Rant, Rant, Rant

Posted by Kurt Maurer on Mar 9, 2005

It makes me queasy to see how ready folks are to sprint into the end zone with a story they know practically nothing about.

We've all heard it a thousand times before: the accused was acquitted, and the public goes into an uproar. Yet the verdict was reached by 12 individuals just like us, but who actually sat through the entire trial in person, heard all the testimony while eyeballing the witnesses in person, saw all the exhibits offered by the eager-to-win prosecution in person, and were fully confronted, in full, with the whole sad and horrific story from start to miserable end... in person.

But we, the public, read, see, and/or hear the headlines generated by commercial (read: for-profit) enterprise the next morning, and second-guess the jury in an instant... and we do it every time. Even though we've only had second- and third-hand accounts handed to us, at our convenience, from sources we freely admit we do not trust 100 per cent.

I've been wondering all along what the real story was with those kids, but expected I'd never know it to my satisfaction. And I can truthfully say that it never occurred to me that criminal negligience was involved.

My point of departure was that people look after kids, and that whatever happened was perfectly wild! Even kids look after kids; it's a basic animal instinct.

So now that they're neatly packaged in pretty little caskets today, the only real question that most likely remains is: what can we learn from this thing?

Yeah, yeah, I know that we all feel helpless, and that we tend to lash out in our desperate desire to do something, anything. But still, we also need to remember that we're about to burn people at the stake too. Is that really the best we can do?

Puff, puff... Stick a fork in me. I'm done.

Kurt Maurer League City, Texas

In Response to: Re: Fatal Florida Kayak/C by Parke on Mar 9, 2005

Replies:

• Re: Rant, Rant, Rant by Tony Calvert on Mar 10, 2005
• Re: Rant, Rant, Rant by Mac on Mar 10, 2005
  • Re: Rant, Rant, Rant by Kurt Maurer on Mar 10, 2005
  • Re: Rant, Rant, Rant by terry on Mar 10, 2005
    • Re: Rant, Rant, Rant by George on Mar 10, 2005
      • Re: Rant, Rant, Rant by terry on Mar 10, 2005
        • Re: Rant, Rant, Rant by Kurt Maurer on Mar 10, 2005
          • Re: Rant, Rant, Rant by FrankP on Mar 11, 2005
          • Re: Rant, Rant, Rant by GKaminski on Mar 11, 2005
• Read this and learn... by Robert N Pruden on Mar 12, 2005