Patterico's Pontifications

12/12/2005

Tookie the Ducky Beats the Rap

Filed under: Crime,Scum — Patterico @ 11:10 pm



iowahawk has found one of Tookie’s children’s stories:

Once upon a time, down a bright sunny alley behind a magical cottage in a faraway kingdom called Compton, lived a little quacky ducky named Tookie. Tookie was brave and strong and all of the other duckies knew to respect him, because otherwise Tookie and his friend Sammy Sawed-Off would mess you up bad, understand?

It goes on like that. One problem: the story doesn’t have a happy ending. Tookie lives.

Luckily, in real life, we’re going to get our happy ending for once, in less than an hour. (Actually, it’s not really “happy” — but it’s as close as you can get in a situation like this.) And that ending will teach children more about morality than two dozen children’s books from Tookie.

UPDATE: Tookie has been executed.

UPDATE x2: I respond to the liars and nutbags at Martini Republic here.

12 Responses to “Tookie the Ducky Beats the Rap”

  1. Song of the Night

    Break out the champagne, someone dies tonight.
    It’s time to celebrate! Party on,
    We won! A political gain for us.
    Halelujah, the unredeemable scum dies tonight.
    Dies dies dies and dies.

    Behold! Good news! God is smiling down, because
    Someone dies tonight.
    Justice is served–we murder a murderer.
    The poor slain will live again and their families’
    Pain be muted, because
    Someone dies tonight.

    Weilding the sword of the Lord, we kill tonight.
    Holy vengeance, God’s utter delight in our destruction,
    Our murderous mission unmasked by the joy of
    Reveling in human death.

    Unhuman death.
    He’s-not-a-human death.
    His life, unredeemable and thus expendable.
    Innocent it isn’t, so
    Fuck him. He dies.
    Humans play God and decide who is
    Nothing. Shit-stained and worthless.
    Rejected by Christ because we said so, a
    Jesus abandonee that dies and dies.

    And is dead now.
    May I have this dance
    Upon the grave of one rendered ineligible to
    Christ’s own extravagant promise of life anew
    (Because we said so)
    Please. Let us become God and act as God
    In power only, never
    Forgiveness.
    This we cannot do–we are only fit to determine death for others
    And embrace this new God of our own design.

    Meanwhile, amid the cheerful festivities, another
    Small piece of our remaining humanity
    Died tonight.
    So we pop the champagne and
    Seek God for validation in our celebration
    And find exactly what we seek–
    In a God of our own design.

    Tom (eb6b88)

  2. Aside from my stand of the propriety of the death penalty and agreement with denial of clemency, nonetheless for those interested in the titles of the 8 works by deceased Stanley Tookie Williams, they are at http://www.tookie.com/booktemp.html [ scroll down]

    1) Gangs and Wanting to Belong
    Gangs can be a family to kids who don’t have one. Tookie informs kids of the danger of this and tells them where they can get support.

    2) Gangs and Your Friends
    Kids need to know that gang members are false friends. This book gives simple techniques to identify peer pressure and to make friends who help, not hurt.

    3) Gangs and Drugs
    Gangs often deal drugs and abuse them. Little kids get involved early. Tookie gives an encouraging and helpful message that goes beyond “Just say no.”

    4) Gangs and Your Neighborhood
    Gangs take over neighborhoods. Wars between ‘hoods are common. This book tells kids how to stay safe in their neighborhoods.

    5) Gangs and Self-Esteem
    Many kids join gangs to feel better about themselves. This book provides kids with other methods of self-empowerment.

    6) Gangs and the Abuse of Power
    Gangs coerce young kids into doing things they don’t want to do. Tookie tells how kids can avoid falling into a gang’s power.

    7) Gangs and Weapons
    Tookie started out on the streets of South Central LA with fists, then guns. Now he teaches kids the tragedy associated with weapons.

    8) Gangs and Violence
    Too many kids don’t realize how destructive gangs are until it’s too late. This book gives the very realistic picture needed.

    Yi Ling (79d5e2)

  3. I am sorry about the 4 people murdered by Tookie – the crimes for which he was convicted. I am sorry for a society that does not keep innocent people like those 4 people safe from violent criminals such as Tookie.

    I’m sorry for Tookie, too, because he turned a great gift – his own life – into nothing. He wasted his life, and he took the lives of 4 other people.

