Jackass is a fandom, right?
So obviously we all know that Ryan Dunn from "Jackass" was killed in a horrible car crash early yesterday morning. And many family members, friends, and fans are in mourning right now. But then Roger Ebert had to speak up. Needless to say, many are pissed at his insensitivity.

Sadly, I kind of figured something like this was going to happen considering the stunts "Jackass" is known for (and we all remember the "Steve Irwin had it coming" wank), but still... that doesn't excuse Ebert's words at all.

Beware the comments in the MSN article, they are just as bad as Ebert's original tweet.

ETA: I would normally agree with the comments here as well, except that the police haven't actually confirmed that he was drunk. If it turns out that that's what happened, that's one thing. But... I'd rather wait to find out the results before I agree with one side or the other.

ETA 2: Apparently Ebert has apologized to Dunn's family and friends saying he tweeted too soon. From People.com

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cleolinda
2011-06-22 01:48 am UTC (link)

what else could it be than someone having too much to drink and getting behind the wheel?

One of the comments says, "Wait for the facts before you pass judgement, OK? The picture shows him holding a drink, not drinking." That's an awfully thin hair we're splitting here.

Also, the guy saying "u think these guys couldnt handle 3 beers come on a 6 year old school girl can have 3 beers over the course of a few hours n be fine." 1) Wasn't it also three shots? 2) I'm not getting in any car that's got a six-year-old driving.

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thoms
2011-06-22 01:57 am UTC (link)

I didn't read the comments. I think I'm glad I didn't, because that one would have made me bang my head against my desk.

Yeah, there were shots as well. A friend of his said "girly shots." Which are... what? Tequila Rose? I got SHITFACED off of shots of Tequila Rose one New Year's Eve, and there's not much tequila in that. It was not pretty. I'm very glad my friends and I chose to take a cab to the bar! The fact that there were three shots involved as well, makes it worse, there's so much more alcohol in shots than in just a few glasses of beer.

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	missdaisy 2011-06-22 05:36 pm UTC (link)
	People never seem to recognize that different beers have different alcohol contents. Which most likely contributes to this sort of thinking. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	kookaburra 2011-06-22 06:27 pm UTC (link)
	And also often that they only THINK they can handle 3 beers. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	cmdr_zoom 2011-06-22 09:42 pm UTC (link)
	I c'n... can totally handle three beersh. Cuz I'm a MAN! YEAH! (Reply to this)(Parent)

	lied_ohne_worte 2011-06-23 07:08 am UTC (link)
	And there is a difference between "handling" them, in a sense of "I'm still upright, can talk coherently, won't do anything I can't remember tomorrow morning, and will probably not have a headache tomorrow morning", and between operating heavy machinery, probably in the dark, at speeds where the slowed reaction speed will be just that little bit too slow. (Reply to this)(Parent)

ekaterinv
2011-06-23 10:10 am UTC (link)

Three beers and three shots would make anyone I know incapable of driving. They might think they could drive, but they would be wrong. Even "only" three beers on an empty stomach is too much.

And no, a 6-year old girl could not have 3 beers over the course of a few hours and be fine. ARGH. This drives me nuts. I'm close to an alcoholic, and he invariably does three things: 1) lies about how much he had to drink 2) thinks he can handle far more alcohol than he can and 3) never thinks he's even the slightest bit tipsy. He did recently get black-out drunk and drive, and I'm just thankful he didn't hurt anyone. If he died in a car crash caused by his own drinking, I would not expect people to pretend he hadn't done anything wrong. In fact, I'd be the first person to say, "this is why you don't drink and drive." I'd probably put it in the fucking eulogy.

Want to be nice to people who are close to someone who drinks and drives? Fight for harsher drunk driving laws and better education about how many drinks is too many. It's a LOT fewer than people think. Stepping lightly around someone who killed himself and a passenger because he drank and then sped does not help.

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phosfate
2011-06-23 03:19 pm UTC (link)

If he died in a car crash caused by his own drinking, I would not expect people to pretend he hadn't done anything wrong.

This. I spent my formative years with an alcoholic, and the only good thing to come out of it was that he never killed anyone. Probably.

I doubt very much that anything Mr Ebert could say would hurt Mr Dunn's family as much as Mr Dunn already has, many times over.

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	athersgeo 2011-06-24 02:22 pm UTC (link)
	How many drinks is too many before driving? Any. Perhaps not in any legal sense, but certainly in every other sense you can think of. (Reply to this)(Parent)

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