Penn State Pedophile Controversy

[Saint Cy of JFC]

South Park did a lot of lame pen state jokes

South Park has been terrible the past couple of years.

 

[LogGrad98]

It's more complicated than that. I've recently read an admission from a soldier who was trained to react a certain way once a fire fight began. The first time he encountered enemy fire, he did not act the way he was supposed to. Shock does quite a number on decision making.

I'll use an analogy. Say you come across someone who just as you see him, shoots another person. I'm sure the immediate thought would be one of two things, get the hell out of there, or stop the gunman. I highly doubt the first thought would be of the victim, and stopping the gunman is probably not the reaction most would have.

The difference in this case is that there's no immediate threat to the witness, but the shock remains the same. While not holding a gun, Sandusky had an aura of power within the Penn State football family, so confronting the man was the less likely of the two actions McQueary had.

Once the shock wore off is when the wheels start turning. Think of it this way, by the time McQueary came to his senses, Sandusky and the kid were likely long gone. Had McQueary called the police and reported the incident, he would have had no way of proving Sandusky assaulted the kid, as McQueary didn't recognize the boy and Sandusky sure wouldn't have offered his name. I'm willing to bet that McQueary thought people in and out of Penn State would just see the accusation as some GA trying to make a name for himself by targeting a revered figure of Penn State, so he called his father for advice, and was advised to go up the chain of command and report the incident to the head coach, which he did.

I just don't think the original witness has nearly as much culpability as those with power and influence who swept the whole thing under the rug and hoped it would never see the light of day again.

Well said. I think there would also be the very human reaction to not believe your own eyes to a certain degree. Walking in on something like that would simply not compute for most people. My sister-in-law walked in on her husband and his mistress, naked and engaged in the act standing in front of their bed. She was understandably shocked and it took her a long time to admit she had seen what she saw (he admitted it so we did not wonder if she was crazy), she just didn't want to believe she had seen it. I imagine a similar reaction would be reasonable in those circumstances with McQueary. Shock and the inability to immediately believe his own eyes would explain very well why he reacted the way he did.

Absolutely no excuses for everyone that was notified. They should have acted immediately.

 

[kwb]

People also need to realize that McQuery just didn't walk in on some random guy doing what he was doing. He knew the man for years and was even coached by him. Not giving the guy a pass but I can understand why he reacted the way he did. It would be a very rough situation to be in when you know the pervert and have looked up to him.

 

[NUMBERICA]

Unfortunately I did read all 23 pages of the GJ report. There is no mention that McQueary told Joe he witnessed a rape

You're right. Accoring to Paterno himself, he reported that Sandusky ONLY did "something of a sexual nature with a young boy" in the showers.

But let's be real:
1) Rape certainly falls under such a definition. Even if it's not anal intercourse specifically, are people really going to split hairs about this?
2) All indications point to Paterno being full of ****. McQuery reported to Schultz and Curley (whom Paterno directly reported to on this matter, and the only known person this was ever mentioned to) that a 10-year was being anally raped in the showers. Why would McQuery tell Paterno anything different?

I really believe the only way you can believe this "horsing around" non-sense is if you've already made a judgment of a person's character beforehand. I have no doubts that Paterno knew the full extent, and I have no doubts that he tried to not to.

 

[Craig K. Manscill]

Well, don't forget that Paterno was there when the event happened, he was the one that ran down to tell the authorities when the time arose. So don't tell me that he can't be innocent, the writing's on the wall. If Paterno had unleashed the wet towel, this would have never happened, which is sad, but true. Sandusky should just smile his pedophile smile and clutch on the jail bars lining his window, staring into the moonless night. That's how I know he's guilty, anyway.

- Craig

 

[candrew]

You're right. Accoring to Paterno himself, he reported that Sandusky ONLY did "something of a sexual nature with a young boy" in the showers.

But let's be real:
1) Rape certainly falls under such a definition. Even if it's not anal intercourse specifically, are people really going to split hairs about this?
2) All indications point to Paterno being full of ****. McQuery reported to Schultz and Curley (whom Paterno directly reported to on this matter, and the only known person this was ever mentioned to) that a 10-year was being anally raped in the showers. Why would McQuery tell Paterno anything different?

I really believe the only way you can believe this "horsing around" non-sense is if you've already made a judgment of a person's character beforehand. I have no doubts that Paterno knew the full extent, and I have no doubts that he tried to not to.

