The Weapon of Choice

So your down at a pub off Main Street, when in comes a Yankee’s fan. What is the proper response?

a. Talk sports

b. State the facts that prove the Red Sox are a better team

c. Run the bastard over with your car

Well, after last week, we all know the correct answer is “C,” run the bastard over. Nashua has just received its new summer past-time thanks to Ivonne Hernandez. It’s a simple way to waste some excessive time (like life in prison at the taxpayers’ expense). Just go to a bar, have four beers, then get in your car and “scare” a fan of another team by running them down with your car. Then you can claim it was an accident in court (though you already have a record) and face second degree murder charges…

If you can’t tell, I am a bit upset with this. I don’t care if alcohol impaired her judgment, this woman got into her car with the intention of aiming her 4-5,000 lb car at pedestrians. Seems to me she also left the area she was arguing in, retrieved her car, and then hunted down the people she didn’t agree with TO RUN THEM OVER! Sounds like intent to me. This is first degree in my book. I may be wrong, but I thought New Hampshire law states that the charges go up then the driver is intoxicated, not down. Unfortunately, the prosecutors decided that because she “didn’t mean” to rundown her victims, this is second degree.

Now here is a creepy though; I think I have had a run in with Ms. Hernandez. If here maroon Dodge Intrepid is the one that had the Yankee symbol on the back window, she is the same one who cut me off then told me I was “number one,” if you know what I mean (finger gestures). I feel lucky today knowing I might have saved my life by ignoring her and letting her act the fool. Who knows, she might have thought I was a Red Sox fan and started ramming my car if I beeped at her.

Basically, what I am getting at is this. We have some very unstable, immature, ignorant people we must share the world with. Therefore we must gauge our actions cautiously. This does not mean we must cower from every shadow, but more that we must think about EVER possible consequence before we act. The two poor people who were run down by this lunatic probably thought they were having a typical Boston VS New York sports debate. Little did they know that they were messing with a ticking time bomb.

When Intelligence Fails...

The whole Reverend Wright situation made me think again about the whole “race” issue. I don’t really think about “race relations” all that much because I never see the “race” part of it. I have friends of many different races, religions, and other “defining” markers. I don’t think of my friends as being one attribute. My friend Garret is Garret, not black or homosexual. Do the attributes of my friends really matter in the whole scheme of things? Yes, because some characteristics design the person, and other no, because some characteristics would not change the person if they were altered.

We all wish that race was not an issue for anyone in this day and age. I personally do not understand why it is an issue now or ever. I may be naive, but the human mind is generally the same from on person to the next, and the blood that courses through our veins created in the same manner. Skin “color” is simply pigmentation of the skin, not a measure of the person.

Cultivation of the person (morals, values, etc.) is what I have found to be important in life. So why do so many things seem to revolve around skin color? Is there a certain lineage that makes one being better than another? Is there a purer bloodline in one race or culture? I found these questions easy to field, the answer is no. There is no “birthright” that makes one person superior to another. Each of us has our own strengths and weaknesses that help shape who we are.

So going back to the good Reverend, I can not help but wonder why he must interject race into the equation. Congratulations, your skin color is different than mine. I fail to see how you could state that I am somehow evil due to my skin tone. What if I was the same person, but my skin tone was darker? Would I still be evil, or would you change your opinion of me? What is the defining line you use when you judge my character? Is it my personality, my education? Could it be that you prejudge who I am simply because of the amount of pigmentation in my skin? I mean no disrespect, but that does seem a bit shallow and dim witted to me. Then again, I could be missing something. Could the good Reverend be correct? Maybe race is a factor and I have not received enough education to understand this concept. Perhaps the amount of or lack of skin pigmentation affects the body adversely.

For some reason, even writing such idiotic statements has made me feel less intelligent. So let us get back to the heart of my argument. The amount of pigmentation in ones skin does not affect the function of the mind, nor the morals and values of the individual. Therefore, to bring race into a conversation about the merits of a person is to be racist. Simply put, I do not care what “color” you are, if you are judging people (group or individual) due to their skin pigmentation, you are shallow indeed. I venture to say you may be racist.