MELVIN DURAI'S AMUZING LIFE
"IT'S DIFFICULT TO UNDERSTAND THE VIOLENCE"<

     Violence baffles me.

     I find myself doing my best Rodney King imitation and asking: "Can't we all just get along?"

     Can't we all just stop hurting each other? Isn't there enough pain in America from the many diseases, natural disasters and IRS audits?

     It's almost impossible to read a newspaper or watch a television news show without finding more examples of needless violence, most of them occurring off the "Jerry Springer Show."

     If it isn't a basketball player choking his coach, it's a boxer making a quick meal out of his opponent's ear.

     If it isn't a student shooting his classmates, it's two students shooting their classmates.

     If it isn't a comedian's wife turning her children into orphans, it's three racists in Texas dragging a disabled black man behind their pick-up truck and proving they're indeed part of a superior race, the fastest race to hell. At the finish line is the leader of the race, Adolf Hitler. He's holding a sign that reads, "Welcome home, boys! You'll like it here. No one here expects you to have a brain."

     Beside Hitler is Ted Bundy, who's yelling, "Hope you guys brought some tanning lotion. If you thought Texas was hot, you've got another thing coming. Your skin will turn dark so fast, you'll wonder why you made such a big deal out of skin color."

     All the violence in America makes me ask another important question: Where did all these crazy people come from? And where were they when their Nike-wearing friends were following a comet to the next level? Didn't they have enough money for the fare? Perhaps we need to do some fund raising for them. It's certainly a good cause.

     There are so many violent people, it's surprising that newspapers don't put them in a special section. We could have three inside sections: "Sports," "Features," and "Strange creatures."

     You've got to be a little crazy to commit some of these crimes. You've got to be a few croutons short of a salad.

     Thankfully, most of us are peaceful, caring folk. We feel guilty when we run over a groundhog. We feel like sending a sympathy card to the groundhog's parents. We feel like attending the groundhog's funeral.

     Some of us would rather wreck our cars than flatten a groundhog. We don't believe in killing anything, unless we can eat it. In fact, if we had to kill cows and pigs ourselves, we'd soon be surviving on salads.

     That's why we can't understand people who commit barbaric acts like the Texas murder.

     The three men almost make me ashamed to call myself a human. I'd refer to them as "racist pigs," but that would be unfair to pigs.

     These men don't deserve the electric chair or the lethal injection. They deserve something special, like a pool party with some bikini-clad alligators, or a special date in Las Vegas with Mike Tyson -- minus his mouth guard, or a romantic night on a cruise ship with Koko the gorilla.

     If they survive all that, we'll be kind to them and let them see a doctor: Jack Kevorkian.

     I hear he's quite effective.