Mendenhall Has The Runs

So apparently Rashard Mendenhall still thinks it’s 2002.

You know, when questioning who was actually to blame for 9/11 had some sort of conspiracy theory cache. In response to the celebrations over Bin Laden’s death, the Steelers RB tweeted;

“What kind of person celebrates death? It’s amazing how people can HATE a man they have never even heard speak. We’ve only heard one side…”

And about the 9/11 attacks he added; “We’ll never know what really happened. I just have a hard time believing a plane could take a skyscraper down demolition style.”

Before I get into what Mendenhall actually said I would like to propose that we have degrees of tweeting. For example news about a baby being born, a birthday, an engagement, being happy for someone, ect. can still be called Tweets. Arbitrary information about one’s day such as; going to the gym, buying some form of clothes, out to dinner or drinks, doing laundry will be known as Blahs. Anything actually sports related, which includes scores, injuries, trades, signings, and firings but does not include simple opinions from sports figures, would be Balls. News tweets would now be known as Extras. News about famous people from the mouths of famous people would be known as Spam, because it isn’t something anyone actually wants to know, but it has some interesting textures.

Then there would be a special category.  One  for when someone shoots off at the mouth with no regard for the consequences of what they are saying, or who might be affected by their comments. We would call these Runs. Not like sprints or the kind you go on in the park, but the kind that you get after eating lots of spicy Indian food.  The kind that leave marks in your boxer briefs.

This diarrhea of the mouth category brings me back to Mr. Mendenhall. Let’s for a second suppose that someone killed one of Rashard’s family members ten years ago. This is not a threat, or any sort of desire on my part to see anyone actually harmed. It is merely a useful hypothetical. The case was very high profile and someone took responsibility for the crime. Not just someone, but someone who had already, on repeated occasions tried to kill that same family member. The person who confessed had the resources, and the fanatic following, to actually get the job done.

The actual crime itself defied logic. Many scientists questioned how someone could pull off such an act. So because of this, many people argued over who actually did it. But as there is no longer the family member to ask about what really happened, the only certainty is that it did in fact happen.

The horrific nature of the crime made people question it because in our brains we just couldn’t fathom it. Mr. Mendenhall didn’t share any of these concerns because it was actually his family member who died, and none of them are going to bring them back. All he cared about was seeing justice done and feeling some sense of closure.

Fast forward to the present day and the man who claimed responsibility for the death of Mr. Mendenhall’s family has been killed. The man, who by the way is the only suspect who ever emerged in the case, had eluded capture for ten years.

But now he is gone.

Now Mr. Mendenhall can go to sleep every night, knowing that the man who killed his loved one doesn’t get to draw anymore breath. I’m sure that regardless of where he stands on the taking of human life, that this feeling would strike a chord deep down inside of Mr. Mendenhall. This emotional reaction would not be celebrating the actual loss of human life.

It would be celebrating what that death represents to him. What that death signifies to anyone who had been affected by the loss of his beloved family member.

Osama Bin Laden killed lots of people’s family members. For millions of others, especially the younger generation who were 9, 10 and 11 back in 2001, he ripped a big fat hole out of a country that they were just coming to understand.  All of those people have had to live knowing that he still walks around for ten years.

So maybe the next time Mr. Mendenhall gets the Runs, he should think about how he would have felt. That perhaps there is a time where people can celebrate what the death of a man represents to them, without it making them bad human beings.

And maybe he should remember this the next time he leaves permanent skid marks all over the internet’s undies.

—–Corey