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Transcript:

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Virginia  0:00  
Well, hello, everyone, and welcome back to Two Lawyers Talking the Law of One. My name is Virginia Robin, I'm a modern shaman and lawyer and together with lawyer Geraldine Johns-Putra, we are discussing the Law of One and exploring what it might look like if the law as we knew it shifted toward applying more unified solutions. This is a 10 part series in which we will see how the Law of One could look as a solution to various societal questions. This is our fourth episode and we're contrasting today the punitive based criminal law system with the unifying premises found in the Law of One. And before we start, I really want to go back to what the Law of One means from my perspective, in any event, because criminal law probably is one of the foundations of what we understand a legal system to mean in that it's got punishments - judgment and punishment. The Law of One fundamentally is a unifying system, in that we are one energy. In that regard, being one energy, you are everything, every being, every emotion, every situation, every event, you are it. And this means that you can't be separated, being one energy. So this is a very interesting concept when we're applying to the present systems we look at. And when we say the law as we have it now, particularly from a criminal law position, whenever you judge something, you are effectively separating it. And what I've seen, or the idea that I have behind this is that our legal system is there to provide rules for an elite to control you. We need, if you have a legal system, from that point of view, someone has to say what the rules are, and someone has to give you guidance on whether you're following the rules. And so in one way I say we have like a parent, it's a parental based system. And when we look at it from a very simplistic point of view, when we're jailing people, or putting them aside and saying they are not good, they, by the way, before I go that far, the Law of One doesn't have a judgment, it doesn't say something is good or bad. It just is. It is for us and our free will on this planet to assign meanings to everything. So because I might see something as good, you may not. And that is okay, from the Law of One's perspective. But from the legal system's point of view, being a parental based system, it's like we've grown up, and we still need a parent. And when we were children, in my view being sent to my room didn't make me into a more obedient child to follow the household rules. So we have household rules, and we have rules in society. And these, I'm not saying rules are bad. But what I'm saying here is in the criminal law system, we get punishment for not following those rules. And does that create a better society? This is really the question. I don't think it created a better society for me. But mind you, I was the child that tried to be good all the time. And when I did try to be the good child all the time, I found that I missed out on a lot of experiences, that I was rather admiring the children that weren't so good, that seemed to be having a bit more fun. But let me put it in another perspective. When we, so this system, effectively, in my view, has an elite and the people that need to follow those rules. We are giving power to others to tell us what those rules are, and to make sure we all abide by them.

 

Now, when you're tired, you want to go to sleep and when you're hungry, you want to eat. It's a natural course of things. When you feel powerless, you want some power back. That's what it's called, relief. We're all looking for, in my view, that we do things, we're motivated to do things because we will feel better in the doing of them. This is what motivates people to do the wrong thing. Why do you do that? The law out there will never prevent you from following or not following your own legal system, I say we have an internal legal system. Thanks, Fiona. Fiona thinks we have fascinating concepts. It is a different way of looking at things. I believe we all follow our own rules, the rules and laws out there are wonderful in that, from the point of view that it's a general consensus, yes, we don't want people killing each other. That is not what we would say is a preference in an orderly society. But people will do it anyway, irrespective of a rule, because you get relief. Relief from something, from what? From having no power within a system. So my idea is perhaps, the Law of One is more unifying. We will show people how to be part of the One, that you are valued, that you are unconditionally loved. But of course, nobody really understands what that is. So that's why we're talking today. So what do you think about that Geraldine? 

