The Singing Men of Ohio are the latest.

Total exaggeration. They were told to suspend all activities until complaints about misconduct (filed by one or more members) are investigated.

Investigations are only warranted when people are guilty. Nobody talks about this.

I wish I still had such a rosy view of the fairness of the US legal system. You might want to look up how many people in the United States spend substantial time in prison without having been found guilty of a crime, the personal financial ramifications of that, and the longterm impact that has on access to basic liberties like housing and employment.

The idea that "You get back to living your life while the crime is investigated" is overly simplistic. In those case, all manner of restriction are placed on what people who have been charged with a crime can and cannot do. If you're charged with a DUI, your license is administratively suspended effective immediately. If you're charged with a financial crime, your licensure is suspended. If a teacher's accused of abusing a student, they don't just go back to the classroom the next day.

By and large, the US justice system functions exactly like the scenario that has you up and arms with the Ohio Boys Who Sing (or whatever). It's a system that functions with pleas and accepting fines, independent of guilt, and the repercussions are felt in very direct ways that may not include jail time. I don't think the US Justice system warrants being held up as an example that should be strived towards.

Not sure if you're familiar with the World Justice Project, but it's a measure of judicial systems globally taking a variety of factors into account. Primarily, it measures how well justice systems globally manage to maintain their independence from the legislature, avoid corruption, are transparent, offer fundamental rights (like the absence of discrimination), and consider both civil and criminal justice. There's a bunch of other stuff too. Here's a link to the 2021 report: https://worldjusticeproject.org/sites/default/files/docum... .

The US ranks 27th. Minorities are overwhelmingly more likely to be incarcerated, which is an area where the US takes a huge hit in the ratings. We are also quite susceptible to corruption -- the prevalence of for profit prisons, and the incentives they create for states factor in heavily here. We also see many examples nationally over legislative overreach. For instance, in Shreveport, LA it's illegal to wear baggy pants and 726(!) people were arrested for that.
There are laws making it illegal to give food to the homeless in certain locales. Broadly speaking, legislatures are guilty of using criminal statutes to attempt to solve social issues. That's not the sign of a healthy justice system.

We imprison more people than anybody in the world. Amongst industrialized nations, we imprison people at the highest rate. Violent crime rates have declined decade over decade, and America is as safe as it's ever been.

And those who serve prison sentences have abnormally high rates of recidivism, largely because of poor policy. We make it legal for employers, housing, etc to refuse those with criminal records. Socially, we've effectively decided prison should serve as a lifelong punishment, and treat it as a way to punish, not rehabilitate.

Also damning for the US -- which I alluded to above -- is that a very small percentage of crimes are adjudicated using the constitutionally prescribed method involving a jury trial. 95% of all convictions today come from pleas, not trials. That's exacerbated by the fact that many, many jurisdictions have passed legislation around mandatory minimums, which incentivizes those accused to plea down even when innocent.

Additionally, there's basically no accountability built into the system for the police or prosecutors, two key cogs in enforcing laws. There should be accountabilty and oversight in place for anybody wielding that much power, and by and large there's not.

I could go on. I don't think your Churchill quote applies particularly well here. Nor does any sense of American exceptionalism.

Just want to make sure I understand. Are you saying the “master questioner”, who is so idolized by a poster or two on this board, was just “exposed”?

So here's an update. The cease and desist order has bee lifted. Where I have a problem with this whole thing is that without a report of what supposedly happened (names redacted of course) and what was discovered, the general public is left to speculate and the reputation of the organization, its members and leadership is soiled.

He actually asked a question and then provided his own answer in the form of the Winston Churchill quote. So I addressed the answer he provided, and explained why it was, you know, dumb. And in the process provided a ranking that included criteria and thought. I didn't realize it was supposed to be a one word answer. Sorry about that!

But yeah, it seems like you ask are really excited to put your octogenarian heads together and see if they add up to anything worthwhile, so feel free to knock yourselves out making the case why the Justice Project's rankings are wrong and America is the best at everything all the time no matter what.

Denmark ranked first this year. That seems worth emulating. Excited to watch you all arbitrarily die on this particular hill.

Yeah, I was hoping the sarcasm would come through there.

Oh man, how do I explain this without confusing you.

Sometimes you're going to run into people in the world who use hyperbole to make a point. I know it's hard to understand, and that reading is hard enough when you don't have to parse words for meaning that might exist beyond the literal interpretation of the words themselves, but it does come to from time to time. This is also true with metaphors, idioms and the like. You'll run into those. For instance, earlier in the thread, rpbobcat said that if the investigation of the Singing Boys doesn't turn up anything, "heads must roll". He doesn't been literally. It's an expression, used for effect. Similarly, there were no actual kangaroos involved in investigating the Marching 110. Kangaroo Court is just an excursion. Hope that helps clear things up for you.

I can answer questions all day long, man.

Cease and desist

Just a thing I have heard through being a student about the SM - I know they threw wild parties so I wouldn't be surprised if it's hazing or alcohol related.

+1 and +1