Lose a Game, Trash the City

By now, you've no doubt seen and heard the images from the riots that took place in Vancouver in the wake of the Canucks' loss to Boston in Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Finals. All across North America today most sane people are asking the same question--why did it happen (and why does it continue to happen in other places)?

The short answers are alcohol and ... the media. Media? Well, to a degree. Alcohol certainly is the biggest culprit, but there's also a segment of the population that does it because they know they'll get in the newspaper, on TV, or even better yet they may go viral on YouTube.

Consider the picture above, which has created quite a sensation since it first appeared on Esquire. The people involved, whom still haven't been identified, have become a cause celeb in the Internet world. Who are they? Why did they stop in the midst of chaos to kiss? In a perverse way, they've become as (in)famous as the couple caught kissing in Times Square on VJ Day.

This isn't one of those rants about the evils of the media in our society; rather, just a sad recognition that the world we live in today is overrun with people who want nothing more than their 15 minutes of fame.

Call me old fashioned, but I liked it much better when such attention-seekers were handled by men like former Colts linebacker Mike Curtis.