Article: The Wild Remember Johnny and Matthew Gaudreau

[Mikki Tuohy]

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[Citizen Strife]

This is such a pointless loss of life.  Both of them could have had 30, 40, or even 50 years of fun memories to share with family, friends, teammates, and fans, only for some dumbass drunk to take it away from them.  I have no sympathy for anyone who chooses to drink themselves stupid (for personal reasons I'd rather not share), and I abstain.  I hope that person gets many, MANY years for what he did.

Also, props to EA for doing a nice thing in NHL 24.  BEE Alcoholic Cola...not so much.  I heard the Jackets or NHL.com ran an internet ad about the drink with the picture of the Gaudreaus somewhere near it.  Talk about two opposing ways, right and wrong, to handle the situation.

Edited August 31 by Citizen Strife

[Citizen Strife]

*Note from above: looks like Bee Acoholic and Coors Light both paid for ads online and for radio shows respectively.  A Columbus talk show host had to address it, saying upper management forced the issue on them*

Like...good god.  For one day, could companies decide not to be classless?  Probably could answer my own question.

[Protec]

Nobody is guaranteed another day in this world. Sad thing, avoidable perhaps and certainly negligent of the driver.

Good reminder for people to stop and think about the things beyond your day to day, or distractions that consume our thoughts & time.

Pray for the families. No winners in the aftermath of these things. At the same time, plenty of lesser publicized tragedies every day.

Be safe out there boys, and don't hesitate to ask the eternal questions. Life is short.

God made a way for all sinners.

[mnfaninnc]

Something has got to be done about people choosing poorly. It seems like the system is set up more to forgive the criminal actions and treat them as some kind of victims than seeing the actual victims get justice. 

It works this way throughout as the actual criminal here was the alcohol, or in a shooting, the actual criminal was the gun. When do people get accountability for their poor choices? Alcohol doesn't poor itself down your throat, guns don't automatically pull their own triggers. Cars, at least now, don't drive themselves into bicycles. 

For some reason we don't want to charge people for being or doing stupid things. In this case, the guys whole life should be stripped from him and given to the victim's families and he'd also have a judgement against him. His small stipend for making license plates would also be given to the families. And this isn't just because the Gaudreaus are celebrities, when you wrong someone because you made stupid choices, there should be some restitution. 

[Sam]

2 hours ago, mnfaninnc said:

Something has got to be done about people choosing poorly. It seems like the system is set up more to forgive the criminal actions and treat them as some kind of victims than seeing the actual victims get justice. 

It works this way throughout as the actual criminal here was the alcohol, or in a shooting, the actual criminal was the gun. When do people get accountability for their poor choices? Alcohol doesn't poor itself down your throat, guns don't automatically pull their own triggers. Cars, at least now, don't drive themselves into bicycles. 

For some reason we don't want to charge people for being or doing stupid things. In this case, the guys whole life should be stripped from him and given to the victim's families and he'd also have a judgement against him. His small stipend for making license plates would also be given to the families. And this isn't just because the Gaudreaus are celebrities, when you wrong someone because you made stupid choices, there should be some restitution. 

First of all, let me start off by saying how sad this situation is. I think you’re preaching to the choir when it comes to gun control.

[Imyourhuckleberry]

A tragic loss for the family and friends as well as the hockey community.

Also empathize it bit for the driver who had been in front of the guy involved in the accident. They were cautiously giving the bikers space on the side of the road only to watch helplessly as some awful driver does the unimaginable.

Even though it's not their fault, they may always wonder if somehow they could have done something differently as the events of this horrific night replay over and over again in their minds for the upcoming months and years.

The guy going to prison for 10 years won't help with the feeling of loss, but that little bit of justice maybe eases the painful burden slightly for the loved ones who feel that void in their lives every day.

It is touching to hear of the heartfelt messages of remembrance and support from the hockey community. Johnny and Matthew, may you rest in peace.

[Dean]

I feel for the families. Especially the kids that will grow up without their fathers . It just makes me sick to my stomach.  I lost mine when I was young and it never goes away. Just a terrible stupid thing to happen . Yeah life is short and life isn’t fair. It seems to me the good go to early.  Getting older and past the young invincibility, Ive learned to be  thankful everyday for the people in my life and try to show it with kindness.  I’ve had a lot of death in my life and sports is my healthy escape.  
    I’m hard on the wild in past few years because I did the 20 years of rah rah  and I don’t have 20 more years . It would be so nice to go to a Stanley cup game in minny in my lifetime. 
   Anyways it’s not about me but those families. An I feel terrible for them. I hope those kids have a great support system to grow up and make their dads proud! 

[mnfaninnc]

17 hours ago, Sam said:

I think you’re preaching to the choir when it comes to gun control.

Well, I wasn't going for a gun control message, I was going for a personal responsibility message.

I get that biking on roads can be pretty dangerous. Around my neighborhood, we have a few bike lanes being built, but most of the 45mph roads don't have them and we don't have a lot of shoulder room. When I was younger and biked with my kids, sidewalks were for pedestrians only, bikes were to be on the road. That was a death wish. We took the sidewalks, better to be alive with a ticket then dead complying with stupid laws. 

Today, so many people are on mental health meds, and opioids that qualify as DUIs. Most don't even realize that they are impaired. But, again, this is not an opioid crime, or mental health meds crime. This is a crime from a real person who ingested whatever form of mind altering substance and then chose to drive an automobile. Not only does it affect response times, it also affects decisions and temperament. Yeah, sometimes a cab or Uber is your best decision!

But, in today's criminal justice system, it is typically the substance that is blamed, not the individual who took it. They get off with a slap on the wrist while a family has to deal with tragedy(s). My point with the guns was they view this the same way, it was the gun who killed the person, not the guy pulling the trigger. Years ago, they were vilifying the SUV as some sort of predatory vehicle too, instead of the guy driving it. 

When we make people less responsible for their actions, and blame the tool they use more than them, we get a society where people can do a lot of dumb stuff and just get away with it, kind of like what happens today, and which may likely happen in this horrible case. Was this the driver's first time doing this? Was he a repeat offender? Was it his 7th time? Most of the coverage will be on the Gaudreaus during this time, very little will be on the drunk driver, but he needs to be investigated and at the very least be held up to public shaming. 

MN has(d) very nice shoulders on the roads during biking season that made it much safer to bike on. You needed it for the winter when plowing the snow. We don't have that same thing in Carolina, some roads have no shoulder at all making biking really dangerous. It's really expensive to widen the roads, especially existing ones and nobody has any patience to wait while road crews widen a road 5 feet for bicycling. One would think the new roads would have that, but in rural NC, I'm not really seeing that as a priority. Perhaps we need to rethink these things?