Why we presume innocence

Both in and out of the courts.  A case study, by Mark Shea. 

Knowing Mark's own political loyalties, is wasn't difficult to believe that Mark would do what he did, and that's join with all of Roy Moore's political opponents and adversaries on both sides of the aisle and demand Moore be removed from his senate race.  Most, like Mark, made this call long before more women were produced from the same part of the town where Moore was living forty years ago, and before Moore made some of his own questionable statements.  Many, like Mark, did it within a day of the WP piece that initially broke the story.

Mark, like Steven Greydanus, has made it clear that Moore's guilt is all but obvious.  There is no room for debate.  If you don't immediately condemn Moore and want him punished, then you support child molesters.  Sort of like what people used to say about the Catholic Church, but I'm sure that's different.  After all, Mark asks why women would make false accusations for no reason?

Which brings us to this little tidbit that came my way.  In it, we have a cry for justice against a vile women who has made an innocent man's life a nightmare with endless false accusations and stalkings.  And who is that man?  It would be Mark Shea's nephew. 

Personally, I have no more vested interest in the case against Mark's nephew than I do the case against Roy Moore.  My thing would be to wait to demand punishment until the cases were heard in an official capacity.  Was Mark's nephew lying to protect himself, or was the woman lying?   I might have my own opinions, but I certainly wouldn't want anyone punished until official inquiries and investigations were conducted that included examining the evidence.

Same with Moore.  But yet, whereas Mark found it easy to accuse a woman who had falsely accused his own nephew, Mark finds it just as easy now to believe every woman accusing Moore and immediately call for Moore, the child molester per Mark, to be punished, no physical evidence or corroborating documentation needed.

And that, kiddies, is why we have the rule of law.  It's to protect us from people who can't quite see the fact that they appear to be playing fast and loose with consistent application of standards, and who seem to be guided more by emotionalism and raw personal bias and prejudice, than an actual quest for truth and justice.