Minorities Hating Minorities

So you've heard about the case in the news where this Indian student filmed his roommate with another man and threatened to broadcast it live.  The roommate ended up jumping off a bridge.  The kid who filmed him ended up getting like ten years in jail for a hate crime and invasion of privacy.


The whole thing disgusts me on so many levels I can't begin to count.  I mean these aren't really kids, they are adults, and they are behaving like little children.  The guy who took a film of his roommate deserves some kind of punishment, but ten years?  The guy who jumped off the bridge obviously had some issues to begin with that brought him to that bridge long before this incident.  


I think the court was trying to send a message out there that hate crimes will not be tolerated.  I do think what that kid did was deplorable, but his life is sufficiently over at this point.  I just don't know if the punishment fits the crime.  However, the crime of bullying and hating someone because of their sexuality is disgusting.  


Now the fact that the kid who did the bullying was Indian bothers me.  In a world that has become so multi-cultural, I wonder why I still am of the notion that when an Indian gets attention for something, he is representing my people.  This Indian kid must have been teased at some point for being Indian, or maybe he was always the bully.  But a minority hating a minority just pisses me off.  


That Indian kid, deep down inside knows what it is like to be different.  He probably knows what it's like for people to judge you based on superficial qualities.  And I have to say that someone who would take the time to video tape two men being intimate, must have some latent homosexual feelings himself that he is in denial about.  I mean why was he so interested to begin with?


This Indian kid is probably some deluded boy who could never come to terms with his own sexual curiosity so he terrified others because he was so terrified of himself.  That's my pop psychology diagnosis of him.  The kid who jumped off the bridge was probably scared to death of himself and his homosexuality and to have it displayed in public was more humiliation than he could tolerate because he was so scorned by people in general.  


These aren't easy issues.  However the courts can't play with people's lives just to make a point.  They sufficiently made the point that you can't bully someone due to hate, but at what cost?  That Indian kid will never have a life and will probably experience more than his share of homosexual activity in jail.  I'm not saying we need to dismiss his behavior, but I don't know that ten years is a fitting punishment.  


I think the most alarming thing about this case is that there was an audience out there that was listening to this kid make threats and no one said anything or did anything about it.  The minute anyone heard of someone trying to make a mockery out of someone else's love life by invading their privacy, they should have reported it to someone or made some kind of attempt to stop it.  


The thing is we are interested too, aren't we?  That audience that was going to see the film of the homosexual act did not protest because their deep down curiosity and need to know the intimate details of people's lives took over.  


Ultimately, we are all responsible for this crime, because we have created a society that wants to put a videotape in every bedroom and make it a reality show.  


This is reality, and the show sucks.


nina