Wasted Honor -

Carl R. ToersBijns is the author of the Wasted Honor Trilogy [Wasted Honor I,II and Gorilla Justice] and his newest book From the Womb to the Tomb, the Tony Lester Story, which is a reflection of his life and his experiences as a correctional officer and a correctional administrator retiring with the rank of deputy warden in the New Mexico and Arizona correctional systems.

Carl also wrote a book on his combat experience in the Kindle book titled - Combat Medic - Men with destiny - A red cross of Valor -

Carl is considered by many a rogue expert in the field of prison security systems since leaving the profession. Carl has been involved in the design of many pilot programs related to mental health treatment, security threat groups, suicide prevention, and maximum custody operational plans including double bunking max inmates and enhancing security for staff. He invites you to read his books so you can understand and grasp the cultural and political implications and influences of these prisons. He deals with the emotions, the stress and anxiety as well as the realities faced working inside a prison. He deals with the occupational risks while elaborating on the psychological impact of both prison worker and prisoner.

His most recent book, Gorilla Justice, is an un-edited raw fictional version of realistic prison experiences and events through the eyes of an anecdotal translation of the inmate’s plight and suffering while enduring the harsh and toxic prison environment including solitary confinement.

Carl has been interviewed by numerous news stations and newspapers in Phoenix regarding the escape from the Kingman prison and other high profile media cases related to wrongful deaths and suicides inside prisons. His insights have been solicited by the ACLU, Amnesty International, and various other legal firms representing solitary confinement cases in California and Arizona. He is currently working on the STG Step Down program at Pelican Bay and has offered his own experience insights with the Center of Constitutional Rights lawyers and interns to establish a core program at the SHU units. He has personally corresponded and written with SHU prisoners to assess the living conditions and how it impacts their long term placement inside these type of units that are similar to those in Arizona Florence Eyman special management unit where Carl was a unit deputy warden for almost two years before his promotion to Deputy Warden of Operations in Safford and Eyman.

He is a strong advocate for the mentally ill and is a board member of David's Hope Inc. a non-profit advocacy group in Phoenix and also serves as a senior advisor for Law Enforcement Officers Advocates Council in Chino, California As a subject matter expert and corrections consultant, Carl has provided interviews and spoken on national and international radio talk shows e.g. BBC CBC Lou Show & TV shows as well as the Associated Press.

I use sarcasm, satire, parodies and other means to make you think!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
































































































































Friday, October 28, 2016

Law of Retaliation [Lex Talionis]







Law of Retaliation [Lex Talionis]
(Matthew 5:38-42)

