3 ms·
It's a bit trickier than that. Ignorance is not a defense to prove innocence. Essentially this is on tautological grounds: I did not know it was illegal to do X
by sophacles 17y ago
It's a bit trickier than that. Ignorance is not a defense to prove innocence. Essentially this is on tautological grounds: I did not know it was illegal to do X. X was done, by you, therefore you are guilty of X. Knowledge of the law carries no weight when arguing fact. However, when it comes to repercussions: ignorance can be used toward motive: "I would not have done it if i thought it was illegal", should probably be punished less than "So what, it is illegal, I will do it anyway". Manipulation of such sentiments is out of the scope of my statement.
- pbhjpbhj 17y agoYes, I was going to mention that ignorance can be used to ameliorate sentencing but assumed that was stating common knowledge. The interesting question is [why this] should this be true? Yes I know there are facile answers to that one but it's still the more interesting question - with subjective morality I think it is a problem. We punish people for doing bad things don't we, not for why they do them? I know, I know...