Being Wrong
TalkLeft has an entry about explosive new evidence in Central Park jogger case. Also here and here and here.
What bothers me most about this is not just that people went to prison for a crime they weren't guilty of, but that the original trial affected our entire zeitgeist, infiltrating the way we look at age and race and violence, the way we talked about 'youth today,' who we trusted and what we did.
It made nothing better for the woman who was attacked and raped and beaten, that the wrong people went to jail. Nothing takes back what happened to her. But it makes a difference to those who were wrongly convicted, to the victims of the man who has now confessed (and to whom other evidence seems to point).
And it makes a big difference to us. Rules ought not to rule the world. But principle and procedure are important. And though emotion, instinct and experience are all part of who we are (important parts we should never give up), we have to care about the rights of suspects, about fair trials, about rules of evidence and doing things the 'right way.' Because if we don't, then we are the Wilders and we give up the things that make us who we want to be, if not always who we are.