Penn State protects child rapist that was former famous D-Coordinator

[darkswordsman17]

Oh, not to derail the thread, but there was an interesting article on Yahoo Sports a while back. Seems that the Red Sox had a similar situation a few decades back.

http://www.thepostgame.com/features...sex-abuse-scandal-still-inflicting-pain-today

I don't think so. They can do a near equivalent though - the death penalty is worth about 60 mil a year to PSU. Hammer their schollys enough to make them non-competitive and that will eventually hit them in the pocetbook. Bowl and TV bans also come with a financial hit, though not a big one as long as the season ticket sales are good.

Here's an idea - they can keep the football program, but they have zero scholarships and no home games for a few years. They'll get humiliated and taunted on the road over and over.

That would be a pretty good punishment.

Wrong. "The College" is made up of thousands of employees, and nearly a hundred thousand students. 99.99999% of "The College" knew anything about this. There were a small number of people in the higher ups of the university that protected him. That doesn't mean you should punish the thousands of employees who had nothing to do with it.

If the president of the USA covered up something heinous, would you dismantle the entire government and cause choas for millions of people? No, you would punish the people involved.

My knee jerk reaction is the football program should be ended, but I agree that's too harsh. I do think though that the NCAA should have already come out and said that the program is on hold/suspension until the investigations are done. They shouldn't punish them until they have a pretty complete idea of what all went on there. They [the investigations] are still on going aren't they?

My feelings overreactions are a bit of a mix between feeling the NCAA's punishments (and just overall any more) are pathetic and I think that has actually contributed to what happened, both at other schools and at Penn State, and also the heinous situation. They need to make this a major example of why this cult of personality mindset around these programs needs to stop.

 

[EagleKeeper]

I just want to see those guilty face punishment, and I don't see how cancelling a future season, after everyone who was involved was fired, achieves that at all. Explain to me how cancelling the season punishes the people involved with this.

The football program was the institution that covered up. The attitude of the system to protect at all costs.

You remove all the bad apples; sterilize the barrel and then refill.

The Penn state football program barrel needs to be sterilized first

 

[actuarial]

The football program was the institution that covered up. The attitude of the system to protect at all costs.

You remove all teh bad apples; sterilize the barrel and then refill.

The Penn state football program barrel needs to be sterilized first

Think of this from Joe P's perspective. He finds out Sandusky is diddling boys.

Scenario 1: If the Sandusky thing gets out, the NCAA will ban Sandusky for life.
Scenario 2: If the Sandusky thing gets out, the NCAA will ban PSU from playing football for a year.

Ignoring the fact that the death penalty punishes tons of people not involved, which punishment do you think is more likely to make Joe P cover up Sandusky's actions? Which do you think will make future coaches more likely to cover up the wrongdoings of subordinates?

 

[Capt Caveman]

Think of this from Joe P's perspective. He finds out Sandusky is diddling boys.

Scenario 1: If the Sandusky thing gets out, the NCAA will ban Sandusky for life.
Scenario 2: If the Sandusky thing gets out, the NCAA will ban PSU from playing football for a year.

Ignoring the fact that the death penalty punishes tons of people not involved, which punishment do you think is more likely to make Joe P cover up Sandusky's actions? Which do you think will make future coaches more likely to cover up the wrongdoings of subordinates?

Scenario 3: Paterno reports him to the authorities after his boss won't do anything. Paterno is a hero and the football program is left alone. Have a conscious and not let other boys get raped.

 

[Miramonti]

The football program was the institution that covered up. The attitude of the system to protect at all costs.

You remove all teh bad apples; sterilize the barrel and then refill.

The Penn state football program barrel needs to be sterilized first

I agree. If the powers that be of the school want to put the football program and a serial rapist buddy of theirs ahead of the welfare of children, the football program should be killed for a little while, not crippled. Fielding a team with no scholarships that will be the quality of a DII team and have them play against some of the strongest D1 teams in the nation doesn't help the players, unless putting them in the hospital is the goal.

