Hi Tim,

Thank you for sharing your thoughts — it’s certainly a lot to take in and I definitely need some time to digest it all and think it through before I can even attempt to give you a reasonable response. I’ll try my luck for now but forgive me if I make some blunders. I think I share my thoughts best if I share them from my stream of consciousness.

You’re right that I am being pretty naive when I said that we can attain justice and truth if we only cooperate. It definitely is being overly optimistic, and you are correct that most times, it is rare, probably even impossible, that we find out the wholehearted, objective truth.

“Due process is only relevant to Governments. People and sometimes corporations are allowed to jump to conclusions, form their own opinions and even be biased against the accused.”

I agree that it is only relevant to forms of Government, so that they do not impose authority over the citizens and violate the civil liberties of the people. Sure, people and corporations have every right to jump to conclusions based on their findings.

But if we perpetuate a culture that gives credibility to any allegations made by anyone against anyone, we dilute the integrity and severity of these allegations and the next step is chaos. Serious allegations cannot be made lightly, and while I am not saying they are always made lightly, there are people who exploit this and ruin the lives of innocent people indefinitely.

Presumption of guilt seeks to deem every accused person guilty until proven innocent, which already sets the precedent to see the person in a negative light. This is detrimental to the people who are trying to come to a reasonable conclusion of the case, since they already start out with a negative bias.

I’m not saying that presumption of innocence is the best way, but it upholds the integrity of the individual until the evidence and situation is clearly stated and shown. It protects the person of immediate condemnation (at least, where there is ability to be protected since people will choose to believe what they want to believe) until due diligence is carried out. It is objectively the better option because we give the individual the chance to be seen as a person of value and deserving of a second look.

All I want to do is to move away from the call out culture that has been pushing people further apart from each other, giving validation to the “he-said, she-said” mentality and going back to our regressive roots of groupthink and mob rule.

Again, I agree with you. Not having been proven guilty does not mean you are innocent. Evil does triumph in the face of good sometimes. But I think more often than not, the concept of presuming innocence and withholding condemnation until due diligence is done has saved many reputations and served more justice than presuming guilt and jumping to conclusions.

Maybe I’m off-topic, not really debating your argument or missed your point entirely, but this is my current position and am willing to listen to yours since you listened to mine fairly.

Thanks again Tim! You helped me learn more about your position and made me just a bit more aware and informed of a different perspective.