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Earlier quoted context omitted.
it seems like a more extreme version of jury nullification. if it became widespread, it would essentially be the end of rule-of-law. but in isolated and rare situations, perhaps it's a beneficial escape valve? easy to suggest from my comfy office in a quiet suburb of course.
I think this is different. Jury nullification is about a lawbreaker not being punished. Vigilantiism is about an innocent person (innocent until proven guilty through judicial process) being punished. If we as a society have committed to the idea that option a is better than option b, then they seem more like opposites.
in both cases, it's an opportunity for the community to make a decision that falls somewhat outside the letter of the law. jury nullification has been used for both noble and quite ugly ends in the US.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
helplessly racist? Thousands of lynchings occurred like this across the country for a hundred years - you can bet they weren't lynching whites more often.
According to the NAACP A) many states had more white people lynched than blacks B) The concentration of the south eastern states did make black people the victims more often both statistically and numerically, by a large margin but C) White people being killed was not a statistical outlier. So there is no novelty. D) “White” didn't include Italians, known Jewish people, any many others at the time. Not until the late…
So you also think the original comment was “helplessly racist” lol?
This is a review of the documentary covering a 'Town Bully' who had evaded authorities and continued to harm people repeatedly. In order to protect the community, a group of vigilantes murdered them, and the community refused to issue any statements to authorities regarding anyone's involvement. I think broadly, I wonder what the place of vigilanteism like this should serve. The sentiments to protect the community ag…
> frontier justice came for McElroy courtesy of the residents of Skidmore (population 440 at the time of the crime). Shaken by the man’s ability to evade jail even after being convicted of a near-fatal attack on a grocery store owner... Belkin also details Skidmore’s plague of subsequent violence ... the series persuasively contends that these crimes indicate that the McElroy episode taught younger Skidmore generatio…
> That doesn't make the actions acceptable, of course. But it does put a spotlight on the importance of having a working legal system that provides some reasonable level of protection to the larger community. This man was tried and convicted by a jury of his peers, it was just in a different courtroom.
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100% true. This is the history of lynching in America. Community murders where nobody saw a thing, and the justification was always that the murdered person was a degenerate who would not receive what the town thinks would be adequate punishment under the law.
Great reading on the culture that gave rise to lynching: https://www.quora.com/Did-slave-masters-actually-lynch-slave...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
100% true. This is the history of lynching in America. Community murders where nobody saw a thing, and the justification was always that the murdered person was a degenerate who would not receive what the town thinks would be adequate punishment under the law.
Great reading on the culture that gave rise to lynching: https://www.quora.com/Did-slave-masters-actually-lynch-slave...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
According to the NAACP A) many states had more white people lynched than blacks B) The concentration of the south eastern states did make black people the victims more often both statistically and numerically, by a large margin but C) White people being killed was not a statistical outlier. So there is no novelty. D) “White” didn't include Italians, known Jewish people, any many others at the time. Not until the late…
“Neither of you were wrong” So you also think the original comment was “helplessly racist” lol?
One could have trivially found another way to bring up the history of lynching as relates to this instance of mob "justice."
The Midwest starts west of the the line between Fort Duquesne in Pittsburgh to the southwest corner of New York. It is north of the Ohio River, and east of the Mississippi River. St. Paul is Midwest. Minneapolis is Prairie.
St. Louis is "the Gateway to the West", not "the Gateway to More of the Midwest".