 

[waggy]

Think of this from Joe P's perspective. He finds out Sandusky is diddling boys.

Scenario 1: If the Sandusky thing gets out, the NCAA will ban Sandusky for life.
Scenario 2: If the Sandusky thing gets out, the NCAA will ban PSU from playing football for a year.

Ignoring the fact that the death penalty punishes tons of people not involved, which punishment do you think is more likely to make Joe P cover up Sandusky's actions? Which do you think will make future coaches more likely to cover up the wrongdoings of subordinates?

OR he could have let PSU turn him in and ban the fucker from ever setting food on a campus again.

then the backlash would have been FAR FAR less then it is in either the 2 you show (or what it is going to be).

 

[bignateyk]

I agree. If the powers that be of the school want to put the football program and a serial rapist buddy of theirs ahead of the welfare of children, the football program should be killed for a little while, not crippled. Fielding a team with no scholarships that will be the quality of a DII team and have them play against some of the strongest D1 teams in the nation doesn't help the players, unless putting them in the hospital is the goal.

Bullshit. Killing the football program would have a drastic effect on tens of thousands of completely innocent people. The entire economy of State College, PA is built around the university, which has been successful in large part due to its football program.

You can make an example out of everyone involved with the incident without economically impacting tens of thousands of people who had nothing to do with it.

You're an idiot if you think killing the football program would be a wise decision.

If you want to execute Spanier, Shultz, and Curley, then by all means, go ahead, but the rest of the employees of the university who had nothing to do with it shouldn't be punished.

 

[Miramonti]

Bullshit. Killing the football program would have a drastic effect on tens of thousands of completely innocent people. The entire economy of State College, PA is built around the university, which has been successful in large part due to its football program.

You can make an example out of everyone involved with the incident without economically impacting tens of thousands of people who had nothing to do with it.

You're an idiot if you think killing the football program would be a wise decision.

If you want to execute Spanier, Shultz, and Curley, then by all means, go ahead, but the rest of the employees of the university who had nothing to do with it shouldn't be punished.

I can appreciate the concern for the local economy, not something I would want to punish. On the other hand, the school was corrupt at the highest level and there were many victims as a result, and someone they protected going to prison for the rest of his life. It's not just these individuals either as it was a culture for decades of kowtowing to paterno and the football program. Not uncommon at other schools, but this situation shows how deep their heads were buried up their @sses, including paterno's.

The punishment that Penn State gets needs to be severe. Whatever it is, it's going to set a precedent, and treating this like a school that's had numerous recruiting violations isn't the answer. While Penn State supports the local community, it also has a responsibility to them, which they already failed horrifically.

 

[actuarial]

Scenario 3: Paterno reports him to the authorities after his boss won't do anything. Paterno is a hero and the football program is left alone. Have a conscious and not let other boys get raped.

Sorry when I said 'get out' I wasn't trying to imply a cover-up was his only option. I was including Joe P reporting him as one way that it would 'get out'.

At least based on the responses in this thread I'm lead to believe that even if Joe P turned him in there would be many people still calling for severe punishment to PSU.

 

[zinfamous]

Bullshit. Killing the football program would have a drastic effect on tens of thousands of completely innocent people. The entire economy of State College, PA is built around the university, which has been successful in large part due to its football program.

You can make an example out of everyone involved with the incident without economically impacting tens of thousands of people who had nothing to do with it.

You're an idiot if you think killing the football program would be a wise decision.

If you want to execute Spanier, Shultz, and Curley, then by all means, go ahead, but the rest of the employees of the university who had nothing to do with it shouldn't be punished.

Remember that while that local economy was "booming" off of the success of the PSU football program, that success came at the expense of ~2 decades of a child rapist exploiting that local economy for his ends, and a further decade of covering this up, all while the rape continued.

