Todd Blackledge Joe Paterno (Baldwin: lawyer, drive, history)
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No one is giving Paterno a pass, but the "everyone who ever admired Paterno is complicit in the scandal and must apologize" rhetroic is getting old. People need to have some perspective.
The people who need perspective are the legions of Nittany Lion fans who elevated Paterno to godlike status. The cult of personality poisoned the university.
The people who need perspective are the legions of Nittany Lion fans who elevated Paterno to godlike status. The cult of personality poisoned the university.
Try agian. The people who need perspective are the mob legions with torches and pitchforks who refuse to understand the basic right of due process.
People taking his side were saying to wait until the facts come out before judging. I and many others considered Paterno innocent until proven guilty. Are you saying we should apologize for wanting to give the man due process?
Don't you know innocent until proven guilty has long been a myth...something to be remembered fondly, but it no longer exists.
The people who need perspective are the legions of Nittany Lion fans who elevated Paterno to godlike status.
God like? No. A better explanation would be father like. You have to understand that most people grew up their entire lives with Joe Paterno as head coach at Penn State pushing students both academically and athletically, for many people this is almost like someone in their family being involved in this.
God like? No. A better explanation would be father like. You have to understand that most people grew up their entire lives with Joe Paterno as head coach at Penn State pushing students both academically and athletically, for many people this is almost like someone in their family being involved in this.
Fatherlike... your clarification is possibly even more nauseating.
Btw, I love how the Joepologists assume all critics are from outside of their Penn State / Central PA community. Spectators from afar who can't possibly understand the unique "Fatherlike" relationship between Paterno and his slobbering fanbase. Jealous fans of Pitt or some Midwestern Big 10 school who just wanted to see Paterno's reputation nuked.
I grew up in Central PA... 90 minutes from Beaver Stadium. I spent four years enrolled as a student at University Park. I have my Penn State diploma hanging in my office. I attended dozens of Nittany Lion football games coached by Joe Paterno. I have a closet full of blue and white t-shirts. My brother lives in State College, and I'm there many times each year.
No one needs to explain to me how Central Pennsylvanians behave or how beloved Joe Paterno was for his 298 official victories. But you superfans need to open your eyes and look around at how the rest of the world views your undying devotion to a liar and a fraud... a man who did not uphold the exalted rhetoric he preached. You need to understand that your twisted fanaticism to a mythical version of Paterno only serves to denigrate the institution that is Penn State University.
You don't get it. You don't get that Paterno's zealous pursuit of 409 well after his coaching abilities eroded... contributed to his decision to cover up for his friend Jer. You don't get that you look like crazed hillbillies who care more about your personal gratification concerning football and your imagined "father-son" relationship... than dozens of children who were raped by a man protected by Paterno (not very fatherlike behavior IMO).
Penn State is a great academic institution... and would have been with or without the token sums donated by Paterno and the many wins against Temple. However, the sycophants in administration allowed Paterno to operate a rogue football program for years... and it ended up costing the university immeasurably more in financial and reputation damages than the couple million Paterno contributed to a library. But it appears many "Penn Staters" care more about the "legend of Paterno" than the university itself.
I'm neither a rbid PSU fan nor a Joe Paterno apologists, by your god like mischaracterization I had assumed you weren't aware of the relationship between Joe Paterno and the PSU fans.
As for my opion on Joe Paterno while it certainly doesn't look good I'll reserve my personal judgment until I can fully grasp all the facts as they come out over the following months and years. I'm not willing to condemn a man based on overzealous media reports and the opinions of a few.
The people who need perspective are the legions of Nittany Lion fans who elevated Paterno to godlike status. The cult of personality poisoned the university.
I have to agree with this, and I'm from Pennsylvania and have always thought highly of Joe Paterno.
On the other hand, the idea that Todd Blackledge or any other former Penn State player who played under Paterno has to apologize for supporting Paterno, at least prior to the release of the Freeh Report, is totally ridiculous.
Let me note one other thing the media has totally glossed over - the Penn State administration and football program was in a truly no-win situation if they report the 2001 Sandusky shower incident to the authorities:
*If they report Sandusky and cannot prove he did anything, and remember we STILL don't know who the victim was that Mike McQueary saw in the shower, then they've slandered a well-respected figure in the community who was the head of an organization helping children, assuming the media gets hold of this story (which I think is a reasonable assumption). This also would have come at a time when Penn State was coming off a losing season, and many people thought Paterno was too old and should retire, so people may have thought Paterno/Paterno supporters had a personal issue with the guy many people thought (at the time) was going to be and should have been Paterno's successor. Though some people may feel differently, accusing someone of child molestation is a serious accusation, and one that cannot be made lightly. You can permanently alter someone's reputation and/or make them lose their job (see Bernie Fine at Syracuse), though obviously Sandusky was already retired.
*If they report Sandusky, the media gets hold of the story, and they believe the accusations (see Bernie Fine and ESPN), then Penn State (administration and football program) gets accused of having a child molester as a coach and not doing anything about it, even though they had no way of knowing/suspecting Sandusky was a molester before 1998 at the earliest (i.e. before the case involving a Sandusky incident off-campus that was ultimately dropped by the prosecution), at least based on what we know now, and Penn State, as both a university and football program, gets dragged through the mud in a similar but probably less extreme (and less warranted) way in 2001 as it actually did (in a more warranted way) in late 2011 and the first half of 2012. All of this occurs despite the fact no one at Penn State knows or can identify who the child is that McQueary saw getting molested in the Penn State locker room by Sandusky.
Neither of the above options comes out well at all for Penn State, and I can understand why Penn State, especially Joe Paterno, didn't feel comfortable falling on their sword for a child that they didn't know and couldn't prove was abused. Having said that, and hindsight is obviously 20-20 but even if it wasn't I think if you want to do the right thing you have to do this, you have to report the winter 2001 shower incident to the proper authorities; you can't allow children to be sexually abused if you have at least semi-legitimate reason to believe that is occurring. Many people could have lost their careers if they report it, in either of the scenarios I outlined above, and that is obviously a major consideration. The _hit may have hit the fan had the incident been reported then, and the positive payoff (preventing other children from being abused), wasn't even certain. However, you need to take action, as difficult as that may be (and I think it was difficult under the circumstances the people at Penn State were dealing with in 2001). The 1998 case that was dropped should have provided a yellow (though not red) flag that Sandusky may indeed have been a pedophile.
P.S. I don't totally agree with forcing Penn State to forfeit their wins from 1998 to 2011, but I can at least understand the rationale for forfeiting the 2001 to 2011 wins. Why they are being forced to forfeit their 1998 to 2000 wins, which occurred prior to the Sandusky shower incident that McQueary witnessed, doesn't make sense to me. That 1998 case I mentioned above was dropped by the prosecution for the case. You (NCAA) can't say someone is guilty of a crime in retrospect when he was not found guilty at the time the crime was being handled in the courts. Frankly, I think the 1998 to 2000 wins should be restored (not that it makes a big difference; that is a tiny issue relative to this whole situation with Penn State).
No...people who place football and their cultish worship of a football coach above the fact that children were raped are ruining this country. Sports are entertainment...just a game....not a religion.
Yes, because questioning a HIRED investigator's very quick, less-than-thorough detective work is the devil's handiwork. GMAB
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