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Geraldine  6:01  
Yeah. I think you make some very important points, Virginia. A couple of things that I would say is that we are in a transitional phase towards what I would call Unity Consciousness, which is really based on Law of One concepts, that we are all literally One, that there is a correspondence, you know, between what we contain in ourselves to what is outside of ourselves, what is in me is actually, is reflected out, and shown back to me because you know, as within so without, as above so below. So the power of applying Law of One concepts in the legal system, is that we focus on individuals to actually create a more harmonious society. So that's Unity Consciousness. And that's the application of Law of One. Towards Unity Consciousness in a transitional phase, we, I see us focusing on removing or rehabilitating or reforming parts of our legal system, that create separation the most. The ones in most urgent need. And you and I have talked about certain areas before, we've touched on family law, I made the comment in that episode that family law and criminal law are the two areas where I see the greatest need, where there's the greatest separation, and the greatest trauma inflicted on people as a result of our legal system and the way that our legal system is structured now, in this punitive way. So I can see urgent need for reform in the criminal law system, and we can talk about that.

 

And then the other thing I wanted to say is that when it comes to the Law of One, the first distortion you can say, of Unity or the Law of One, that applies, basically, my belief is throughout this Universe, the first distortion is free will. Because that's what enables individuated experience. That's what enables all of us as fragments of the original Source to go out and choose different experiences. As you come into a very dense plane like Earth, in the year 2022, what you find is that this free will manifests itself in rather chaotic ways, because we are separated. The separation is that we are, we inhabit different bodies. And we don't realise the connection with each other so easily. So there's a physical separation and a mental separation and an emotional separation. And so, the way that, when we exercise free will here, and we create impacts on each other, they occur in a very physical way. For example, if I wanted to hurt somebody, I could actually physically create damage to them and I could actually end their lives here on Earth. So what we need then, given the way the Law of One has been, or Unity has been distorted where we are, I believe that we need to, we would be better off creating a system that regulates, not as punitive laws, but recognises the impacts we create on each other physically as well as emotionally, because we're very emotional beings here, regulates those in a way that is fair. You touched on the law having been really a tool that serves the elite. I see a reform that is more holistic and fairer. So it's one that's agreed upon. And that goes into our political system and how laws are created and enforced, whether the people who do that are really representative of us and whether we've agreed to what they do. So those are the two important things I want to talk about, you know, we're in a transitional phase, and we do exercise free will in a rather peculiar way here. So criminal law, and I think criminal law as a concept, is really going to like I foreshadowed, going to have a significant change.

 

Virginia  10:38  
Well, you know, you mentioned the individuation of each of us, and that is really, that is how we who studied the Law of One understand how the Source energy experiences itself otherwise, you know, it would be just is-ness, and vanilla, and there will be no experiences had. So each experience is valuable, whether people find that shocking or not, every experience is valuable for our wholeness. But as you said, when we're talking about an individual, what we tend to do in the criminal law is put people away, and think that's going to solve a problem. However it doesn't, because you are still connected to that individual, we are all connected to that individual no matter what. So even when that individual is released into society, if ever, and sometimes we put them away forever, but that then impacts a whole lot of people. Some others may think this is a good thing to put people away and just forget about them. However, even the so called victims probably don't get to resolve why they became a victim, what happened in that situation? A whole lot of things, when we shut it, say non-acceptance of something in society. Everything is acceptable. This is a very difficult concept and probably for another time. But we're just talking basic concepts in here and why perhaps, the criminal law, because people are asking questions at the moment, why do we have so many crimes that keep getting repeated when we have the same result? We keep getting the same result. And I think people are hopefully beginning to understand we need to approach everything from a completely different perspective if you want to change. No, it's not going to change overnight, but we have to start somewhere. And we have to start by bringing more connection to each member of the community to bring value. And you know, from a shamanic point of view, I've studied the shamans and yeah, has been the idea that in some shamanic communities where there have been people that are perhaps not following the rules, if you like, that everyone in the community, the Elders ask the question, how are we individually responsible? Because I am you and you are me. So what did I do? Or how was my contribution to this situation? And rather than saying no, put that away, we don't like to see that, we only want this neat package that looks like vanilla and shiny on top, but we are all and we need to celebrate all of humanity the way it is, because everyone has a perspective and a value.