There is deserving shame in State College, and as was recently mentioned here--that barrel needs to be sterilized. A 2 or 3 year loss of football is more or less necessary, I think, because this does send a message.

If a place like SMU gets their program axed due to non-criminal actions, then why the fuck should a place like PSU get off without (at bare minimum) comparable suspension of activities?

 

[edro]

Wrong. "The College" is made up of thousands of employees, and nearly a hundred thousand students. 99.99999% of "The College" knew anything about this. There were a small number of people in the higher ups of the university that protected him. That doesn't mean you should punish the thousands of employees who had nothing to do with it.

If the president of the USA covered up something heinous, would you dismantle the entire government and cause choas for millions of people? No, you would punish the people involved.

I agree.

I think all the bad press is punishment enough for the university. They have already lost a ton of recruits and no one outside of Pennsylvania will want to go there for at least 10 years.

They already fired all involved. What more can they do?

 

[edro]

Remember that while that local economy was "booming" off of the success of the PSU football program, that success came at the expense of ~2 decades of a child rapist exploiting that local economy for his ends, and a further decade of covering this up, all while the rape continued.

That's ridiculous.
They were completely unrelated.

Oh god... I can't believe I am defending PSU. (as an OSU fan)

 

[Capt Caveman]

Sorry when I said 'get out' I wasn't trying to imply a cover-up was his only option. I was including Joe P reporting him as one way that it would 'get out'.

At least based on the responses in this thread I'm lead to believe that even if Joe P turned him in there would be many people still calling for severe punishment to PSU.

If he had done that back in 1998, the number of victims may have been only a few and this incident would have been a small blip on the radar. Today, no one would probably even talk about it.

Now, you have a cover-up that has gone on for more than a decade with more victims. Lawsuits will keep this in the spotlight for a long time.

 

[zinfamous]

That's ridiculous.
They were completely unrelated.

Oh god... I can't believe I am defending PSU. (as an OSU fan)

How in the hell is it unrelated?

This rape scandal was explicitly covered up (as few have denied) to protect that very same culture of football; which was important to people's passions and (as has been argued here by those who still want to protect that culture) to defend the local economy that depends on that culture.

It is very much related. Of course I am not saying that the 99% of people in State College who were unaware of this aren't innocent, that what was going on underneath them to protect their livelihood was somehow under their purview--but that really is quite irrelevant.

I think we tend to only hear (at least at the start of all this), about those who went out to the streets to protest the legitimate demonizing of JoePa, those who harassed the father that attended a game to protest the actions of the PSU admin--we here mostly about those rabid, morally backwards fans that refuse to care about anything other than football. I think, however, there are many in State College that understand the gravity at this, that likely feel a sense of personal shame that for 2 decades, that culture was rotten to the core. Their livelihood, completely dependent on this culture, as fragile as it was if such details ever came to light, must instill a bit of self-reflective shame, no?

those in charge of the coverup new exactly what they were doing, and why they were doing it. They knew this would damage that cultural legacy, this "economy of innocents."

Why, then, give those guilty individuals exactly what they wanted by not tarnishing that culture and only meting out relatively meager punishment?

 

[waggy]

Sorry when I said 'get out' I wasn't trying to imply a cover-up was his only option. I was including Joe P reporting him as one way that it would 'get out'.

At least based on the responses in this thread I'm lead to believe that even if Joe P turned him in there would be many people still calling for severe punishment to PSU.

I don't think so.

IF he went to the police. IF they would have nailed the pedo, IF they would have come out and said "we at penn state do not condone what he has done. we will back the police in the investigation into what he has done"

i think the backlash and punishment would be far less then it is going to be.

in other words if people used common sense and ethics it wouldn't be as big a issue.

 

[Gibsons]

those in charge of the coverup new exactly what they were doing, and why they were doing it. They knew this would damage that cultural legacy, this "economy of innocents."

This.

