idiggory, King of Bards wrote:
gbaji wrote:
I have always held open the possibility that there is either evidence we are not aware of which would make a valid case for charging him *or* that public pressure might cause charges to be filed anyway. Honestly, the vote is still out on which just happened. My position is going to be the same one it's been all along though: Let's wait until the facts come out and let the legal process work its way through. My issue has always been with what I saw as a rush to judgment based on public outcry and emotion. I was not wrong about that.
You can say that all you want, but you are just as guilty of assumptions as anyone else in the thread.
I disagree. But you're entitled to your opinion, I suppose.
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Our demands have been for a trial.
I'd say that you are repeating the demands of others, and now that they've got the trial they are demanding, they will move on to demanding nothing less than a conviction. Anyone who thought that this was just about getting Zimmerman a fair trial has been deluding themselves. While that is what should happen if the evidence supports it, it's *not* the motivation of the folks who are being the most vocal on this issue.
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The public outcry isn't what caused the trial. It is, however, what gave Martin the opportunity for justice.
And if Zimmerman is not convicted, does that mean Martin did not get justice? See. That's the problem I have with this. While I hope that the prosecutor is operating based on the facts of the case and the results of the investigation and nothing more, my fear is that the demands for "justice for Trayvon" require a trial, so they get a trial. Now that they have one, it'll demand a conviction. Will a jury give them one? Can we be sure that anything that happens from this point on is based on the law, or based on the fear of the mob?
And what happens if he's not convicted?
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There's a very good chance this case would have been swept under the rug without all the attention. Doesn't mean they are pressing charges because of it.
I'm not sure how you can write those two sentences one right after the other. If the charges would have been filed whether the attention was generated or not, then the attention wasn't necessary. If they wouldn't have then we're left with one of two possibilities:
1. The charges would not have been filed because there really wasn't sufficient evidence to file them.
2. The charges would not have been filed because the police just didn't care enough, were racist, or whatever other reason.
The entire assumption behind raising such attention is that condition 2 is true (or even may be true, so I'm not necessarily arguing that this is wrong). The concern is condition 1 though. The same attention would be raised if that was the case, yet there's nearly no way for anyone involved to know this (or to care in many cases). And that creates a condition where it's nearly impossible for actual justice to prevail. No matter what the outcome of the trial, someone's going to think something was wrong.
Edited, Apr 12th 2012 5:04pm by gbaji