Much has been said about the blessings of the peacemakers in our society today. The fact that I feel this is something important to write about is based on the fact that the law of retaliation is very applicable to many scenarios or situations today as well as they were back in the Old Testament days.
Let me make my purpose clear why I am writing about the “Lex Talionis” or the ‘law of retaliation’ as it sits within our justices system today. We are talking specifically about retributive justice, in the phrase of ‘an eye for an eye’ from Exodus 21:23-27. The basis for this law is the foundation of punishment and must be considered to be a root value of our society as it is written for us to follow.
The basis for this form of law is the principle of ‘proportionate punishment’ or as we usually say in today’s words, ‘let the punishment fit the crime.’ The problem with such ideology is that the punishment may not be at all proportionate in certain ways. This calls for a discretionary decision to value the loss versus the punishment.
In none biblical terms, this is the law often applied in cases where the principle is designed to give or provide equitable retaliation for an offended party. Straying away from the Old Testament, we began to see various definitions come out of this traditional law including those words spoken by Jesus on the Sermon on the Mound where he preached to ‘turn the other cheek’ rather than the ‘eye for an eye’ approach but offered a monetary compensation offer rather than violence upon another. On the other end of the spectrum, we have Islam that has a code that has been taken more literally as a thief may lose his hand in punishment for such an act.
Simplifying this process, as Christians, we are taught that the difference between Christianity and Islam is simple: Christianity teaches that when struck you should turn the other cheek; however, Islam teaches that when you are struck you strike him back – this is better for you and the other person involved. One can begin to see a wide gap in the meaning of the different worlds involved already. It really becomes an issue of who or what is the appropriate authority on the matter when the punishment is handed out.
Under the law of retaliation, we are taught to strike back, get even or do unto others like they did to you. This is the basic rule of law for the justification for doing what is actually a retaliatory act. For many, this appeals to them as the right way to handle most situations where an injustice has been committed or done especially if this harm was personal and not just offending but embarrassing or humiliating as well.
Perhaps, we can readily see how this could go wrong as a retaliatory strike and do away with justice. So as it stands, turning the other cheek may, in fact, be a profound way to settle the score in a more practical manner and in the meantime, avoid further conflict, oppression and the needs of everyday life.
Thus, in the end, reasonable men follow Jesus’ teachings in confronting the words of the Old Testament and the law of retaliation. Here the ‘Lex Talionis’ has been softened up a bit to give it a more practical and less harsh meaning that before.
Why do we follow the words of Jesus and not the Old Testament you ask? Let us compare societies from the past with today’s cultural and dynamic influences. Without taking it to the ‘edge of the possibilities’ we see how our ethical limits are now imposed by our laws.
Laws that defy the old way of ancient situations where you and your family lived without a formal justice system in place, no regulatory police force to enforce the laws equally and no courts set up by local, state or federal levels to guarantee your rights are being upheld through due process. There are no kings or other higher authorities looming to rule over you. It is you and your laws to follow and work out some sort of retribution. A settlement that is fair and equitable on all counts without doing any more harm that has already been done. Every law has a sanction that has bee created or drafted and passed with due diligence and to the satisfaction of the people as well as the government.
In ancient days, whenever a crime was committed, you had to take the law into your own hands and inflict the punishment because there was no police to arrest the offender, no courts to impose punishment and no end to the madness as it was nothing more than a cycle of violence that never ended. Something that was likely to end up in a feud that lasted forever.
Thus under this Mosiac law of “lex talionis,” it was a real advancement of society as it addressed the cause of justice through a tribunal hearing and seek the appropriate punishment. But what should the appropriate punishment be in the case of murder or maiming? This is where the law comes into play: “a life for a life,” “an eye for an eye,” “a tooth for a tooth.
The punishment must fit the crime – no more than the crime but also no less. It was strict but fair. It was also designed to prevent and deter such crimes. It was there to remove punitive actions for crimes from the hands of the victim and his family and put them into the hands of the governing judicial system. It was designed as a principle of proportional justice. It was also designed to suitably punish the offender. This is the irony and abuse of how people misunderstand this law. It is misunderstood now the same way it was misunderstood at the time of Jesus. A law that was designed to prevent actions of personal retaliatory revenge is used to justify it!
Under the teachings of Jesus, the Son of God is trying to avoid confrontation and get away from the old ways of teaching the ‘eye for an eye’ and the mindset that is associated with such thinking. Let me make it very  clear that God wants us to take actions of personal revenge out of our hands. We can turn them over to the governmental authorities if appropriate, and even if that doesn’t work, we need to turn them over to God Himself.
As we learn more about the words of Jesus, we see the genesis of the role of the peacemakers and the peacekeepers. By contrasting the old ways, we have formulated a system that allows justice to be handled in a more structured way rather than emotionally and often irrationally as crimes stimulate the emotions quicker than most other things around us. Jesus has a different perspective. He addresses the issue on what you should do if offenses of conflict or insult happen to you. Jesus, in my view, addresses not what the court or government should do, but what a disciple should do when he or she is offended. Keep in mind that Jesus was comparing his system of righteousness with that of the scribes and Pharisees. This is an important point to hold onto as much as you can to keep things in perspective.
When we are confronted with situations when we are offended, when we are insulted, we have two choices: we can escalate the conflict with retaliation, or we can de-escalate the conflict. We can be a “warmaker” or a peacemaker. Jesus said in the beatitudes, “Blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called sons of God” (Matthew 5:9).
We are peacemakers when we de-escalate these situations of conflict and extend a blessing instead. When we turn the other cheek, we are a peacemaker. When we forego the lawsuit, we are a peacemaker. When we go the extra mile, we are a peacemaker. When we give to our brother in need, we are a peacemaker.
Now we come down to the applicability and practical aspect of this most difficult part of applying the teachings of Jesus. What is the scope of applicability here? It can be applied to a lot more situations than we may want it to apply and what we are comfortable with at the time.
Peter writes, “Finally, all of you be of one mind, having compassion for one another; love as brothers, be tenderhearted, be courteous; 9 not returning evil for evil or reviling for reviling, but on the contrary blessing, knowing that you were called to this, that you may inherit a blessing (1 Peter 3:8-9). Strangely, this parable does not apply to war or capital punishment. For some reason, it has been left out of that scope of applicability.




Branded - Ronin






Branded a Ronin –

“Gold is Silver, and Greed is God”


No one doubts, the crimson splattered stains on the ground are the blood of brave warriors who volunteered to fight the fair fight overseas. None who signed up to fight would have ever thought this war in the Middle East would escalate to such horrific and deadly proportions where the whole world is at war at the moment. There is no justice any longer –everything and everyone is up for auction to the highest bidders as prisons are overcrowded with those who rebelled against tyranny and greed.

