Thread by @chukroxx

So a while ago a relative of mine asked me what type of law I wanted to practice. I told her I wanted to do be a public defender. At this, she made that face black women make when they see someone else’s child cutting up in Walmart. The lips pursed. The nose bunched. The squint.

Public defense?” she spat, “why would you wanna do that? Those people deserve to be put in jail! For some of them, their sentence is a punishment from God! Who are you to get in the way of God’s divine wrath??”

Side note: high new followers, all, god, 12k of you. My name is Charles. Among other things, Im a Christian and I try to take it seriously. I’m even currently going to divinity school. So occasionally I tweet about religion and how it intersects with blackness, politics, law, etc

if that bothers you then feel free to unfollow I’m not mad lol

Anyway, my relative was legitimately concerned about the state of my soul salvation considering that I intended to defend “those people.” This is a reaction I get all the time, especially from religious folk.

And that’s an interesting phenomenon to me: when I have conversations with secular folk, or many non-Christian religious folk, they are FAR more understanding of why I want to do public defense.

In conversations with secular folk about why public defense, we often use terms like “school-to-prison pipeline,” and “collateral consequences,” and “reasonable doubt,” and “due process.” These conversations are generally policy oriented. Almost scientific.

And though we may disagree with the merits of my career choice, almost all understand intuitively why PDs are necessary.

However, conversations with church folk on the same topic often devolve into anger and incredulity. Now they use terms like “those people,” and “God’s punishment,” and “hell-bound,” and, my personal conversation favorite, “I’m, gonna pray for you.”

This isn’t a racial thing either. Black Christians can be just as bad or worse in their view of public defenders. Perhaps because, all too often, black Christians who have “made it out” look down on their fellow black folk who didn’t. Idk. Not for today. But worthy of note.

This reaction puzzles me greatly, especially considering the fundamental beliefs of Christian faith. Beliefs which include terms like “70x7,” “faithful and just to forgive,” “while we were yet sinners,” and “all have sinned.”

Christians love prosecutors, y’all. Love them like they are the Cherubim incarnate. And that love bothers me deeply. Not that prosecutors are inherently bad people (that took so much effort to type), but because that love stems from a place of people getting what the deserve.

(Which ignores the fact that nothing has been proven when public defenders take the case.)

For a people who base their entire religion on the idea that God isnt going to give them what they deserve, that they’ve been blessed with the free and unearned gift of salvation, Christians sure do take a theologically ironic stance at the role of public defenders in society. //