Joe Paterno is wonderful man (and an old family friend), and FWIW, I think firing him at his age is an awful act of disrespect towards someone who has helped Penn State enormously for many decades. It smacks of cowardly institutional CYA.
The man is not accused of doing anything himself. He is accused of not going to the police many years ago over a third or fourth hand hearsay report which would not be admissible evidence in any court:
[Paterno] shook hands with many of the students, some of whom were crying.
Other students were upset. A large crowd descended on the administration building, shouting “We want Joe back!” then headed to Beaver Stadium.
One key question has been why Paterno and other top school officials didn’t go to police in 2002 after being told a graduate assistant saw Sandusky assaulting a boy in a school shower.
Paterno says he should have done more. Spanier has said he was not told the details of the attack.
Sandusky has denied the charges.
Innocent until proven guilty? Not only does that no longer apply to accused criminals, it apparently doesn’t even apply to people accused of not calling the cops on persons never charged nor convicted based on what someone said someone else said he saw.
Accusations are more important than truth.
I think Penn State is being run by gutless unprincipled cowards.
MORE: Herman Cain is taking heat over unproven allegations that he did something personally. Many are saying he should have the benefit of the doubt, and I agree.
Why should there be a different standard for Joe Paterno, who is accused not of doing something, but of not reporting something that someone else was alleged to have done, and that he (Paterno) did not witness?
Sorry, I don’t get it. I realize the underlying conduct is appalling, but that does not change the way the law works or the presumption of innocence.
What is with this lynch mob mentality?
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15 responses to “Hysteria rules, as usual”
With all due respect, you are totally wrong. Fired is the least of his worries.
There are no allegations whatsoever concerning Paterno. Firing him for not reporting third-hand information in 2002 is bullshit, and the students are rightfully upset. More here:
http://www.nj.com/rutgersfootball/index.ssf/2011/11/penn_state_sex_scandal_scene_t.html
I’m getting sick of it.
If you are saying I am missing something, please supply a link.
Public policy is decided by entertainment choices because news is decided by entertainment choices.
They sell eyeballs to advertisers.
If someone told me that he saw someone else commit a crime, I would tell him to call the cops.
Paterno’s behavior constituted a coverup. He was going to go anyway, but his arrogant comment yesterday that the Trustees had better things to do likely accelerated his dismissal.
The President and the other administrators were also complicit, as were the several witnesses who did not report the crimes to the police.
From what I read, the guy who said he was an eyewitness to the incident says he told Paterno, who then reported it to his superior. How is passing along secondhand information to a superior a coverup by Paterno of anything? If anyone is guilty of not reporting a crime to the police, it is the witness. And if Paterno’s superior covered it up, how is that a coverup by Paterno? He was not the witness.
Would you stand next to a man, in support, that you knew had just sodomized a 10 year old boy?
The Graduate Assistant that reported him in 2002 was probably scared for his future for even alleging he saw Jerry Sandusky with his penis in a pre-teen boys anus. While he probably should have done more, he did what he was supposed to do, go to those in charge and it was ultimately the higher ups that chose to make the fumble.
What do you call an older woman that likes younger men? A Cougar.
What do you call an old man that likes little boys? A Nittany Lion.
“Would you stand next to a man, in support, that you knew had just sodomized a 10 year old boy?”
You are saying that Paterno knew that? All he knew was what he heard the graduate assistant say he saw — “that the graduate assistant had seen Jerry Sandusky in the Lasch Building showers fondling or doing something of a sexual nature to a young boy.” The GA was no kid, but a 28 year old man. Old enough by any standard to be considered a responsible adult. At 28 I was a licensed attorney.
What kind of person would see a kid being anally raped (a detail he did not tell Paterno) and not intervene, not call the cops, but instead decide to tell Joe Paterno the next day? Paterno would have been justifiably skeptical, but he did pass the information along. A thorough review concluded Paterno had done nothing wrong at the time.
If someone came to me with a story like that the next day, I’d have reason to be skeptical.
Something about the way this ten year old story has surfaced right now seems odd.
Careful Eric, the next thing you know they will have you complicit in the cover up, and a member of NAMBLA. The beginnings of hysteria?
What kind of person would see a kid being anally raped (a detail he did not tell Paterno) and not intervene, not call the cops, but instead decide to tell Joe Paterno the next day?
Someone who was scared for his future because of what he witnessed. Someone who wanted so badly to be a part of PSU football so bad that he would have let Jerry sodomize himself. Someone who was raised without moral values.
I don’t believe for a minute it went on since the 70s but there were no rumors until the 90s. I don’t believe he was the only one involved in it either.
“Innocent until proven guilty” is a matter for criminal proceedings, not necessarily for employment. It might have been better to suspend Paterno pending the outcome of an investigation, but the university is well within its rights to terminate him. This is an ugly and very sordid mess. Sandusky will have his day in court and if he’s guilty… well, I hope he never sees sunlight again.
Hey Eric, Still believe there is no connection between Homosexuality and Pedophilia? The incidents with Sandusky are merely recently sensationalized, but they are unique by no means.
There is homosexual pedophilia and there is heterosexual pedophilia, just as there are homosexual sadomasochists and heterosexual sadomasochists, homosexual fetishists and heterosexual fetishists, etc.
Sandusky is married to a woman, but I don’t think that establishes a connection between pedophilia and heterosexual marriage.
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“There is homosexual pedophilia and there is heterosexual pedophilia, “
Yes there is. And Heterosexual pedophilia ought to make up 98% of all pedophilia, but yet it does not. The 2% of Homosexuals are way over-represented in the number of Child molestations which occur.
I hope you are intelligent enough to grasp the significance of this point, because I would very much like to hear how you can spin this.
“just as there are homosexual sadomasochists and heterosexual sadomasochists, homosexual fetishists and heterosexual fetishists, etc.”
Yes, and people who study astronomy and geology too. As the topic is Pedophilia, the categories you mentioned are as pertinent to the discussion as the categories I mentioned. The issue is Injury to another, which is sort of the Libertarian mantra, so you ought to be very familiar with the concept. A fetish that causes no injury to another is irrelevant to the discussion.
“Sandusky is married to a woman, but I don’t think that establishes a connection between pedophilia and heterosexual marriage.
I believe the term you are looking for is “beard.”