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Critics, Nietzsche, and the Criminal Law
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 09 June 2015
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Power can be evil, but it also protects the weak. The figure of justice...carries a sword in one hand. The use of power...is a key philosophical and moral problem....Power is a condition of life: a thing that must be handled.
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- Copyright © Canadian Journal of Law and Jurisprudence 1992
References
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37. In 1984 the British Columbia Supreme Court sentenced the five individuals known as “the Squamish Five” to life imprisonment, twenty-two years, twenty years, ten years, and six years, respectively, for conspiracy in respect of certain accusations of attempted robbery and arson. See R. v. Taylor (1983), 8 C.R.R. 29 (B.S.S.C); R. v. Taylor (1984), 40 C.R. (3d) 222 (B.S.S.C).
38. See “Politics and Sentencing: A Statement on the Squamish Five” (1985) 19 This Magazine at 34. The authors state here that “it is beyond question that the [Squamish Five] were motivated by a sincere concern for the dangers of nuclear war and the destructiveness of pollution and pornography.”
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57. I am referring here to Gairdner’s preference for those philosophical theories which tend to support, as he calls it, “our traditional way of life”, or “the popular view of right punishment” and “the popular wisdom of how society works”: ibid, at 343. In other words I am labeling Gairdner a political conservative as opposed to a political radical.
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77. Ibid, at 224.
78. Ibid.
79. Ibid.
80. Ibid. at 226.
81. Ibid.
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95. Popper, supra, note 15 at 234.
96. Popper, ibid.: see also Dworkin, supra, note 22 at 272–73.
97. Popper, ibid.
98. Ibid, at 238.
99. Ibid, at 236.
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104. Regina v. Robertson (1987), 33 C.C.C. (3d) 481.
105. As per Sopinka, J. in L.E.D., supra, note 103 at 125–26:Google Scholar “The use of the term “background” in Robertson was merely a succinct method of describing the relevance of the evidence in that case.”
106. Supra, note 103 at 133.
107. Ibid. at 115 (my emphasis).
108. Ibid. at 129 (my emphasis).
109. Ibid. at 134.
110. Kelman, supra, note 101 at 665–66.
111. Ibid. at 670.
112. Ibid. at 667.
113. Ibid. at 666.
114. Nietzsche, supra, note 19.
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