Go figure--except that maybe they share one brain among them.
On the one hand, I feel for Tookie: his is a personal human tragedy, and perhaps he has tried to make amends while on Death Row. And now he will meet his maker.
On the other hand, I see punks wearing "colors" here in New Zealand, pretending to be Crips and Bloods, and yes murdering and maiming folk. This is a new thing for us in NZ: the American Gangsta is an export that has been inflicted on us over the past ten-or-so years.
We do not want or need American Gangsta crims in New Zealand. We are tired of cleaning up the senseless grafitti, weary of the increase in burglaries, robberies and rapes, and sick of arresting and convicting P-Methamphetamine powered scroats.
We do not appreciate Hip-Hop, or Rap. It teaches our kids to be delinquents.
Tookie helped invent this misery, for all of us. He should ask nicely for clemancy and mercy, and perhaps Society in its goodness would oblige. But he does not deserve it. He deserves to hang.
It's simple, really. The only reason any black person, even a Blood, wants Tookie to avoid the death penalty is because he is not being murdered on the streets. They'd rather have him killed on the streets. It's what they understand: unlawful killing. If he was shot in the streets it would be just as unnoticed as any other gang member's death. But the fact that he will be killed lawfully is what has Tookie's defenders up in arms. If he were killed on the streets the story would read, "a black man falls victim to street violence as a result of poverty and racism." And some Black people really believe that. " But because he is being killed as a result of being found guilty in an established court of law the story must read, "racist Governor to execute innocent Black man." Truthfully, I pity the man more than I do his victims. Why? Because their lives were cut short and the Lord has taken account of that. But in Tookie's case he has exterminated 4 of the Lord's children, and he will pay dearly. The death penalty is likely the beginning of his torture. As has been said in the past, "Vengeance is mine."