Analysis though Television

I started a blog for BF. It’s his new obsession now. I think it’s pretty funny. He’s trying to keep it under a particular theme. I tried that, but this blog became more about my life, rather than any particular insight on law school. In a way, though, I guess the people that would read this would be more interested in my life because most of the people who read it are my friends, not anyone trying to gauge the intricacies of law school through my particularly sharp wit.

On that note, I’m going to expound on some societal thoughts spurred by Criminal Procedure and Angel. Last night I was watching the second season of Angel (which is by far inferior to Buffy .)I came to the episode “A Thin Dead Line” where the youths who frequent a runaway home started by the character, Anne (who was introduced in an episode in season 2 and developed in the first episode of season 3 of Buffy) are being brutalized by local law enforcement. A few minutes into the episode we discover these cops are actually zombies cops brought back after dying on the streets. These zombies were brought back by a captain at a precinct where the crime in the area was so severe that people were either being murdered or raped every three days. After the captain brought these cops back from the dead, the crime dropped dramatically (mostly because the cops didn’t care if you were doing anything right or wrong when they started beating you). Eventually Angel discovers what’s going on, and destroys the talisman that keeps these zombies going. At the end of the episode, the detective that helps Angel out points out how much safer the area was since the zombie cops started patrolling.

This got me thinking. In America, we value the individual rights of a potential innocent so much that we will let some of the guilty go. Even though the streets were safer and crime had gone down, innocent people were still being chased and hurt. We want safer streets and neighborhoods, cops who become vigilantes (even if they are being controlled by a good-intentioned captain) are not the solution because we don’t like the idea that we could potentially be targeted ourselves.

It was funny that this idea of American government was so well explained through zombies and vampires in a WB television show.