5 elements of toxic legalism

“Take responsibility. Be rational. Keep it simple. Relieve your pain. Take a stand.” What’s wrong with these? Everything!

These snippets all point to the problem of “toxic legalism”. Toxic legalism is when you

put flexible laws ahead of the inflexible needs,

which such laws exist to serve. This occurs in at least five dimensions, covered below.

Which do you believe as more accurate?

No one is literally above the law.

OR

No one's impactful actions are beyond the reach of agreed upon responses to our needs, but the needs themselves sit above laws as they occur before any law was ever codified.

Anankelogy establishes a natural need as an objective fact. The less your needs resolve, the less you can objectively function. And the more predictably you will suffer pain. Objective needs are inflexible needs; they cannot be readily changed to fit the demands of laws.

By contrast, anankelogy recognizes human laws as arbitrary legal fictions. The more we obey laws more than respond to needs out of love, the more our wellness suffers. Arbitrary laws are flexible laws; they can be readily changed to fit our inflexible needs.

There are at least five ways the original purpose of laws can slip into toxic legalism.

1. Slipping from personal accountability to hyper-individualism

2. Slipping from rational authority to hyperrationality

3. Slipping from vagueness to overgeneralizing

4. Slipping from impartiality to alienating avoidance

5. Slipping from punitive enforcement to hostile adversarialism
   

Toxic legalism can be defined as prioritizing subservience to laws or to social norms over serving the needs for which they exist. Anankelogy recognizes each of these elements as a level of functioning, or of your level of wellness.

The law exists to impersonally convey each other’s needs. Taken to extremes, it devolves into something ignoring our needs, or worst. Too much law sinks into what anankelogy recognizes as toxic legalism.

Each toxic element starts out innocent enough, trying to address some need. Then slips into problems when misapplied. Instead of helping our needs, it dangerously undermines our needs.

Anankelogy considers such hindrances to our needs as defunctions. Which gets corrected by what anankelogy calls refunctions.

Need-response exists as a new profession to help us restore our functioning. Need-response gets us back to resolving needs to improve each other’s wellness. Laws do not resolve needs; properly motivated people do.

In short, toxic legalism presents these five dangers. Need-response counters each one in ways no one else even tries.

1. Slipping from personal accountability to hyper-individualism

This starts with something good. The law emphasizes personal responsibility to act appropriately. Authority compels your responsibility toward the rights of others.

Too personalized, and we slip into overlooking the external limits constraining compliance. That easily morphs into toxic legalism. Taken to extremes, this actually undermines our personal and shared responsibilities.

Toxic legalism tends to overemphasize personal responsibility at the neglect of other’s responsibility toward you. This tends to leave your needs unaddressed. You might solely blame yourself for the resulting pain, which risks trapping you in more pain.

2. Slipping from rational authority to hyperrationality

This starts with something good. The law checks your irrational behaviors if reacting on your feelings. Rational-legal authority checks your impulses toward others.

Too rational, and we slip into guarding our vulnerabilities even from ourselves. That easily sinks into toxic legalism. Taken to extremes, this actually undermines rationality.

Toxic legalism bends toward rationalizing in ways that enable you to hide your vulnerable feelings. You expect your rational arguments to be socially safer than exposing your less defensible emotions. So you cover your emotions with slick sounding arguments.

3. Slipping from vagueness to overgeneralizing

This starts with something good. The law tends to be vague to apply to various situations. Laws remain flexible to apply to a wide array of situations.

Too vague, and we slip into overgeneralizing that overlooks relevant specifics of our affected needs. That easily slides into toxic legalism. Taken to extremes, this actually undermines the intended flexibility of the law’s vagueness.

Toxic legalism persuades you avoid any details that risk rejection. Coalitions stick around widely agreed upon generalizations. You also might prefer to avoid uncomfortable specifics. You perhaps generalize for relief from pain.

4. Slipping from impartiality to alienating avoidance

This starts with something good. The law tends to be impersonal to avoid favoritism. Laws are best kept impartial, to treat all equally.

Too impersonal, and we slip in avoidance of the natural discomfort of our bodies warning us of real threats. That easily devolves into toxic legalism. Taken to extremes, this actually undermines impartiality.

Toxic legalism has you avoiding discomfort and avoiding others, to the point of remaining painfully alienated. You slip into isolation to avoid having to deal with others. Until you find your seclusion painfully lonely.

5. Slipping from punitive enforcement to adversarialism

This starts with something good. The law opposes lawbreakers to ensure respect for others. Facing social sanctions for disrespecting others proves a powerful motivator.

Too adversarial, and we slip in mutual hostilities and defensiveness that shuts down needful cooperation. That easily shrinks into toxic legalism and fuels problematic oppo culture. Taken to extremes, this actually undermines critical opposition to questionable actions or ideas.

Toxic legalism normalizes premature opposition to others. Slight disagreements expand into mutual hostilities. Common ground gets overlooked to indulge in side-taking. You oppose another’s needs who oppose yours, locking you into mutual adversarialism.

Law-based institutions compound toxic legalism

Sociology has long recognized how every institution and authority tends to drift from its founding purpose to serve a public need to serving itself to ensure its own continuance. Beyond these five key elements, other factors emerge that pull authorities from serving the law's original purpose—to address our needs—to serving mostly themselves.

More of these toxic elements exist that compromise our wellness in the name of the law. For now, consider how the five key elements emerge in the adversarial justice system.

1. Hyper-individual: When confronted by law enforcement, externalities get patently ignored.

2. Hyperrational: Authority patently ignores your vulnerably felt needs.

3. Overgeneralizing: Adjudication easily neglects the many specifics involved in a situation.

4. Avoidant: Adjudication offers relief for the winning side, not a path toward removing pain.

5. Adversarialist: You are pitted against another, with little if any effort to identify or address the needs on all sides.

Now consider the makeup of polarizing politics.

1. Hyper-individual: Politics reduces you to an atomized rational decisionmaker, blaming you for poor ballot options.

2. Hyperrational: You’re supposed to rationally find answers, rationalizing unresponsiveness.

3. Overgeneralizing: Coalitions rely on avoiding specifics that could evoke disagreement.

4. Avoidant: Politics tend to keep you alienated from each other, to avoid relating with each other on a more personal level.

5. Adversarialist: You are pitted against another, with little if any effort to identify or address the needs on all sides.

The more judicial and political authorities benefit from these toxic elements, the less they are aware of its cost to our wellness. Ironically, the more you submit to toxic legalism, the less well enough you will be to faithfully comply with every legal requirement. Authorities then position themselves as the solution, despite fueling the problem.

Love over law

Need-response calls out this conflict of interest as a form of empirical evil. It is measurable, independent of personal biases or religious beliefs. Need-response then offers to replace it with empirical uprightness. Need-response helps you to measurably improve wellness by directly addressing the needs that laws exist to serve. After all, you don't exist for human authority; such authority exists for you.

Need-response counters all of these elements, with the refunctions listed above. And by prioritizing inflexible needs over flexible laws, with what it calls citationization or "law-fit". Which calls for citing the needs to be served by any cited social norm.

Need-response raises the standard with universal principles, or “character refunctions” including love. Moreover, need-response raises the standard from the law’s harm reduction norm to loving one another—to properly honoring the needs of others as you would have them honor your own. Which can more easily result in

• more resolved needs,

• less pain to suffer, and

• greater overall wellness.

Your responsiveness to toxic legalism

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