Who is to Blame?
Our Justice system is not broken, instead our false narratives are.
Over the last year, we had a significant number of court cases that garnered considerable media attention. They have received substantial coverage from all news agencies, and throughout the year, you could not turn on the news without one of them being in the headlines. These cases would carry the headlines, and then as you scroll down on the news feed, you would see all sorts of worst fear narratives for the potential outcome of the case from opinion writers. Fear sells, right?
We had the Derek Chauvin case. Chauvin was a police officer who, while in the line of duty, murdered George Floyd. What did the opinion writers say before the trial happened? That the justice system is broken. There is no way we will get a fair trial for this murder. They will not convict one of the system’s own, a police officer. He is a white police officer who killed a black man, and he will get off because he is white. This was the narrative from the opinion writers. It is a play on fears, but it is what they pushed.
Then you have Kyle Rittenhouse case, who was charged with the murder of two people and various other charges. What did the opinion writers and politicians say before the trial happened? Well, Kyle was supposedly a white supremacist domestic terrorist. Kyle drove across state lines armed with an AR15. He went to Kenosha to find people to kill. The people he shot were there to affirm black lives’ value, dignity, and worth. This was the narrative from the opinion writers as well as politicians. They were playing on the fears to stoke America.
The Ahmaud Arbery case is where three men chased him down the street and killed him. This case was unique in some ways because there was hesitation in charging the murderers. The narrative from the opinion writers was this happened in Georgia, so there was no way there would be justice through the courts for Arbery dying from a brutal murder three white people. Of all the cases I will discuss, this case was the one that genuinely had deep racism embedded in it, and it was the one that most of the opinion writers shied away from. They instead gravitated to the Rittenhouse case. To me, I found that strange.
We also had the Jussie Smollett case. Jussie told authorities that he was beaten up by white Maga hat-wearing individuals in Chicago’s coldest morning of the year. Now the narrative from the media was this is a race crime. There was no way a person of color could make this up. Even though people knew he made some of this up, there is still racism against him. This was the narrative even after the verdict.
The last case I will discuss is the Kimberly Potter case which is she was a police officer in the line of duty that drew her firearm and not the taser which she shot Daunte Wright in the confusion of the moment. This resulted in Wright’s death. The opinion writers said Potter would walk and not face a day in prison because the legal system protects the police officers. In our justice system, a white police officer could not be held accountable for the death of a person of color. This was the narrative.
So, in each of these cases, the mainstream opinion writer’s narratives were false. So, I ask why do we value their opinion then? If they are wrong, why do we gravitate to them? I can tell you why. Some people enjoy that narrative because it feeds their fears. There are people who wish their fears to be discussed because if the fear is discussed more and more, in their minds, it will become a reality. Just look at how these panned out.
In the Rittenhouse case, Kyle was proven innocent. If anyone ever actually dug into the evidence and not the splices of video and tailored coverage, they would conclude he was innocent. Since most opinion writers didn’t, we had the benefit of the trial being aired on TV. Whether you like Fox News or not, they should get the trial in real-time in its entirety, unlike other networks that spliced in for their moments. So, America got to see how it was with all the evidence laid out. A jury of 12 found the young man innocent of the charged crimes. Even after that, there were still grumblings from opinion writers and some politicians that said, hmmm, “we have work to do with our justice system.” What no justice prevailed, it just didn’t prevail where it put an innocent man behind bars like the politicians, and opinion writers wanted.
The Smollett case, proved that Smollett was guilty of lying and making up a race crime. This was from a jury that decided this. Once again, the justice system got it right. No matter who you are, you cannot make up race crime, lie to the police and think you will get away with it. Some mainstream media still said the justice system was racist towards Smollett. Take a step back from all this, and there is racism in this. It was racism from Jussie Smollett towards the white population, but no one wanted to talk about this. Instead, we turn that blind eye to that.
In each of these cases, the mainstream media and politicians got it wrong and didn’t devote the energy towards what common sense could see. Instead, they focused on the worse case fears hoping their audiences would follow them blindly. We have Chauvin, who was found guilty, and anyone decent human could see that. Rittenhouse was found innocent, and anyone open-minded person could see that. In Arbery’s case, his killers were found guilty, which was obvious. In Smollett’s case it was proven he was nothing more than a liar starving for attention. Potter’s case, as we all knew, made a bad mistake, but she is the expert, and it cost a young man his life; the jury proved this in a court of law. Maybe when it comes to the justice system, common sense prevails.
So, I say, America, we have a responsibility here. I would suggest that we kick some of these opinion writers to the curb because it has been proven their opinion is not worth a crap. They don’t just miss the mark occasionally with their view, but they miss it daily. I would suggest the same for politicians that try to stoke the flames of hate and divisiveness instead of supporting the justice system. Though we have a personal responsibility here, some of us bought into this wronging of people. Some of my fellow Americans bought into the narrative that the justice system is broke when it has proven to be the most dependable thing there is. All you have to do is follow the law, and justice will prevail.
Because justice has prevailed, I think America Deserves Better from its people to trust the system a bit. So, although mainstream media, politicians, and some opinion writers are wrong, I also believe a portion of the American population is wrong for believing that horse crap. As we say in the Army, maybe it’s time to tighten up our shot group or lace our boots up right, and I would say the same to those that listen to the opinion writers.
The Vet
