The Penn State punishment was announced today. I honestly thought everyone in the world (with the exception of Joe Paterno's family) agreed that a strong punishment was necessary. I thought if there is one thing we can all agree is bad and should be punished it's molestation of children and the enabling of that molestation. But today on Facebook I've seen posts that indicate some people think the punishment is too severe and I am honestly dumbfounded.
One comment on a post I read said something like, "all the students at Penn State are being punished for the actions of one asshole". First of all, to call Jerry Sandusky an "asshole" is the largest understatement I can think of. He's not an asshole. He's a monster. He didn't cut someone off in traffic. This man cornered small children in a shower and forcibly shoved his cock into their assholes. I'm sorry to be vulgar, but let's be honest about what we're talking about here. These children looked up to him, trusted him, and he fucked them while they cried for help.
And we're not talking about the actions of one asshole either, or even one monster. We're talking about the actions of five monsters. The most powerful men at Penn State all knew what Jerry Sandusky was doing. They didn't report him to the authorities. They didn't try to stop him. On the contrary, for more than a decade they continued to put him in situations where he would be surrounded by children. They took the man they knew was raping children and they continually stuck him in a room with them. Those children had nobody to protect them. And when adults found out, when adults were finally clued in, they not only covered the whole mess up, they enabled its perpetuation.
All for the sake of their football program. To avoid bad publicity. It was more important to them to protect the integrity of their football program than it was to protect those children who had nobody else to protect them. I cannot imagine a more disgusting abuse of authority than this one. These children were terrorized for more than a decade so that Penn State could avoid bad publicity and continue to field a winning team. Well, if this was done to protect the football team, the only punishment that will have any teeth whatsoever is one that cripples this all important football program.
One argument I've heard against the severity of the punishment is that it punishes the current students and football players at Penn State rather than the men responsible. And it does, but not as strongly as some people seem to make out. And this very argument actually highlights the problem at hand. We're worried that the football program is so important that we'd rather protect it and the entertainment it provides (and dollars to the university) than punish an indescribably grave wrong.
And how severe a punishment are we actually talking about here? Yes, it's crippling to that program for a decade or more. Last year several football players at Ohio State were caught receiving free tattoos. They didn't have to pay for tattoos because they were Ohio State football players. And their university received a one year ban from post season play for that. Free tattoos. At Penn State University children were systematically raped for more than a decade. If free tattoos equals a year, what do you get for terrorizing children for 13? Four years. And an enormous fine. And you lose a ton of scholarships. And your coach has to vacate every win during that span and loses his title as winningest coach in NCAA history. They will be irrelevant for a long time to come. Seems about right to me.
And I just don't understand the argument that you can't lay down this punishment because people other than those guilty will be harmed by it. Of course they will. Sorry. When a father commits a crime and has to go to jail for it, do you honestly think the only person affected by that is the man? Do you think growing up without a father isn't doing irreparable harm to his children? Of course it is. But we can't refuse to send him to jail just because his children will also suffer. (And don't get off on a tangent about how our legal system is inherently flawed and we send too many people to jail. Of course it is, and of course we do, but that isn't the debate we're having today.)
And how severe is this punishment to the football players really? In most situations, a student athlete on scholarship is free to transfer at any time, but if they do they have to sit out for a full year before becoming eligible again. That has been waived for these football players. They can leave Penn State whenever they want with impunity. And we're talking about Division 1 athletes at a football powerhouse. Every single scholarship athlete on that football team is very good at what they do. Each one of them that seeks a scholarship elsewhere will be given one. I admit, it may not be at a school with a program at the level Penn State was when they signed, but they will have an opportunity to play Division 1 ball somewhere else. And those that choose to stay at Penn State and thus suffer from these restrictions, well, that's their choice.
And how severe is the punishment to the student body in general? I grew up rooting for the Nebraska Cornhuskers. And when I say rooting, I mean weeping after losses. I love Nebraska football. And I attended the University of Nebraska for one semester. I lived on the campus where my favorite football team played. If something like this had happened at Nebraska while I was there, I would have been devastated, inconsolable. But how would it have affected the quality of education I was receiving there? It wouldn't have. Was I at school to get an education or was I there to watch football games? I'll tell you what it would have affected; it would have affected the quality of my entertainment on 12 Saturdays a year.
I'm sorry, but the entertainment needs of some students in Pennsylvania are absolutely inconsequential compared to the need to send a message not just to those in charge at Penn State University, but to every college in America. We've known for decades that football (and basketball) programs at United States universities have become too powerful. But we didn't realize just where that would lead. We thought that the education of student athletes was suffering. We thought that actual education was taking a back seat to wins and losses. And we were right. But we never knew the endgame. We couldn't possibly have guessed that there are men in the world who think their school's ability to continue to recruit top level athletes had become more important than every human being's responsibility to care for children who are being attacked. Well now we know. And we have to send a message that this is not okay. That there is no football program in the world that is worth one child getting raped. Every time Jerry Sandusky shoved his cock into a little boy's asshole we were sending a message that we don't care about them as much as we care about sports. Today we sent a different message. And I am amazed that it's not a message that every adult in America can support. That football program and all the people who are affected by this decision are absolutely inconsequential. These children were surrounded by adults who thought football was the most important thing in the world. And if the NCAA didn't stand up and tell them it wasn't, they'd still be thinking it today. I love college football. I look forward to it every year more than you can ever know. But some things are more important. In fact, almost everything I can think of is more important. So if some students at Penn State University have to suffer the consequences of getting that much needed message out, well... so sorry.
UPDATE: I also wanted to write a quick word about an unforeseen (if relatively inconsequential) aspect of this tragedy. From now on, much like baseball fans after the steroids scandal, every fan of a major college athletics program has to ask themselves, "Could this have happened at my school?" "Could this be HAPPENING at my school?"
As I mentioned, I grew up in Nebraska cheering for the Nebraska Cornhuskers. We are fanatic. In Pennsylvania, sports fans have the Steelers. The Eagles. The Phillies. The Pirates. The 76ers. The Penguins. The Flyers. And that's just the professional sports. In Nebraska if we want to cheer for a professional team in ANY sport, we have to look outside the state. If we want to cheer for a college team of any importance at all, we have to look outside the state. We have Nebraska football. That's it. The first time Nebraska played for a National Championship during my lifetime, churches in the state cancelled services because they knew nobody would be there.
Tom Osborne is at least as beloved in Nebraska as Joe Paterno in Pennsylvania. They say the exact same things about him. A man of principle. A man who puts the "student" ahead of "athlete". A man who knows what is right and who acts on that. If you asked me a year ago if I believed officially sanctioned child molestation was happening under the watch of Tom Osborne I would have answered with an incredulous, "Are you crazy?" What would Penn State fans have answered to that question a year ago?
This places doubt in the minds of every fan of every college football program in the country. Or if it doesn't, it should. Because if it can happen under the watch of Joe Paterno, it can happen anywhere.