    Funny how Tookie is in the news, but the 4 people he killed 25 years ago are forgotten, as if they never lived.

    steve miller (60a854)

  4. […] Update (13/12/05): Tookie was executed by lethal injection and was subsequently declared dead at 12:35 AM by the California Department of Corrections. MarksBrain asks; “what have we gained?” …one less murderer in our midst! […]

    Opinionated Voice (739a0c)

  5. Well, that’s the way the Tookie crumbles.

    Justice Frankfurter (2dcd84)

  6. A bit over the top, Tom, especially the forgiveness part. It’s funny (but not ha ha funny) to speak of forgiveness, when Tookie acknowledged his guilt, much less asked for anyone’s forgiveness.

    I understand opposition to the death penalty, and there certainly is a faith-based argument against capital punishment (probably the only persuasive anti-death penalty argument). And I even understand making someone like Tookie the poster boy for abolition. It was the bottom of the ninth, with the bases loaded and the abolitionists down by 3 runs. Trying to save Tookie was a swing for the fences — succeed, and capital punishment is a thing of the past, because if we won’t execute Tookie, there’s probably no one who deserves the death penalty. Strike three.

    TNugent (6128b4)

  7. The symbolic importance of forgiveness, TNugent, unfortunately lies not with the purpetrator but the victim. It has nothing to do with whether the accused is “guilty” or “remorseful” or “deserves it” or not. It’s about how the victim can find true closure and peace–and whether it can come from the death of another. It is my spiritual understanding that it cannot. Yet, we plow on ahead with false promises of new life through death–and sacrifice our humanity as we go.

    I don’t begrudge people who disagree with over this issue. This is just my personal belief; I would never try to force my lofty views on those who have been victimized. But the joyful grave-dancing on this site and others is reprehensible to me. Celebrating another’s death is barbaric, no matter how much you may think he “deserved it”; Judeo-Christian values indeed. If you have a spiritual outlook at all, premature death is nothing less than a tragedy before God, a potentially redeemable soul that humans are too quick to give up on, when I believe that instead, God never does.

    As a post script, let me say that I think that the worst thing about the death penalty debate that resurfaces whenever someone else gets executed is that it turns into a “is this person good enough for clemency or not” discussion, and nothing deeper than that, as if the collective question of whether or not the government should kill people as punishment depends varies on a case by case basis. The central moral question, in my opinion, is whether the government should kill people as punishment or not. Not if it should in this case or that case.

    Tom (764816)

  8. But the joyful grave-dancing on this site and others is reprehensible to me. Celebrating another’s death is barbaric, no matter how much you may think he “deserved it”

    I assume you’re talking about comments and not posts; I don’t remember doing any “joyful grave-dancing” here. I say in the post above that Tookie’s execution is not a happy ending, but it’s as close as you can get to one under the circumstances. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with society taking a certain grim satisfaction in seeing justice done, though I agree that some of the comments on the site have taken the celebration further than I personally would.

    I’m not shedding any tears over his death, I can tell you that. I’ll save those for people like my Dad.

    Patterico (7ca378)

  9. Tom, it is not my place nor yours to forgive Mr. Williams, even if forgiveness required no confession or remorse. That is for God–or, if he had asked for one, one of God’s earthly representatives–and for Mr. Williams’s victims to give.

    Only you can decide the central moral question for yourself but as to the central legal question, whether government should take life in punishment, we have a representative government. If a state’s electorate say that it should and the Constitution permits that it should and 12 jurors say that it should and the requirements of procedural due process have been met then yes, the government should take people’s lives as punishment for those crimes which society finds to be of such gravity that no other punishment will meet the requirements of justice.

    Craig R. Harnon (4ff073)

  10. Tom, you’re not the victim. So, when you suggest forgiveness for Tookie, you are indeed attempting to impose your views on others. And don’t pretend they’re lofty. There’s nothing “lofty” about having so little regard for the lives of victims that the most you’re willing to advocate for a murderer like Tookie is life in prison.

    TNugent (6128b4)

  11. This is from so many months ago, but I can’t let this stand, TNugent. I realize I was unclear with regards to who ought to forgive, so let me clarify: I was specifically referring to those of us on the sidelines. I thought this was apparent when I stated that “I would never try to force my lofty views on those who have been victimized.”

    If you had actually read through my post and attempted to understand my viewpoint, you might’ve correctly interpreted that “lofty” was actually a self-depreciating reference. You also might have found that my “advocacy” against the death penalty has everything to do with my religious worldview–and nothing do with having “little regard for the lives of victims.” Your false dichotomy (to oppose death penalty = little regard for lives of victims) doesn’t fit–and I suspect you knew that already. So kindly show a little generosity of spirit, perhaps as I did above–when I chose to say “I don’t begrudge people who disagree with [me] over this issue” instead of something like “There’s nothing ‘lofty’ about having so little regard for human life that you’re only willing to advocate for it in the form of pre-sentient fetuses.”

    Tom (eb6b88)


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