Whoops...
Just got into a brief discussion with a few of my coworkers. It ended with all of them looking at me like I'm an idiot. It ended with me walking away because what's the point?
They were talking about reporting crimes, particularly violent ones. The consensus was that if you were reporting a crime, you shouldn't need to provide your name and information. Also, if you did need to do that, it certainly shouldn't be available to the person you were reporting. What if they retaliated? There should be some sort of protection? It's absurd!
I stood and listened for a while and eventually couldn't help myself any longer. "Well, it's in our Constitution." They stared. "The Bill of Rights." More staring. "The right to face one's accuser?" More staring.
I didn't know what to do, so I just turned around and walked away. I mean, I understand their concerns. After all, if one does commit a violent crime, then there is certainly a chance that they would use that information to retaliate against someone who turned them in. I completely understand the desire to protect your family.
What if it was the other way around, though? What if you could report anonymously? What if someone accused you of a violent crime? Battery, for example. And what if they were making it up? If they had to produce no information, then how would anyone ever find them for testimony? How would you ever refute their claims? Or, if we take the lenient assumption under those circumstances, how would the state ever prove a case against someone? After all, the police didn't witness the crime. They're merely arriving based on the tip of an anonymous stranger.
What reason would there be to stop people from falsely accusing at random? Just the goodness of humanity? Forgive me if I put a little less faith in that. That said, obviously these people didn't believe so firmly in the benevolence of strangers either, otherwise they never would have been concerned in the first place.
That's why we have rules, because sometimes people aren't good to others. That's why we have a Bill of Rights...
Sometimes you just have to walk away.
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