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| Rubin "Hurricane" Carter (Source) |
His story is very heartbreaking but how he got through it is just extraordinary.
So who's Rubin Hurricane Carter and what is his story? He was an American boxer and at the height of his boxing career in the mid-1960s, he was wrongly accused of a crime he did not commit - triple homicide. He got convicted due to fake verdict. Prosecution had secretly promised leniency to the witnesses regarding their own crimes in exchange for their cooperation. Carter got three life sentences.
The book cites Carter's story to illustrate how he chose to react and act on the injustice that happened to him. Holiday writes:
Was he (Carter) angry about what happened? Of course. He was furious. But understanding that anger was not constructive, he refused to rage. He refused to break or grovel or despair.
Every second of his energy was to be spent on his legal case. Every waking minute was spent reading law books, philosophy, history. They hadn’t ruined his life they’d just put him somewhere he didn’t deserve to be and he did not intend to stay there. He would learn and read and make the most of the time he had on his hands. He would leave prison not only a free and innocent man, but a better and improved one.
It took nineteen years and two trials to overturn that verdict, but when Carter walked out of prison, he simply resumed his life. No civil suit to recover damages, Carter did not even request an apology from the court. Because to him, that would imply that they’d taken something of his that Carter felt he was owed. That had never been his view, even in the dark depths of solitary confinement. He had made his choice: This can’t harm me. I might not have wanted it to happen, but I decide how it will affect me. No one else has the right.
We decide what we will make of each and every situation. We decide whether we’ll break or whether we’ll resist. We decide whether we’ll assent or reject. No one can force us to give up or to believe something that is untrue (such as, that a situation is absolutely hopeless or impossible to improve). Our perceptions are the thing that we’re in complete control of. They can throw us in jail, label us, deprive us of our possessions, but they’ll never control our thoughts, our beliefs, our reactions. Which is to say, we are never completely powerless...
Even in prison, deprived of nearly everything, some freedoms remain. Your mind remains your own (if you’re lucky, you have books) and you have time lots of time...
It's almost unthinkable how one could survive and keep one's sanity for being punished for 22 years for something you're not guilty of. And Carter's choice not to file a civil suit or request for an apology from the court (when he was released) is just unbelievable. I like how Carter put it - This can’t harm me. I might not have wanted it to happen, but I decide how it will affect me. No one else has the right.
Every second of his energy was to be spent on his legal case. Every waking minute was spent reading law books, philosophy, history. They hadn’t ruined his life they’d just put him somewhere he didn’t deserve to be and he did not intend to stay there. He would learn and read and make the most of the time he had on his hands. He would leave prison not only a free and innocent man, but a better and improved one.
It took nineteen years and two trials to overturn that verdict, but when Carter walked out of prison, he simply resumed his life. No civil suit to recover damages, Carter did not even request an apology from the court. Because to him, that would imply that they’d taken something of his that Carter felt he was owed. That had never been his view, even in the dark depths of solitary confinement. He had made his choice: This can’t harm me. I might not have wanted it to happen, but I decide how it will affect me. No one else has the right.
We decide what we will make of each and every situation. We decide whether we’ll break or whether we’ll resist. We decide whether we’ll assent or reject. No one can force us to give up or to believe something that is untrue (such as, that a situation is absolutely hopeless or impossible to improve). Our perceptions are the thing that we’re in complete control of. They can throw us in jail, label us, deprive us of our possessions, but they’ll never control our thoughts, our beliefs, our reactions. Which is to say, we are never completely powerless...
Even in prison, deprived of nearly everything, some freedoms remain. Your mind remains your own (if you’re lucky, you have books) and you have time lots of time...
It's almost unthinkable how one could survive and keep one's sanity for being punished for 22 years for something you're not guilty of. And Carter's choice not to file a civil suit or request for an apology from the court (when he was released) is just unbelievable. I like how Carter put it - This can’t harm me. I might not have wanted it to happen, but I decide how it will affect me. No one else has the right.
If Carter had another alias, I think it should have been unbreakable.
Anyway, let me end this post with a beautiful quote I found online which Carter said in 2014 - two months before he passed away:
“If I find a heaven after this life, I’ll be quite surprised. In my own years on this planet, though, I lived in hell for the first 49 years, and have been in heaven for the past 28 years.
“To live in a world where truth matters and justice, however late, really happens, that world would be heaven enough for us all.”
