<snip>Unlike many posters here I still have an interest in the PGP. Their conviction fascinates me and is partially why I became so interested in this case. From what I gather most of them hold normal beliefs outside of this case. They don't think the moon landing was faked in Kubrick's basement, or that lizardmen run the White House. Yet they firmly believe, beyond a shadow of any doubt, that two students who just met, spontaneously teamed up with a virtual stranger burglar they happened to run into, and plotted a murder in languages none were unanimously proficient in, against another student in a shared home, for no reason, based on the flimsiest questionable evidence that appeared only after the Italian police made a series of highly public and potentially embarrassing arrests following an unrecorded interrogation which produced provably false statements the police themselves claimed they knew to be true and acquired only after getting the interrogee to buckle.
Based on their behavior in this thread and around the internet I have come to understand that Amanda is their primary interest in the case. She is the central figure. That all of the alleged evidence taken at face value is actually against Raffaele doesn't seem to be taken into account by a single one of them. Of all PGP ever to exist not one has ever proposed a theory where Amanda isn't the wielder of the kitchen knife stabbing the life out of Meredith. This mythological construction is something I continue to find interesting.
Excellent summary, bagels. While I am not as interested in or fascinated by the phenomenon of the PGP as I once was, I agree it is definitely something to think about, if one likes to think about psychology and human behavior.
As you say, "...Amanda is their primary interest in the case." Personally, I can't imagine having a vendetta against a stranger for any crime committed against anyone not related to myself in some way. For example, when Casey Anthony was under indictment, complete strangers would gather in crowds on her parents' front lawn to protest against her.
Based only on my limited exposure to the news coverage about those people, they seemed to be mostly of a lynch mob mentality. The PGP, on the other hand, not only "hold normal beliefs outside of this case," but they also consider themselves sophisticated intellectuals. I can't see any of them camping out on Casey Anthony's parents' front lawn, or associating with any of the people who do, but they are gripped by the exact same emotional, personal-boundary-crossing reaction against an accused individual who has nothing to do with them.
Another contradiction is consistent within the two groups. The PGP would never admit to having authoritarian loyalties (except maybe Italians who understandably don't have perspective on their own country's political culture), yet "respect" for the Italian judges and legal system has been a requisite theme in their side of the debate. Similarly, the lynch-mob protesters in most ways seem to be knee-jerk, red-white-and-blue jingoists, who presumably respect their own country's legal systems and police.
Yet here come both groups, putting themselves in
place of the systems they claim to respect, as if the systems will not properly prosecute a Casey Anthony or an Amanda Knox without their help. Less hypocritically (in my opinion), PIP don't bother promoting faux, emblematic respect for the police, judges and legal systems, because they assume those entities very possibly will not do their jobs without outside guidance.
) Bruce would rather all the posting now taking place in the IIP forum was taking place on the other endorsed cases still open.
that he has filed for 500,000+ Euro for false conviction.
I don't recall Mach's HIV position but generally he didn't seem to have crazy positions. If you have his HIV position handy please send it to me or post it.