After seeing images of Giants wideout Plaxico Burress being led to a New York courthouse in handcuffs yesterday, I couldn’t help but notice that this was one of the best-dressed soon-to-be-convicts I’d ever seen. Considering this was a guy who had shot himself in the leg just days earlier, I was impressed by the sense he had to piece together a nice wardrobe as he marched to what will ultimately be remembered as the beginning of his funeral.

In the past 48 hours, Burress has been verbally assaulted left and right not for accidentally pulling the trigger on himself, but simply for owning and carrying a gun. Lots of people own guns. Lots of people carry them around in public. Some of them even fire their guns illegally. America isn’t mad at Plaxico because he owns a gun and happened to shoot it. America is mad at Plaxico because Plaxico is Plaxico, and Plaxico is a bonehead.

We are a hypocritical people. We’re especially hypocritical when celebrities are involved. Take for instance the curious case of Marvin Harrison. Harrison, for those of you who don’t know, is a future-Hall of Fame receiver for the Indianapolis Colts. Over this past offseason, Harrison allegedly brandished and fired a pistol at a bar he owns in Philadelphia. A bullet from the gun matching the one owned by Harrison struck a man in the hand. Casings matching the very same gun were found at the scene. This story was barely a blip on our radar and has yet to be solved, yet Harrison is all but innocent in the public spectrum.

Through society’s tunnel vision, Burress and Harrison are two very different people. Burress is cocky. Harrison is humble. Burress is lazy. Harrison is tireless. Burress is an idiot. Harrison is intelligent.

In reality, there are just as many similarities between the two. Both own guns. Both have had past transgressions with the law. Both have allegedly fired their guns in public.

Now to be fair, Marvin Harrison does possess a concealed weapons license, while Plaxico Burress, as we just found out, does not. So there’s always the possibility that we are discriminating against Plax because he illegally owns his weapon, while Harrison is legally entitled to tote his gun around. Of course, license or no license, publicly displaying and firing a gun is considered illegal no matter the circumstances and since both individuals have been accused of committing such an act, they are essentially on an even playing field.

Let’s face facts. Marvin Harrison is as close to a model citizen as the NFL gets. He’s quiet, modest, and plays the game hard. By contrast, Burress is everything we hate about American professional athletes. He’s brash, flamboyant, and occasionally slacks off when playing. The fact of the matter is we hardly heard anything about Marvin Harrison when he for certain got in a fight with a patron at his bar (he has already admitted to a physical altercation), and then allegedly shot that individual with a gun that he very certainly owns. Yet when Plaxico Burress allegedly shoots himself in the leg with a gun that he likely owns, the American public wants to send him to prison for at least a few years to send a message that this is not ok.

I’m not defending either one of these individuals for their actions. But here we are turning a blind eye to Harrison’s behavior, while we labor over how severely we can punish Burress. How can we justify sending a guy who committed an act of stupidity to prison for a number of years, when someone like Harrison is free to live his life without question for allegedly committing an act of outward violence? The only reason public figures like New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg want to prosecute Plaxico Burress to the “fullest extent of the law” is because Plax has had a down year, is the poster boy for “lazy overpaid athlete,” and committed an act of sheer idiocy by shooting his own damn self.

Americans should be paying more attention to teenagers involved in gang shooting deaths, like the one that happened last week at Tukwila’s Southcenter Mall, than some fool who keeps a loaded gun in his pants (literally, not figuratively). Besides being a joke, what Plaxico did is foolish and nothing more and there’s no reason he should go to prison for what he did when society will punish him for years to come for being dumb. Instead of worrying about what our celebrities are doing, let’s worry about where kids are getting their weapons, why we can’t clean up our neighborhoods, why gangs are making a resurgence, and why teenagers are being murdered. If we want to send a message, let’s forget about Plaxico Burress and start worrying about things that actually matter.