1. I’m not sure what you are getting at with your first statement.
2. I’ll try to give my two cents on this:
As I stated in the post you responded to, the role of the state (from my point of view) is to protect individual rights. The military (and CIA, the state dept, etc.) does its best to ensure that we aren’t deprived of life, liberty or property by foreign enemies. Law enforcement does the same with respect to domestic enemies. The civil courts provide a remedy if our rights are violated by a fellow citizen (I cause a car accident that damages your property and incurs medical bills; you breach a contract and I lose money as a result; etc.)
This may sound like it’s just semantics to a lot of people, but we don’t want the army, the police or some judge to take some action for the
purpose of imposing cosmic justice in the perpetrator. We want them making decisions and taking actions intended to maximize the protection of our rights (to life, liberty and property).
We hope the rulings will be “just,” but they should have nothing to do with what the defendant “deserves,” for better or for worse. If I cause $1,000 worth of damage to your car, the court will award you $1,000 (plus court costs, etc.) for the purpose of making YOU whole. The fact that I lose that money is not the point; it’s incidental. If that same negligent action on my part happens to cause $100,000 in damage instead because you were driving a delivery truck for antique vases, well, that sucks for me.
Here is another way to think m about it: if I hit you with my car and break your leg, causing you to miss six weeks of work and incur bills at a total cost to you of $20,000, what is the more appropriate remedy: (a) I pay you $25,000-$30,000; or (b) I get my own leg broken by a court appointed leg-breaker? Option (b) isn’t constructive. It does nothing for the victim, or anyone else. And the whole point is the victim.
Stepping back from the context of a single civil lawsuit, the objective of the state in general is to minimize the losses (and intrusions upon rights) suffered by society. If my negligence causes you to lose $20,000 and have a shitty couple months, that’s a “sunk” loss. We can’t get it back. Instead we distribute that loss, to the extent that we can, to the most appropriate party (i.e. the party whose actions caused it). We aren’t doing it to punish them — we’re doing it because
someone has to take the hit, and making them take it is the
least unjust thing we can do.
So how does criminal activity fit into this? If a criminal act causes losses, the perpetrator will be sued civilly, but what about the criminal aspect? It’s very to easy to see why people get caught up with what the perp “deserves,” but (in my view) we shouldn’t lose sight of the core purpose of involving the state at all. If the purpose of the government is to minimize losses and the infringement of rights, what should the objective of a government court be? The exact same thing. When it comes to criminal activity that stomps on people’s rights (by depriving them in some way of life, liberty, property) the courts can minimize that stomping in two ways: (1) keep the stompers away from us; and (2) dish out sentences that will deter future stomping. Just like civil courts, there’s going to be a lot of overlap between those aims and what most people think the defendant “deserves.” But it’s still (from my POV) not about him.
Naturally this is all subject to debate. Not just with respect to the law and the courts, but with respect to all the other things governments have expanded into. But that’s my two cents.
If anyone is interested in this kind of thing, look up the economic theory of tort law.
Simple overview:
https://oxfordre.com/economics/view...0625979.001.0001/acrefore-9780190625979-e-341
Scholarly article from a very famous judge:
https://chicagounbound.uchicago.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2548&context=journal_articles