Forget about 2002, Paterno knew about this guy back in 1998 - that's why Sandusky "retired" despite having the best defensive squad in the country.

 

[NUMBERICA]

Forget about 2002, Paterno knew about this guy back in 1998 - that's why Sandusky "retired" despite having the best defensive squad in the country.

Touche.

 

[vslice02]

Numberica,
Fair enough. As always I respect your opinion and you make logical assumptions a majority of the country would agree with.

My personal feeling is that the grand jury report left behind some substantial gaps regarding Paterno - which is logical to me as the objective of the supposedly "sealed" report was to convey details supporting the indictment of Sandusky, Curley, and Shultz.

I'm confident once things unfold, Paterno's efforts in response to the 2002 incident will be viewed in a much more positive light, and that much of the outrage directed at Joe should have been aimed at the school's administrative officials. And if that's not the case I will be back here to eat crow.

 

[moevillini]

...I'm confident once things unfold, Paterno's efforts in response to the 2002 incident will be viewed in a much more positive light, and that much of the outrage directed at Joe should have been aimed at the school's administrative officials. And if that's not the case I will be back here to eat crow.

I would like to agree with you, but yesterday's Wall Street Journal pointed out some things that I find especially troubling

https://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204443404577052073672561402.html

STATE COLLEGE, Pa.—Legendary Penn State football coach Joe Paterno clashed repeatedly with the university's former chief disciplinarian over how harshly to punish players who got into trouble, internal emails suggest, shedding new light on the school's effort to balance its reputation as a magnet for scholar-athletes with the demands of running a nationally dominant football program....


In an Aug. 12, 2005, email to Pennsylvania State University President Graham Spanier and others, Vicky Triponey, the university's standards and conduct officer, complained that Mr. Paterno believed she should have "no interest, (or business) holding our football players accountable to our community standards. The Coach is insistent he knows best how to discipline his players…and their status as a student when they commit violations of our standards should NOT be our concern…and I think he was saying we should treat football players different from other students in this regard."

The confrontations came to a head in 2007, according to one former school official, when six football players were charged by police for forcing their way into a campus apartment that April and beating up several students, one of them severely...

...In 2004, after several incidents involving football players, Mr. Paterno told the Allentown Morning Call newspaper that the players weren't misbehaving any more than usual, but that such news was now more public. "I can go back to a couple guys in the '70s who drove me nuts," he said. "The cops would call me, and I used to put them in bed in my house and run their rear ends off the next day. Nobody knew about it. That's the way we handled it."

...In August 2005, Mr. Spanier, the university president, suggested that Dr. Triponey meet with Mr. Paterno. Athletic director Curley, assistant athletic Director Fran Ganter and Joe Puzycki, the assistant to Dr. Triponey, also attended the Aug. 11 meeting, according to two people knowledgeable about the meeting. Mr. Paterno loudly criticized Dr. Triponey at the meeting for meddling, these people say.

The following day, Dr. Triponey sent an email to Messrs. Spanier, Curley and Puzycki summarizing the meeting and sharing her thoughts and concerns. In the email, which was reviewed by The Wall Street Journal, she said that football players were getting in trouble at a "disproportionate rate" from other students, often for serious acts. She said her staff had tried to work with the athletic department, sometimes sharing information, but that whenever her department initiated an investigation into a football player, the phones lit up. "The calls and pleas from coaches, Board members, and others when we are considering a case are, indeed, putting us in a position that does treat football players differently and with greater privilege."

In 2007, as many as two dozen players broke into an off-campus apartment, sparking a melee that captured headlines and prompted the police to file criminal charges against six Penn State football players. "Pretty much the entire Penn State defense broke in and started swinging bar stools and stuff," says John Britt, then a third-year criminal-justice major who was beaten up in the incident. Mr. Britt says he took a beer bottle to the back of the head—and that players apparently continued to beat him after he'd lost consciousness. (Now 25, Mr. Britt serves warrants for state court in Philadelphia.)

Dr. Triponey's department began an inquiry. According to a Penn State employee's record of the proceedings, Mr. Spanier was involved in at least nine meetings with representatives of the judicial-affairs department, and Mr. Paterno was involved in at least six.