It was said in revelations; the world would come to an end someday. It was written in many ways our future is our past and nothing ever changes. Today, the children of the world are looking at the world that is on the brink of ruin because of corruption and greed. This hunger and chaos rules the mood of persons evil minded and filled with the darkness inside their so-called hearts.

They have spread their wickedness from city to city, from state to state and from country to country until there was nowhere else to run and find some common sense or sanity to guide their ways. Today, they are trapped inside their own ignorance, hidden under a veil of ignorance and darkness.

Those who are rich and powerful seek only dominion of those who used to be middle class and the poor became poorer. They own their clothes on their backs but that is all as they have been stripped of all material possession by a tyranny that rules them with an iron first and heavy firepower.

Taxed to the highest rate while the rich were exempt for such burdens, a group of Ronin freedom fighters has taken to the streets to fight this trend of power and dominion over persons still free.

The earth has been severely damaged by Mother Nature’s wrath as the wind, rain and fire have destroyed much of the moral soul of mankind. The natural landscape of rock, trees, steel and sand has been turned into contaminated dust. For those who escaped the doom and gloom of nuclear warfare sit still and gaze at the moon and sun through clouded skies filled with radiation that causes the aurora of the north pole drift all the way south of our borders.

Some Ronin walk through life with burned flesh as a reminder of the battles. Scars are plenty and every Ronin knows that it will be a struggle to hold onto what they got until the free rise again in numbers against the corrupted elements that surround them.

Branded by fire, they are the elite and survivors of this game called life. Armed with the spirit of independence and free-will, they march on the oppressors with whatever they have to fight with, even as it may be their bare hands and feet to meet their foes.

There are no uniforms of regularity. There are no colors that bond them together or set them apart. No longer are tattoos the means to identify their preferences or desires; now they are branded for life as they seek to destroy those who resist this call for freedom.

Needless to say, this apocalypse was preventable. The signs on the walls were ignored and ignorance ruled the population. Trapped by lies and deception, they put the wrong people in government and allowed the corporate entities to rule the laws that were broken or rewritten to suit their own corporate greed for wealth and power.

Today, chaos and corruption ride the winds from all directions as the world once again seeks to free itself from a man-made disaster. The ashes of war are plenty as they fill the streets in the cities, the country roads in the open spaces and the trees in our forest. Aligned with the evil of man-made chemical contamination, there are sporadic signs of life still resisting the poisonous soul that was sprayed with a pesticide that burned the soul of the earth and taste of the water.

There are no kings or queens, no governors or presidents. No democracy or rule by people or parliaments. There was a congress at one time but they were also bought and sold as slaves to the corporations. Today, only tyranny exists to rule their individual tract or empire.

Today, in their quest for power, land, and wealth, a wave of revolutionary spirits is growing underneath the earth as treachery and depravity seep from every branch of corruptible and contemptible source created to establish absolute power over those they chose to dominate and control for their own selfish needs.

Most animals have been slaughtered, eaten or burned to ashes. Most foods are genetically altered to affect the brain and submit the hearts and souls to the master that grows the crops. There is slight resistance and that spirit dwells in smaller numbers but the Ronin warriors know, it’s only a matter of time before they disappear into the darkness and come back in larger numbers into the light. They will not vanish completely.

They will leave traces of dust and scribe messages on the walls of deserted or ruined dwellings to let the populace know they have not abandoned them. For the sake of liberty, they gather secretly to flourish as a small army of Ronin armed only with the firepower preserved when the bans on guns were universally imposed by the United Nations who oversees this path of destruction and malevolence towards our human rights and civility we once enjoyed under a dissimilar source of power.

They are fighting what has been called a New Order. An order created by banks, politicians and businessmen so filthy rich; they could buy the world of all its debt. Democracy disappeared overnight as they controlled the currency of every nation. Bountiful and beautiful lands disappeared into spores of commercialism designed to make the rich even richer.

Freedoms that once flourished have all but vanished completely.
The underground of resistance is diminutive in numbers but their spirits swell into a tsunami of courage and boldness while hidden in the desolated and isolated parts of the earth. There is no division of religion. Their colors are mixed but all bleed red as their ideology is common and their culture is to fight for liberty and freedom.

Hidden from the high sky burning sun, they wait their turn to fight these oppressors with everything they have, making a new Red Dawn movement a reality as others slip into the shadows to fight the light for not all men are twisted or turned into sheep or shells of blank minded persons. Some continue to wander to find these Ronin who are willing to fight for liberty and freedom.