Channeling Kafka

I find it easy to imagine being taken from my home in the dead of night for something I never did (always assuming someone was kind enough to tell me what I was supposed to have done, not all countries of the world give a prisoner the right to know with what he is charged).

I find it easy to imagine being woken up in the cells by the caress of a baseball bat against my ribs and then having to endure the beating. I can't imagine confessing but many people would, provided they were told what to confess to.I find it easy to imagine being refused communication with anyone outside and then given a lawyer appointed for me who turns up drunk and unprepared on the day of the trial.

I can imagine hearing endless evidence that would convince anyone with half a brain of my innocence... only to look at the jury as they pronounced me guilty and realise they didn't have one between them (or alternatively, they just didn't know me and so didn't know I must be innocent).

I can imagine being taken to prison and locked away, perhaps in solitary confinement after the other prisoners and guard are told my crime is particularly repugnant even by their standards.I can imagine being turned down for release countless times because I would not admit my guilt for a crime I did not commit.

I can imagine dying in prison because I was not prepared to admit a crime I did not commit.Alternatively, I can imagine crying my eyes out and begging for my mom (or almost anybody else to be honest, you don't know my mum) as they dragged me kicking and screaming to the gurney and held me down while they filled me up of poison all for something I knew I didn't do.

I can also imagine being murdered and do you know what. A murderer is evil. It's somehow worse to be killed after "due process" by upstanding normal citizens just doing their jobs. Whether one person suffers that fate, or millions, there is no difference in quality between the regimes that allow it.