Why do we value dogs more than our women?

Three bullet pre-summary:

• Michael Vick has repaid is debt to society, if an NFL owner wants to pay him to play football once he is released from jail they should have every right to do that.
• Who does everyone condemn Michael Vick like he is the new Hitler, but no one bats an eye when an athlete is charge with domestic abuse or assaulting a woman?
• 60% of rapes in America go unreported each year. Is it hard to understand why when people in America care more about the well being of a dog than that of an individual who files a charge of abuse? 

Michael Vick will be released from jail this summer. Allegedly any day know he will be sent to a half-way house to finish out his sentence. In the America I know, once Michael Vick is released from prison he will be allowed to play in the NFL immediately. Assuming an owner wants to pay him. That's the beauty about America, everyone has a choice.

It is a free country. but Michael Vick, as a felon, has less rights than many of us. However, he has served his time. Why do so many people believe he should be held to their personal moral compass? Why are they outraged at the face Mr. Vick could play football again? Is their sense of morality higher than the legal code of America?

I call bullshit on this outrage for so many reasons. My top two are 1) Where was this outrage for previously arrested athletes who were then released and resumed their careers? Some of them cost human lives... 2) We want to sacrifice Michael Vick for killing dogs but barely bat an eyelash (or even fine a player) when they get charged or convicted for a form of domestic abuse or assault against a female.

I won't try to defend what Michael Vick did. I can't. It was horrible and illegal. He was arrested and served his time. We let these athletes back into our professional sports after major arrests and jail times, why not Michael Vick?

• Jamal Lewis, RB Cleveland Browns -- using a cell phone to facilitate a drug deal
  
• Leonard Little, DE, St. Louis Rams -- involuntary manslaughter: involved in fatal car crash while intoxicated
• Ruben Patterson, SF, currently a free agent (cut in 2007) -- third degree rape
• Charles E. Smith, PF, now retired -- vehicular homicide

Every year high profile athletes are being charged with domestic abuse, assaulting women, sexual abuse, etc. (that is the saddest etc. ever used) Yet these athletes are welcomed back to our lineups without any public outcry. Hell, they generally haven't even been suspended or fined.

Where is the moral outrage here? We have millions of people and PETA coming to the rescue for animals, especially dogs, but who is coming to the rescue of the women? No one seems to care. A black eye here, a broken rib there, a little rape, no problems here. It happened to a woman. But if you so much as clip that dog's toenails wrong you get the entire world wanting your neck.

People argue that many of these domestic abuse or assault charges are dropped or the athlete pleads guilty to lesser charges to get the case over with. That is horrible and naive. Many victims of domestic abuse will drop charges to "protect" their husbands. There are countless "undisclosed settlements" between athletes and accusers.

The worst part is no one pickets team offices to get that player banned from the league for hitting a woman. They league and team itself is highly unlikely to take discipline action at all. That is socially unacceptable.

Here are just a handful of athletes who have been charged*  (or more) with domestic abuse or assault against women in the past decade:

• Larry Johnson, RB, Kansas City Chiefs (2003, 2005, 2008, 2008 -- suspended one game in 2008 for breaking an unrelated team rule)
• Jason Kidd, PG, Dallas Mavericks (2001 - plead guilty ... never suspended)
• Ron Artest, F, Houston Rockets (2007 - 7 game suspension, much less than the 72 game suspension from the Detroit melee in the crowd. Evidently being convicted of domestic abuse is 1/10 as bad as fighting a grown man at a basketball game)
• Patrick Roy G, Colorado Avalanche (2001)
• Brett Myers, P, Philadelphia Phillies (2006 - in full view of public, not suspended because it was an "off field matter")

*I am a firm believer of innocent until proven guilty, but our society does not even bat an eye to these charges anymore. It is not just that a charge of killing a dog carries more weight in our nations moral outrage than a charge of beating your wife; it is the fact that there is little to no outrage at a charge of abusing your wife.

