Innocent Or Guilty, Justice Will Eventually Be Served

The only way we move forward is by going deeper.

Dear Jennifer: If you had sat in as a juror on the O.J. trial then I would respect your opinion about it. But the crime of the century has been the opinions of the know-it-all media people like yourself. HE IS INNOCENT! in my humble opinion until PROVEN guilty. Sincerely, Gail

P.S. I’m a white, 53-year-old female teacher.

Dear Gail: I thought, comparatively, I had been very restrained in terms of the O.J. drama. I have made only a few brief comments and I intended to make no more. BUT the saga looks like it will continue and my desk is covered with O.J. fallout.

The letters cover the following topics: people concerned that we eliminate educated people from juries by asking them if they’ve read anything lately; that we get what we deserve if we are unwilling to serve on juries ourselves; that it is better for our society, in the long run, to convict the Los Angeles Police Department than to convict O.J.; that Nicole Brown was a prostitute for selling her body to a celebrity, plus she took a rich black man away from black women; that it’s time blacks were let off to even the score for all the white killers let off; that this is all the fault of liberals, etc.

National civic dramas help us sort out who we are and what needs to be changed. They rarely provide justice on an individual basis but they usually do in the long term. Clarence Thomas does get to serve on the Supreme Court but the assumptions about what men and women can do and say to each other are forever changed.

The Ruby Ridge trials and the Branch Davidian/Waco hearings have redefined government even if no one pays for all those deaths. The Oklahoma City bombing case will ask us to consider what side we are on, democracy or anarchy, regardless of what happens to the defendants.

That’s how I view the O.J. drama, as a civic lesson in what is wrong and right about our legal system and our beliefs about American racism. I recently attended a judicial conference on how to increase the participation of all citizens on juries and how to remove the most unjust elements from the legal system.

Your comment, “He is innocent,” is a semantic game. He was acquitted, that’s all. As in many other trials there are always those who will believe one way or the other and acquittal or conviction may not settle the question of guilt. It does remind us that a fair trial and an honest police department are more important to Americans than that the guilty be convicted. You have heard it many times, better that a thousand guilty people go free than that one innocent person be convicted.

So if he’s innocent he will find ways to rebuild his life. If he’s guilty he is now living a nightmare, lying to his children, selling his notoriety, defending himself against the grief of the Goldmans and Browns, surrounded by “friends” and family who know what he had done. Perhaps he can split his personality and no longer dream about “that night,” perhaps not.

So this media person is willing to drop out of the frenzy and I suggest all of us do. Use your time and energy to improve our justice system. Boycott the books, videos, pay-for-view or whatever else that gets offered. Whether O.J. did it or not, all the products and appearances are covered with blood and deceit. - Jennifer

Dear Jennifer: Right now I am at the point where I am a bit frustrated with the world. Besides my mom and a close friend, who don’t fully understand what I am saying, you are the only person I can express my spiritual experience to. I think you understand because you have experienced “spiritual knowledge.” What I need is a group or someone to talk to who is as interested in the truth as I am. Sincerely, Meling

Dear Meling: Hannah Arendt, in a difficult book, “The Human Condition,” wrote about how hard it is to face our essential aloneness. The individual consciousness we so cherish as Americans, is unique to each of us. We are and always will be alone. So we struggle our whole lives to be understood, to be known, to share what we feel or believe we know. When you are young the struggle is most difficult and the pain acute, as you age and connect in the available ways, it eases or you make peace with it. I will send you some of the information that helped me, some groups I know about and one of my books, “Visions,” which talks about this journey you have begun. - Jennifer

The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = Jennifer James The Spokesman-Review