Like many of you, I’ve been following the developments in the break-in and shooting at Shermans Dale Beer and Beverage. There’s something very upsetting about knowing the scene of a deadly crime first-hand. It’s a feeling I described in a column last year about the shooting of our dear friend and neighbor, Daniel Miller; how, every time we drive past the house on Warm Springs Road where Dan was shot, we get a cold chill.
Although I didn’t know Jeffrey Harless, the man who was killed during a robbery at the Shermans Dale Beer and Beverage, or Andrew Slike, the owner of the store who was recently determined to have been justified in shooting Harless in self-defense, it still felt strange to read about the incident. I know that store. I’ve bought beer there. The next time I shop there, I’m sure I’ll have that uncanny feeling I still get on Warm Springs Road.
We live in a time where news is more “interactive” than ever before. Of course, there has always been gossip. But these days, where so much news is consumed on the internet, and news organizations are keen to keep as many eyeballs as possible focused on the advertisements on their Web pages, we, as news consumers, have been invited to participate in the news ourselves, to give it shape with our opinions.
This was driven home to me in the days and weeks following Dan’s shooting. As soon as an update to the breaking story was posted on Pennlive.com, a new wave of comments would be posted by online readers.
Of course, you never knew exactly who these people were. The usernames associated with the comment were often as colorful as the posts themselves. The anonymity of the Web is a big component of its success, and also a source of some its major abuses.
In the “blogosphere,” the facts of a case aren’t terribly relevant. All that’s needed is an initial report, which becomes an excuse to air a set of prejudices.
One camp suggests that the shooter was totally justified in protecting his property. Another argues that it’s unchristian to take a man’s life over a few dollars.
Things quickly escalate to name-calling. To worry about vigilantism is to be a scum-sucking, ACLU-card-carrying Liberal with a capital “L.” To worry about protecting one’s property is to be a heartless, uneducated, gun-toting redneck.
The age-old tension between city and country rears its head. Harrisburg is painted as a latter-day Gomorrah, a city devouring itself in an orgy of drug-dealing and murder. Perry County is described as wilderness of lawless inbreds.
Politics enter the fray, highlighting the chasm that separates red and blue in this country. People disagree with each other fundamentally and passionately, but have utterly lost the ability to talk to each other without resorting to childish, ad hominem attacks.
In other words, these online forums are a perfect reflection of our political culture, where a U.S. senator feels it appropriate to shout “You lie!” in the middle of the president’s address to a joint session of Congress — and enjoys a bump in popularity among his constituents as a result.
Unfortunately, what gets lost in all the noise and anonymous internet posturing are the actual facts of a crime. We don’t yet know everything there is to know about Dan’s death. We may never know. But his was certainly not a case of home invasion by some anonymous boogie-man, the way the early bloggers would have had it.
The initial furor that erupted on the Pennlive forum in the wake of the Shermans Dale Beer and Beverage shooting was equally misguided. Some argued that Mr. Slike should have waited for the police to arrive. Others, who know a bit more about the police coverage in Perry County, argued that Mr. Slike did what any other responsible business owner would have done in response to a silent alarm.
The matter was settled by video surveillance footage from the night of the burglary, which, according to the Perry County District Attorney, established that Mr. Slike’s use of deadly force was reasonable and justified.
Most of the posters on Pennlive were jubilant to hear that news. Score one for the good guys!
Part of me feels that way, too. If a burglar were coming at me out of the dark with a hammer in his hand, I hope I’d have the resources, training, and preparation to stop him with a bullet.
On the other hand, another member of the community — however you want to demonize him for his terrible choices — is dead.
That hardly seems like cause for celebration.
This column was published in the Perry Co Times on 21 January 2010
For more information, please contact Mr. Olshan at writing@matthewolshan.com
