I did not expect life to reward me. I did not expect the world to respect my boundaries and limitations. I did not believe fairness was out there in the world and that i was entitled to it. I expected a shared commitment: a collective decision that fairness matters because we decide it matters, because we make it matter, because human beings cannot live together without it. I expected the promise to carry weight.

If punishment isn’t meant to help me understand what I ought not to do, then what was it for?