Another post about OJ Simpson

Although the OJ Simpson case was huge and broadcast across America, some of us didn't know much about it until we went over it in class.  The case happened before we were even born, so there was no reason for us to have felt its impact.  Because of that, I think we bring an interesting perspective to the table. On the one hand, we don't get the emotional arguments.  We shrug our shoulders and say, "Okay, a football player killed someone.  He was a celebrity.  It was a big deal," but we have a hard time really feeling why people were so upset.  On the other hand, we can be far more neutral about the evidence presented to us.  We didn't grow up worshiping OJ Simpson, so we didn't find the murder hard to believe.  We didn't know Nicole Brown, either, so we didn't want revenge for her.  And we certainly weren't living in the immediate aftermath of the Rodney King riots, or any other major, multi-day riot.

Even now, although I intellectually understand why the case was such a big deal and why it was so divisive, I still can't entirely get why people were so mad at the jury, or why people were willing to watch only that case all day every day.  It sounds boring.  And that generation gap makes it hard for us to understand a major reference point in our society, even today.