 

Geraldine  13:29  
Yeah. So what happens in criminal law is that the way it's set up right now, is that the accused has action taken against him or her by the State. And that is why when we have criminal law cases, we have this the Crown versus or the State versus so and so. So what we do as a community is we say, that's not our problem, that a crime, you know, it's a problem that the crime was committed in terms of it has hurt the community, but in terms of enforcing and punishing, we'll leave that to this amorphous State. And the State is all powerful, right? So when an individual accused commits a crime, they then have the whole weight and machinery of the State, the court system that first of all, you know, the police system, then the prosecution and the incarceration system, all of that, judiciary, comes down on to the individual, and all of us, then sit back and leave it to that system. And what that does is first of all, it isolates the accused, it says you're no longer part of the State or the community we come down against you. Firstly, it removes the victim and it removes the community from that whole structure. So what you're talking about with the way it's done in in Indigenous societies and we do see these concepts coming back into criminal law, particularly in countries like Australia where we have Indigenous concepts that there have been efforts to marry them back in to our legal system, We are seeing that bringing back of inclusive justice, or in some cases, it's called restorative justice. I run a podcast, the New Earth lawyer podcast, that explores ways in which lawyers are changing the practice of law to change the world. And I've had lawyers coming on who talk about restorative justice and the moves that are being made there. There are some very powerful examples given, the one that I've used many times is one in which a young girl was murdered by her fiance, this happened in the US and the two families knew each other that of the young girl, the murder victim, and that of the accused her fiance. And what the family of the victim chose to do was to employ restorative justice concepts, which is that they actually forgave the young man who murdered their daughter, and actively engaged in ways in which he could be rehabilitated, which ended up reducing the sentence and allowing him to take steps to make amends. So he actually ended up engaging in community service, talking about dating violence and relationship violence. His sentence was reduced, and he's now in a minimum correctional prison or facility. And they go on and they talk about, you know, both families talk about what they've managed to achieve. The young man is very remorseful in the community, you know, the families have had more healing and the community has had more healing.

 

Virginia  17:12  
Exactly, and I've, there are others doing in Scotland, particularly trauma informed criminal rehabilitation, and getting that into prisons, which is marvellous, because people need to see that they're worth something. You see, this is what we're doing. We're saying people are worthless. But when you, when I say you're worthless, it means I'm saying I'm worthless. And that is not, we're not evolving from that place any longer, we need to say that we are all worthy, that we are all equal. Because in the present system, I see it from a hierarchical point of view, we are not all equal. There are people that have the power, and we need to show people, you have individual power. I know. I don't know whether you know, the story of Brian Banks. He was incarcerated for a rape he didn't commit. He was 16 years old in the US, and he just written a book recently. But he talked about, and this is what I took, say, you know, people get quite angry about crimes that are committed. And yes, it's valid to feel emotion and valid to express how you feel. Absolutely. Everybody's expression is valid. What he learned from his book, get it honestly, it is an amazing story about how he was prejudiced every step of the way. He was an African American young man, I don't know how old he is now, I'm not sure. But he spent a lot of time in prison for something he didn't commit, and a crime he didn't commit. And he ended up being able to see freedom in his own mind, he was able to be free in his own mind. And this is the point of it all. Your life is your response to it. And he is a shining example of how you can be incarcerated under the worst conditions for something you did not do, as a test if you like. He was a God-fearing man, if you like, and I'm not religious, but to say this is a test for me, you know, and he was able to free his own mind. And when he was able to do that he was able to get himself free. And he isn't afraid, based on some other evidence, and it was just how a beautiful sequence of events that he was able to, the Universe conspired if you like to then set him free, physically free. But this is what I'm talking about is everybody's response to these situations is really very individual. And if we keep saying everything is bad and pushing away, we are not going to get anywhere, we need to see everything that's happening in this world as opportunities for our own growth or for our own evolution. You know, it's a big topic that is not taken lightly, because I know some crimes are very, very horrible for people. But it is something that we need to explore, why is it happening and with trauma-informed, that getting back to this trauma-informed lawyering is to look back into why? Why did someone do that? Why? What happened to them? What did society allow happened to them? And how can we correct it and then correct ourselves in the future so that we're not imposing and I believe it's rules, parental roles on children are saying, you're no good. You know, you can't tie your shoelaces properly, you're stupid, you know, these rules that we carry as children are really, really very, very important but they, we allow them to define us in the future. And if we can re educate that this is not defining you anymore, you have a choice as to how you believe you are. And it does come back to self love, it always comes back to love.

