This my friends is the hypocrisy of America. When a brutal murder is exploited by the news media for big ratings and profits it is ok. When active and passive participants write books and participate in 'special reports' for thousands and dollars the exploiting of the deaths are no problem. When the man who most people is guilty attempts to profit off the infamy the public gave him, hell no.
Hypocrisy? What, did Dell also kill Nicole Simpson and Ron Goldman?
No. O.J. Simpson did. He's as much as admitted it; a civil jury found him liable for it; a racially-motivated criminal jury gave him a free ride for it. But that he did it, no serious person can doubt any more. So why is it hypocrisy to be offended that a murderer, unpunished already, not also be allowed to profit financially, and legally, from his acts?
I would argue that the free market has spoken here. The government sure didn’t force Murdoch to pull the plug. And I’m actually a bit disappointed. I wanted to see this stuff.
And for the record, I am a white male of above average intelligence, (and above average skepticism), and I have serious doubts that OJ committed the crime. Serious enough that I wouldn’t have convicted him on the evidence presented to the jury in the criminal trial. Not sure how I would have voted in the civil case though.
Good grief--if Jeffrey Dahmer were still alive there would be idiots screeching for his right to publish a cookbook and slamming anyone who dared to object to it.
I wrote the 1998 cover story in Esquire "Whistling In The Dark," in which OJ gave the hysteria inducing quote: "Let's say I committed this crime. Even if I did do this, it would have to have been because I loved her very much, right?"
I know so much more about this than I am able to say here and now. It's a tragedy that in my mind has not really begun to unfurl in its true dimensions, because of all the moral thunder.
He "did it," yes.
But that is not where the truth of the matter ends; It is where a much deeper exploration begins.
O J Simpson was found not guilty of multiple counts of murder by a jury of his peers. As far as I am concerned, that was the end of it.
Don't like that attitude? Then override the United States Constitution, get rid of the amendment that guarantees trial by juries, and let panels of judges determine innocence. As in other legal systems. Or return to the days of law by lynching and the hangman's rope out in the woods.
The fact is, I do not give a damn about these celebrated multimillion dollar cases. For every rich and well-connected guy like Simpson, who could afford the best courtroom legal representation that his money could buy, there are thousands of poor saps who routinely get sent to prisons; where they are turned into hardened criminals even if they were relatively minor offenders when they went into captivity.
Stop howling about justice and learn to live your lives within the context of the contradictions, limitiations and opportunities of the system we now have. Or try tampering with it, and condemn yourselves to live with the almost-always unanticipated consequences.
I absolutely agree with you Mr. Harris, and I often said as much in the countless OJ conversations I was pulled into on and off television. I said the man was acquitted, deal with it. He was acquitted because reasonable doubt WAS created, by way of police corruption and abject racism. That is not the same as saying the jury "found him innocent."
The degree and depth of outrage and moral panic is indiciative I feel of a deep seated racism. Nobody ever cares this much about domestic homicides.
But my point, totally oblique, was to say that there is another dimension to the "story" that transcends this whole booble bubble about our legal system. There's something else.
Our legal system is not what is most striking about the times we live in, or this OJ matter. Sorry I am just being more and more oblique. I will write about this. Soon. I will explain what I mean. In the meantime, I am asking only that people think deeply about free will.
I think about free will constantly, Celia. What's more, I actually practice it. Above all, I question all premises all the time. Because without solidly-grounded premises there is no logic. And without logic there is no reason. And without reason as the basis of human interaction and self-governance, any social contract is based purely on force, robbery and enslavement.
And no, Dean. This is a lot more than the gospel according to St Ayn.
Surely, we trust someone will explain free will and the logic and the reason behind this apparently seemingly oblique and yet obliquer and darker mystery of an un-important non-newsworthy domestic homicide.
Two people die a violent, brutal, bloody, spontaneous death by homicide and all the evidence points where ? booble-bobble ? society ? racism ?
LA police ? Judge Ito ?
Where does the truth of this matter end ? Or did it already end ?
