America is so strange. On one hand, nearly everyone thinks the system doesn't work. And yet, they tacitly assume the justice system works. They think it works just like on TV - innocent until proven guilty, detail-oriented public defenders and judges, and scrupulously honest prosecutors and police.
It's nothing like that. The justice system is a machine that chews people up, and spits out convicts, and it operates with impunity precisely because of ignorant views like yours. Getting arrested or convicted is like winning a shit lottery, and all you need to win is to be around a cop having a bad day. Since very few people are "winners", so the knowledge of the real system is minimized, and the knowledgeable ones are marginalized and ignored because they are, after all, convicts.
People break the law and do so with impunity all day long. In fact, they get paid well to do it. Your typical family law attorney should be arrested, tried and convicted, and they've destroyed countless families, harmed countless children. But they are pillars of the community. So just because someone got punished by these corrupt people doesn't make them evil, it makes them unlucky.
(In fairness I'd estimate that 90% of arrests/convictions/plea deals are straightforward, valid and basically fair, and those convicts often are repeat offenders, low intelligence, struggling with addiction and mental health. They deserve a chance too, but it's the 10% who get swept up for breaking no law, or breaking needlessly punitive laws, that I particularly feel for. You know, the Aaron Swartz's of the world.)
I think you basically answered your own objection. Probably 90% of convicted criminals are really criminals, and that's why people are suspicious of hiring them. The point of this project wasn't "get convicts hired because 10% of them are innocent", it was "get convicts hired because even though 90% of them are guilty, that's okay." It's called "70 million" because that's the total number of convicts, not an estimate of how many are innocent. And the founder himself is an ex-con, and he admits that he's actually guilty, and the crime he committed actually harmed people, it wasn't a corrupt prosecutor or a bogus drug law.
wondering what you know about how many cases are decided by plea bargain rather than trial, where the plea bargain is coerced rather than voluntary?
wondering also what your opinion is of felony drug convictions (for possession)? Technically a crime, but can you name the harm?
But more seriously wondering about your unwillingness to believe that people can change, and unwillingness to allow for redemption or forgiveness.
Which ultimately means you don't believe in justice. If society has decided that a certain crime has a penalty of 5 years in prison, then after 5 years the person has paid their debt to society. They are no longer a criminal, that debt is paid.
>wondering also what your opinion is of felony drug convictions (for possession)?
I'd be fine with a project to get people convicted of felony drug or other nonviolent, victimless, crimes hired, and run by someone with such a conviction. This was not that project.
>But more seriously wondering about your unwillingness to believe that people can change,
It's a matter of the odds. People who have committed genuine crimes are greater risks. They can change, but we don't know that they've changed.
>They are no longer a criminal, that debt is paid.
Being rationally distrusted as a risk is a consequence of their crime, not a form of punishment; it's not done because of a desire to inflict suffering on the criminal, but to avoid harm.
>How have you changed your life based on the hurts you have caused others?
I've gone my life without committing a large scale financial fraud or similar act which hurt others to that degree.
> And the founder himself is an ex-con, and he admits that he's actually guilty, and the crime he committed actually harmed people.
And the founder realized that his actions cause real harm, that hurting people is bad, and decided to dedicate his life to acts that did not hurt people.
He repented.
How have you changed your life based on the hurts you have caused others? Do you even admit that your actions have hurt others? Because I guarantee that you have caused pain, and harm.
I agree with this. The justice system is fucked up. I’ve been arrested myself, so this isn’t some punitive viewpoint looking in from outside.
My point is that I don’t agree with labeling someone convicted of a crime as being among society’s most heroic or honest. That’s just a laughably ridiculous statement.
> In fact, they get paid well to do it. Your typical family law attorney should be arrested, tried and convicted, and they've destroyed countless families, harmed countless children.
I was with you up until this. While I understand the view that what many attorneys do is immoral or wrong - generally speaking to my knowledge there isn't widespread illegal behavior?
I understand but don't fully agree with the view that laywers are "evil" - but the way I see it is they are skilled at playing by the rules of the law. This makes them incredibly powerful (for both sides of people that can afford it), but if they are generally playing by the law - thus not arrestable. Tearing a family apart because the mother is an A hole and lies about things the father does might be immoral - but it's not illegal for an attorney to represent them.
>While I understand the view that what many attorneys do is immoral or wrong - generally speaking to my knowledge there isn't widespread illegal behavior?
From my own experience, and the attorneys I've talked to, and the other fathers/husbands, certain practices are rampant. False allegations of abuse are regularly made by the female, which grant injunctions/TROs, ex parte, which are then used to withhold children. Perjury is never prosecuted. Not ever. Judges don't care about timelines, and regularly ignore the statutory limits on holding hearings, meaning that a TRO can be in effect indefinitely without a single hearing. Judges regularly don't read motions, do not rule on them.
Time is on the side of the most shameless liar. Both attorneys make more money in this kind of case, because it takes time, its very litigious. Both attorneys have every incentive to not just not deescalate, but escalate the situation. If you are representing yourself, they will try to overwhelm you with paperwork - my wife had one attorney who would, instead of filing motions, would keep appending to a single motion and resubmitting the entire omnibus. They filed invalid motions, they filed hearsay. The entire premise of the actions were to delay, keep the kids, increase the pain until I gave into all demands. From what I've heard, this is a common tactic, because it works. To hold out means to give up your kids for years. Everything, and I mean everything here, is in violation of statute, and no-one in power gives two fucks. Plus at the end of it they count on the fact that you're too exhausted to pursue any kind of remedy, and in fact your faith in the system has been so destroyed that you're convinced that it would do no good anyway. Like I said, they do it because it works.
It's nothing like that. The justice system is a machine that chews people up, and spits out convicts, and it operates with impunity precisely because of ignorant views like yours. Getting arrested or convicted is like winning a shit lottery, and all you need to win is to be around a cop having a bad day. Since very few people are "winners", so the knowledge of the real system is minimized, and the knowledgeable ones are marginalized and ignored because they are, after all, convicts.
People break the law and do so with impunity all day long. In fact, they get paid well to do it. Your typical family law attorney should be arrested, tried and convicted, and they've destroyed countless families, harmed countless children. But they are pillars of the community. So just because someone got punished by these corrupt people doesn't make them evil, it makes them unlucky.
(In fairness I'd estimate that 90% of arrests/convictions/plea deals are straightforward, valid and basically fair, and those convicts often are repeat offenders, low intelligence, struggling with addiction and mental health. They deserve a chance too, but it's the 10% who get swept up for breaking no law, or breaking needlessly punitive laws, that I particularly feel for. You know, the Aaron Swartz's of the world.)