 

Geraldine  21:22  
I think what's so interesting about this very topic, and also what we really need to bear in mind as we head into reform of our legal system, and you and I are talking about a particular kind of reform, which is taking it into Law of One concepts, what we need to bear in mind is that educating lawyers and judges and anyone involved in the legal system, on a spiritual, in a spiritual way, would ideally, and I say this, from my perspective, I don't claim to have all the answers, ideally, we'll give people a fuller perspective of our multi-dimensional reality. So when we speak of Law of One, and we speak of Oneness, where we're talking at a relatively high level, if you want to give dimensions hierarchies, but we're talking at a very overarching level, and then you can come all the way down to where we exist here. And if I punch someone, that person is going to hurt, right? It, literally, they're going to feel it. In a way, I'm punching myself, but it doesn't feel like that to that person, that person is going to go ouch.

 

Virginia  22:43  
Because as we know, hurt people hurt people. And that's it, you're hurting, they're hurting. So...

 

Geraldine  22:47  
Yeah, exactly. But my point is that, it has immediate repercussions. So being able to see all the way through and being able also to have empathy for people who are victims of crime, instead of saying, well, it's all One, you know, there's a reason for it, to say well on our level, it hurts like hell, on our level, it hurts to be a victim of crime. It, you know, you can't, you can't explain away, there's an immediate emotion as well as the physicality, you can't necessarily easily explain away, rape and, you know, serious assault and murder, and so on and so forth. So, taking a full, as full an approach as possible means that we understand, lawyers understand that we are all One and that there's a reason, that we are responsible for the person, for creating the person who committed a crime. And we also take the part of the victim, we understand that but we bring it down to where we exist as three-dimensional individuals. And we say we also see that a hurt has occurred. So we've got to balance, being multi-dimensional, right, means balancing all of those perspectives. So about rules, I think we're talking, we're bringing it down to a, for want of a better term, lower perspective. We're bringing it down to the perspective of, listen, it's not cool to go around hitting people, right? It creates, not only are you hurting that person, but it creates a society that we don't want to live in here, right? So we have what we call rules. And we have, whether you want to call them guidance or rules, but they are the ways in which we choose to live. And that's going to create a happier three dimensional society. So I think that the legal system, that criminal law system, by bringing in these elements that we've been talking about, by understanding the trauma that has created the perpetrator, by understanding trauma that the victim suffers, by understanding the trauma that the community suffers and bringing it holistically, that's actually trying to cover off both the higher perspective understanding of what's going on, as well as the quote unquote, lower perspective understanding of the individual, very individual understanding of that there's been a true physical and emotional consequence here. And also that kind of middle perspective understanding of that's not going to have, that's not conducive to the kind of society we want to live in.

 

Virginia  23:34  
Yeah, I, look, I absolutely agree with that. And from, as I said, we can't go from here to here in one step, we need to sort of have increments about how this will work. You know, from my point of view, and you know, this isn't lala land, we are energy. This is physics. And when you look at, if we shift the way we look at things, from an energetic perspective, we know that we are one all connected, because energy is, energy must flow. And there are energies, its property is frequency, then if you have low frequencies, they attract, they resonate together, and you animate those frequencies in your life. So it's education, re educating people into that you are an energetic self. If things are coming into your existence that are not preferred, as you say, rather than we don't reject anything, it's just not preferred. We don't prefer that in an orderly society. That's more loving. Yeah, I don't want a punch in the face either, you know?

