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| Joe Paterno |
As far as breaking news goes, I'm a little late to the party here. I wanted to post an immediate reaction to the news that Penn State head coach Joe Paterno was fired after 46 years as the head coach, but I didn't think I could wrap my head around the entire situation. Honestly, I still can't - and I don't think anyone can yet.
The allegations, of course, are that former PSU defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky was involved with several molestation crimes, some of which took place during Sandusky's tenure with the team, and some of which took place after he left the program in 2009. These are only allegations at this time and have yet to be proven true or untrue. What we know is that at least one alleged victim has stepped forward and leveled these accusations.
MANDATORY REPORTING
As an educator it is important for me to be aware of the laws governing how to handle sensitive situations involving abuse, sexual or otherwise. Some states require that teachers and coaches report incidents - or even rumors of incidents - to police. In such a case, Coach Paterno would have a legal obligation to contact the authorities. However, Paterno lives in Pennsylvania, where he is not legally obligated to do so. What Paterno was required to do in such a situation was report the incident up the food chain. When then graduate assistant Mike McQueary allegedly witnessed the crime on the PSU campus and passed it along to Paterno, the head coach reportedly alerted the school's athletic director. Paterno's legal obligation was fulfilled.
Where the system broke down was higher up the chain than Paterno. The athletic director and the president of the university both decided to sit on the information in the hopes that it would go away. This is an old-school approach that doesn't seem to work in the information age. There was a time when horrible incidents could be swept under the rug, and potentially embarrassing allegations would never see the light of day because the victim would be terrified of the implications. However, all it takes here in 2011 is for one person to find out, and the information can travel around the world in minutes. Furthermore, victimes are encouraged (rightfully) to speak up and fight back. As the years go by, people are encouraged more and more to seek help, not only for themselves but also for other victims.
MIKE MCQUEARY
McQueary was a graduate assistant at the time of the alleged incident in 2002. As a G.A. who was clearly trying to get his foot in the door of the coaching profession, I would not expect him to go all out to expose his former coach (I use that term loosely, since McQueary was a quarterback and Sandusky coached defense). Not only would he be ratting out a superior, but he would potentially be committing career suicide and exposing his alma mater to damning accusations. In an ideal world, McQueary would ignore all the professional related drawbacks and "do the right thing." But I have a hard time believing that many people would go straight to the police with such information. McQueary did what I believe most of us would do in his situation, and that was reporting it to his superior, Coach Paterno. (For the record, I would like to believe that I would go straight to the police . . . but since I have never been in McQueary's shoes, I can't say for certain.)
The people calling for McQueary to be fired are being extremely harsh and, I believe, hypocritical. I would be surprised if McQueary keeps his job beyond this season, but that has more to do with the general "cleaning of the house" that I expect to occur in the off-season.
JOE PATERNO
As I mentioned above, Paterno has no legal obligation to do more than what he did - which was reporting it up the food chain. As a former colleague and presumed friend of Sandusky's, it would be extremely difficult to pick up the phone and call the police. I would like to believe that the athletic director and university president would take it upon themselves to report the incident. They are employed and paid to do difficult administrative duties, and this obviously falls in that category. If I were in Paterno's shoes, I would hope that I wouldn't have to report my colleague and friend.
All that being said, what should Paterno have done when he discovered that his superiors were not going to act on the allegations? He should have contacted the police. That's the bottom line. Someone should have done something, and part of being a leader and role model is doing the right thing, even when it's difficult.
Paterno had no legal obligation to report the incident, but he did have a moral obligation to do so. As a public figure representing Penn State, he has more than a legal obligation to act appropriately. There were a couple coaches in the last decade or so who were fired from their college head coaching positions for being photographed partying with undergrads. Is it illegal for coaches to drink alcohol with college students at house parties? No. Is it how they should represent the university? Probably not. Heck, even a young Matt Leinart was publicly derided for pictures appearing of him in a hot tub with a couple college girls . . . and Leinart was just a fledgling NFL quarterback.
Paterno was caught in an unfortunate situation. He initially responded exactly how he should have . . . but when things didn't go further, he dropped the ball. It's sad that the man who essentially built Penn State from the ground up and who has otherwise represented college football so well is now embroiled in a sexual molestation scandal. And it's important to note that his lone transgression is not that he sat on the information, but that he reported it to the wrong people. This does not make Paterno a villain. Many people want to paint him into a corner as a horrible person, and I disagree with those people. He made a mistake - a mistake that I hope others don't replicate. But it does not negate all the positive things that he brought to people's lives as a person and a coach.
WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?
On a small scale, I believe that most - if not all - of the coaches at Penn State will be gone after this season. Even though there seems to be no indication that the other assistant coaches on the staff were involved, they are probably considered "guilty by association." There are some excellent coaches at Penn State, and having been a fan of Big Ten football and having met these coaches at clinics, I have been particularly impressed by the work of linebackers coach Ron Vanderlinden and defensive line coach Larry Johnson. But I believe the only way the program can move forward and recruit other young men is by cleaning house.
On a larger scale, it seems that we as a society should realize that doing the right thing is what matters. Legal obligation or not, there is a way that we should handle controversy. Whether it's fair or not, there are things that come ahead of job aspirations and protecting an institution. There's an old saying that goes, "Integrity is how you act when no one is looking." In the modern age, someone is always looking. Do the right thing.
Magnus, I find your statements about McQueary somewhat troubling. Let me qualify my statements as I know that there may be different versions of the events floating around. My understanding is that Mc. (McQueary) observed the forcible act upon the 10 yr old in the shower and left the sports complex. If my understanding is true than Mc not only didnt meet the minimum acceptable action by going to the authorities but more mind boggling he did not step in and stop this horrible act. To call his firing "harsh" because of these failures is laughable. Just because he wasnt legally obligated to do anything doesnt excuse his moral and ethical failure when he walked away from a boy being raped. I cannot imagine that if the University is ever to recover from this that they could consider keeping such a person employed. Is that how they should want to be represented?
ReplyDeleteAnd I can only hope that you are wrong when you state that many people would do what he did in thesame situation in part to save their own career. We have become an extremely selfish society if this is true. If my understanding of the events is incorrect, forgive me as I must sound like an idiot.
@ Anonymous 7:58 a.m.
ReplyDeleteRecent reports (as of last night/this morning) suggest that McQueary DID stop the act in progress and then went to his superiors. This post was made in light of that report. Of course, that report might be erroneous, but so could everything else that has been reported previously.
Keep in mind that the person Paterno turned this over to is charged with perjury. Also, keep in mind another incident in 1998 was turned over to the prosecutor, but no charges were filed. Does anyone know whether Paterno asked a follow up with accused perjurer ? Did the the alleged perjurer tell Joe he had turned it over to the prosecutor? Remember the outrage about the Duke lacrosse team that turned out to be false? Sandusky is the villain, and the AD may be a villain, not Paterno or McQuery. they certainly could have done more, but what did the AD and prosecutor do?
ReplyDeleteMagnus,
ReplyDeleteI usually tend to agree with a lot of things you say, but I cannot agree with the "Firing McQueary Harsh" comment. Let me explain.
1) Initial reports are that he did not stop the crime he walked in upon, but rather fled the scene and did not report it until the next day to his Superior.
2) Joe Paterno did not walk in on such and incident and was reporting to his Superiors based on second hand knowledge.
3) If Joe Paterno should be fired for not using his better judgement when his superiors did not report the crime and tried to sweep it under the rug, then McQueary has to be fire for having direct first hand knowledge of such incident. He also failed to use his better judgement when the same guys (who were also his superiors) failed to take action, and he was not a second hand story.
4) Joe Paterno does deserve to be fired for allowing Jerry Sandusky to continue to be around his football program even after knowing that nothing had been done to rectify this issue.
The entire staff at some point either has direct knowledge or indirect knowledge and none of them even second guessed this guy. The entire staff has to go.
It is a sad time when in college football the focus is all about winning, which Joe Paterno continued to do, and the one thing that sent him packing was a poor hire and a scandal. He will never get mentioned for all the good he has done in his dedicated life.
I will be reserving judgement on McQueary and JoePa until the trial when more comes out. So far the story has been one sided and at some point we will hear from them, and at that point I'll decide what I think. Right now though I do think they fail the moral obligation test.
ReplyDeleteI will however not reserve judgment on Sandusky. The guy is clearly messed up and things can only look worse for him as we learn more.
Magnus, this is a good measured article and I appreciate the effort to remove emotion from it. That must not have been an easy task.
