The Justice Game and Thank You for Smoking

The notion of “Conflicting perspectives” will always exist. When viewpoints differ, each individual seeks to affirm their own, generating diverse and sometimes provocative opinions, giving rise to this notion. This is apparent in Geoffrey Robertson’s book, The Justice Game (1998); The Trials of Oz and Jason Reitman’s film, TYFS (2005), exploring the clashes of public morals and cultural views through a spectrum of textual features, mainly satire and the manipulation of language. The methods by which these conflicting perspectives are represented shape how the audience perceive them particularly creating a subjective view of the judicial system and society at large.
Firstly, conflicting perspectives arise from the collision of public morals. In the Trials of Oz, Robertson utilizes medial caesura, “I knew all about the law – but nothing about justice” connoting the limitations of law. Justice, however “is the great game” according to Robertson and can be subject to various influences, foreshadowing the prejudicial justice the trial will face. In response to the disagreement over whether the Rupert Bear Strip was “art” or “pornography,” Robertson’s repetitive use of satire ridicules the court for its exaggerated response towards the Oz Magazine contributors as criminal “co-conspirators” whilst emphasizing the court’s hypocrisy in “corrupting public morals”: “Oz was one of the last cases tried by a jury which was not randomly selected.” Through “one of the last cases” it demonstrates that this systematic bias was present and still is which is further supported through statistics, “as true in 1997 as it was in 1971” increasing the reliability of this perspective. Furthermore, the extent of this hypocrisy and corruption is presented through, “police officers […] ‘licensed’ to sell pornography of the hardest core”. The superlative, “hardest core” contrasts to the expected role of the “police”, hence emphasizing the absurdity of the legal system’s morals. Argyle, who is a...