Hitler died before he could be tried. Does that mean he is presumed innocent?
Trick question, you’re falling for semantics. “Innocent until proven guilty” really is “legally-innocent until court-proven legally-guilty”, which is the only avenue the state has to imprison someone.
What it doesn’t mean is “you’re not allowed to have an opinion and/or act on it until the accused has gone to court”. The court of public opinion works independently from the court of stuffy judges in wigs. Sometimes it’s wrong, but that doesn’t mean it’s always wrong nor that it shouldn’t exist. OTOH the legal courts very often fall short of delivering a verdict for a bunch of reasons, many quite bad (victims don’t want to relive their traumas for months, cops are uncooperative, court system is backed up, legal definition of rape is unprovable, etc.).
Hitler died before he could be tried. Does that mean he is presumed innocent?
Trick question, you’re falling for semantics. “Innocent until proven guilty” really is “legally-innocent until court-proven legally-guilty”, which is the only avenue the state has to imprison someone.
What it doesn’t mean is “you’re not allowed to have an opinion and/or act on it until the accused has gone to court”. The court of public opinion works independently from the court of stuffy judges in wigs. Sometimes it’s wrong, but that doesn’t mean it’s always wrong nor that it shouldn’t exist. OTOH the legal courts very often fall short of delivering a verdict for a bunch of reasons, many quite bad (victims don’t want to relive their traumas for months, cops are uncooperative, court system is backed up, legal definition of rape is unprovable, etc.).