December 12, 2005: If you Tookie Googlers are looking for the latest info on the quadruple murderer, here it is.
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I have to wonder if all the celebrity fawning over Stanley ‘Tookie’ Williams has actually done his cause more harm than good? Meaning, if one of the arguments for the death penalty as a deterrent – then what stronger message to send than “I don’t care what you’ve done for me lately, look at what you did in the past!”
First, this is not a discussion about the merits of the death penalty itself – for that, I’ve created a post over at blogs4God that lists what some other Christian bloggers are saying about this media event.
Instead, what I want to briefly touch on, in hopes of a heated comment-driven debate, is whether or not the red carpet of celebrity do-gooders paint government officials into a corner? I think they do.
For example, imagine being a judge on the California State Supreme Court or perhaps the Governator and getting hit on the left side by the latter’s Hollywood peers with arguments of “do it for the children” knowing that the right will return with the argument “look at the message you’re sending.”
The message being: you can brutally massacre innocent citizens execution style without fear of suffering the death penalty so long as you write a children’s book about being sorry for starting a gang. Best part is, you don’t have to actually establish any sort of foundation or and enforceable ‘turn in your bandanna’ campaign – just ‘feel’ sorry.
Perhaps add to that the thought that you also don’t have to apologize nor pay back to the victims of your crime – provided you get to tell your story of your feel-good redemption on the silver screen … but I digress …
If this is the case, if these are the messages we’re getting from the today’s tale of Tookie, then it is reasonable to speculate that the glitterati do their causes more harm than good. What do you think?
As always, you can click on the pix to see the movie poster parody full size.
Now that I’ve fixed the link (c’mon people, comment next time I break it).
