Three innocent Black people were murdered by two White men in an unprovoked hate crime in Tulsa. Two years prior, the father of one of the murderers was killed by a black man after the father knocked the black man down with a stick for making threats against his daughter. In the comments of a story about this horrible crime, I disagreed with a commenter who said the father had it coming, and found myself arguing against people who I might normally agree with and being “liked” by people who I might not “like” in return.
Being progressive doesn’t mean always defending the Black guy. It means looking at the facts and not jumping to conclusions. It means not retaliating against people just because they remind you of others who did you wrong. It means not convicting unless you’re sure beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant committed the crime, while at the same time trusting facts and logic to guide you towards getting it right more often. And it means considering mitigating circumstances, even if the subject is a crotchety old White man beating a Black guy with a stick.
Edit: I added “by two White men” in the first sentence for clarification.
Update: Soon after I added “White men” I read that Mr. England is Native American. For now, I’ll leave my words up there as written.
BnmnG 
Great insight. Correlates with the post I just wrote on pinkpundit quite nicely! Thanks.