Bad judgement ruins Vick’s reputation

comes are much worse than the actual fights. The losing dog, if not dead already, is subjected to some of the most horrendous acts ever heard of.

JONATHAN BARNETT STAFF WRITER JEB724@CABRINI EDU

It seems to me that death is so lightly thought of; it’s often tossed to the back of our minds. A fight is just another event; it gets our blood flowing.

How can one sit by and enjoy watching the destructio and sometimes death of participants of such “reallife” events?

I find myself thinking back to the days of the Coliseum when crowds, in the name of sport, watched as men fought to the death. When I think about events such as these, certain words come to mind: Barbaric. Animalistic. Inhumane.

Now think about these events, replacing the humans with animals. Is it any less barbaric? Can it now be considered a reasonable sport? Something for the average person to watch and bet money on?

I can’t see any logical reason for dogfights. There is no positive outcome from them. There are only negative consequences to such events.

If dogfights themselves were not enough, the out- do. I should have realized that since it wasn’t a human it was okay to kill it for fun.

Some subjects involved in the dogfighting case with Michael Vick, star quarterback for the Atlanta Falcons, admitted to having committed horrible acts of physical violence on the dogs involved in the fights.

Among the brutal acts of violence were such things as slamming a dog’s head onto the ground until it was dead, holding a dog’s head in a bucket filled with water until it drowned and electrocution to the point of death.

I cannot even fathom how any of this could be considered even slightly entertaining. These acts can only be judged as revolting and pervasively sadistic.

Maybe I will go next door and get my neighbors’ dog and take bets on how many times I can hit its head on the pavement until it dies.

For the “sport” of it, I will ever so barbarically slam its head on the asphalt in front of my house until its head is a mess of fur, brains and blood. I will proceed to laugh and joke about it with my friends.

When the police show up at my house and believe me, they will animal cruelty, and they exist for a reason. One of those reasons is so that things like this do not go unchecked.

When I spoke with people I know about this issue they all had the same general response. It is wrong and anyone involved should be punished for such violent crimes, whether the victims were human or not.

There is no doubt in my mind that Michael Vick should be held accountable for the crimes he committed or helped commit. I say this because no one, no matter how famous or important, should be able to get away with such heinous crimes.

If any other Average Joe or Jane were caught up in this kind of activity there is no question as to whether that person would be incarcerated for his or her involvement.

Nature vs. Nurture

To the Editor:

I am writing to respond to your article published this week in the Loquitur entitled, “Can your genes really influence your friendships?” I am writing to stress to readers to suspend some belief in accepting the findings in the “gene” study the author has cited.

Although the sample was large, 1800 participants, the sample was comprised of, entirely, white males from the state of Virginia. Generalizing the results to other populations, gender, race, location, is limited. Also, the behaviors of friends surveyed, drinking, smoking, stealing, etc., are skewed and antisocial/negative behaviors more often witnessed in a male population.

of friends was found to be more similar among identical than fraternal twins. This would not be surprising given that identical twins also share more of the same environment, clothes, friends, etc., than fraternal twins.

Any of the author’s findings can also be explained by environmental causes. Heritability indices are not very reliable as they often do not take into account the interaction between nature and nurture, biology and environment. Perhaps from an evolutionary perspective, certain befriending behaviors may have been passed along genetically to ensure survival, but very little evidence for that is provided by this study.

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ANTHONY VELLUTATO/ GRAPHIC DESIGN EDITOR

Some people have tried to justify these acts by claiming, “It’s only a dog.” Well since it was “just a dog” I guess that doesn’t make it a horrible thing to show up, I will simply explain to them that I was perfectly justified in what I was doing. I was just participating in a sport of sorts and it would be absolutely ridiculous for them to arrest me since it was just a sport, something my friends and I did all the time for fun.

There are laws against

I do not believe any of Vick’s claims that he did not know the dogfights were illegal in the location where they were taking place. If you are going to run, fund or even participate in something of this nature you most certainly know the status of its legality.

I’m sorry, Mr. Vick. As a football player, you are a legend in my eyes and you will remain that way. As a person, I can’t help but to be disappointed and utterly disgusted because of the bad judgment and the lack of moral character you have portrayed to your public.

Finally, it stated that similarities in the choice

Dr. Melissa Terlecki, assistant professor of psychology

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