Maria Paola Garza Lazcano

Professor Johnson

March 22, 2022.

Does society have an obligation to offer payment for past injustices?

The issue of whether we should have an obligation to offer payment for past

injustice has been widely debated in our community recently. This is an important issue

because it affects our community and the people involved in this type of problem. A

variety of different arguments have been issued about this problem. This essay will

address both arguments, good or bad ones, and point out some of them as the way we

thought of them.

It has been argued that responsibility matters and that each of us owes a duty of

care to others (Kukathas,2015). Most people do not know how to address or do not know

about values, the ones that our parents teach us. It is claimed that most people take

advantage of the weak ones, manipulating them and making them lose the game or even

the case. However, as Kukathas states, responsibility can be one of the most important

values in our life, leading us to do the right thing. The denial of responsibility goes

something like there is no sense to hold us responsible for the wrongs preprepared by

people in the past. This kind of indifference sends out a signal saying that the old people

do not matter, so for them, justice does not matter at all.

As an example, we have the femicide that happens every day in México. Even if

it is not our responsibility to pay for past injustices, we owe them an answer about the

death of their girls and so raise our voice to at least try to change this type of problem in
México. Eleven women die per day in México because of the femicides and even if it is

the government’s responsibility to try to change these acts, they do not do anything about

it. People are cruel by not knowing the consequences of their acts and more if they know

that there is no consequence for their acts.

In addition, keeping them with no consequences will make us not being able to

respond to the consequences of our acts by not being responsible for them. The problem

will keep growing if they do not care at all.

In conclusion, society does have a responsibility for past injustice, our system

created them as if they were not important for the people and this culture kept growing

till our days. We should have a great punishment program instead of what we have that

is nothing. Our society is no longer able to allow more of this type of injustice with no

one being responsible for them. If we continue with our past crimes against our bad penal

system, the problem and this culture that teaches us to not be responsible for our actions

will keep growing.

Kukathan, C. (2015). Responsibility for past injustice: how to shift the burden.

University of New South Wales, Australia.

https://www.jus.uio.no/smr/english/about/current/events/2015/politics-
philosophy-economics-2003-kukathas-165-90.pdf
CSIS. (2020, March 19). Femicides in Mexico: Impunity and Protests. Center for
Strategic and International Studies. Retrieved March 22, 2022, from
https://www.csis.org/analysis/femicides-mexico-impunity-and-protests