CRIMINAL REPORT

Name: Burress, Plaxico

Sex: Male

Height / Weight: 6’ 5” / 232

SSN: Unknown

DOB: 8/12/77

Jurisdiction: New York

Charges: Domestic Disturbance / Temporary Restraining Orders in Aug./Sep. 2008;

Accidental Gunshot Wound on 11/28/08

Although the New York Giants’ Web site reports that he “Returns home to Virginia Beach, Va., every Thanksgiving to host a dinner for the community at his alma mater, Green Run High School” — and perhaps he did — Plaxico Burress added his name to the ever-lengthening list of NFL players who disregard the laws of society last Friday night.

The list is ridiculous. Last year, it seemed that half of all players on the Cincinnati Bengals created new or added to pre-existing criminal records. Adam ‘Pacman’ Jones, who still doesn’t seem capable of getting his act together, instigated a gun fight in a Las Vegas strip club after he and his entourage “made it rain.” The most infamous NFLer of last year, Michael Vick, is now serving time for his PETA-publicized connection to a dog-fighting ring in his hometown.

While Plaxico’s self-inflicted gunshot wound may seem to pale in comparison, one can easily wonder what he meant to do with that gun. As his record indicates, just a few months ago Plaxico had a temporary restraining order — in fact two restraining orders in consecutive months — placed on him. The guy clearly has an aggressive attitude. So while he may not have intended to shoot somebody at the time that he pulled the trigger, Plaxico definitely did not mean to shoot himself, and likely had somebody else in mind for some point in the night. 

But whatever his intentions that night, a repetitive domestic disturber does not need to be running around New York city’s clubs with an entourage and a gun. Burress is just another case of a professional athlete who may be fulfilling his potential as a player, but is not fulfilling his potential as a role model.

This shortfall is of course not exclusive to NFL players by any means — basketball players are regulars regarding domestic disputes and drug charges, while those who play our heralded national pastime, baseball, have proven their disregard for their role model status by consistently cheating through steroid usage.

Nor is this shortfall exclusive to those who play professional sports. Two of the most notorious examples, Nixon and Clinton, proved that presidents often forget that they occupy the position of what might be considered the greatest potential role model in America. One step down, senators such as Ted Stevens and Larry Craig proved that congressmen, the cream of a state’s crop, can fall short of their role model responsibilities as well. Keep moving down the list, and one finds the many inept barons of Wall Street — the CEOs who, while perhaps not role models as visible as athletes and politicians, displayed that a position of power can make fulfilling one’s responsibilities a seemingly more difficult task, while making filling one’s pockets more appealing.

Granted, there are many role models in these professional categories who do fulfill their responsibilities to the admiring public, and it’s only that hearing about the scandals and stupidities of a Clinton or a Burress are much more appealing to the general public and thus the media.

Yet the sad fact is that with status, money, power, and a place in the public eye comes not only incompetence at being a role model, but often incompetence at being a law-abiding American citizen.

So what will happen to Burress, one might wonder.

Given his high salary, Super Bowl ring, and superb statistics as a wide receiver, the answer is: nothing.

Yes, Burress might receive a fine or a suspension, and will definitely miss a number of games given that he shot himself in the leg, but he will remain virtually unpunished, just like his NFL and other high-status professional peers before him.

Although this is the case, one cannot argue that it should continue to be simply because of our country’s precedent of holding those in power or other famous persons to a lesser standard than the average American citizen. If we want role models to actually serve as role models, those who fall short of the potential that their professions bring — and in fact harm society by setting lesser-than-average examples — need to be held to a higher standard than the average American.

So rather than simply publish the scandals and stupidities of these people, we need to make examples of them, while also publishing the good works of those role models who are actually fulfilling their responsibilities. We need to send them to the same prisons that non-famous Americans are sent to and we need to send them there for the same amount of time that any non-famous Americans would be sent for after committing the same transgression.

Unfortunately, as I watched football on Sunday, noticing plenty of Burress and Vick jerseys in the stands, as I recalled that Ted Stevens still received approximately half of Alaska’s votes, and as I imagined a few CEO salaries of bankruptcy-filing companies, I remained unconfident that our potential role models will ever be impelled to act as they should.