Ever since this young man was gunned down by some punk hoping to clean up opportunistically on what was supposed abandoned cash I have been curious if any other 24 year old black men were shot to ultimately die by another on Nov. 26. The odds favor it but are any of them being honored as a fallen US soldier never has within the last 7 years? Pat Tillman doesn’t count as he was another of NFL celebrity.
Taylor was an NFL football player for a very short while. Dale Earnhardt drove race cars for a long time. These two were celebrity sports figures, nothing more. Heroes to some but millionaire sports figures don’t play into the moral fabric of everyday life as the memorials of these two might suggest. All that can be gleaned by putting them on that pedestal is learning of their lives, which we needn’t do. I don’t know if America really needs to grieve over FATHEADS as we are given over to. What does it say about our priorities when soldiers come home dead in body bags and go nameless – minus the fanfare of nationwide memorials that would put their names and faces on news channels as well as newspapers and other periodicals? How many periodicals will Sean Taylor’s face grace the cover of? As was with Dale Earnhardt it becomes macabre.
How many names and faces of the victims of crimes such as the VA Tech shooting or the DC snipers can we readily identify? Who cares? They aren’t celebrity sports figures are they?
Maybe it’s the fact that the media constantly spotlights highly paid sports figures so we may live vicariously through their excesses. Does that cause us to hold them above all others in life? I think the media itself teaches us who to hold in esteem. Hours upon hours of news stories and exposes puts them foremost in the minds of society.
Paris Hilton, not a sports figure, is a celebrity for no reason at all. The world bent a knee and wept when Princess Diana died in an automobile accident while the death of Mother Teresa was barely noticed. Paris would have a leg up on Teresa as well as we know far too much about her than is necessary. I think Teresa was glossed over by the media in its efforts to discuss Di, Di, Di.
The 4 youths that wanted to steal from Taylor are a product of the mindset I have described. They were out to take another’s valuables – steal – no doubt thinking the rich sports figure might have the best goods. They no doubt had an inside line as to what was where.
Shooting Sean Taylor was probably as easy as playing a video game for the trigger man. He has probably played enough games where he has shot another in the game. What is the sense of playing if you don’t shoot someone?
Breaking and entering with a handgun was far too easy. The 4 in question supposedly didn’t know someone was home and planned on ransacking the home to get money to blow within week to further their stupidity.
So goes society.
