Friday, August 22, 2014

Am I Wrong?



So, I just responded to a comment and now I'm wondering if I was wrong to respond. I received a comment on my "The Right to Surrender" post. 

The comment said: 
"By all accounts?" Excuse me...the facts are NOT in...but we do know ONE FACT - he had committed a robbery hours before walking down the middle of the street and being asked by a policeman to come over (who didn't know about the robbery)...EXCUSE ME! The facts are NOT IN YET...stop judging!

I responded:
Wow, normally I wouldn't take the bait, but I'll bite. Did you even read the whole post? First of all, it says, "By the accounts of multiple witnesses," not "By all accounts." I worded it that way on purpose because, at that time, we hadn't heard Darren's side. Second, can you please point out to me where I judged the case? I explained that Darren Wilson lost control of the situation and a terrible tragedy occurred at his hands; I gave my opinion about people who went online and made nasty comments that seemed to insinuate that stealing somehow made Mike Brown worthy of death; I condemned the initial police response; I condemned the looters and the rioters and praised those who stood against them and I ended the post with "How do we solve this? The solution is simple: arrest the officer who shot and killed Mike Brown. Take this battle off the streets and send it to the courts where it belongs." I'm tired of the case being tried in the media. I want it to go to court so that we can all (hopefully) hear the facts. How you find fault in all of that is beyond me. At no time did I claim to know the facts. The only place I can possibly see you interpreting as stating "facts" is the part that says, "Mike Brown was done running. He was trying to give up and his right to surrender was taken away" and that is based on the now 5 witnesses, it's not something I just grabbed out of the air. I went out of my way not to say anything disparaging about Darren Wilson, because you're right, we don't know all of the facts yet. However, I respectfully disagree with you that we know ONE FACT. We actually know TWO FACTS. The one about the robbery that you and I both stated and we know that Mike Brown is dead and Darren Wilson killed him. The next time you want to be outraged by something you read that doesn't share your sentiment, I suggest you read it twice and make sure it's saying what you think it's saying.

Was I wrong to respond? Should I have just left it alone?

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