# Sandra Bland video **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 22, 2015, 5:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sandra-bland-video/725859 "2015-07-22T05:50:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 74
**Author:** ![cmyk](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmyk/32/3353_2.png) [@cmyk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmyk)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2015, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sandra-bland-video/725859/1461 "2015-07-29T18:03:46Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > No. Although there is no law requiring her to extinguish her cigarette, there is a law requiring her to step out of the vehicle when ordered to do so and told that she’s under arrest. Right, that I understand. We’ve been over it. I was mainly arguing about the officer’s beef with her cigarette, and how that would go down in the case. I get your point that almost any claim of reason he (his attorney) chooses to go with that request of his will fly. But I think public opinion is rather :dubious: on the matter. Not that that counts for much in a hearing. ---
**Author:** ![Steophan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steophan/32/9595_2.png) [@Steophan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steophan)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2015, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sandra-bland-video/725859/1462 "2015-07-29T18:17:41Z")
> [@you\_with\_the\_face](#): > > An impartial juror should discount his testimony due to his poor credibility issues and use the objective evidence to infer his motivation for ordering out her car. From that it’s clear his motivation has nothing to do with safety concerns for the reasons pointed out. No, an impartial juror should not do that, they should give all of the benefit of the doubt to the cop, as he’s the defendant. You prove, yet again, that you have no understanding of law, justice, or morality. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2015, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sandra-bland-video/725859/1463 "2015-07-29T19:07:27Z")
> [@Steophan](#): > > No, an impartial juror should not do that, they should give all of the benefit of the doubt to the cop, as he’s the defendant. You prove, yet again, that you have no understanding of law, justice, or morality. **Bricker** can I ask you opinion of this view that wherever X is a defendant in a trial, whatever X says should be given all the benefit of the doubt in virtue of X being the defendant? ---
**Author:** ![Terr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Terr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terr)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2015, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sandra-bland-video/725859/1464 "2015-07-29T19:19:58Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > **Bricker** can I ask you opinion of this view that wherever X is a defendant in a trial, whatever X says should be given all the benefit of the doubt in virtue of X being the defendant? In a criminal trial, since the charge has to be proven “beyond reasonable doubt”, obviously if there is doubt, it benefits the defendant. ---
**Author:** ![Steophan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steophan/32/9595_2.png) [@Steophan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steophan)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2015, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sandra-bland-video/725859/1465 "2015-07-29T19:22:56Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > **Bricker** can I ask you opinion of this view that wherever X is a defendant in a trial, whatever X says should be given all the benefit of the doubt in virtue of X being the defendant? You can ask him that, but it would be nothing to do with what I actually said. The jury don’t have to believe him, but they have to be sure, beyond reasonable doubt, that no explanation for his behaviour other than the illegal one he’s been accused of is possible. So, if he claims to have wanted her to leave the car because he was in fear of injury from his cigarette, the jury can’t conclude from their belief that he was lying that any specific other reason was the case - they need actual proof for that. ---
**Author:** ![drad\_dog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/aeb1de/32.png) [@drad\_dog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drad_dog)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2015, 7:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sandra-bland-video/725859/1466 "2015-07-29T19:24:27Z")
In a civil trial its the 'preponderance of the evidence" The officers lying and dissembling, as well as his inconsistency will be held against him. ---
**Author:** ![Steophan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steophan/32/9595_2.png) [@Steophan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steophan)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2015, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sandra-bland-video/725859/1467 "2015-07-29T19:25:38Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > In a criminal trial, since the charge has to be proven “beyond reasonable doubt”, obviously if there is doubt, it benefits the defendant. It continues to astonish me how many otherwise intelligent and knowledgeable people, here and elsewhere, do no understand this. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2015, 7:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sandra-bland-video/725859/1468 "2015-07-29T19:26:50Z")
> [@Steophan](#): > > You can ask him that, but it would be nothing to do with what I actually said. Here’s what you said: > [@](#): > > … they should give all of the benefit of the doubt to the cop, as he’s the defendant… Here’s what I said you said: > [@](#): > > wherever X is a defendant in a trial, whatever X says should be given all the benefit of the doubt in virtue of X being the defendant Unless you mean what you said to apply not to everyone but only to some subset of people that includes cops, then what you said and what I said you said are logically equivalent. But you do not understand what you said, or you do not understand what I said you said. Or you “understand” both but don’t know how to think logically. I don’t know what I can do about any of those three cases. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2015, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sandra-bland-video/725859/1469 "2015-07-29T19:36:51Z")
