Penn State Deserves the Death Penalty

“Four of the most powerful people at The Pennsylvania State University — President Graham B. Spanier, Senior Vice President-Finance and Business Gary C. Schultz, Athletic Director Timothy M. Curley and Head Football Coach Joseph V. Paterno — failed to protect against a child sexual predator harming children for over a decade.”

 The Freeh Report

A child rapist was allowed to ruin lives for two decades because Joe Paterno and the Penn State Administration did not want to “hurt the image” of Penn State football.

The coaches and the lackeys in the administration, the Board and the community failed. Completely. They did more to harm the reputation of Penn State football than any rival could ever have dreamed.

In most communities, if a janitor became aware of a child being raped, the janitor would be considered a hero for reporting it.

In Joe Paterno’s world the janitor feared being fired for protecting the life of the child. The Freeh Report on Penn State makes it clear that the school’s leadership was blinded by a “culture of reverence for the football program.”

 In other words, child rape was ignored because it would inconvenience the football program.

As a lifelong educator, I have been taught and I deeply believe the most important function of an educational institution is to protect children. Apparently, Joe Paterno, the athletic director, and others at Penn State chose which students to protect (football players) and which students not to protect (children being raped).

 Defensive reactions from Penn State diehards are predictable and sad and terribly,  tragically wrong.

A woman left flowers and a note at the statue honoring the man who put winning football games as a more important priority than protecting the lives of children being raped. Her sign read “He was a man, not a God.”  Really? None of us are gods and all of us are fallible. But I wondered why her note didn’t read “He was a man who made us proud by winning a lot of football games, who cares if he protected a pedophile beginning in 1998. He wasn’t a God.”

A current player said that the team motto is, “shut out the noise,” as if the outrage across the country over the rape of children in your locker room is simply “noise.”

ESPN analyst Matt Millen went so far as to say Paterno’s legacy shouldn’t be tarnished, saying, “He made a mistake. Does that discount all the positives he did over 50 years?”

The answer is: YES.  I am glad that ESPN encourages free speech, even by idiots, but the answer is most definitively yes.

Millen’s bizarre logic is at the heart of the defense of Joe Paterno and Penn State football. The defense plays out like this. I have heard this line of defense endlessly from people who think that contributing to charity and winning a lot of football games on Saturday afternoons forgives turning a blind eye to over a decade of pedophilia.

We are all human, we are all sinners, we must all constantly ask for forgiveness for the wrongs we’ve committed. I certainly have. But not all wrongs are equal.

The defense might make sense if Paterno had been caught bribing recruits, cheating on his taxes, or even stepping out on his wife. Those are “mistakes.” Those offenses, combined with a sincere apology, would make him no different than so many famous people who have fallen only to rise again in the love and respect and forgiveness they have earned. Looking the other way while children are being raped in your showers for over a decade is not a “mistake.” It is an unforgivable sin.

Joe Paterno can seek forgiveness from a much higher source.

The Board of Trustees and the administration of Penn State University do not deserve our forgiveness. They failed, unspeakably failed, to protect children from sexual abuse.

Every time I hear someone defend Paterno, I would simply add this sentence: “And he protected a pedophile and allowed children to be raped for two decades in order to protect the reputation of his football team.”

Matt Millen really believes it was a “pristine program.” I would add the following: “It was a pristine program in which the Coach allowed other boys to be raped but not you. How pristine does that sound to you?”

The Freeh Report is scathing. Not only did Penn State University allowed children to be sexually abused and raped on their facilities in order to protect the reputation of their football team, they showed no compassion for the children. No compassion for the children. Concern about football trumped compassion for the children. As horrible as the coverup, as horrible as the Paterno culture of fear that made janitors afraid for their jobs if they reported children being raped in their showers, more disgusting was the utter lack of compassion shown by Paterno and his bosses for the children being raped while he fretted about the “image” of his football program.

If Penn State is serious about making amends the following four things should happen:

(1)  Penn State University football must be shut down for at least a year and the culture of the campus and community recalibrated so that never again will the image of the football team be considered more important than compassion for children. Penn State University should do this voluntarily; they should not wait for the NCAA to do it. Yes, I know, the young men on the current team had nothing to do with the scandal. I hope they are given every assistance in finding positions to play on football teams at schools where protecting children is considered more important than winning football games.

(2) The Board of Trustees of Penn State University should resign. Although many of them have made public statements of concern and prayer for the victims, according to the report they created a culture in which the football coach was not held accountable for the numerous crimes committed by his players and the monstrous act of evil committed by his close friend and assistant coach.

(3)  Mike McQueary, the assistant coach who witnessed a boy being raped in the shower and did little more than slam a locker and call his daddy, should never be allowed to work around children again. He expressed great angst when confronted with the vision of a coach raping a child. He slammed his locker. He called his daddy. That’s all. If my son played football, would I trust his safety to the hands of the huge, powerful, former football star and coach who didn’t know what to do when watching a child be raped? How about stop it? How about confront your fellow coach? How about grab the boy and take him to safety. How about, instead of running home to call daddy, call the cops? This man should never work near children or young people again.

(4)  The statue of Joe Paterno should be taken down. When the Penn State University football program eventually reemerges from the ashes of its disgrace, people should not walk by a statue honoring a man who won a lot of football games but allowed children to be raped. Penn State–prioritize.