The American Life

I found the story about Julia Sweeney very interesting. What I found most compelling was that she viewed her crime as an opportunity, not a sin. I found it interesting that she thought she was further developing a person relationship with God through committing her crime. She said she thought of God as her ‘pimp’, and she was paying him off with the money she stole, which I found very odd. She made it sound as if stealing could be justified. At first she would steal in order to compensate her parking fee; this was her way of righting this injustice of having to pay for her parking. She also justified theft with the reasoning that she was using the money for good acts. She wasn’t buying drugs. She was donating money to her church, and paying off her college loans and other expenses. Even though stealing is wrong, she did not have evil intent. Her basic intention was to right a wrong not steal money from her employer. This did not change my mind about the act of robbery. It showed me a different perspective on theft, and how it can be justifiable to an individual.

In Joe’s story, I found it interesting that he felt validated from evoking terror in the individuals he robbed. He felt that it was his job to educate these individuals that life can seem perfect until something comes along and messes it up. This is how he felt when his mother died and his father started beating him. He was educating people about how the world really was and that life can go downhill very quickly. Joe’s story made me feel sympathetic. His mother dies at an early age then his father starts beating him. He went through several traumatic events that inevitably shaped his life, and the person that he became. His reasoning for robbing banks was very simple. He didn’t work and needed money. He wanted to wine and dine his friends and this was the way he did that. Also at the same time, he could educate people about life, while feeling validated at the same time. I found it very interesting that before he robbed banks, his body would shut down. Its like he knew what he was doing was wrong, and his body was trying to stop him from committing these acts. His story didn’t make me change my mind about the crime of robbery. It just reinforced the fact that people commit crimes for different reasons, and that traumatic events that occur during childhood can have a long term impact on an individual.