Penn State Child Molestation Scandal

That was an incredible article about the artist. And good on him for being a 'childraiser' as well as the 'parent' and 'midwife' of his work.

I've just got back from seeing plenty of Curches where King Henry the Eighth decreed heads of statues be removed, as part of his de-iconizing the church during his rein. I've got the terms of what he did wrong, but and sensitive to the importance of keeping aware of the meaning of art. Well Done Pilato.

And well done Borla on keeping this thread current. Yes, I don't contribute much to it, but Yes ... I closely follow it.
It's the News that I would NOT be seeing if you were not 'guardian' of its sharing. Thank you.

 

Cant put a price on stolen innocence and ruined dreams can you.

 

When I watch this video I'm not sure how they're going to handle it.

There may be options that don't harm the players but still eliminate the football program. Some people have suggested allowing transferring without penalty and possibly granting them an extra year of eligibility, I think those would be fair choices. It depends on how you frame the benefits to the football program and importance of the cultural structure that supports it.

 

NCAA source: "Unprecedented" penalties against Penn State - CBS News

About to hit the fan...

 

Good. I hope it's a multi-year suspension for the program. I live in central PA, did my undergrad just outside of state college, and briefly attended one of Penn State's affiliate schools. My entire life, family and friends have been steeped in Penn State. I am just blown away by how far gone that culture is. One of the things that I haven't really been able to believe is the extent to which people are not just defending Paterno but villainizing the board and the investigators, calling for their dismissal for being 'unfair' to Joe (who they maintain has done nothing wrong). I've seen people actually make the argument that what Paterno did on the football field is sufficient to make up for his 'mistake' and that he shouldn't have his legacy harmed for it. I've seen several people already this morning say that tearing down Paterno's statue is no different than tearing down the Nittany Lion.

It is clear to me that a significant portion of Penn State has completely forgotten about what the school is really for and where there priorities ought to be. They have placed football on a pedestal, making it's continued success and reputation paramount to all other concerns. I don't see how you can correct a problem like that without canning the football program for considerably longer than a year.

 

Its a sad story, no matter how you look at it.

 

Generally speaking, NCAA sanctions like this include allowing players to transfer without penalty - i.e. having to sit out a year.

And I personally find it about as hard to feel sorry for a Division I football player at a major conference as I do the CEO of the huge oil company mentioned by Borla. They don't share it any of the blame for this particular scandal at all, but that does not make them good people or even likeable. I've been around enough of them in my life to know that there's a large percentage of them that are solely interested in themselves long before any program.

 

the vacated wins from '98 - '11 means a loss of 111 wins from paterno's record to 298

 

but paterno's dead. what difference does taking away wins make from a dead guy?

seriously, penn state's football program should have been shut down. the problems were systemic--they went beyond individuals and spoke to the effects of bounded rationalities in blinkering ethics. this is not a new problem, nor is it particular to penn state's football program--but it seems that there's a quirk in the u.s. of a. of never going after diseased organizations like that, particularly not when the disease isn't that different from the normal operation of all kinds of bureaucratic environments except to the extent that (a) in this case the notion of loyalty to the organization resulted in sheltering sandusky and (b) sandusky got caught. but then again, i think the archdioscese of boston should have been vaporized as an organization after the scandal that hit the catholic church in the area a few years ago.

the notion that shutting down the program is punishing the players is made irrelevant by the ability of these players to transfer.

 

it's the organization itself that's the problem. i understand the objection that arises on behalf of the players, but if you follow that to its limit, then nothing should have happened to penn state because any sanction would impact on the players. but i have a pretty cynical view of big-time college sports.

this ruling seems a finger wagging. taking victories from a dead guy is about as symbolic a punishment as can be imagined for example. depriving the program of revenues it makes for a year, given the system of foulness outlined in the freeh report is really not terribly harsh. the ban on post-season play will doubtless affect television revenues significantly. where do they go anyway? not to the players...the scholarship thing: where's that money going to go? anywhere? they should have killed the program and redistributed it resources across the university. fuck em. short of that, there's still a de facto sanction for loyalty to something as stupid as football getting in the way of thinking like a decent human being when confronted with even something like systematic child abuse. i don't think that's ok.

hell, athletics programs cover up petty crimes like rape all the time. that's not ok. maybe killing off penn state's football program would have done a little something about that sort of thing.

i don't personally care what the football players there now happen to think. it's unfortunate for them that they happen to be there when this all went down. maybe they could transfer. or maybe they could get educations. penn state's a good school.

 

The reasoning, as I understood it from watching the press conference, was not just about players but essentially the industry surrounding Penn State football. A lot of people in and around state college depend on the football team for their paycheck, to eliminate the football program for a long time would have collateral damage likely measured in millions of dollars per year outside of the school. I think it's fair to want to avoid that where you can. I also don't think the NCAA sanctions were nothing. I doubt you'll see Penn State in a position to contend for anything for at least a decade. While Penn State will be able to field a team in the future, it won't be a competitive team because they now have very little to offer prospective players. I think that the hope of the of the NCAA is that they can eliminate the cultural error at Penn State which has placed winning ahead of all else by eliminating the chances of really having a winning football team.

Personally, I don't think it will work. What I see from the people around me is quite frankly frightening. They're trying to claim that it's unfair to punish the team because the crimes weren't related to football. They've said that Paterno was a good enough coach that the statue should have stayed up regardless of what he did. One person even said (though many agreed) that taking down the statue of Paterno was no different than taking down the Nittany Lion.

I don't see how you can change a group mentality like that without a wholesale break from football. Probably for at least 5 years.