4 ms·

Bryan Stevenson: "Each of us is more than the worst thing we’ve ever done.” There's a lot of people in prison for good because of something they did (or that h

Bryan Stevenson: "Each of us is more than the worst thing we’ve ever done.” There's a lot of people in prison for good because of something they did (or that happened near them; see LWOP) when they were adolescents. Plenty of people who are entirely different at forty or sixty years old from who they were at twenty, but who won't ever be out on parole because of the nature of their conviction. Would /you/ want to be judged for anything based on who you were as a twenty year old, or who you are today?

dionidium 4y ago
Until we live in a universe where the harm to the victims can be undone I think we have to accept that ours is one where your actions are forever. If I could flip a switch so that we lived in the other kind of universe, I would, but I can't convince myself that that's the character of the universe we actually inhabit. As for my own actions, I've never beat anyone's head in with a hammer or raped a defenseless woman in an alley or abused a child, and yet I think every day about the harms I have inflicted on others over the course of my life. I'm not sure I totally understand what people even mean by "starting over." It's not something I would expect for myself and if I ever do commit any of the aforementioned crimes (God help me) I hope I have the courage to put a bullet in my own throat before I'm ever tempted to ask for a "second chance."