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Todd Bertuzzi says he’s not a mean-spirited guy. You know what? I believe him.

I’m not trying to make excuses for Bertuzzi. If he only sits out the rest of the year and the playoffs, he should thank his lucky stars. They might have tried to really make an example out of him. He got at least what he deserved for what he did.

But can we really blame him as an individual? The mainstream media is certainly doing a good job of that. But who’s really at fault? Bertuzzi is not a cause of violence in hockey, he is a symptom.

Starting at too young an age, hockey players are taught that they take care of their own, that if someone does something you don’t like, violence is an appropriate response. While Bertuzzi certainly went further than most ever do, he was simply doing what he had been taught all his life that he should do: get payback for something that happened to his teammate.

It doesn’t matter that “what happened” to his teammate was a perfectly legal play, well within the rules of the game, and it doesn’t matter how long ago it was, it doesn’t matter that the premeditated nature of the assault crossed the line. The real reason it happened was that Bertuzzi, and so many others like him, believed that “something” had to be done. And in the world of North American hockey, “something” always means violence.

Some have questioned whether this incident would have occurred if fighting were not allowed in hockey. That is a meaningless question. Bertuzzi’s assault is not the result of tolerating (even encouraging) fighting in the game. Rather, they are both symptoms of a single cause. Banning fighting today would not eliminate this type of incident (nor would it propagate it). It would take a generation growing up in the hockey world being taught that this is not acceptable behaviour. It is probably too late for players like Bertuzzi; the thought process is so ingrained in his mind that it will not ever be completely forgotten. Players in major junior, even competitive midget, are also probably too far gone to sway. All because of the deeply-ingrained culture of violence in hockey.

Should we be condemning Bertuzzi for his actions? Certainly. There are many other players who learned hockey in the same environment as he did and have never done anything like this. So he certainly had some control over his course of action. But to blame him and only him is self-defeating. By blaming him and not taking a look at the system itself, we do all hockey players an injustice. I truly believe that Todd Bertuzzi is feeling an immense amount of remorse at what happened. He certainly did not mean Steve Moore any real harm. But can you imagine the confusion that must be going through his mind now? He knows that breaking a man’s neck can simply not be justified in the name of competition. Yet he was doing what he had been taught to do, by men who told him it was what real hockey players do. He must be facing an identity crisis: by doing something that he thought was right, he did something he knows is wrong.

Some have asked, when (or if) Bertuzzi returns, will he be the same player? I certainly hope not. I hope that he will have learned from this, and will realize that violence is not an appropriate reaction. The hockey mentality of “if we can’t beat ‘em on the ice, we’ll beat ‘em in the alley” is disgusting and archaic, and needs to die. Perhaps if more players like Bertuzzi realize this, some real change can result.