> [@Steophan](#): > > It continues to astonish me how many otherwise intelligent and knowledgeable people, here and elsewhere, do no understand this. It continues to astonish me how many otherwise intelligent and knowledgeable people can think something logically follows from something else just because it feels right and shares some words with the thing it’s supposed to follow from. I encounter this in the classroom all the time but at least most students don’t have the additional burden of thinking they’ve clearly thought everything through and definitely must have understood. No, they’re totally confused about what follows from what, but at least they know they’re confused about this. This helps them to learn. Not so in some other cases I could name. Here’s what **Terr** said: > [@](#): > > In a criminal trial, since the charge has to be proven “beyond reasonable doubt”, obviously if there is doubt, it benefits the defendant. Right off the bat there’s a clear failure of logic here. Let’s correct that at least: In a criminal trial, since the charge has to be proven “beyond reasonable doubt”, obviously if there is reasonable doubt, it benefits the defendant. (I have not bolded the change because you should already have known ahead of time what change I was going to make. If you did not, you should go find it, and think on this situation for a while until you have discovered the reason you did not notice the change needed making.) This revised version already puts to question the applicability of this “simple obvious truth” to the case at hand, since the very thing at issue is the question of whether the doubt involved is “reasonable” or not. But even barring that consideration, the claim is on its face already obviously wrong. There is no logical relationship between the concept “X is true beyond reasonable doubt” and “If there is reasonable doubt, it benefits the defendant.” Note, for example, that if the prosecutor has discharged the necessity to prove her case beyond a reasonable doubt, then she has _ipso facto_ made it unreasonable to doubt her case–and that in turn implies it _is reasonable to doubt_ whatever the defendant may have said. So we have in such cases a scenario wherein a charge must be proven beyond a reasonable doubt, and it is also at the same time reasonable to doubt what a defendant has said (in other words, there exist doubts which are not to the benefit of the defendant). Once you’ve grasped a case like that, it is easy to see that there can be cases wherein a prosecutor has _not_ proven the case beyond a reasonable doubt, yet has offered evidence which _does_ nevertheless throw at least _some_ of what the defendant said into doubt. ---
**Author:** ![Steophan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steophan/32/9595_2.png) [@Steophan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steophan)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2015, 7:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sandra-bland-video/725859/1470 "2015-07-29T19:38:05Z")
I’m not saying that “what X says” should be given the benefit of the doubt. X himself must be given the benefit of the doubt. Nothing to do with what he says or doesn’t. Even if you disbelieve every word from his mouth, that doesn’t prove _anything_, it simply increases the doubt. You need actual, solid, beyond reasonable doubt of wrongdoing, not just a lack of evidence of innocence. And no, evidence or even proof of lying is not evidence or proof of any other guilt. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2015, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sandra-bland-video/725859/1471 "2015-07-29T19:39:43Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > But you do not understand what you said, or you do not understand what I said you said. Or you “understand” both but don’t know how to think logically. I don’t know what I can do about any of those three cases. A fourth case I failed to mention, and perhaps it is the most charitable interpretation here: You understand both claims, and know very well how to think logically, but in certain cases, do not care to do so. ---
**Author:** ![Terr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Terr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terr)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2015, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sandra-bland-video/725859/1472 "2015-07-29T19:40:21Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > I > In a criminal trial, since the charge has to be proven “beyond reasonable doubt”, obviously if there is reasonable doubt, it benefits the defendant. No. If there is “reasonable doubt” it acquits the defendant. If there is doubt, it benefits the defendant but if it does not rise to the level of “reasonable doubt” it may not lead to acquittal. ---
**Author:** ![Steophan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steophan/32/9595_2.png) [@Steophan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steophan)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2015, 7:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sandra-bland-video/725859/1473 "2015-07-29T19:42:50Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > A fourth case I failed to mention, and perhaps it is the most charitable interpretation here: You understand both claims, and know very well how to think logically, but in certain cases, do not care to do so. Or, just possibly, I know exactly what I said, why I said it, it is completely correct, and (for whatever reason) you are incapable of understanding that. Your tangled mess of pseudo-logical nonsense a couple of posts up strongly favours my interpretation. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2015, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sandra-bland-video/725859/1474 "2015-07-29T19:44:56Z")
> [@Steophan](#): > > I’m not saying that “what X says” should be given the benefit of the doubt. X himself must be given the benefit of the doubt. Nothing to do with what he says or doesn’t. Yeah no. That’s not true. You are not telling the truth about what you yourself are saying. You were speaking about whether to accept testimony as true. In other words, you were talking about “what X says” for a certain X. Look man, it took you a bit of time to come up with that response, so I know you spent some time going back and forth between my quotations of what you said and what I said you said. In your brain was this slow dawning realization that you had fucked up. I know how this goes. It has happened to me on several occasions in the past. But then you quashed that realization, instead pouncing on a point of phrasing in order to be able save face by pretending the particular phrasing had any real implications for the substantive point. This is definitely a dishonest thing to do. But again, I’ve been there as well. I know how this goes, and I know that, in a certain state of mind, it doesn’t _feel_ dishonest. Over time I got to develop an instinct for knowing when I was bullshitting myself. Nobody can do this perfectly, but with careful attention you can learn to see it for yourself. I wish you good luck in the future on this point. ---