McK, all the evidence points squarely and solely to a court acquital ten years ago. It's over, and that's all there is. "Truth" in jurisprudence is an entity dependent upon the skill of the attorneys arguing the case before a court, and their relative ability to pursuade or dissuade a jury.
So citizen Simpson is as innocent as your or me, and he has the court documents to prove it.
And that's just the way the cookie crumbles.
What do you want, McK? A long and tranquil life that you may well achieve, or a perfect world than can exist only in your dreams?
We're not talking about the same thing. But I have to bow out because I am not yet ready to explain what I am talking about. I don't mean free will in the conventional sense. Regarding the verdict I think it one must simply say: That jury made that decision for their reasons, rooted in a totality of experience and everything that brought them to that point in THEIR lives. Reasonable doubt was created and so the right thing to do was acquit. That does NOT mean "innocence." It means reasonable doubt. We built a legal system in this country designed to work this way. The guilty sometimes walk so that the innocent less often get hanged. Burden of proof etc. And we built into it that whomsoever can afford it, hires great lawyers. And most of the time nobody objects.
Well, other than the fact that you just admitted truth in jurisprudence is just a suggestion decided by the least competent, I would offer:
Excuse me, but one lady juror was asked by a reporter, did you look at the evidence, she responded, yes we did look at it, as it was on the table in big stacks. And we walked around it, I think she said.
So Arnold, did you ever read about the second trail ? Or why, Gerald Uelman, OJ defense attorney, he of "if the glove don't fit you must acquit fame" and Professor of Law at Santa Clara University who once wrote in the San Jose Mercury news why OJ was not guilty in the criminal case and more than properly found guilty in the civil case ?
There was no finding in the criminal trial of innocence which is not the same as not guilty.
Are we getting there or are we getting more oblique ?
Arnold, being acquitted of a crime is not the same as not having done it. A civil jury found as a factual matter that he did do it, but you can't go to jail based on the standard of proof on which a civil jury can rely.
Many people committed murders and were either acquitted or never tried. (And McK is right: Acquittal is not a finding of "innocent.") That doesn't mean we can't acknowledge that they're killers. Especially when they admit they are.
I understand completely why OJ was found “not guilty” in criminal court, but “guilty” in civil court. And I agree with the logic.
In criminal court, the test is “guilty beyond a reasonable doubt”. Not beyond all doubt, but beyond a reasonable doubt. The definition of reasonable is up to each juror.
In civil court, the test is “liable based on a preponderance of evidence.” So 51% guilty/49% not guilty is all it takes. Or maybe even 11% guilty, 10% not guilty, 79% not sure might even work. Talk to a lawyer about that….
Personally, I would not have convicted OJ in criminal court, because I had what I consider to be some reasonable doubts. At least based on the evidence the jury saw. Less so on the evidence we the public saw. And I have leaned more towards guilty more facts came out. But I’m still on the fence.
But in civil court, I probably would have ruled against OJ. Even definitely more so today as opposed to 10 years ago.
I wanted to see this latest interview and read the book, because more info might sway me more in one direction or the other. But maybe that’s just because of my prurient interest.
We are arguing over semantics, Jay. No, OJ never actually admitted it. Just like I never actually admitted to eating a Milky Way last night. But I am finishing up a blog post about how I would have eaten a Milky Way. In vivid, chocolaty detail.
No. O.J. Simpson did. He's as much as admitted it; a civil jury found him liable for it; a racially-motivated criminal jury gave him a free ride for it. But that he did it, no serious person can doubt any more. So why is it hypocrisy to be offended that a murderer, unpunished already, not also be allowed to profit financially, and legally, from his acts?
Lost me at that point. The color of my skin has nothing to do with this.
And for the record, I am a white male of above average intelligence, (and above average skepticism), and I have serious doubts that OJ committed the crime. Serious enough that I wouldn’t have convicted him on the evidence presented to the jury in the criminal trial. Not sure how I would have voted in the civil case though.
I know so much more about this than I am able to say here and now. It's a tragedy that in my mind has not really begun to unfurl in its true dimensions, because of all the moral thunder.
He "did it," yes.
