didn’t stop to check the forum.
Contrapuntal:
From the forum rules. If you want to address me again, open a thread in the BBQ Pit. I’m not going to respond to your threadshitting or hijacking anymore. And that goes from now on, in any thread. If you’ve got a problem with me, let’s hear it. In the proper forum.
But “a few years” (your words) is?
I don’t know you from Adam.
It’s a musical term. Glad I could clear that up for you.
So pointing out that one year is not two and a half years is disparaging? Really?
I don’t disagree with what you say here. My point was that in both cases a crime was committed. In both cases the perpetrator was punished by the state (for some definition of punished - Vick was actually punished much more harshly FWIW). Little actually committed a very similar crime even after his punishment (although he didn’t kill anyone this time - and was acquitted on the DUI).
And yet, on this past Sunday, I heard thousands cheering when Little got a sack. And folks in this thread are calling for Vick to have a brain hemorrhage.
Either a sports hero can be rehabilitated by serving the mandated punishment for their crime, or they can not. Picking and choosing just because dogs are cute or Vick doesn’t seem “sorry enough” makes no sense to me.
This is ridiculous, sorry. It’s fine (though wrong IMHO) to say he should never be allowed to play again. But to try and say he should be allowed back in, but not for several years just isn’t realistic. Given the length of an NFL career, and the intensity of the demands on the body, pretty much any more time banned from playing would have ended Vick’s career. You might think that is justifiable, in which case say it. Don’t hide behind letting him come back at a time when it would be essentially impossible for him to come back.
DUI is sort of the-crime-that-other-people-commit in our society. Everyone I know hates drunk drivers and damn near every one of them has driven drunk. In any objective analysis, it’s does more harm to society than dogfighting, but these things are never really objective. And I think most people get the impression that someone who can do what Vick did to dogs isn’t very far removed, if removed at all, from being able to do it to humans. They’re a very dear species to us, our “best friends.” So, in the real life discussions I’ve had about this, Vick is seen more as a torturer and a murderer than a dogfighter (emotionally, not factually, remember.) And murder and torture are worse than DUI.
That being said, I don’t know anything about this Little fellow, but if he killed someone DUI and was given a second chance, and then got another DUI, he shouldn’t be playing either. The large businesses in our society only seem to have standards when the bottom line is affected, and Vick and Little obviously aren’t hurting the bottom line.
Excuse me, what are you talking about? I don’t think Michael Vick should ever set foot on a football field again.
Well, I based it on this:
[QUOTE=Cisco]
Well, contrary to most Christians, this atheist believes in forgiveness. But Vick is nowhere near it yet. It’s been, what, a year? You’ll have to forgive me for not buying the PR blitz. If the NFL had any scruples whatsoever he would not be playing. Then maybe he could go on a public-speaking tour to raise awareness about dogfighting and animal abuse. After a few years of that, I would be a long way towards forgiving him. As of now he just wants to play ball (literally and figuratively), and doesn’t deserve an ounce of credit or forgiveness. He can go fuck himself until he earns a reason for the public to think otherwise.
[/QUOTE]
The implication I got was that once he earned forgiveness, he should be allowed to lead a normal life, without unnecessary restrictions. Apparently that isn’t the case. I apologize for reading too much into what you meant by forgiving someone.
Sorry, I see what you mean. I guess I just mean that if Vick rededicated his life to doing something positive for animals, I would have no problem personally forgiving him. Not that my personal forgiveness means a fart in a wind tunnel to him, but there ya go.
He served his time. He paid his fine. I am not happy he is allowed to play football again. But I can live with it.
But I do not believe he regrets what he did to dogs. I still think he regrets getting caught. I think Vick would go back into it in 2 seconds if he could get away with it.
I watch football and he put on a good show. I do not know if he can be a good player again.
I think this is a pretty insightful post.
However, I don’t think any of the NFL players who drove drunk and killed people or strangled hookers or whatever ought to be playing now. It’s weird to accuse people of a double standard when it isn’t asked in the thread what should have happened to the people with more serious crimes. Fuck them, too - and also fuck Michael Vick.
That’s a perfectly reasonable approach to take. I didn’t bring up Little to point out a double-standard, but to highlight that there are two ways to deal with criminal behavior among sports stars. Either they are forever banned/shunned, or they serve there penalty to society and are then re-admitted to the games. The Little story seems to point out that both the NFL and NFL fans by and large choose to cheer for criminals if they serve there time (and help the team win, of course).
Also, Cisco’s response does point out that there is a cultural effect on what crimes are tolerated by the fan base. DUI is something that a large percentage of NFL fans can see (and often have seen) themselves committing. Dogfighting is not (or shooting yourself or someone else for that matter).
So what jobs should a convicted criminal who has served his time be allowed to hold? Is it a salary cap type thing - he can only earn minimum wage?
I can see restricting the employment of an ex-con based on relevant factors - a convicted child abuser not being allowed to work in a day care center; a convicted drug offender not being given the power to prescribe drugs; Michael Vick not being allowed to be a dog breeder. But last thing I check, and Cleveland aside, the NFL has bugger all to do with dogs. If he isn’t allowed to work, who should support Vick? If he is allowed to work, how do we determine what jobs he should be eligible for?
What, he was breeding some other kind of dogs too? Something other than pit bulls, which are famous for their deference and tolerance toward humans?
[QUOTE=Pit Bull Rescue Central]
Traits like human aggression, severe shyness, and instability are not typically found in the APBT breed, nor are they acceptable. Dogs with these traits are not good representatives of the breed and should not be placed into adoptive homes.
Those who wish to label these breeds as “dangerous” are often quick to insist that the dogfighting aspect of their history somehow means that they are inclined to “fight” humans. This is simply wrong. A central fact of pit bulls’ history is that their lineage actually makes them less inclined to be aggressive toward humans. For over 160 years, they have been systematically bred away from human aggressiveness. As Malcolm Gladwell (author of The Tipping Point, Blink and Outliers) explains in an article published in The New Yorker in 2006:
Pit bulls were not bred to fight humans. On the contrary: a dog that went after spectators, or its handler, or the trainer, or any of the other people involved in making a dogfighting dog a good dogfighter was usually put down. (The rule in the pit-bull world was “Man-eaters die.”)
[/QUOTE]
Not totally opposed to your view, Sailboat, but quoting from something other than the Pit Bull Rescue Center might be a tad more convincing.
Also I am not sure the last line…
… is necessary very helpful to the idea of pitbulls as not dangerous to humans.
I would discuss this with you reasonably, but I’m afraid I’d be wasting my time as these arguments have been made before and summarily ignored by those who don’t want to hear them. Rather, I’ll just point out that, per the CDC, pit bulls are far more likely to be involved in dog-related fatalities than any other breed. By nature I’m a dog defender, and I recognize that it is very possible to raise a pit bull who will not attack. However, I can’t imagine that training them to fight and kill other dogs as Vick did makes them any more “deferent and tolerant of humans”. What Vick was doing was dangerous, both to other animals and to humans.
I can’t tell if that is the discredited Clifton study or not, but the time frame seems about right. At any rate, it acknowledges that it cannot determine whether certain breeds are disproportionately represented, which pretty much renders your point moot.
Are you arguing that Vick’s breeding and training of fighting dogs didn’t endanger humans?
No one but you apparently.