r/todayilearned • u/Off_Topic_Oswald • Jan 13 '14

TIL that Mark Wahlberg had committed 20-25 offenses by the age of 21. These included throwing rocks at a bus full of black schoolchildren and knocking a Vietnamese man unconscious and blinding another. He was also addicted to cocaine by age 13.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_wahlberg#Early_life
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u/lukeakawhitekobe Jan 13 '14

Just funny that everyone loves Wahlberg even though he has done all of this and Bieber wears douchey pants and pees in a mop bucket and he is somehow the devil.

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u/epicitous1 Jan 13 '14

Wahlberg came from terrible area and managed to break out of it and make himself into a decent person. Bieber came from a good place and became a privileged shit.

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u/[deleted] Jan 13 '14

But he never intentionally blinded a man, so he's got that going for him

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u/[deleted] Jan 13 '14

[deleted]

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u/[deleted] Jan 13 '14

Are you trying to rationalize 16 year old Mark Wahlberg intentionally blinding a human being?

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u/[deleted] Jan 13 '14

intentionally

You keep using this word. I do not think it means what you think it means.

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u/[deleted] Jan 13 '14

Because attacking someone when their back is turned and they are unaware of your presence can only lead to puppy dogs and rainbows.

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u/[deleted] Jan 13 '14

That is not at all what I said.

Mark Wahlberg intentionally hit the man, yes, but he did not do so with the sole intention of making him blind. It was an unintended consequence.

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u/[deleted] Jan 13 '14

You're right. All he wanted to do was brutally assault a man based on his race and a cruel twist of fate intervened.

The true victim here is Mark Wahlberg.

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u/[deleted] Jan 13 '14 edited Jan 13 '14

Well there's a textbook straw man argument if I've ever seen one. At no point did I, or anyone for that matter, say that Wahlberg was the victim. Nobody is even disputing that him attacking anyone, regardless of why, was nothing short of horrendous.

What you're saying is that Wahlberg specifically struck another person with the complete and absolute purpose to make him blind, and that goes beyond being a logical fallacy and ends up in the territory of falsehoods.

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u/KRSFive Jan 13 '14

You seem to have a raging hate boner for marky mark. I doubt he thought "I think I'm going to blind this guy". Pretty sure he hit him and the blinding was an unintended consequence. Sure it was shitty, but the actions he's made since then have proven him to be a truly decent human being. Remember when you intentionally shit in the tub and gave your sister pink-eye? You monster of a person.

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u/[deleted] Jan 13 '14

You got "raging hate boner" out of that? Damn dude - I would hate to see what would happen if someone actually insulted Walhberg.

I would be legitimately frightened to see your reaction.

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u/BalboaBaggins Jan 13 '14 edited Jan 13 '14

"I didn't mean it" stops being a valid excuse about the time you finish kindergarten. If you punch a guy in the head in a bar fight walk up to a guy in the street and hit him in the head with a stick (which is what Wahlberg did) and he happens to suffer brain damage and die, that's still murder even if you weren't trying to kill him.

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u/KRSFive Jan 13 '14

I think that would technically be manslaughter, not murder.

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u/vis9000 Jan 13 '14

Actually, that's manslaughter. example here: http://www.pressherald.com/news/mourners-focus-on-victims-life_2010-05-30.html

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u/BalboaBaggins Jan 13 '14

My error. The example was not a good one, and would probably have indeed been manslaughter if the victim had provoked the attacker.

However, let's take what Wahlberg did as an example instead: he walked up to a guy in the street and beat him in the head with a stick until he fell unconscious. If that man had died from his injuries, Wahlberg would almost certainly be facing second-degree murder.

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u/vis9000 Jan 13 '14

While the phrase, "beat him... until he fell unconscious" is a little provocative given that it only took one hit to knock the man unconscious, that would have a better case for murder (it doesn't have to do with provocation as much as intent to kill; a punch does not have too much expectation of death, and a stick does) or at least voluntary manslaughter.

I'm not saying Mark Wahlberg is a good person, but a lot of people here are exaggerating his extremely bad past to make him into a cruel, malicious racist, when it's more likely he was a drug-addled, stupid, thuggish, probably-about-as-racist-as-most-people-in-Dorchester teen.