I’ll start with a quote from Bertrand Russell:
The power of the State may be brought to bear, as it often is in England, through public opinion rather than through the laws. By oratory and the influence of the Press, public opinion is largely created by the State, and a tyrannous public opinion is as great an enemy to liberty as tyrannous laws. If the young man who will not fight finds that he is dismissed from his employment, insulted in the streets, cold-shouldered by his friends, and thrown over with scorn by any woman who may formerly have liked him, he will feel the penalty quite as hard to bear as a death sentence. A free community requires not only legal freedom, but a tolerant public opinion, an absence of that instinctive inquisition into our neighbors’ affairs which, under the guise of upholding a high moral standard, enables good people to indulge unconsciously a disposition to cruelty and persecution. Thinking ill of others is not in itself a good reason for thinking well of ourselves. But so long as this is not recognized, and so long as the State can manufacture public opinion, except in the rare cases where it is revolutionary, public opinion must be reckoned as a definite part of the power of the State.
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Bertrand_Russell
I can testify from my experience that what Bertrand Russell said is true. I have never been to England but his comments apply equally to India.
Now I do suppose that a tyrannous public opinion may be useful to the police or the magistrates. It may help in getting people to not commit crimes. In politics also the BJP has come up with the ‘Ek hai to safe hai’ mantra and that has helped them win the state elections in Maharashtra whose results were declared yesterday. But such a public opinion also curtails intellectual, scientific, philosophical and artistic growth and attainments.
And such attainments and pursuits are necessary for the survival of the human race (please see link below). But an even more important point is that being free makes life worth living. And a tolerant community is necessary for us to be free.
What sort of a life will we be living if we spend our time indulging unconsciously in a disposition to cruelty and persecution (to use Russell’s words). This sort of life is not given to constructive activities. We are robbing ourselves of what makes life worth living.
Time is the one thing that, once it is gone, it is gone. We can never have it back. And according to Tibetan Buddhism we have had the good fortune of a human birth after (for all practical purposes) an eternity.
For more on this subject (of rebirth) please see the book below:
As I said earlier the police may find a tyrannous public opinion helpful in preventing crime and catching criminals. But we are not here to do the job of the police. We have not been trained to do that work, we have not signed a contract, we are not getting paid a salary and most of us lack mature judgment. It is quite likely that most of us will do more harm than good.
And we have better things to do with our time.
The Bible says: Judge not that you be not judged. Jesus also spoke about having life more abundantly. I don’t see why I should be prevented from following these ideals because the legal system is broken and does not do its job.
Russell also speaks on the importance of spending our lives in some constructive purpose. Please see the chapter on Work in his book below. It is a classic.
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Addendum:
This isn’t really necessary to my main point in this blog but if you like you can ask Bing Copilot for the answer to this question:
What are the features of society that contribute to intellectual and artistic growth?
I asked Bing this question and would have given you the link to the answer but I have got logged out of my account and have lost my password. I’ll get around to logging in eventually.
Anyway Bing’s answer should interest you.