Vick

[King Glorious]

Originally Posted by pgardn

Just listened to a sports radio talk show driving home from work. Plenty of callers that were quite obviously African American were saying Vick is being punished because white America loves dogs more than people...

Its going racial. I had a feeling.

This is also true. I do believe that white America has more love for dogs than people. There was someone that once said that white people would rather kiss a dog on the mouth than kiss a black person. I think that in a lot of instances, that's true too. But that shouldn't take away from the fact that Vick was wrong and has to pay the price. I don't think anyone disputes that fact but where the disagreement comes is in what that price should be. I believe that if anyone else would have gotten prison time, he should too. I believe he should be suspended without pay while he's serving prison time. I believe that he should lose his endorsements. But I also believe that there is something wrong with the system when a person can be convicted of a DUI, where they are putting the lives of many people at risk, regardless of whether they kill anyone or not, and they get less time than what Vick will get. Someone said that it's a new commissioner in place and that if Leonard Little or Reggie Rogers had been guilty of the crimes they committed in today's league, their penalties from the NFL would have been more severe than what they got then. But that's the NFL. What about the justice system? That hasn't changed. Little got 90 days and Rogers got a year. And that's for killing people. Vick should get more than that for being involved in killing dogs? That just doesn't make sense to me. I also don't think it's fair for anyone to decide that they can KNOW who can and can't be rehabilitated. Not a single person knows how the down time will effect Vick. I'll agree that it's likely that it won't make him change his beliefs.....but that doesn't mean that it can't happen. I also don't think that many black people are saying that Vick is being punished because he's black. I think they are saying that he's being punished MORE because he's black. I'm not sure that there isn't some truth to that. There is a reason that a jury is supposed to be made up of your peers. To a lot of black people, especially in the South and in the ghetto, right or wrong (and I do think it's wrong), dog fighting is something that is seen as just something else that goes on. I've talked before about how, when u've seen something long enough, even something as dispicable as this, u develop a sort of immunity to it. That's just the way it is. I would bet that if u asked most black people what they think should happen here, most would say he should do his time as mandated by the law and then he should be given the opportunity to come back. If no owner wants to take a chance on him because of the negative publicity that would come along with it, then he won't play again. But I guarantee that some would. Some of the same guys that are condeming him today would sign him tomorrow if it could mean a few more wins and more fans in the seats to watch him play and more money in their pockets. This is the truth. Sex offenders, murderers, thieves, white collar criminals......all can be rehabilitated. But Vick can't. A person can bilk many people out of millions of dollars and effect people's entire lives and families for generations and get a slap on the wrist but Vick should be in prison for life? I just have a hard time with that. What's sad is that if Vick had killed a human, the outrage wouldn't be nearly as bad.