In closing, I give America a big giant middle finger right now. Apart from PETA members (who I have many other issues with) and a good percentage of vegans and vegetarians, this is a buttload of hypocrisy. Please follow this with the understanding I believe what Michael Vick did was wrong, I am glad he went to jail, but firmly believe he has served his debt to society and owes us nothing more

1. In America, dogs are pets. Therefore there is a taboo against eating their meat and this taboo is extended to the mistreatment and killing of dogs. 
2. In America, we slaughter millions of cows a year. We eat their (delicious) meat. There is no taboo against this in our culture.
3. In other parts of the world dog meat is used for human food. There is no taboo in these culture to eating dog meat.
4. In some parts of the world cows are considered sacred and cannot be harmed or killed. There is a major taboo against killing cows in these parts of the world
5. Therefore it can be concluded: an individual's outrage to the slaughter or killing of an animal is determined by sociological factors. This outrage is not a point of universal morality. It can be argued that it is not inherently immoral to kill a dog.
6. As far as I know, the murder of a human is a point of universal morality. I bring this up for a comparison between universal and societal morality.

So we are currently outraged in America that an athlete who broke a social taboo, went to jail for breaking this taboo, and was deemed by the government of this society to have repaid their dept to this society, might be allowed to play football, while in some other culture there is a good chance he would never have been seen to have done anything morally wrong. Yet when a woman in our society is beaten, choked, and/or sexually abused by an athlete, which breaks a social taboo as well in our society, they are allowed to not miss any games, not be fined, and not have a media and societal rush of outrage and condemnation? What am I missing?

I know some asshole out there will say, "In some cultures men are allowed to beat their wives so it is the same point as the dog thing." I have not the resources to check every culture's rules, but I am willing to say I highly doubt that it is legal in any place in the world to abuse a woman on a whim. It may seem, in some parts of the world, that is is legal because of the great difficulty women in those parts of the world face in bringing their attacker's to trial and to justice. That doesn't mean it is illegal, it just means the means are not there for justice to be served.

We have the means here in America and yet 60% of rapes in America are not reported to police. Imagine that rate in countries where it is more difficult for a woman to speak out. It doesn't make it legal.

So here we are in America, where women have equal rights under the law and the ability to get fair trials against their accused assailants. Yet our media and our outrage would rather focus on a dog killer even after he has done his time in jail instead of putting that magnifying glass on those who beat their wives. 

In closing, America get over yourselves. If you want to picket outside the NFL for a long suspension or ban for a player, why don't you start with someone like Larry Johnson who has 4 charges of assault against women in 7 years (2 in the past year) and let Michael Vick move on with his life.

***I would like to make clear, I in no way condone Michael Vick's actions. I simply believe the man has done his time in jail as mandated by our government and should be allowed to get any job that someone is willing to hire him to perform. I do not get the desire of the current American psyche to destroy him and punish him further for a crime he has already sat in jail for commiting. 

***I would also like point out I do believe that killing dogs in our society in a very high form of animal cruelty. If I saw anyone in America killing a dog (other than euthanasia purposes) I would consider this a terribly immoral act.  However, if I were in Korea I would view the same scene completely differently. While I would feel it was immoral and a form of cruelty I would have to realize that in that culture this act was no more cruel than the slughtering of cattle in America for food. Whether you view any slaughtering of animals in any way, shape, or form is another issue completely. There should always be a strong attempt to view actions and morals within that scoieties context and not bring your our societal norms into play in judging the actions of others.

***Obvisouly there are issues at play here that are better discussed out of the context of a blog where I feel very limited and contrained in my wording. My main purpose was to exclaim my general disdain for the extreme  and continued hatred shown toward Michael Vick in contrast to the ignoring of domestic abusers and assaulters. To do so I discuss many other sensitive subjects that should be an open dialogue in our culture instead of ignored as uncomfortable. Since these were not my main points and merely tangents that help make my main point I hope I did not mistate myself or use a careless word. In this situation that could lead to a terrible misunderstanding and I seriously hope that was not done. I deleted three paragraphs of rambles at the end to eliminate the chances of this.

***I doubt anyone is still reading this, but I have a question for the comment area people: what is it about our society that keeps us from having adult, grown up discussions about issues that truly affect our society? We seem to latch onto fringe issues that don't matter or attack a guy who killed dogs because that is easy, everyone thinks that is horrible and he should be locked up so we pat ourselves on the back. If we are lucky enough to have a real topic to discuss, the media throws the most polarizing individuals on the screen to yell at us and no progress is ever made. Generally, we just pretend we have advanced further than we actually have. Why is America like this?