Is this how we're supposed to post? I'm a little confused…. When I heard about the rich drunk driver boy in Texas, I quickly thought of the connection to a Tale of Two Cities. Since we don’t really have a chance to talk about these kind of things in class, I thought I’d post about it here.
For those of you who don’t know what I mean by “rich drunk driver boy in Texas”, here’s the story. Ethan Couch, a 16 year old, killed 4 people and injured 11 others while drunk driving in the summer. His sentence could have been up to twenty years in jail, but instead it was ruled for him to just have ten years of parole. You’d hope there must be a really amazing reason for this, right? Here it is: he’s wealthy.
His lawyer said he suffered from “affluenza”, aka, he never learned that things wouldn’t always work out right. He had always had all the money. He had all the cars. And how was that his fault? So it was ruled that he shouldn’t have to deal with the consequences of his actions since he didn’t know there would be consequences. But I think that this ruling encourages the idea that money still can solve all problems. Ethan couch is going to a rehabilitation “resort” in California for $450,000 a year.
Flash to A Tale of Two Cities- Chapter 7. Monsieur de Marquis sends his driver racing through the streets, and kills Gaspard’s son in the process. His first reaction to this is to buy his way out of it. He throws a few coins toward Gaspard and feels that his debt is set. Nobody really challenges him then because they know that if they were to, chances were they would end up with Gaspard’s son. But they did not actually let this go. After all, the Marquis had a knife in his chest by the next morning.
So I think this is a really interesting comparison to modern day society. Even more than two hundred years after this book is set, money still seems to be a solution to everything. But neither then nor now does money bring back those killed by recklessness of the wealthy and powerful.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteIs this how we're supposed to post? I'm a little confused…. When I heard about the rich drunk driver boy in Texas, I quickly thought of the connection to a Tale of Two Cities. Since we don’t really have a chance to talk about these kind of things in class, I thought I’d post about it here.
ReplyDeleteFor those of you who don’t know what I mean by “rich drunk driver boy in Texas”, here’s the story. Ethan Couch, a 16 year old, killed 4 people and injured 11 others while drunk driving in the summer. His sentence could have been up to twenty years in jail, but instead it was ruled for him to just have ten years of parole. You’d hope there must be a really amazing reason for this, right? Here it is: he’s wealthy.
His lawyer said he suffered from “affluenza”, aka, he never learned that things wouldn’t always work out right. He had always had all the money. He had all the cars. And how was that his fault? So it was ruled that he shouldn’t have to deal with the consequences of his actions since he didn’t know there would be consequences. But I think that this ruling encourages the idea that money still can solve all problems. Ethan couch is going to a rehabilitation “resort” in California for $450,000 a year.
Flash to A Tale of Two Cities- Chapter 7. Monsieur de Marquis sends his driver racing through the streets, and kills Gaspard’s son in the process. His first reaction to this is to buy his way out of it. He throws a few coins toward Gaspard and feels that his debt is set. Nobody really challenges him then because they know that if they were to, chances were they would end up with Gaspard’s son. But they did not actually let this go. After all, the Marquis had a knife in his chest by the next morning.
So I think this is a really interesting comparison to modern day society. Even more than two hundred years after this book is set, money still seems to be a solution to everything. But neither then nor now does money bring back those killed by recklessness of the wealthy and powerful.