PROPERTY IDEALS ASSIGNMENT

QUOTE:

Augustine (5th century CE, North Africa)

“Surely all those who think that they are enjoying possessions they have acquired lawfully, but who don’t know how to use them, can be convicted by us of keeping what belongs to someone else. They certainly do not belong to someone else if they are held lawfully; but lawfully implies justly, and justly implies well. If so, then everything that is possessed wrongly belongs to someone else; but if someone uses possessions wrongly, he possesses them wrongly. You can see then how many people ought in fact to return property that isn’t theirs, and how few can be found who ought to have property returned to them! Wherever such people exist, the more justly they own property, the more they despise it... In the meantime, however, there is toleration for the injustice of those in wrongful possession, and certain laws have been established among them, known as ‘civil laws’. These are not intended to make them use possessions rightly, but rather to make them less oppressive in misusing them.”  

(Letter 153)

WHAT I THINK IT MEANS:

What I see that this post is saying is that we have possessions that we have acquired lawfully. Meaning they once belonged to someone else but now they belong to us. Whether or not we know how to use them does not matter as long as we use this property justly and lawfully.

If we however unlawfully and unjustly posses this property, then they belong to someone else. But if we use and possess our property wrongly then it is still ours.

So this is saying that when it is proven that the property is possessed unjustly and unlawfully then it is returned to its lawfully abiding owner. Otherwise tough luck. But the unlawfully cases happen less frequently.

Then the philosopher states that in the meantime, there are laws that tolerate the people who are in wrongful possession. Certain laws are protecting them and those are the civil laws. These laws do not stop them from misusing the property unjustly. It makes them less oppressed to use them. It does not feel like he agree's with this.

WHAT IT RELATES TO:

So with all of that being said I feel this reminds me of Edward Snowden. He stole documents that did not belong to them. To some, he used them justly because the government was hurting the people. But to some it was treason and it was unlawful. In his case, he was allowed to leave and live in another country where he frequently tweets.

WHAT MY THOUGHTS ARE:
I think that this is one of those cases that no one is ever going to agree on. Even I myself feel torn on certain points. But ultimately I do believe it was treason on his part even though I understand and sympathize with his reasoning. It was really mostly about the way he went about releasing those documents, and the fact that he released documents. Is what makes this unethical on his part. Even though he was trying to bring to light something unethical that was happening. Two unethical act's do not make a right on either side. Without getting into too much detail about the case, because I do not like to be involved in politics, If he would have gone about this differently then the outcome was probably going to be the same to be honest. But it is tough because he was trying to do what he thought was good.

LINK:

https://edwardsnowden.com/

https://twitter.com/Snowden

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/edward-snowden

http://www.newsweek.com/why-obama-wont-pardon-edward-snowden-nsa-538632