5 ms·

> And while it's not totally relevant, he was hardly just some kid It's absolutely not relevant. Everyone has rights. This "people who seem guilty should have

> And while it's not totally relevant, he was hardly just some kid It's absolutely not relevant. Everyone has rights. This "people who seem guilty should have a harder time in the legal system" take your comment is leaning into is a self sabotaging approach to justice, I hope for obvious reasons.

roenxi 5y ago
People who seem guilty absolutely should have a harder time in the legal system. That is the group of people who are more likely to be guilty. Police have quite a lot of discretion in who they arrest and that is already a fairly strong "looks guilty" signal. What is important is there must be minimum standards to try and remove individual bias and push the system towards evidence based outcomes. If there is no evidence someone did something, they should not be punished. But if there is overwhelming evidence from the get go that they've committed a crime then the police can go through the motions and interpret the procedures unhelpfully. It isn't perfect (in fact, the system is terrifyingly arbitrary) but it must be acknowledged that a case looking to be open-and-shut is suggestive of guilt and should influence how procedures are applied.
- beebeepka 5y ago
  I guess it's easy to look at things this way if you're not on the wrong end of this "how things look" situation. Your argument strikes me as incredibly dishonest at best, and just plain evil at worst.
  - roenxi 5y ago
    Enforcing the law is, in a sense, evil. At the end of the day enforcement is some combination of violence, coercion and thoughtfully depriving people of life/liberty/comfort. The enforcement system is wildly imperfect and a side effect of that is the people involved have to make judgement calls about how to treat the people who get caught up in the legal system. If you can think of a way around that then you'll get your name in the history books. > Your argument strikes me as incredibly dishonest at best, and just plain evil at worst. Hopefully the path from dishonest to evil passes through some more positive places, because there are a lot of options that seem to be missing there.
- salawat 5y ago
  It is because of viewpoints like yours that I celebrate the U.S. legal system, and that I despise the enforcement apparatus for it's discrimination against highly intelligent people. It is not difficult to become the butt end of the prosecutor's ire; and when faced with the resources of the State, how amazing that one can not only actually hold the State accountable to follow it's own process for depriving one of one's own life and liberty; and that one can actually fight tyranny at the same time by forcing the Government to tip their hands, and reveal their methods through sufficient attention to detail and the right questions. How fantastic that a legal system acknowledges that a State with an agenda will wring all sorts of construed meaning out of silence; and pre-emptively writes out large swathes of that type of testimony (even if I disagree with some courts interpretation of testimony). Restricting the State to having to make a case on material facts. Many warts that our legal system may have, most of the more pressing ones are problems of will to prosecute or investigate tough cases and lackluster investigatory technique when done. The "seems pretty sus" barrier has no place in a justice system. Material facts. The world around a genuine wrong-doer will tell more than enough to convict them without playing games with "well they made the investigator's life more difficult by not opening the door and answering questions" and a follow up game of who is better at formulating the more intellectually palatable leading questions. Not one person should have to lift a finger to help contribute to building the walls in which the State seeks to contain them, and every innocent suspect deserves the finest council to help them navigate the vagaries of the legal system, and even the guilty deserve to have the case depriving them of life and liberty be conducted to the squeakiest degree humanly possible, with the aid of a robust defense. To do anything less is an affront on human decency, and the integrity of the judicial apparatus.

roenxi 5y ago

People who seem guilty absolutely should have a harder time in the legal system. That is the group of people who are more likely to be guilty. Police have quite a lot of discretion in who they arrest and that is already a fairly strong "looks guilty" signal. What is important is there must be minimum standards to try and remove individual bias and push the system towards evidence based outcomes. If there is no evidence someone did something, they should not be punished. But if there is overwhelming evidence from the get go that they've committed a crime then the police can go through the motions and interpret the procedures unhelpfully. It isn't perfect (in fact, the system is terrifyingly arbitrary) but it must be acknowledged that a case looking to be open-and-shut is suggestive of guilt and should influence how procedures are applied.

beebeepka 5y ago
I guess it's easy to look at things this way if you're not on the wrong end of this "how things look" situation. Your argument strikes me as incredibly dishonest at best, and just plain evil at worst.
- roenxi 5y ago
  Enforcing the law is, in a sense, evil. At the end of the day enforcement is some combination of violence, coercion and thoughtfully depriving people of life/liberty/comfort. The enforcement system is wildly imperfect and a side effect of that is the people involved have to make judgement calls about how to treat the people who get caught up in the legal system. If you can think of a way around that then you'll get your name in the history books. > Your argument strikes me as incredibly dishonest at best, and just plain evil at worst. Hopefully the path from dishonest to evil passes through some more positive places, because there are a lot of options that seem to be missing there.
salawat 5y ago
It is because of viewpoints like yours that I celebrate the U.S. legal system, and that I despise the enforcement apparatus for it's discrimination against highly intelligent people. It is not difficult to become the butt end of the prosecutor's ire; and when faced with the resources of the State, how amazing that one can not only actually hold the State accountable to follow it's own process for depriving one of one's own life and liberty; and that one can actually fight tyranny at the same time by forcing the Government to tip their hands, and reveal their methods through sufficient attention to detail and the right questions. How fantastic that a legal system acknowledges that a State with an agenda will wring all sorts of construed meaning out of silence; and pre-emptively writes out large swathes of that type of testimony (even if I disagree with some courts interpretation of testimony). Restricting the State to having to make a case on material facts. Many warts that our legal system may have, most of the more pressing ones are problems of will to prosecute or investigate tough cases and lackluster investigatory technique when done. The "seems pretty sus" barrier has no place in a justice system. Material facts. The world around a genuine wrong-doer will tell more than enough to convict them without playing games with "well they made the investigator's life more difficult by not opening the door and answering questions" and a follow up game of who is better at formulating the more intellectually palatable leading questions. Not one person should have to lift a finger to help contribute to building the walls in which the State seeks to contain them, and every innocent suspect deserves the finest council to help them navigate the vagaries of the legal system, and even the guilty deserve to have the case depriving them of life and liberty be conducted to the squeakiest degree humanly possible, with the aid of a robust defense. To do anything less is an affront on human decency, and the integrity of the judicial apparatus.