In a meeting with Messrs. Paterno and Spanier and others, Dr. Triponey complained that the players were stonewalling her and suggested that Mr. Paterno ought to compel them to be truthful, according to one person familiar with the meeting. Mr. Paterno angrily responded that his players couldn't be expected to cooperate with the school's disciplinary process because, in this case, they would have to testify against each other, making it hard to play football together, these people say.

In the end, police dropped many of the charges against the players, and two pleaded guilty to misdemeanors. The school's inquiry led to four players being suspended for a summer semester. They did not miss any games...

the bolded part reminded me of what you hear in military or police forces, the idea that you can't rat-out your co-worker because you have to trust them implicitly. I don't care for that attitude in those situations, but at least I can see that those are folks involved in potentially life-threatening situations with their colleagues - - but football players?

come on now....

 

[gregbroncs]

Numberica,
Fair enough. As always I respect your opinion and you make logical assumptions a majority of the country would agree with.

My personal feeling is that the grand jury report left behind some substantial gaps regarding Paterno - which is logical to me as the objective of the supposedly "sealed" report was to convey details supporting the indictment of Sandusky, Curley, and Shultz.

I'm confident once things unfold, Paterno's efforts in response to the 2002 incident will be viewed in a much more positive light, and that much of the outrage directed at Joe should have been aimed at the school's administrative officials. And if that's not the case I will be back here to eat crow.

You have more confidence than me. I tend to think the more that comes out the worse Penn state and Joe Paterno are going to look. We already know what the bare minimum is he could have known and his reaction was irresponsible bordering on criminal. If any more comes out regarding what he knows I see no way it can make him look better. But there is a whole ton of room for this guy to look much much worse.

 

[vslice02]

I would like to agree with you, but yesterday's Wall Street Journal pointed out some things that I find especially troubling

https://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204443404577052073672561402.html

Yeah I read that article. When put in that light it doesn't reflect postively but I could also paint it in the light of a disgruntled ex-employee piling on. One of her big disagreements was she wanted to suspend LB Dan Connor because he made prank phone calls to a former assistant coach. After that incident in the spring of 2005 - a sentiment grew around Penn State that she was willing to go overboard in order to put her own stamp on the way things were done. In addition to ratting out teammates, the stone-walling in '07 was partially due to the fact that whatever they said, they knew Triponey would use it against them. Another one of Paterno's concerns was reporting off-campus incidents to the campus disciplinary committee and including extra-curricular activites in sanctions. The leaked email (not the article) points out that Penn State was one of only 2 schools in the Big10 to take that approach.

I find this all ironic - because for those who followed PSU football closely - the prevailing notion often was that Joe Paterno was too hard on his players when it came to disciplinary matters. The article conveniently failed to mention that also in 2007 Paterno dismissed two of his best defensive players (starting DT's Phil Taylor and Chris Baker) from the team for a non-criminal incident that occurred off-campus that summer - much to the dismay of their teammates as well as several assistant coaches. Phil Taylor went on to become a 1st-round draft pick out of Baylor and Baker is currently w/the Redskins. In 2003 Paterno kicked Maurice Humphrey - his best (and practially only competent) WR off the team after being charged w/assualt. In the 90's he suspended star WR Joe Jurevicius multiple times (including the Citrus Bowl) for failing to meet acedemic requirements. Just last year he sat a player for the entire season for not meeting his academic standards (not the school's or NCAA requirements - requirements Joe Paterno set for the kid). Joe forces his younger players to live in regular dormitory apts so they are forced to interact with all students, not isolated as football players. Incidents involving alcohol that aren't even blinked at at other universities result in multi-game suspensions at PSU.

You coach 50 years there's going to be some incidents (not an excuse - more of a fact) but IMO criticizing Paterno for player-discipline of all things is laughable.

 

[Darkwing Duck]

Academic requirements and sanctions DO NOT equal disciplinary actions based on the overall student body. The picture YOU'RE painting, Vslice, is that you believe Paterno knew best on how everything related to the football program should be handled, and no other disciplinary body should have interfered, means that there is absolutely NO way Paterno could not have known about Sandusky's indiscretions going as far back as at least the '90s, and he did absolutely nothing of influence to stop the man from continuing to assault boys. This is tacit approval, and should be treated as such.

 

[Gyp Rosetti]

Numberica,
Fair enough. As always I respect your opinion and you make logical assumptions a majority of the country would agree with.

My personal feeling is that the grand jury report left behind some substantial gaps regarding Paterno - which is logical to me as the objective of the supposedly "sealed" report was to convey details supporting the indictment of Sandusky, Curley, and Shultz.

