Great news!
"WNBA star Brittney Griner released from Russian custody in a high-profile prisoner swap between the U.S. and Moscow"
Link to article: https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/wnba-star-brittney-griner-released-russian-custody-high-profile-prison-rcna60683
Link to Reddit discussion: https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/zfyfhc/wnba_star_brittney_griner_released_from_russian/
Reddit appears to hate it, though. They're acting like our justice system is exactly like Russia's, and her being in a literal hard labor prison camp (Russian gulag) means nothing.
Also, in America, you're innocent until proven guilty. This means that we'd rather people who we're sure about be granted innocence instead of possibly throwing an innocent person in jail. Why? Because if we started throwing innocent people in jail, our country would be super fucked up. It's more ethical to let people go if you're unsure than to throw a bunch of innocent people into jail. That's basically what we did with the trade. We're letting someone go who didn't deserve to be in prison (a hard labor prison camp, actually) in exchange for the guilty Russian arms dealer. If it had been the opposite or if the trade hadn't happened, that would be like throwing one innocent person into a hard labor prison camp for every guilty criminal out there. Everyone and their mother would end up in the gulag. That's not fair. That would be a fucked up society to live in.
I think the same logic applies when you're doing prisoner swaps during war. In order to save guys on your side from being tortured and killed, you let some of the guys from the other side go. Even if you're playing by the rules (Geneva convention--war crimes rules), the other side is not. And your soldiers don't deserve to be tortured until they're begging for death. It's my opinion that no one deserves that, but that's a different argument.
I hope they find someone to exchange Paul Whelan for next. I think there's one other American as well.
