Zero Tolerance

I wanted to write a fun blog about the beauty of the fall season and how excited I am to break away from an ordinary black handbag to a deep red one, but Ray Rice got in the way. 

As you all may know, Rice punched his then-fiance, Janay Palmer, in a casino.   She fell to the floor unconscious, and he dragged her limp body out of the elevator.  Initially, he was suspended for 2 games; once the video of the event went viral, he was cut from the Baltimore Ravens in addition to being handed an indefinite suspension from the NFL.     

This morning, I saw a segment on CNN with Dewan Williams, the wife of former NFL player Wally Williams, who was a domestic abusive victim herself.  At one time she left her husband, moved back home with her family and enrolled in a master's degree program.  She is now an Advanced Practical Nurse, specializing in psychiatry.

The interviewer asked Dewan how she felt about Rice's indefinite suspension on the NFL.  I expected she would say this action is long overdue.

Instead, she said just the opposite.  She said that Rice is unfairly paying the price for a far-reaching issue involving those football players who have abused their wives as common practice without penalty, for years.

She is correct that this is a huge problem, but let's not forget that Rice did, in fact, inflict significant harm on Janay, and we witnessed it, compliments of the Revel Casino's security camera footage.  Rice has earned the honor of leading his former team to adopt a Zero Tolerance Policy and, the way I see it, such a ruling is a most beneficial outcome to a very bad situation.

It just so happens that in this day and age of electronic recordings, we can all see with our own eyes just how brutal people can be and, in this case, the outcome of the Rice video represents the collective wrongdoing of superstars who think they can do no wrong.  

Rice's suspension is the best news I've heard in a long time.  I'm sorry for Janay that her victimization became a public embarrassment on top of personal humiliation (or the other way around), but I'm more sorry for her that she married him, even after this happened, which most likely wasn't the first time.  Luckily at 26 years old she is still a young woman; I'm hopeful that one day soon she will reverse the course of her current decision to stand by Rice.  Comments she posted on Instagram today reflect what some would call Battered Women Syndrome.

I think we all have to assume going forward that whatever we do can be revealed to the entire world instantaneously, and maybe for some of us, that will make a difference.  You just never know if there's a camera or a phone recording our actions.  That's even made me think twice in a public elevator when I've had a wedgie to contend with.

But more to the point, why on earth do people feel it is OK to physically abuse their loved ones?  Dewan said these players are accustomed to enforcing their will on the field and see it as their right to continue with this behavior at home.  She explained it like it was a bona fide excuse. There is no doubt that this mentality and what appears to be an acceptable culture needs to addressed.

In the meantime, I salute the formation of the Zero Tolerance Policy, for whatever the reason, to try to right some wrongs, thereby opening the door for widespread change to replace widespread ignorance and complacency.