I'm confident once things unfold, Paterno's efforts in response to the 2002 incident will be viewed in a much more positive light, and that much of the outrage directed at Joe should have been aimed at the school's administrative officials. And if that's not the case I will be back here to eat crow.

No matter what's revealed, Paterno's most to blame. He's the most powerful person on that campus. It's not even close. Hell, he may be the most powerful person in the state, even moreso than the governor, yet when nothing was truly done about Sandusky, he did ****. He had the power and did nothing good with it.

 

[LogGrad98]

They need to take care of this guy the same way they welcomed Lysander onto Hyperion's team in Immortals. Then finish him off in the burning bull.

 

[bigb]

He's the most powerful person on that campus. It's not even close. Hell, he may be the most powerful person in the state, even moreso than the governor

And that is probably the root of the problem. IMO, it seems that he came to believe he was the "end all, be all" for everything and everybody needed to stay the hell out of his way.

 

[moevillini]

And that is probably the root of the problem. IMO, it seems that he came to believe he was the "end all, be all" for everything and everybody needed to stay the hell out of his way.

plus the idea of the "brotherhood of the team" or whatever you want to call it, and the fact that it was more important to keep the brotherhood intact - - that kind of mentality might be OK if it's a matter of making prank phone calls or shooting arrows through windows, but the idea can be taken too far - - as it was in this situation.



anyhow, in a very weird case of foreshadowing, my youngest son and I watched a very bad, yet campy and compellingly creepy 1993 movie "The Crush" with Alicia Silverstone as a very precocious and disturbed 14 year old with a major crush on the 28 year old writer renting her parents coach (no pun intended) house. At one point in the story, the protagonist is accused of criminal sexual assault of a minor after she falsely claims he forced himself on her. And strangely enough, in several scenes just before he's arrested, he's wearing a Penn State sweatshirt!

 

[moevillini]

taking this in a slightly different direction...

https://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203802204577066233328186376.html

...Every generation or so, a scandal emerges that not only exposes the flaws of an institution but shakes entire industries to their foundations. For higher education, that scandal should be Penn State.

The unfolding events of the Penn State sports scandal show a major university that has been more interested in protecting itself than in educating students or serving the public. The institutional reckoning must begin and end with the governing board. It is responsible for the actions of university leaders, and its members owe taxpayers and students accountability and transparency....

I thought this was a good editorial, it's more focused on the educational climate in high education, and misplaced priorities, but the way the whole Penn State incident seems to be represented simply as a case of a university trying to protect it's reputation seems a little misguided to me.


I'm not saying that Penn State (or any other university or institution) is/was not concerned with protecting their reputation - most definitely they are. But I also think that it's very wrong to think that was the only reason that these allegations were kept on the down-low. I think the specific nature of these allegations are particularly uncomfortable for everyone to acknowledge. Had it been a situation of a coach doing something like providing alcohol to underage players or other more "acceptable" unacceptable behaviors, it would have been much easier to confront the coach, and/or acknowledge the wrong-doing.

But because in both the Penn State and Syracuse situation, the transgressions involved something people may feel extremely uncomfortable about, that makes it more likely that things will be swept under the rug. Or discounted as being something other than what they are. I think a lot of it has to do with either discomfort or uncertainty over issues related to homosexuality, particularly conversations pertaining to one's own personal sexual preferences - particularly if those preferences seem to be outside the realm of what most might consider "normal"

What I'm saying here is that it needs to be looked at not just as a Penn State issue, and certainly not just as an issue of an institution trying to protect it's reputation, but as an issue where we as a society need a vocabulary and training to be able to discuss our fears/suspicions.

 

[Marty McFly]

I don't need to comment at all on this story since everyone already knows how much of a **** fest it is. The thing I'm worried about is how many more schools have this kind of thing going on? If this happens at a college, what about high school, jr. high and elementary schools? Holy ****.

 

[bigb]

I don't need to comment at all on this story since everyone already knows how much of a **** fest it is. The thing I'm worried about is how many more schools have this kind of thing going on? If this happens at a college, what about high school, jr. high and elementary schools? Holy ****.

Ever heard of this guy named SalmonHobo?











OK, that's probably not funny.

 

[NUMBERICA]

Ever heard of this guy named SalmonHobo?











OK, that's probably not funny.

...







That's at least a little funny.