Nobody Is disposable

James Martorano

We live in an era when powerful voices spew hatred and divisiveness every day.

They tell us whom to fear, whom to despise, and whose suffering we may ignore.

They would have us categorize other human beings as worthless, evil or disposable. Through repetition, they make contempt seem natural and cruelty acceptable. Each of us faces a moral challenge: will we absorb this hate speech, or resist it and actively work to humanize our society?

I feel that challenge deeply because I have spent my life trying to persuade others to recognize the humanity of people they might otherwise dismiss. Throughout my career in criminal defense, I have asked judges, prosecutors, and juries to see the person behind the accusation. A charge describes alleged conduct. It cannot encompass an entire life. Behind every case stands someone with a history, relationships, wounds, choices and possibilities.

Understanding that person does not excuse wrongdoing. It makes judgment more thoughtful and justice more responsible. We must protect victims and hold people accountable. We must also resist believing that an accusation, or even a conviction, tells us everything worth knowing about someone. No person should disappear behind the worst thing he or she has done.

That commitment must extend beyond the courtroom to victims of crime, people sleeping on sidewalks, families facing separation, and individuals living here without immigration papers. Humanity cannot depend on whether someone is my client, shares my politics or makes me comfortable. Its recognition must guide every exercise of power over another person.

The death of Jordan Neely brings these obligations into painful focus. On May 1, 2023, Neely, a 30-year-old man struggling with homelessness and mental illness, encountered Daniel Penny, a Marine Corps veteran, on a Manhattan subway train. Penny restrained him in a chokehold, and Neely died. Penny maintained that he was protecting passengers. In December 2024, a jury acquitted him of criminally negligent homicide. The encounter became a national confrontation over public safety, mental illness, homelessness and responsibility.

Anand Giridharadas’s brilliant and deeply insightful book, "Man in the Mirror: Hope, Struggle, and Belonging in an American City," gives us a vivid portrayal of these two individuals’ lives before they met on that fateful day. By tracing the paths that brought Neely and Penny to that subway car, Giridharadas restores the human complexity that public controversy so often obscures. Their lives began long before the moment that made their names nationally known.

For me, the book’s profound moral power lies in its invitation to look closely, resist easy judgments, and recognize the humanity that anger and ideology can conceal. Giridharadas challenges us to examine whose suffering we acknowledge, whose humanity we overlook, and what those choices reveal about ourselves. His insight deserves our attention, especially when public discourse encourages us to stop listening.

The passengers’ fear matters. Neely’s life matters. Neither should erase the other. Recognizing frightening conduct does not make suffering irrelevant. Recognizing humanity does not deny the need for safety. We can respect a jury’s verdict while asking what might have prevented the crisis. A prosecution’s legal resolution does not exhaust our moral responsibilities.

When we reduce a troubled person to a threat, we stop asking questions that might save lives. What help was needed? What opportunities for intervention were missed? If our only concern is making someone disappear, we may mistake the removal of visible suffering for the resolution of its causes.

The same danger arises in our treatment of people without immigration papers. We may disagree about borders, deportation and enforcement. Those disagreements cannot cancel our obligation to recognize the humanity of those affected. Immigration status identifies a legal circumstance; it does not measure human worth. No paperwork creates humanity, and no missing paperwork cancels it.

A mother remains a mother in detention. A child remains a child when an official opens a file. People in custody still need adequate food, sanitation, medical attention and respect. We bear responsibility for treatment imposed in our name, especially upon people with little power to make themselves heard.

Language can make us forget this. “Criminal.” “Addict.” “Illegal.” “Enemy.” A label becomes permission to stop listening. History vanishes. Suffering becomes unimportant. Humiliation becomes tolerable. Ask yourself: would I accept this treatment for my child, my partner, my parent? That question cannot resolve every dispute, but it can break through the distance that permits indifference.

The hate speech circulating through public life threatens our conscience. Voices trafficking in contempt invite us to prove loyalty by despising others. We must refuse to let their contempt become our own.

Resistance alone is insufficient. Humanizing society requires institutions that preserve dignity, policies that address suffering before catastrophe, and citizens willing to challenge abuses. It also requires ordinary acts of courage. Refuse to share a message that makes suffering entertainment. Challenge language that degrades an entire group. Listen before dismissing. Offer help. Ask whose voice is missing.

My lifetime in the law has strengthened my conviction that accountability and compassion belong together. We can condemn an act without declaring its perpetrator worthless. We can protect the public while preserving dignity. I have made that argument because another person’s freedom and future were at stake. Today, I make it to all of us.

Accept this moral challenge with urgency and courage. When powerful voices declare people disposable, speak up. When cruelty is committed in our name, challenge it. When suffering is dismissed because of an accusation, illness, or immigration status, insist that a human being stands before us. Our silence leaves the vulnerable to face contempt alone.

We cannot leave this work to judges, elected officials, charities, or some future generation. It belongs to us now. Every conversation, every public decision, every encounter with someone in distress offers a choice. We can reinforce the contempt surrounding us, remain silent before it, or help interrupt it. Let us choose humanity every day.

Let our compassion become something another person can count on. Stand beside the degraded. Demand care for people in crisis and humane treatment in custody. Let us refuse to teach our children that some lives matter less. The frightened deserve safety. The wounded deserve care. The accused deserve fairness. The forgotten deserve to be seen.

Look at the person whom powerful voices tell you to despise. See a life as real as your own, someone who feels pain and fear and still has a claim upon our conscience. Then act. Speak. Help. Defend that person’s dignity when doing so is unpopular. Our humanity survives through our willingness to protect the humanity of others. Nobody is worthless. Nobody’s suffering is beneath our concern. Nobody is disposable.