Joe P Scapegoat?

Colleges and Universities A-Z Penn State
21

<p>

The presumption by anyone that this was ever the case is an insult to everyone who has ever gone to a school with a famous athletic team.</p>

<p>

The two are never fully seperable, especially when at some level (encompassing Spanier and Schultz at a minimum) the academic and athletic departments fall under a single bureaucracy and are all considered targets for lawsuits. For the people involved in the coverup, it was not possible for any such damage to NOT be damage to THEM personally.</p>

<p>

If Penn State is willing to damage the local economy, kick a hundred of student-athletes off scholarship, lay off hundreds or thousands employed by the athletic department, all because there were a few people who did something horrible, what does that say about them then? Do you really think that this type of coverup is so intrinsically tied to sports that it would not have happened elsewhere? Have you ever read the news before?</p>

22

<p>Cosmicfish: I think many Universities with famous athletic programs struggle with this. I am an Indiana alum. Indiana certainly struggled with this with Bob Knight. There were times that it felt as if Bob Knight ran the University. In actuality he never had the power at IU that Joe Pa apparently had at PSU. Nonetheless I agreed with Bob Knight’s dismissal. The primary purpose of a University is education. If the famous athletic program undermines the educational purpose then the priorities of the University are out of whack. That appears to be what happened at PSU for approximately 15 years. If that is an insult, so be it. I believe that all universities with famous athletic programs should be on the lookout for this.</p>

<p>Too bad that the local economy, the student-athletes, and the employees of the athletic department were connected to such a flawed program. I just don’t believe in maintaining a flawed product because of the collateral damage which would be caused by fixing the flawed product. Your statement is just another example of the thinking which allowed this to go on for 15 years. In your mind, Penn State football is too big to fail.</p>

23

<p>

I do not think that anyone denies or denied that Paterno had tremendous power over the athletic department (although I would argue that most coaches have more power than they actually use), but I am not aware of any manner in which his power extended out over the rest of the university. I had some football players in my classes, starters and future NFLer’s, and I never saw them getting any undue benefits other than tutors provided by the program (as opposed to the tutors available for free to the rest of us). </p>

<p>

In what way did this happen? What classes, courses, majors, research programs were undermined by the football program? Other than students who skipped out on doing homework to go to a game (and who paid the price for doing so!)?</p>

<p>

I am not sure it is an insult because I am honestly not sure what you are saying - yes, there are a lot of people who idolized Paterno, but I am not sure how ANY of that actually impacted academics. Please explain, so that I can be insulted.</p>

<p>

No, I just see no advantage in allowing it to do so. The people who directly contributed to the problem are losing their jobs and/or going to jail. The people who indirectly contributed have been shamed and/or embarassed. The people who are just trying to make a living or go to school should also lose out? Even though doing so will not actually change anything? Are there still people who have not gotten the message that this sort of crap is not acceptable? Do you think that killing the program will somehow make people more vigilant?</p>

<p>If anything, killing the program will send a wide and clear message - that when we all wanted to tell those janitors “no, you should tell about the crime you witnessed and you won’t get hurt” that we would have been lying. It will send the message that if you witness this sort of abuse you should keep quiet or you, your friends, your family, everyone associated with the program are going to lose their jobs - when it comes out. So better keep quiet and act like you didn’t hear anything, at least until everyone you know has a new job.</p>

24

<p>Cosmicfish: You don’t see damage to the entire University as a result of this scandal? Had the parties in the know acted earlier as they should have, they could have limited the damage. There is no question that the well-being of the football program was deemed more important than the well-being of children and the well-being of the University as a whole.</p>

25

<p>

Of course I do. What I don’t see is how killing the football program provides a benefit greater than the cost of doing so.</p>

<p>

And saved some kids, yes.</p>

<p>

A long time ago, I was hired to do business-to-business sales, a job I was able to stomach for about 3 weeks. When they instructed me on their sales tactics (which I found repugnant), they pointed out something that I have almost always since found true - most executives do not act in the best interests of their company, they act in their OWN best interests WITHIN the company! And this is what happened here. All of the individuals involved had a personal stake in keeping this quiet - Spanier was responsible for the university, Schultz for crimes committed on campus, Curley and Paterno for the football staff - and therefore all had personal reasons to want to keep this quiet.</p>

<p>The fact that it happened in the football program was more of a factor in some of the lesser decisions - the janitors, McQueary, etc. The only way to ensure that this never happens at higher levels is to eliminate college athletics entirely - not at PSU, but everywhere, because as long as there are academic executives over the athletic department (as there always are) those executives will have incentive for covering the problems of that department. Killing it PSU alone just encourages future cover-ups.</p>

26

<p>Even if they wanted to cover things up, the least they could have done was to fire Sandusky, and not keep him around to commit further bad acts.</p>

27

<p>

Actually, they could not have - he was already on his way out the door when the first allegation occurred (the one that was investigated by the local DA but never prosecuted), and was no longer a university employee for the second set. The true crime of the cover up (to me) is that preventing him from abusing other kids would have been impossible and seemingly unjust without revealing what they knew… which they were patently unwilling to do.</p>

<p>So they could cover up the crimes that had already been committed, or they could stop future crimes. Doing both would have required killing Sandusky, and then covering THAT up, which I would agree would still have been a superior solution, if harder to pull off. But firing him was never part of the solution.</p>

28

<p>cosmicfish: As is usually the case, it was the cover-up which was most damaging to the university. Had this been reported early it would have been primarily a Jerry Sandusky scandal, with some collateral damage to the football program and the university. Nobody would be talking about the death penalty. Because it was covered up for 15 years more damage was done to more kids and more damage was done to the University. I fail to see how coming down hard on a culture which allowed this to go on for 15 years encourages future cover-ups.</p>