Also, your statement on integrity at the end is awesome. I will sharing it with my kids and making it my status on fb if that is ok. I will cite you of course.
@ Nick 9:47 a.m.
ReplyDeleteAgain, the most recent reports say that McQueary did, in fact, halt the incident.
Personally, I think a graduate assistant has a whole lot less responsibility to report a coach than head coach Joe Paterno does, whether he has first-hand knowledge or not.
@ Anonymous 9:51 a.m.
ReplyDeleteThank you for the compliments. I, too, think the situation was handled rather hastily, since nothing has really been "proven" beyond the court of public opinion. But I suppose the university has an image to uphold.
Of course you can cite the statement at the end. Thanks.
@ Thunder,
ReplyDeleteRegardless of Position there is no degree of responsibility that precludes him from informing the Police when he directly witnessed such a horrible thing. Stopping it (if he indeed did and according the victim 2 there is no grand jury testimony that says he stopped the incident) shows he knows right from wrong. Both he and Paterno are guilty of passing the buck, and believing someone else should take care of it. Definitely a lapse in judgement from both of them.
Hopefully when all is settled and the dust clears there is a completely different story than was we are hearing here.
Your comments sound so reasonable, but they horrify me. That we have been reduced, as a culture, to subtle calculus regarding pedophilia is truly a symptom of our decline. One would hope there is clarity yet on some things, for which disregarding safety, career, and ambition would be automatic, such as pedophilia.
ReplyDeleteConsider if McQ had walked in on a murder. Would the same choices still seem understandable, if not courageous? Of course not. Yet, in my opinion, pedophilia is worse than murder - I can think of justifiable murder. I cannot think of justifiable pedophilia.
That said, we don't know all the facts.
Here is my issue with Paterno on this (and please correct me if my details are incorrect).
ReplyDeleteThere was an issue with Sandusky in 1998 that I would have to assume Joe Pa knew about. After that Sandusky was still granted access to PSU facilities.
A couple years later MC walks in on Sandusky in the act of raping a child. He reports it to Joe Pa, Joe Pa then tells his bosses that he has reports Sandusky was horsing around in the shower.
Regardless of how he phrased it to his bosses or what they do with it, Joe Pa now has 2 reports of Sandusky doing something with young boys. How does he react to that? He continues to give Sandusky access to the PSU facilities until 2011. As far as I am concerned at that point he is enabling a child rapist or at the very least a pedophile.
AVC
@ Meeechigan Dan 10:46 a.m.
ReplyDeleteI don't know that we have been "reduced to subtle calculus." I'm not sure that we have ever been above subtle calculus. There was a time when people were terrified to report these things, both as witnesses and victims. Pedophiles aren't a new phenomenon, yet it seems like more of them are being caught these days. Is it because people were never caught, or is it because those things were never reported? I'm not 100% sure of the answer, but my guess is that it's the latter.
I actually think we've taken a step forward in reporting crimes/seeking help because the public has encouraged it. Things aren't perfect, obviously, but we might be moving in a positive direction.
I will reserve my judgment on Joe P until everything come to light. Morally speaking, yes, Joe P should have reported the issue to the police at some point, when his superiors clearly chose to not act. He made a mistake (from a MORAL point), one that he will clearly live with, by choosing to ignore the issue and letting Sandusky to continue his horrible acts. That being said, my impression is that Joe P is taking the brunt of the blame. Yes, he is Joe P, a public figure larger than life, but it seems that the majority of the blame being leveled by the media, the public, is being placed squarely on his shoulders, something which, I feel, is not completely fair. We have a pathological obsession in this country with sensational news. We love a good witch hunt, and love to burn the witch, especially when the "witch" is a public figure. Lindsay Lohan (clearly a troubled individual) is a "whore", "bitch", has "no business being born". Conrad Murray is "heartless murderer", "he murdered Michael Jackson in cold blood". Joe Paterno is "monster", "he is worst than Sandusky because he let him continue doing it", he should "rot in hell". These are some things that I have seen in the media, on message boards, etc. Sure, Joe P is partly to blame, but to put the blame squarely on his shoulders, as I said, is not completely fair. What about the campus police and state police that was alerted in 98? Did they bother to do a thorough investigation? What about the district attorney that decided not to investigate? What about the university officials? My point is, there is enough blame to go around but we tend to go into this flash-mob mode and focus all the anger at one individual. You can argue that had the cops decided to do a thorough investigation in 98, after one of the mothers came forth, Sandusky could have been stopped back then. The police therefore deserve as much, if not more (it is their job to investigate crime), than Joe P.