 

Geraldine  26:44  
Yeah, I think preference is a great way of putting it.

 

Virginia  26:48  
Yeah, that's another preference for us. But there it is, and how do we get, how did it happen? Nothing happens by accident. Absolutely nothing happens by accident. So it is, why is this a part of my existence right now? And it's time to question it. Sometimes we need to feel some hurt, we have not been allowing ourselves the full gambit of emotion. There's a whole lot of education around this is what I'm saying. Because if we're looking at each other, as you said before, physical, so physically separated objects that have no connection to each other whatsoever, we are on the wrong, we're not, we're not looking at it from a Law of One perspective, we are looking at it from a 3D perspective. And as the High Court of Australia when referring to the Indigenous and how they see things as part of one indissoluble whole is not within the realms of the common lawyer at this present time, because the common lawyer thinks we have proprietary rights over things, like they're separated, whereas the Indigenous see things as all connected. The Indigenous are spot on, it is physics. It's all energy. And when we can start re-educating people from that point of view, I think we'll make some inroads so that you cannot put a rule around something and make someone do things, people are expressions of the one individual whole. And this, it stems from childhood, always, you know, we have adults now still acting out their three year old and wanting some closure on that and trying to mature that aspect of themselves. That is not able to express itself properly, not being able to say I'm worthy. This is a big deal. And we're still looking out there for the gratification and looking outside of ourselves for the love that we are seeking. We are all seeking love. That's what we have, I believe effectively, we've been born into this planet to really disintegrate and pick up the pieces finding our way home to love again, and having the experiences as you go and say, wow, that was an interesting one. But if you can see everyone as an actor in your play as well, I mean, there's a whole lot of ways you can educate from this point of view, but it's the criminal law system. I think we touched upon this earlier, Geraldine, is also governed by people that have money that want to keep prisons alive, you know, and that is another factor. It's another hidden factor in all of these things that really keep the egregore, I'll call it, an egregore of energy. Keep people thinking the way yeah, we just got to put people in jails and that will solve everything. But was not solving anything. It's just making people that are in prisons, quite wealthy.

 

Geraldine  29:44  
I agree. So that's a great example of how connected, interconnected all our systems are. So that's interconnected with the monetary system and with the for-profit system that we actually spoke about in our last episode. So if enterprises or companies were motivated by purpose and not for-profit, not by profit, then you wouldn't have this issue where it actually is good business to create criminals. One of the other things that I see is, what happens ideally, as a preference in criminal law reform is that we would begin to break down this idea of a criminal law system, as opposed to civil conflicts or disputes. And people who are not lawyers might not really appreciate that there is a difference. So in a criminal law system, when you criminalise something, then you're, that's when the framework that I was talking about earlier, you know, of the State coming down upon you. And if you've done something wrong, then it's the State versus you, that's different from when you might have a dispute with your say, next door neighbour, and it's not criminal, your next door neighbour thinks you've done something wrong, and they have, they bring a civil matter against you, that's you versus them. When you go into the criminal law system, a lot of things happen, not only as I said, the machinery of the whole State comes down on you, but you also then create the stigma of a criminal. We all know this, right? A criminal record, which you hopefully can get expunged or you go to great lengths to make sure you don't have a criminal record. That is another example of how we separate and isolate criminals. We would preferably remove that whole idea of that person committing a crime and being a criminal. And you would see disputes, even the ones that I was talking about where you do something that your next door neighbour thinks is wrong, there wouldn't be so much of a difference between those, the way we fix or address or resolve those issues with the way we resolve the issue in a criminal matter.

 

Virginia  32:04  
Yes, it's been interesting, it really is still interesting, isn't it? Why do you have to be punished? That's still...

