That’s the video from U2 ft. Green Day, a cover of the original song from The Skids. The video depicts the aftermath of catastrophe Katrina on New Orleans, with all the flood and destruction left, resulted in food and medical shortage, and so it shows how the people were in dire need of aid as soon as possible. Then, the video shows how the army sent to Iraq was redeployed to aid the suffering New Orleans, with the military personnel were given name “the saints”. The video ends the tale with letting the audience see “Not as seen on TV” sign while the vehicles fading to nothingness. Intriguing, isn’t it?
I am very interested at “The Saints” part. We can see that the title was given to the modern “men-at-arms”, soldiers with great strength and power, wielding fatal devices and controlling deadly arsenals, capable of putting many lives to end, or as the video has shown, are also capable of saving lives. They are entrusted with that power because they are “saints”, seen as perfectly wise and presumed will use the power for the greater good. But as the video showed: “Not as seen on TV”, it can also be translated as “Not as imagined”, it is possible that reality is in contrary to what we hope. There is no “saints”, not in this term. Everybody has flaws and misjudgments are not something extraordinary. There is a very great risk on putting deadly power on human and expecting that person to act for the good of all. It is possible the power will be used to harm unjustly whether deliberately or not.
Now, the issue of whether death penalty should be used or not, in my opinion, is not different. Should we entrusted judges with the power to legally terminate lives? Can we trust them enough with it? As we’ve seen before, there is no “saints”. It is possible for judges, as they are humans, to make mistakes, and lives would be the cost. Can society accepts that cost?
Anton World 