**Author:** ![Steophan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steophan/32/9595_2.png) [@Steophan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steophan)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2015, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sandra-bland-video/725859/1475 "2015-07-29T19:47:16Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > No. If there is “reasonable doubt” it acquits the defendant. If there is doubt, it benefits the defendant but if it does not rise to the level of “reasonable doubt” it may not lead to acquittal. Unreasonable doubt is basically pure solipsism or sci-fi level specualtion, as in “but what if nothing really exists” or “it could have been aliens”. Both are possible, but are discounted as unreasonable. If there’s any explanation of the evidence, no matter how improbable, that can be reasonably deduced that doesn’t have the defendant being guilty, they are not guilty. I know you know this, but it’s another one of the things people don’t get. Including many jurors, sadly. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2015, 7:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sandra-bland-video/725859/1476 "2015-07-29T19:48:17Z")
> [@Steophan](#): > > Your tangled mess of pseudo-logical nonsense You genuinely, in the strongest sense possible, have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about here. I’m going to just go ahead and leave the conversation now, I think I’ve said everything I can say to you. Enjoy the rest of your day. ---
**Author:** ![Steophan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steophan/32/9595_2.png) [@Steophan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steophan)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2015, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sandra-bland-video/725859/1477 "2015-07-29T19:52:54Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > Yeah no. That’s not true. You are not telling the truth about what you yourself are saying. You were speaking about whether to accept testimony as true. In other words, you were talking about “what X says” for a certain X. No, I was not talking about that - I wasn’t mostly talking about what he said at all. I was saying that there was no way an impartial jury could conclude from the evidence in the video, beyond reasonable doubt, that he did, in fact, order her out of the car in revenge, that there’s no other scenario that any reasonable person could conclude is possible. Go back and read the whole of the post I was replying to. You can believe he’s lying all you like - but you can’t take that lie as being proof of _anything_. [quote] Look man, it took you a bit of time to come up with that response, so I know you spent some time going back and forth between my quotations of what you said and what I said you said. In your brain was this slow dawning realization that you had fucked up. I know how this goes. It has happened to me on several occasions in the past. But then you quashed that realization, instead pouncing on a point of phrasing in order to be able save face by pretending the particular phrasing had any real implications for the substantive point. This is definitely a dishonest thing to do. But again, I’ve been there as well. I know how this goes, and I know that, in a certain state of mind, it doesn’t _feel_ dishonest.[/qupte] Nope. That’s why, in my first reply to you, I said “You can ask him that, but it would be nothing to do with what I actually said.” when you asked **Bricker** if the jury had to believe what he said. > [@](#): > > Over time I got to develop an instinct for knowing when I was bullshitting myself. Nobody can do this perfectly, but with careful attention you can learn to see it for yourself. I wish you good luck in the future on this point. I’ll give you points for rhetoric, it’s a good attempt to make me doubt myself. Fortunately, I can go back and read everything I wrote, and realise that it was all exactly what I meant to say. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2015, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sandra-bland-video/725859/1478 "2015-07-29T19:54:37Z")
> [@Steophan](#): > > I’ll give you points for rhetoric, it’s a good attempt to make me doubt myself. Fortunately, I can go back and read everything I wrote, and realise that it was all exactly what I meant to say. I love you **Steophan**. 😃 I said I was exiting the conversation but the above non-substantial contribution just welled up from my insides, I couldn’t keep it down. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2015, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sandra-bland-video/725859/1479 "2015-07-29T19:59:10Z")
nvm this post, it never happened, look away! ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2015, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sandra-bland-video/725859/1480 "2015-07-29T20:01:50Z")
> [@you\_with\_the\_face](#): > > An impartial juror should discount his testimony due to his poor credibility issues and use the objective evidence to infer his motivation for ordering out her car. From that it’s clear his motivation has nothing to do with safety concerns for the reasons pointed out. In what litigation context should this inference be made, specifically? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sandra-bland-video/725859.md?page=73) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sandra-bland-video/725859.md?page=75)