Hating Michael Vick Is Hating Yourself
The Pittsburgh Steelers signed Michael Vick. Online petitions, Facebook pages, and even a rally ensued to prevent the Steelers from signing him, in other words, effectively making a living.
America
Key goals of our criminal justice system include preventing crime; protecting the public; supporting victims of crime, their families and witnesses; holding people responsible for crimes they have committed; and
helping offenders to return to the community and become law abiding members of the community. Has this happened here?
Michael Vick
Michael Vick served 18 of a 23 month sentence in a federal penitentiary. Since, he has completely rehabbed his image, stayed out of trouble, spoke out at countless animal abuse functions, given money towards animal abuse and prevention awareness, and apologized profusely, repeatedly, seemingly endlessly.
He outperformed his contract for 3 productive years, then signed an incentive laden deal paying back he enirety of his $18 million dollars to debt collectors. He could have filed for bankruptcy and shielded his new contract money, but he didn’t. He repaid his debt, and put the money back into the system instead of stealing from it.
Dogs
I know people love dogs, but dogs don’t have thumbs. In my opinion, a person’s life is not the equivalent of a dog’s life. There are athletes, politicians and celebrities who don’t serve time for crimes such as spousal abuse and domestic violence (unless it’s caught on tape), but those crimes affect people. People are apparently subordinate to dogs, I’m told.
Furthermore, why is a dog’s life more valuable than a cow, chicken, or fish’s life? It seems the line of equality in the animal community are drawn at dogs and Cecil the Lion.
Racism?
What conclusions can we draw from this? Well, there are obvious racial implications here. Namely, it seems white people care way too much about dogs, and not enough about people. I say white people without knowing for sure the percentage of signatures and protesters that are white, but only looking at the composition of the city of Pittsburgh and Steeler fans.
Remember that? That’s Eagles wide receiver Riley Cooper. Who was the Eagle that was most important in defending his man in the mostly black locker room? Michael Vick. That’s who. His continued opposition for a crime he has overpaid for lends credence to the argument that ultimately, it does not matter what you do if you are black.
Michael Vick is a role model for anyone who has made mistakes in life and ultimately redeemed themselves. That’s you.