 

Geraldine  32:14  
It comes down to that. Exactly. 

 

Virginia  32:17  
Why do you have to punish? It's perpetuating a shame that we've had maybe as children? Yeah, I'm just repeating. I'm used to this, this is familiar to me. So I'm quite happy. And, of course, that's why we have recidivism as well, because people think, well, I know the rules of jail or living in living my life this way. I know the rules here. And I can negotiate my life that way. And I feel a little like, I have a little bit of power in the system or power over my life. I don't have power in the world out there where they have the rules, and I can't work with all that. And I'm not a good person like they are or whatever it is. It's rather, yeah, it's just a complete shift of how we approach our fellow humans. Like you're all valuable.

 

Geraldine  33:04  
Exactly, and you remain valuable. And so this is why the Indigenous ways of addressing so called crimes is very interesting, because they don't go into that. They might choose to eject a particular person from the tribe if the crime against the tribe is so egregious, but generally, what works well, in the Indigenous way of addressing these issues, is that person, the perpetrator,  accused, however you want to call them, remains part of the community, right? And they have an interest in remaining part of the community, because the community gives them support and gives them life so that they will then accept the sentencing that might come from, in Aboriginal we call it circle sentencing, that comes from the circle of Elders. They accept that this is what is needed to remain part of the community. And then after they have redressed their wrong, they are still a part of the community. We don't then say, my God, we can't give you a job because you've got a criminal record and you can't do this because you've got a criminal record, the stigma is done, they have addressed whatever they need to address, the victim also will accept it. And that's the holistic thing that we're talking about. 

Another important thing I think, that comes from reducing this whole idea of that's a crime and this is a crime, is you know, we have what we call victimless crimes in our criminal law system. And, you know, that's like drug offences and things like that, right? We have created this whole hierarchy of this, this damages society, and criminal law becomes a tool, a very powerful tool to regulate behaviour. This so called desirable behaviour of people which goes back to your point about elites, Virginia. If you take those so called victimless crimes out of the whole criminal law system and you focus on like, with drug offences it might be a crime in some places to actually be carrying a volume of drugs on you, right? We wouldn't treat that as a crime, we would treat that as an opportunity, if we really had a preference that that didn't happen, we would treat that as an opportunity to investigate why that has happened. And an example, this is not, many people would say this is not a victimless crime, but it's an example of criminalising something that is at heart a very emotional matter. And that's the abortion debate that's going on in the US. Abortion is criminalised in many places. Is it really a matter for the whole State to come down on a person who has chosen to terminate their pregnancy? It's such a, that is a great example and this is why I believe we are having this debate right now in this turning point, it's such a great example of where we really need to be examining, why do people make this choice? How can we support them? How can we help them, no matter what the circumstances of their particular situation, how they got pregnant, we support them as a community and make it a community, a true community issue and own it, and don't point at them and say you've committed a crime, and now you're going to be punished for it.

 

Virginia  36:54  
Look at and that is absolutely. A really, it's a very, very difficult topic. Of course, people are very divided on that one. And everyone's entitled to their very own opinion. However, you know, from my point of view, I believe that everybody has a right to make decisions for themselves. And this is why I think the Law of One would be valuable, because you become autonomous in that you make your own decisions. And people say, well, you know, wouldn't the law of the jungle prevail? And dog eat dog? Well, but I say that exists already. You know, that's, it is the power, that you have more power, you get to say, in this society. So I say that exists already. So from my point of view, that if we were able to self-regulate, you know, with some general guidance, look, I think we follow our own rules anyway, it's as simple as that. But given the idea of, we were taught how to make a decision, most people do not know how to make a simple decision. Now, that is, it's a funda... every day you make about 70,000 decisions and some, most of them aren't loving to yourself. That's a real key to this. It's just, what gives me relief, is what I tend to do. You know, if I feel hungry, I'll go and eat. Like I said, If I feel tired, I'll go and sleep. So whatever gives me some relief from whatever my pain is what I do, then that's why we have this crime, what we call crime, people do things that don't follow the rules. And that gave them some relief to do. Now, we have to question why was that giving you relief?