29

<p>I don’t know if it is true or not, but about six months ago I saw a story on TV about someone, perhaps even a District Attorney, who mysteriously disappeared and has never been found. There was speculation in that news report that perhaps he had learned about the scandal.</p>

<p>Anyone happen to know anything more about that???</p>

30

<p>

I agree 100%</p>

<p>

Because defining the scope of that culture is difficult. Do you really think that every janitor and secretary and even assistant coach would cover this up because they idolize PSU football? They wouldn’t - for a lot of them, it is just a job, and I know that because I know some of these people. But a lot more would cover it up to protect their job whatever it was. Kill the football program, and yes, you do punish everyone who idolozed PSU football so much that they would overlook child abuse (which is who, exactly? I have never met such a person) but you also punish those who did nothing wrong, would do nothing wrong, and now see that the janitor who was the first witness of Sandusky’s abuse did the right thing - keep quiet, say nothing, and keep your job until you retire. Speak up and they kill your department and put you out of work.</p>

31

<p>[Ray</a> Gricar - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia](<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ray_Gricar]Ray”>Ray Gricar - Wikipedia)</p>

32

<p>

Welcome to State College! Ray Gricar was the DA, he did disappear mysteriously, and there is conflicting evidence about why/how he did so. On one hand, as a DA he certainly had enemies. On the other hand, he appears to have researched “how to disappear” on his own computer at home. It is a big mystery - speculate all you want, people have been looking for the truth for years and the timing makes little sense with regards to the Sandusky case (he vanished in 2005).</p>

33

<p>Cosmicfish: You are missing the point. Had this been nipped in the bud, had the janitor reported what he saw, the damage would have been limited and we would not be talking about the death penalty. We would not be talking about the janitor’s job. Coming down hard on the program would actually encourage whistle-blowing - report it before it gets out of hand. That said, whistle-blowing is always a difficult thing to do.</p>

34

<p>Joe P proved to be lower than pond scum, he’s a joke, a hypocritre and a liar. The only solace is he knew it was all gonna blow up before he croaked, now he’s with Bin Laden in the pits of hell.</p>

35

<p>[The</a> woman who stood up to Joe Paterno - CNN.com](<a href=“http://www.cnn.com/2012/07/15/us/triponey-paterno-penn-state/index.html]The”>http://www.cnn.com/2012/07/15/us/triponey-paterno-penn-state/index.html)</p>

36

<p>College football is out of control in this country.</p>

<p>I wonder how many other big name football programs would have acted similarly to Penn State in a similar situation.</p>

<p>Or how many have covered up rapes and assaults by their star players.</p>

<p>In my view, a college football team should be made up of “normal” students, guys who would have earned admission to the University even if they couldn’t play football. Instead, what we often have is a bunch of kids who are essentially ringers, who have no real interest in attending college, and aren’t remotely qualified to attend that particular university. </p>

<p>Look at college basketball, where the new trend seems to be “one and out”, where the kids just play for one year.</p>

<p>When you root for your college football team, you are essentially rooting for hired ringers, who often have very little to do with the college they are playing for. (Don’t get me wrong, I watch the games on TV too)</p>

<p>Now, I realize many college football programs are extremely profitable, and bring big money to the college, which can be used for educational programs. But that doesn’t make it right. A college could set up a strip joint, and have girls wear skimpy college outfits, and that might bring money to the school, but would it really be the right thing to do?. Also, eventually, it seems that the college football program often becomes more important than the University itself. </p>

<p>Supposedly, a coach at University of Oklahoma, perhaps tonque in cheek, said “we are trying to build a university our football team can be proud of”.</p>

37

<p>Just in case you need a little extra reading about “the woman who stood up to Joe Paterno”</p>

<p>[Safeguard</a> Old State ? Preserving the Rights & Traditions of Penn Staters. The Vicky Triponey Timeline of Terror](<a href=“http://safeguardoldstate.org/the-vicky-triponey-timeline-of-terror/]Safeguard”>http://safeguardoldstate.org/the-vicky-triponey-timeline-of-terror/)</p>

<p>Just to be clear, we are talking about a woman who made it her agenda to strip students of much of their self governmental powers, and consolidated such powers under her office. She may have clashed with Joe, and maybe on a certain level, in that respect she had a point. However, as a student at the time, she was a detriment to my college experience, and it had nothing to do with football…</p>

38

<p>I would call it a smear campaign but obviously those are old complaints. She didn’t seem to understand that a college exists because of and for the students, but then neither did Joe Paterno. I’ll still call it a smear campaign because it has nothing to do with how Paterno protected players from prosecution and other discipline all those years. It has nothing to do with her larger point on the culture of deification. </p>

<p>If you want to go down that road, given how so many students reacted to his firing, I also question that they should be governing anything. Maybe they should be baby sat. She’s not a hero, I get it. Paterno was still a self-serving devil though in his maniacal pursuit of a record at all costs, not a scapegoat by a long shot.</p>

39

<p>The Paterno family launching its own investigation reminds me of OJ’s quest for the real killer. I am sure they will hire someone more credible than the former head of the FBI. Good luck finding that email where Paterno says:" Sandusky must be stopped , let the reputation of the football program suffer."</p>

40

<p>It was not a few people making bad decisions that lead to this scandal. It was the Head Football Coach, Athletic Director and President of PSU. A culture was created where janitors and assistant coaches could not speak out and report child abuse.<br>
This is not a few kids taking $1,000 to play ball at a school. If allowing, failing to report, and covering up child rape, by the leaders of a university for the purpose of protecting the football program and it’s revenue, doesn’t deserve the death penalty please tell me what would.</p>