But that is not where the truth of the matter ends; It is where a much deeper exploration begins.
Don't like that attitude? Then override the United States Constitution, get rid of the amendment that guarantees trial by juries, and let panels of judges determine innocence. As in other legal systems. Or return to the days of law by lynching and the hangman's rope out in the woods.
The fact is, I do not give a damn about these celebrated multimillion dollar cases. For every rich and well-connected guy like Simpson, who could afford the best courtroom legal representation that his money could buy, there are thousands of poor saps who routinely get sent to prisons; where they are turned into hardened criminals even if they were relatively minor offenders when they went into captivity.
Stop howling about justice and learn to live your lives within the context of the contradictions, limitiations and opportunities of the system we now have. Or try tampering with it, and condemn yourselves to live with the almost-always unanticipated consequences.
Arnold Harris
Mount Horeb WI
The degree and depth of outrage and moral panic is indiciative I feel of a deep seated racism. Nobody ever cares this much about domestic homicides.
But my point, totally oblique, was to say that there is another dimension to the "story" that transcends this whole booble bubble about our legal system. There's something else.
Our legal system is not what is most striking about the times we live in, or this OJ matter. Sorry I am just being more and more oblique. I will write about this. Soon. I will explain what I mean. In the meantime, I am asking only that people think deeply about free will.
And no, Dean. This is a lot more than the gospel according to St Ayn.
Arnold Harris
Mount Horeb WI
Two people die a violent, brutal, bloody, spontaneous death by homicide and all the evidence points where ? booble-bobble ? society ? racism ?
LA police ? Judge Ito ?
Where does the truth of this matter end ? Or did it already end ?
Amen, Father Harris.
So citizen Simpson is as innocent as your or me, and he has the court documents to prove it.
And that's just the way the cookie crumbles.
What do you want, McK? A long and tranquil life that you may well achieve, or a perfect world than can exist only in your dreams?
Arnold Harris
Mount Horeb WI
Well, other than the fact that you just admitted truth in jurisprudence is just a suggestion decided by the least competent, I would offer:
Excuse me, but one lady juror was asked by a reporter, did you look at the evidence, she responded, yes we did look at it, as it was on the table in big stacks. And we walked around it, I think she said.
So Arnold, did you ever read about the second trail ? Or why, Gerald Uelman, OJ defense attorney, he of "if the glove don't fit you must acquit fame" and Professor of Law at Santa Clara University who once wrote in the San Jose Mercury news why OJ was not guilty in the criminal case and more than properly found guilty in the civil case ?
There was no finding in the criminal trial of innocence which is not the same as not guilty.
Are we getting there or are we getting more oblique ?
Many people committed murders and were either acquitted or never tried. (And McK is right: Acquittal is not a finding of "innocent.") That doesn't mean we can't acknowledge that they're killers. Especially when they admit they are.
I understand completely why OJ was found “not guilty” in criminal court, but “guilty” in civil court. And I agree with the logic.
In criminal court, the test is “guilty beyond a reasonable doubt”. Not beyond all doubt, but beyond a reasonable doubt. The definition of reasonable is up to each juror.
In civil court, the test is “liable based on a preponderance of evidence.” So 51% guilty/49% not guilty is all it takes. Or maybe even 11% guilty, 10% not guilty, 79% not sure might even work. Talk to a lawyer about that….
Personally, I would not have convicted OJ in criminal court, because I had what I consider to be some reasonable doubts. At least based on the evidence the jury saw. Less so on the evidence we the public saw. And I have leaned more towards guilty more facts came out. But I’m still on the fence.
But in civil court, I probably would have ruled against OJ. Even definitely more so today as opposed to 10 years ago.
I wanted to see this latest interview and read the book, because more info might sway me more in one direction or the other. But maybe that’s just because of my prurient interest.
Ron,
I don’t think OJ has ever admitted to being the killer. Maybe I missed that though.
And I agree that MAYBE we shouldn’t call him innocent. Maybe.
But we definitely shouldn’t call him guilty. Because, by our laws, guilty he is most certainly not.
But maybe we are all just arguing over semantics.