believe that affirmative action needs a higher level of scrutiny or confidence level when bright lines are decided as there is a limited number of seats, and the under punishment of one person may lead to the over punishment of another.  

I also thought it would be interesting to look at bright lines from Harris's argument of distributive justice. Harris does not seem to consider bright lines at all when making this argument; rather she seems to be making the argument for all African Americans no matter what socio-economic background that they may hail from. Could there be a higher threshold of bright lines for affirmative action besides race? Or could the solution be "the proliferation of bright lines;" in which "the solution to the problem of breeding bright lines is better bright lines." (pg. 18)

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