I know that’s quite the inflammatory title, so I’ll explain it upfront. I recently read Franz Kafka’s In the Penal Colony. If you haven’t read it, go do it.
I liked The Trial and The Metamorphosis, but neither compares to the true horror that is In the Penal Colony.
In the Penal Colony Plot Summary
I’m going to spoil the whole story so that it can be discussed. The story takes place around an execution machine called the Harrow. The main character asks questions about it.
In a brilliantly paced set of revelations, the reader becomes aware of how the torture machine works:
The condemned person is gagged and strapped to the machine. A bunch of tiny needles stabs them for six hours, repeatedly tattooing their crime on their body. They bleed a lot, but the machine is carefully designed to not let them die. Then they’re buried alive.
But it’s much, much worse than that.
There is a collection of laws that must be followed in the colony (it was unclear whether anyone had access to them to know what they are).
When charged with the crime, you are not told what it is. You have no chance to defend yourself. You are convicted without trial. The first time you learn of any misdoing is too late because it is from the words appearing on your body from the Harrow.
Twitter Shaming
Unfortunately, this should sound all too familiar from Twitter shaming.
People post jokes without knowing what the rules are for offending the wrong group. Then they get accused and convicted without trial.
The first time they learn of their political incorrectness crime is when the words start flowing across their Twitter feed. By then it is too late. They will probably lose their job and have the next several years of their life wrecked.
Does the story give us any hope or are we stuck in this twisted sense of justice forever?
The end of the story is hard to make sense of. The executioner turns the machine on himself and gets the words “Be Just” tattooed on him.
By administering this punishment on others, the executioner has clearly broken the rule of being just. This machine and system are so clearly unjust that we don’t need the story to understand that.
By analogy, I think Twitter shaming punishment is not just, but the people doing it haven’t realized this yet. They call it social justice the same as the executioner in the story calls the Harrow justice.
This doesn’t make it so.
Learning from the Story
One interpretation in light of this analogy would be that when members of the mob become targets themselves, they will be dealt a sort of poetic justice and see how wrong they were.
Although this is satisfying to see when it happens (think of the “dongle joke shamer” who lost her own job as well), it is a “two wrongs don’t make a right situation” and is unsustainable. An eye for an eye and the whole world would be blind.
Ultimately, I think the ending teaches us that we can only get out of this mess if the people instigating it take matters into their own hands to stop it.
Outside forces won’t ever be enough.
Unfortunately, these people will probably have the machine of their own making turn on them for this, and, like the main character, they too will be a victim of this justice.
But it has to be their own choice, otherwise, the practice will continue unhindered.
