He joined the navy at 18, in 1991 - immediately after getting off the street and out of the gang.
Did you expect his transformation to be instantaneous?
Did you expect his transformation to be instantaneous?
How does one "end up" meeting with neo Nazis? He fails to take responsibility for his behavior after his hate crimes conviction!
Probably the same way that alcoholics often end up at bars.
For alcoholics their existing friends are often all alcoholics too, and to them normal people just dont "feel right" and are hard to meet when the only place you feel comfortable is a bar.
Similarly, when tryin to extricate oneself from a undesired community (toxic or otherwise) one has to learn where to meet people from the desired community, unlearn the undesired values+vernacular, learn the values+vernacular of the new community. etc.
We're herd creatures and, for many, not having a herd feels like being on the brink of death.
For one, if you happen to be in the same military unit, "meeting with them" is kind of an inevitability.
Also, this was still 30 years ago. If this is seriously the most recent example we have of him continuing to interact with neo-Nazis, then I feel like it's reasonably plausible that he's sincere barring further evidence to the contrary.
Equality through jail isn't the goal, but we'd be remiss to ignore that he's admitted to a hate crime and living a pretty full life.
It is yet another example of the cracks in the rule of law
Well come on, it takes more than being "sorry" and building companies and "trying to treat everyone equally." Nothing he mentioned, besides apparently turning snitch in some cases, is even a hint of undoing the damage he did. Said another way: one way to make amends is to at least do something, you know, like even try to walk a path, any path. It doesn't sound like he's done more than stop hanging out with some people, which, congratulations, but it's no Nobel Peace Prize material. He should strive for Nobel Peace Prize material. Again: anything.