The news has been fixated on the hunt for and capture of an escaped prisoner in Pennsylvania. A man who murdered his girlfriend in front of her young children, he sounds like a menace to society and should be imprisoned — even if I think we have too many people in prison for nonviolent crimes and the prison industry thrives on racism and torture. But it got me thinking about how much TV coverage is devoted to these spectacles and how much we prioritize individual crimes over larger, systemic crimes committed by corporations like Exxon. Darren Woods is the current CEO, who lied to Congress two years ago about decades of suppressing company research on the oil industry’s enormous contribution to global warming. Lying to Congress is an actual crime on the books. Haul him in.
Incidentally, Pennsylvania had another breakout while I was drawing this cartoon. Nine young men escaped following a riot at a juvenile facility. They have all been captured since then. I don’t know what sparked the riots, but Pennsylvania, like every state in the country, throws mentally ill people in prison and responds to their inevitable crises with violence.
Discussion ¬