Plus this: McQuery was a graduate assistant (basically an intern) when he first saw/reported an incident in 2001 or so. He got the big promotion to assistant coach, was this to keep him quiet? He ended up testifying for the prosecution, but I still wonder why he wasn't a little more vocal for a decade.

 

[zinfamous]

I don't think so.

IF he went to the police. IF they would have nailed the pedo, IF they would have come out and said "we at penn state do not condone what he has done. we will back the police in the investigation into what he has done"

i think the backlash and punishment would be far less then it is going to be.

in other words if people used common sense and ethics it wouldn't be as big a issue.

yep, exactly.

whenever stories like this get out--deplorable crimes, plus the cover-up--you often hear conversation that describes these events as two types of crime: the crime itself, and then the denial of the crime/the cover-up.

Which is worse?

I think all of us would agree that rape is certainly the worst aspect of this--but remember that the efforts to cover this up and deny it (if but individually and internally among those with knowledge of the crimes), led to further incidents of rape.

Not only that, the effort to hide these crimes created more criminals and only lead to this new perception of PSU as an entity that values college football over child welfare. Period. There is to be no defense of why the culture of college football should be protected in light of why it was protected here. I can't fathom that argument.


If it were simply Sandusky--the story would be vastly different. PSU simply would not be dragged through the mud as an institution (b/c of the admins and police involved) and as a sports program (because of the actions of the AD). Sandusky would have been the only one pilloried for this.

Sadly for PSU and for the residents of State College (well, those that weren't rioting on the street to defend their rape-protecting old man of a coach) and those affiliated with the university, the few real criminals in this have forever tarnished the name, and this culture--because of their actions.

It is unfortunate that this is the legacy, that those who were unwittingly "a part" of this, will forever be linked to these actions. Again--not saying that there is culpability here amongst the greater part of PSU or the town, but it is something that now serves to define the core of this culture--unfairly or not. That is the reality.

 

[preslove]

yep, exactly.

whenever stories like this get out--deplorable crimes, plus the cover-up--you often hear conversation that describes these events as two types of crime: the crime itself, and then the denial of the crime/the cover-up.

Which is worse?

I think all of us would agree that rape is certainly the worst aspect of this--but remember that the efforts to cover this up and deny it (if but individually and internally among those with knowledge of the crimes), led to further incidents of rape.

Not only that, the effort to hide these crimes created more criminals and only lead to this new perception of PSU as an entity that values college football over child welfare. Period. There is to be no defense of why the culture of college football should be protected in light of why it was protected here. I can't fathom that argument.


If it were simply Sandusky--the story would be vastly different. PSU simply would not be dragged through the mud as an institution (b/c of the admins and police involved) and as a sports program (because of the actions of the AD). Sandusky would have been the only one pilloried for this.

Sadly for PSU and for the residents of State College (well, those that weren't rioting on the street to defend their rape-protecting old man of a coach) and those affiliated with the university, the few real criminals in this have forever tarnished the name, and this culture--because of their actions.

It is unfortunate that this is the legacy, that those who were unwittingly "a part" of this, will forever be linked to these actions. Again--not saying that there is culpability here amongst the greater part of PSU or the town, but it is something that now serves to define the core of this culture--unfairly or not. That is the reality.

Very well put.

I might add, had Penn State athletics and university administration simply gone to the police when McQueary saw the rape they could have raised a lot of awareness and money for child wealfare causes. The team could have worn armbands in support of the victims, raised money from local business, and done other public measures to distance themselves from the crime. They could have used their huge presence in the college football world to do some good for victims of molestation. A competent and law abiding administration could have navigated this crisis in a way that left Penn State's reputation at "they did all they could do in this nasty situation." Instead, it is rightly perceived to have become an irresponsible public actor.

 

[momeNt]

Penn State football can use this as motivation, it's really an us against the world mentality for them. Don't be surprised if they are contending for the national championship, and in doing so show the world the fight they have in the face of adversity.

