OT: Penn State emails reveal... stuff

Submitted by BiSB on

From Anderson Cooper 360 tonight:

(H/T Scott Bell, @sbell021)

Holy shit. That is all.

BILG

June 30th, 2012 at 10:00 AM ^

First off, I want to say I am really sorry for the victims and couldn't imagine dealing with that sort of pain, mistrust, humiliation and whatever else one deals with for the rest of their lives after such trauma at a young age.

Someone said it on here earlier...this is why you don't build statues of people until they die.  As deranged as this whole thing is in regards to the abuse, I am not at all shocked by the conspiracy or those involved with it. Nor does the inaction of the community surprise me, as to rock the boat on something that seems so outlandish and implausible is quite a personal risk.

Anytime a public persona is too good to be true, it probably is.  Tressel and Joe Pa are great examples in NCAA football.  From priests to politicians, it always seems that the most moralizing individuals often have the most to cover up. Maybe it's a defense mechanism like the self-loathing homosexual who behaves as a homophobe.  Maybe its that once reaching certain levels of power and prestige, people start to believe their own press or feel the need to do anything and everything to keep that image alive. Whatever the case, be weary and be cynical.  How many Larry Craigs and Bernie Madoffs do people need before they wake up.

In reference to Happy Valley, you would have to be the most gullible of morons to believe that suspicion and rumor was not circulating around Sandusky for years in that community.   However, the inaction of the administration probably suggested to those hearing the whispers, that it was just rumors and blown out of proportion.  IE, Yeah, maybe he is a bit of a creepy old guy that sometimes hugs a few too many kids and slaps them on the butt when playing tag. But no way could one believe that a coach is straight up prison raping kids in the shower and still walking around campus and working with his own childrens' charity.  The whole thing is unimaginable because you have to believe in some baseline of human decency, if not from the sick (Sandusky) at least from the responsible (administration) in charge behind the scenes.

 

 

Charlie Chunk

June 30th, 2012 at 11:10 AM ^

I think Joe stayed with Penn State in order to cover up the Jerry Sandusky incidents.  Paterno couldn't retire.  He knew the whole mess would be exposed after he retired.

Paterno represents lack of leadership in my book.  He will always be less than a man.

He had an opportunity to be a real hero, but he chose to put his head in the sand instead.

To hell with Joe Paterno!

WolverineHistorian

June 30th, 2012 at 11:22 AM ^

Watching that CNN clip, Curley, Schultz and Spanier talk about confronting Sandusky about the McQueary incident and ALSO tell him that they know about the first incident, which was the investigation that took place in 1998.  This is the same investigation that JoePa testified and claimed to have never heard about until 2011 when the sh*t hit the fan.  His family is still claiming that he didn't know about the 98 incident/investigation.

I always thought Joe was lying about this because Sandusky was his defensive coordinator at the time and he coincidentally "retired" 6 months later.  Surely he would know about the investigation at the time.  But these emails now can confirm he was lying.  Are we honestly supposed to believe that Spanier, Curley and Schultz knew something this big that the Lord and King JoePa had no idea of in 1998?  There's no way he didn't know.  When is PSU nation ever going to comment on that?

woomba

June 30th, 2012 at 11:26 AM ^

but what new facts really came out of these e-mails?

We all knew that Spanier and the rest will be facing trials and that they had prior knowledge of these incidents and that Joe Pa was the one who notified them and these e-mails just verify that.

I understand that this e-mail can read like it's Paterno who's pushing for these guys to not go to the police but It's entirely possible that Paterno just discussed the extent to which he knew about the incident and they realized that they didn't have anything 100% solid and decided to not make the call...which I thought was generally accepted order of events to begin with.

XM - Mt 1822

June 30th, 2012 at 11:51 AM ^

Mgo-mates,

PSU is in huge trouble.  There are statutes that vary by state, but they are generally called 'mandatory reporting' laws and require just that - if a specific class of individuals (such as doctors, nurses, social workers, teachers, etc.) are given credible information of child abuse or domestic violence, they MUST REPORT it to the police.   If there are victims that were abused after this 2001 report, they have civil causes of action to recover money that woiuld be breath-taking.  They can go after the school and each individual, including JoePa's estate, that had knowledge and failed to report.  Even in the absence of mandatory reporting statutes, I can't imagine a jury not awarding huge sums of money to these poor kids.   Talk about your smoking guns, these are epic.  

maizenblue87

June 30th, 2012 at 2:45 PM ^

This whole thing is so sick. Joe Paterno has been revealed as a modern-day Jim Jones. This personality cult led to unimaginable horrors inflicted on children. I can't believe PSU fans still defend Paterno or any of the others complicit in this tragedy.

JamieH

June 30th, 2012 at 4:03 PM ^

Kick 'em out of the Big Ten.  Forever.  The Big Ten will survive.  It will probably be better without the current putrid stench eminating from Happy Valley anyway. 

I think their football program needs the death penalty.  Five years.  This is exponentially worse than SMU, or honestly, what any football program in history has been caught doing. Like 10 billion times worse.  They can start over from scratch as an independent in 2017.

If Patenro actively prevented this thing from going to child services and the university went along with him, they need to end football at Penn State now.  It's just disgusting.

 

STW P. Brabbs

June 30th, 2012 at 11:23 PM ^

Bullshit argument. End of. Give the players free rein to transfer, in addition to maintaining their scholarships to PSU in cases where players do not want to transfer. By the logic people are employing, football programs could almost never be punished, because innocent people would be affected negatively.

The whole point is that the situation is far, far more important than football. That needs to be remembered.