ReplyDeleteOne of the earlier comments was spot on - By not calling the police initially they did nothing to protect the one child in 2002. By not taking a stand and banning him from even getting near the program they enabled him to prey on young kids under their watch for nearly a decade. THAT is why Paterno and McQueary should be punished.
ReplyDeleteMaybe they aren't legally obligated to call the police and maybe there is enough gray area based on what Sandusky claimed last night to have a problem with the cops, but why would you let this guy near your program? Let alone bring kids to practice?!?!
AC1997
Good post Thunder.
ReplyDeleteRe: JoePa, Well put. The legal obligation here is secondary to the moral obligation. He made a bad mistake and as a result people were badly hurt. His inaction doesn't necessarily make him an evil man - like most people he did some good and made some mistakes, albeit on on a bigger stage - but he's not the leader many thought him to be. His image is forever tarnished...
Re: McQuery, what most people would do is beside the point. He was put in a tough spot, but ultimately didn't do what he SHOULD have. Now, he is subject to the repercussions. That's fair.
Furthermore, since that time, he's been promoted and moved up the food chain and leadership hierarchy. Whatever excuses could have been made for a grad assistant unwilling to sacrifice his career are out the window by now. At this point, he's well above the standards expected of a grad assistant - and with Sandusky still walking around campus and (allegedly/probably) preying on children. It doesn't take much courage to drop an anonymous tip to the press to prevent Sandusky from committing another assault.
I don't think McQuery's actions are excusable any more than JoePas. I think the various defenses and commentary that focus on human weaknesses, the difficulty of the situation, and the shades of gray are valid - but so are the calls for those complicit in the silence to pay.
And it's important to note that [JoePa's] lone transgression is not that he sat on the information, but that he reported it to the wrong people. This does not make Paterno a villain.
ReplyDeleteHis "lone transgression" was meeting his absolute bare minimum legal requirements in reporting the rape of a 10-year old boy. Joe Paterno was, unequivocally, the most powerful man in state college, and could have put a stop to all of this in 2002. Instead he chose to do as little as he possibly could.
But really, that's not JoePa's lone transgression. As recently as 2008, Paterno saw Sandusky on Penn State's football facilities with a 12-year old boy, and did nothing. And who knows how many times he saw Sandusky interacting with young children between 2002 and 2008. Did he make any inquiries as to what was going on?
Paterno's repeated inaction in the face of the phsyical and psychological abuse of children absolutely makes him a villian. He's certainly not worse than Sandusky, who is an absolute monster, but JoePa's inaction was appalling.
As for the end of your post, I agree with the takeaway. Do the right thing. Period.
My obervations:
ReplyDelete1. A person who can say no to a resignation request by the board of directors of an organization, is ipso facto, the top of the food chain. This is why Paterno's actions are not close to being acceptable in my mind. He was the most powerful person at Penn State and arguably in the entire State of Pennsylvania at the time. So in Re:Re: "Where the system broke down was higher up the chain than Paterno." I disagree. Where the system broke down was precisely with Paterno, because Paterno WAS the system.
2. I agree with you on McQueary, and say that people are being harsh on him. What I would add is that I think the impulse of most people to be harsh on him has more to do with the reason OSU fans are mad at Christopher Cicero. He involved the coach, thereby exposing the coach to an opportunity to make the wrong decision, which ultimately brought low the coach. It happens so universally that it must be human nature to blame the guy at the bottom of the totem pole for the bad decisions of the people at the top who we may have some emotional connection to.
Thunder,
ReplyDeleteYour premise that McQueary may not have wanted to cross a superior is unfounded. Sandusky retired in 1999. The incident in 2002 happened because Sandusky had unlimited access to the capus as part of said retirement. He was still bringing kids from his "charity" to the football building.
That being said, this was a good read. I think that the whole staff should go. This was a cover-up of epic proportions. This was a colossal failure to protect our kids. Regardless of what comes out during Sandusky's trial, innappropriate behavior was allowed to happen. Sandusky's interview the other night did not help his cause either.
This is a tragedy, and hopefully one that WILL be prevented next time. As long as adults don't look the other way when a child is being sodomized.