Shocking New York Crime - Off-Topic

If you have a nanny for your children, or know someone that uses the services of a nanny, just be certain she is qualified to do the job. At VFR there is a shocking story from Manhattan's Upper West Side, analyzed with perceptive comments from readers. They speak of demonic forces at work in the world, of the envy of backward people for those more affluent and successful than they, of the sheer folly of allowing Third-World individuals with a totally different and atavistic mentality to care for wealthy American children.

There are many Iagos among us - people who are charming and liked by everyone. People who wouldn't hurt a fly. And yet who are eaten away by feelings of having been denied their due. Such people have to stand by and watch while others get what they feel should come to them. And so they snap, and commit an unspeakable act of brutality. In the case of Iago, by transplanting into Othello the seeds of his own jealousy, he allowed someone else to do the deed (and to go down in literary history as the very symbol of jealousy.)

"I follow him to serve my turn upon him:
We cannot all be masters, nor all masters
Cannot be truly followed."

"Were I the Moor, I would not be Iago:
In following him, I follow but myself;
Heaven is my judge, not I for love and duty,
But seeming so, for my peculiar end:
For when my outward action doth demonstrate
The native act and figure of my heart
In compliment extern, 'tis not long after
But I will wear my heart upon my sleeve
For daws to peck at: I am not what I am."

But whereas Iago is fully cognizant of his envy toward Cassio who got the promotion he coveted, of his hatred for Othello for not recognizing his own superior qualifications, and even of his jealousy toward Othello, who married the very young and fair Desdemona, it is not likely the Dominican nanny had the sophistication or intelligence to reason through her feelings. Rather they must have festered inside of her and risen suddenly in a thirst for blood difficult for many of us to comprehend. She may have been on drugs, but drugs are not necessary for such a psychic phenomenon to occur. She indeed was not what she was. I'm sure there will be more information in the coming days. 

One thing I learned in the public schools is that the kinder and more familiar you are with the kids, the more they hate you. They hate your kindness because in their mind you are supposed to hate them so that they can hate you. When you remove any justification for their hatred they may get even. Crazy, but true.

One last thought: Why did Shakespeare choose a Moor, instead of a European Venetian, as his protagonist? Long before O.J. there were racial divides that often proved fatal if the innocent and naive, like Desdemona, refused to see them. But besides that, did Shakespeare feel that a Moor was more readily tempted by the Devil, less able to cope with a damning rumor, despite his great physical strength on the fields of battle?