Fair amount doesn't suggest equal amount. On the other hand, I have seen very LITTLE coverage of the Seattle incident since it occured. Actually, the ones >I've< seen are saying that he is being CHARGED with a hate crime.. and trust me, the levels of coverage I've seen on this PALES in comparison to the coverage given to Gibson's drunken palaver.
No offense, but its kinda silly to suddenly curse the media for giving more coverage to the actions of a celebrity than it does to the actions of a "regular person" - as if this were the first time that such a thing had ever happened and its just Mel Gibson thats being railroaded, or as if its some kind of moral judgement on the part of the media. It isn't a moral judgement, and its not just Mel Gibson - the media always pays more attention to celebrities than it does to the average person, even if that average person was a criminal. C'mon, SURELY you've noticed this, A2K. How much time did the media spend on Clinton's extramarital activities, or on Brittney Spears' 24 hour marriage, or on any other silly little thing celebrities do? You don't think there are greater sexual sins and marriage abuses in the world? Of course there are. But we are a celebrity-obsessed society, thus celebrity bumps up the news value of what would normally be a run-of-the-mill stupid act.
News headlines are not a rundown of what the world thinks is most immoral - its a list of what the media thinks people want to hear about based on past ratings and publication sales. Its a business decision - NOT a moral one.
If people choose to forgive this blatantly anti-Semitic outburst, thats up to them, of course. Personally, I've been drunk plenty of times, and I've NEVER used racial slurs or made sexist comments, nor have I ever felt any urge to. I've known drunks and been with people who were intoxicated, and I've never seen anyone express feelings of such a deeply hateful, prejudiced nature unless those feelings were rooted in some sort of preexisting prejudice. Its not as if this is the first time that Gibson has faced such charges - his father is a blatant, unrepentant Holocaust denier, and Gibson has refused to seperate himself from his dad's views in any meaningful way (when asked about it, I believe his response was "my father has never once told me a lie in my life" - not very encouraging, is it?).
Sometimes when it walks like a duck and talks like a duck, you gotta call it for what it is.....