 

Geraldine  38:40  
Yes, the criminal law system is set up in a way that perpetuates the idea that we don't have self agency, that if we do something wrong, and we step out of the society's rules, then it as I said, that all of these consequences that follow, and it's all out of our hands. Like I said, it then becomes somebody else's issue. If someone else has committed a crime, it then becomes someone else's issue to deal with it. So none of what we're talking about is easy. Actually, even if we were to move into a far more evolved society than we are now, the conversations we're talking about having around things like abortion or murder, I mean, it's not like a circle of people who represent the community discussing, what are we going to do about this, is any easier than a court case really, but the energetic consequences are quite different. And the trauma that it avoids is very significant. Because what happens when you touch upon this with trauma is that trauma begets more trauma, trauma ripples out to and touches everybody. So it touches the victim and it touches the perpetrator and it touches people they know and of course it touches the community. So what we're doing is we're not saying that this is going to be any, a very straightforward thing to create a system that is more reflective of the Law of One. But we're actually saying it's time to, and I think I might have said this before on this show, it's time to grow up and and accept the consequences or accept the implications of being a grown up society and deal with those difficult issues. One of the great advantages of dealing with it in this way is anyone who's done any kind of inner work will know this, right? If you go to counselling and therapy, you can actually make a lot of progress as an individual understanding why things are coming up for you. This is one of the things that goes on there, why is this coming up for you? Well, we then as a community, as a collective, what we call crimes are the equivalent of some conflict coming up for an individual, we then get to say, as a community, why is this coming up for us? What are we trying to learn here? And that's coming back to saying that the community takes responsibility for having created the circumstances for it.

 

Virginia  41:32  
That's exactly what I see with all this. These things in the news lately is, without going into detail is why? Why are these things happening over and over and over again, nobody is really addressing it. Nobody is saying let's look as a community, what is going on. And as I believe, we need to look at the reality from a different place. We need to re-educate, I think that is the beginning of it. Re-educating people to say you are an energetic being, you are here for the experience of it. And sometimes those experiences aren't pleasant, but you have also learned to, you have learned how to disconnect from love and you are trying to find your way back. And this is why you do the things you do. So it just gives people more information about why is that happening? I've said it helps us have some compassion for why someone did something, and helps us to, whilst we need to process our emotion about things we don't prefer, it also energetically releases us from the negative tie to something. This is really important because if we keep spiralling in the negative and I'll want to address the words victim and perpetrator as well, in these, in the criminal law. We have the accused that's probably different but victim and perpetrator, particularly the word victim. A lot of people like being a victim, I have to say that quite out loud. And people hold on to that energy because everyone gives them attention and gives them love. Oh, you poor thing. Yes, you know, something horrible has happened. But also don't forget the person that perpetrated the crime, something horrible is happening to them also, they just don't do it out of love. They're not feeling loved. And this is what is lacking in this society, is love. We can't, and people who, they don't know how to deal with love, and I understand all that and that's for another conversation but fundamentally, we need to look at, give different labels. This is your experience and this is your experience from one side and another and I know that that needs a, that's a big shift as well. But to shift the energy of everything, because we create archetypes, and we just, we fulfil that archetype and keep it animated, and keep the separation of people. And if we don't help the victim address perhaps why they are a victim or why they're enjoying being a victim and, you know, it might sound harsh, but we've all been there. All of us have been there. We've quite enjoyed being the victim of something at some point. Some of it's a lot larger than in other cases. But we have all done it. And we've enjoyed that little bit of attention. And that's wonderful. But we need to learn how to self soothe and how to all come together in love as a community.

