What a difference a video makes

When the first video came out showing running back Ray Rice dragging his unconscious fiancée out of a hotel elevator in Atlantic City, we could only guess what had happened just before.

In their press appearance last May, she actually apologized, “I do deeply regret the role I played in the incident that night.”

He offered no details, although his choice of words was certainly Freudian.

Said Rice, “I won’t call myself a failure. Failure is not getting knocked down, it’s not getting up. Sorry, I just want to hit on everything.”

He meant his talking points, of course.

But the video from inside the elevator changed everything.

I’ve seen it in the movies, but I had never seen a man strike a woman for real. He decked her like it was a street fight.

It dawns on you – this kind of thing is going on off-camera every day.

Ravens Coach John Harbaugh did what he had to, “We came to the decision that we came to, to release Ray.”

Kim Gandy of the National Network to End Domestic Violence sees a silver lining in the NFL’s response, “They’re going to work to increase public awareness about domestic violence and begin to change the culture.”

But it’s not just football – It’s movies, video games, hip hop lyrics.

And we all have some skin in this.

We’re on the verge of going to war against an Islamic State that believes in locking women away to protect them from Western corruption. We can’t afford to have it appear that they’re right.