system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5: What is the logic behind the Fifth Amendment and not having to give information in court if it incriminates you?

As above. I'm sure there's a reason for it, was just curious what it could be.
gpt
Because forced confessions have been used by many despotic governments, and still are, to preserve a veneer of legality and legitimacy, while completely subverting actual justice. Many despotic governments only hold onto power by pretending to following some kind of standard or rule of law. Even the Soviets did this. It was all a sham of course, but it's helpful for tyrants to be able to pretend to be impartial arbiters of real justice, especially when they are nothing of the sort. So suspects, enemies of the state, undesirables, and the like have been jailed indefinitely, tortured, had their families threatened, and much more in order to convince them to sign a false confession. Once they had the confession, the following execution or forced labor could all be swept under the nice and tidy rug of procedure and legalism.

The Founding Fathers were well aware of this, and it was still common practice at the time (and still is in parts of the world such as China, Cuba, or NK). The intention of the Bill of Rights was to basically keep the new government from doing the same stuff the old government did. The old government wanted everyone to be members of the Church of England, so they put in freedom of religion. The old government seized printing presses and required all printed materials to be approved by Royalist authorities, so they put in freedom of the press. The Revolutionary War actually started when British troops attempted to seize powder and muskets from a colonial armory, so the right to keep and bear arms was put in. Each Amendment was a response to some injustice the old government had committed in some form against the colonists. The British monarchy used forced confessions and torture to prosecute (often false) charges, so the Founders put in the right to be free of cruel and unusual punishment and the right to be free of self-incrimination.