June 14, 2005 :: Guilty after proven innocent

Of course, everybody knows by now that Michael Jackson has been found not guilty on all ten counts. I'm not going to even bother linking to an article, you can find them on your own. There are some deeper consequences here that bother me, though.

The jury of 12 of his peers (if it is indeed possible for MJ to have peers in any sense) sat through 14 weeks of intense, detailed trial presentations and testimony. The public at large sat through 14 weeks of sound bites, news blurbs and fluffed up dramatism in various forms of media, designed to sell advertising and magazines and whatever else needed selling. The jury of 12 found him innocent on all counts. The public, by and large, still believes he is guilty and just "got away with it". Obviously, one group is in a better position to pass judgment. In fact, one group in particular is required to pass judgment. The other group? Getting lots of exercise leaping to conclusions.

What disturbs me the most about this are some particular comments I've heard from friends. In a nutshell, there is nothing that anyone could ever say or do to convince them that MJ did not molest children, and that he should be under some jail right now, if not burning in a lake of fire in hell. I sure am glad they're not sitting in the jury in a trial for me. It disturbs me most because these are black people saying this to me, black people who know full well the massive miscarriages of injustice that have been perpetrated upon us through the vehicle of the American judicial system. Too many of us have been sentenced to death (and other onerously long sentences) by way of wrongful, spiteful and racist convictions. If there is any one thing we should wish from the courts, it is for a fair trial. As far as I can tell, MJ got one, and the jury decided he was innocent. That is good enough for me.

For the record, I don't hold an opinion on MJ's guilt or innocence, because I know I don't know nearly enough about any of the people involved, and I wasn't standing in the room when whatever happened happened. I said the same thing when OJ was on trial, and people tried to tell me I was weaseling out. There is absolutely no rational basis for any person not involved in the trial (and indeed, probably not anyone but OJ, Nicole and Ron) to know what happened that day, and to say otherwise is just puffery.

Besides, if you think MJ should be under the jail, then you just ought to think R. Kelly should be his bunkmate. At least we have a tape of that!

posted by Rainmayun at 10:29 AM -