 

Geraldine  44:45  
And that's a really important point because we've been talking about the community and we've been talking about the perpetrator. But the real, it's a really important element that is the victim, why in a Law of One way or from a Law of One perspective, why did that victim choose to be a victim of a crime? And I think that what is quite powerful about restorative justice modalities is that there is this focus on the victim and empowering the victim. So one of the classic criticisms of criminal law, very traditional criminal law systems is that the victim has no voice. So we've tried to address this in the past where we do have victim impact statements now given in court, that's a recognition that, you know, allowing the victim a voice does allow that person to feel more empowered, and does allow for quicker healing. But I think a deeper examination of giving the victim the support to actually help them through even deeper than that, which is like, well, why? Why did I choose for this to happen to me? What lessons does it hold? For me, that's a very tricky space and quite an advanced space to try to work in. And so having that element of a justice system would be reflective of quite a mature collective. And I think it's something to strive to, you know, I think of the Truth and Reconciliation Commissions that have been helpful in large scale human rights abuses, rather than to have large trials like, you know, Nuremberg Trials or whatever we have, and punish en masse we actually have Commissions, and the most famous one was the South African one, which was when Nelson Mandela got together with Bishop Desmond Tutu, and they were actually trying to heal a nation of deep hurt. And they came upon the Truth and Reconciliation path to do that. And they had their sub-committees of the Commission to deal with different parts. And a very important committee was to actually look at the victims and to address their position, address their grievances, as well as allow them to come forward and talk about it. Rather than hide that away and say, you know, either that's not important, or that's embarrassing, or that we're going to create our own stigma for you. You come out and you talk about what it's done, what happened, how you feel. And that is that first step towards the deeper healing that I was talking about. So we most definitely have models. But with more spiritual insight, we can create even even more profound ones.

 

Virginia  48:01  
Yeah, yeah, look, I think it's for me, it's it is a re-education. On who we are, what our reality is, for all of, for all legal questions, but particularly criminal law, we would learn so much about ourselves, we will evolve.

 

Geraldine  48:19  
That's exactly I mean, that's wonderful. That goes back to what we were saying, like, why have we got this distortion of Unity, that is free will? It's for the experience. So, you know, the more we get from each experience, as human beings, the richer our whole existence is on this particular plane.

 

Virginia  48:41  
And look, I think it's really funny in some ways. Henry Ford said it best if you keep doing what you've always done, you'll always get what you've always got. And I think we, to me, society is looking a little bit silly. Like we're kindergarteners or something, we just keep repeating the same thing, hoping for something different and it's just not going to happen. We have to change your perspective.

 

Geraldine  49:04  
What's happening now is that a lot of mud is coming up right if you want to remain in this analogy, so the kids are having massive mud fights. And we're not, we need to be cleaning ourselves up and saying like, why are we getting into this mud fight? How can we prevent future mud fights? Rather than flinging more mud and bringing more people into the mud fight? Here, here is some mud for you. I'm gonna here, some fresh new mud. Yeah, it's time to look at it and go, why are we even in this?

 

Virginia  49:38  
Yeah, exactly. That's what I think as well. Speaking of mud, so our next episode is going to be on climate change.

 

Geraldine  49:46  
That's going to be huge.

 

Virginia  49:49  
Yeah, I know. That's a beautiful topic. And I think that's where we'll probably end this conversation here too. Because yeah, the criminal law is pretty heavy. Yeah, climate change is as well, but I am quite excited about that one also. So that's our next episode. So thank you so much, Geraldine for being on doing this with me today. And we had so much fun talking about this because it's such a radical topic, but I think it has to be said. And we're being pretty forthright without going into too much detail because it's a very, very big topic. And that I think the same situations apply to climate change. So if you're interested in everyone in what we're talking about, please join us for the next episode. And we'll see you then. So thank you. Thanks for watching.

 

Geraldine  50:40  
Thank you, everyone, and thank you Virginia, it has been a pleasure as always.

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