With child rape convictions and the massive cover-ups behind it, it's easy to lose sight of the importance that Penn State football plays in Pennsylvanians lives, rest assured, all the convictions and naysayers of the world abroad are just fuel to the fire in the deadly storm that will be Penn State Football in 2012!

Nittany Lions!

 

[Capt Caveman]

Penn State football can use this as motivation, it's really an us against the world mentality for them. Don't be surprised if they are contending for the national championship, and in doing so show the world the fight they have in the face of adversity.

With child rape convictions and the massive cover-ups behind it, it's easy to lose sight of the importance that Penn State football plays in Pennsylvanians lives, rest assured, all the convictions and naysayers of the world abroad are just fuel to the fire in the deadly storm that will be Penn State Football in 2012!

Nittany Lions!

It's this kind of attitude why the football program should receive the death penalty. It's this attitude that allowed Sandusky to continue to rape children.

 

[Miramonti]

I agree.

I think all the bad press is punishment enough for the university. They have already lost a ton of recruits and no one outside of Pennsylvania will want to go there for at least 10 years.

They already fired all involved. What more can they do?

AD Tim Curley is currently suspended on administrative leave.

 

[DrunkenSano]

Just because the football program affects thousands of people doesn't mean it shouldn't be killed and rebuilt from scratch. It sends a clear message out to every other program in the country that there is zero-tolerance for this kind of sick shit. So if anyone hears anything, they better report it to the correct authorities. Not shoot the news up to the guy in charge of them and brush their hands, thinking it's finished.

The people who get screwed, they can blame all those involved in covering up, form a lynch mob for all I care or better yet, file a suit against them and take them for all they've got. But a message has to be sent, one that shows that football is the most important thing in a college. People choose to invest in the football program, that is their choice, this time it crashed and burned. People invested in a lot of things in life and sometimes they crash and burn, like the housing market.

 

[surfsatwerk]

It's this kind of attitude why the football program should receive the death penalty. It's this attitude that allowed Sandusky to continue to rape children.

So we now think its a good idea to punish those whose thoughts we find objectionable? The people who allowed this to happen will have their day in court or at the very least lose their job and be held up to public ridicule.

 

[Jeffg010]

Penn State football can use this as motivation, it's really an us against the world mentality for them. Don't be surprised if they are contending for the national championship, and in doing so show the world the fight they have in the face of adversity.

With child rape convictions and the massive cover-ups behind it, it's easy to lose sight of the importance that Penn State football plays in Pennsylvanians lives, rest assured, all the convictions and naysayers of the world abroad are just fuel to the fire in the deadly storm that will be Penn State Football in 2012!

Nittany Lions!

WTF are you trolling? Putting football above all else even child rape is pretty fucked up. If this is the mentality over at Penn State then my take on all out ban on football is well deserved.

When I say that I think Penn State should get a 5 year ban on football I'm doing them a favor. It would be in Penn States best interest to take that ban instead of getting sanctions on bowl games, banning scholarships, or banning home games. If they were to let Penn State hobble year after year it will do them no good. No top recruit would ever touch Penn State again.

With a 5 year ban Penn State could start fresh with a top coach. Once they got a high level name coach they could convince top recruits that they could be starters and with a full ride might be enough to get Penn State on track. It would take the right couch to do it though.

To all the people saying that we need to think about the kids who are on the team now are fools. Penn State is going to suck monkey balls this year and putting the current players though that is not what they deserve. The current players are better off finding a new team.

 

[surfsatwerk]

WTF are you trolling? Putting football above all else even child rape is pretty fucked up. If this is the mentality over at Penn State then my take on all out ban on football is well deserved.

This is my objection with you guys. You could transplant this tragedy into a million different situations and it would have played out just the same. Why didn't somebody talk? You got priests raping alterboys, men in the Airforce raping women under their command, etc...

People make scummy awful choices to cover their own asses and lie to protect other scummy people. It happens everywhere and until we start producing a better quality of person it will continue to happen. It's not a Penn State football problem, It's a human problem.