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Joe Paterno dies...
- Thread starter Mac'nCheese
- Start date
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Ass clown? Are you kidding me? Look at everything he accomplished and everything he did for PSU.
To be fair he hung around there for 60 years, any coach could do the same in that tenure.
He went to his superiors who then mishandled the situation. Of course he's going to take the fall, but if his superiors had done what was expected of them, there wouldn't be any controversy surrounding Joe. It's not what "he did" it's what the people he went to failed to do.
If that makes you feel better but here's how I see it: first, you don't go to your superiors when kids are being raped. You go right to the police. Second, if you too go to your superiors first and they don't do anything about it, then you go to the police. He was a grown man not a little boy telling his mommy and waiting for her to act, he knew right from wrong. He should have followed up on such a horrendous crime. He's not "taking the fall", he just as guilty as his superiors.
Im not a big college football person, nor did i go to Penn State...but what bothers me is how (to me at least) a lot of news outlets are praising Paterno's legacy and giving tributes and remembrances and all.... when just a few weeks earlier the same people were metphorically dragging him through the streets for his actions (or lack thereof) in the Sandusky scandal.
I guess anything for a story right?
RIP Joe.
I guess anything for a story right?
RIP Joe.
I mean he was 85 years old. That's what old people do - they die. Let's not even throw in they just recently found he had lung cancer and he worked every day of his life until a few months ago when others retire 20-30 years prior.
^this. He lived his life and could have changed the lives of others off the field and he didn't.
I know a lot of old people never go to doctors cause of cases like this. He was so healthy his whole life and then he goes to the doctor and boom! he's dead a few months later. Sounds crazy but I swear a bunch of us at work talked about this a while back and our grandparents do believe this. Never go to the doctor, never get sick, go to the doctor: and suddenly you have cancer.
Paterno has been ill for the past 5 years. He just hid it like he hid everything else at that school.
This!
I live 20 minutes from PSU and I've had friends call me on the phone screaming at me because of my stance on this whole thing.
Campus police != real police, I don't give two ***** about what the law says. Campus police don't deal with rapes and murders and homicides like real police do.
And again, when a child is raped you DO NOT tell your superiors and leave it at that, you call the police, then tell your superiors and keep pressing for stuff to be done.
My sister who worked as a case worker for years gave me an example of some law that Joe should have followed but didn't that requires teachers, coaches, etc to report to the police endangered children. I forget the specifics but in the end JoePa was wrong.
Sure its always sad to see someone pass away and I feel bad for his family but PSU fans are idiots when it comes to the whole JoePa thing. My facebook wall is filled with people mourning who didn't even know the guy in real life. If you take sports out of the equation people wouldn't be nearly as sad.
I for one will be interested to see how he will be remembered and what his legacy shakes out to be. My initial presumption is that there will be a mention of being the best coach of college football but his these findings of this past year are going to be mentioned in the same sentence at the same time.
It'll be tied to him for the near and mid-term future, but I'm sure it'll end up being just a small mention or a footnote in the future. I mean, he's a football coach and will be known for his football achievements. He had almost 50 years of success before the scandal took place under his watch and then only blew up in his last month as a coach.
Right or wrong, that'll probably be the case.
Edit, addendum: Just came across this article from a writer who is either either on point or totally off the mark. Think Dodd hit it pretty well, especially in this part:
Right or wrong, that'll probably be the case.
Edit, addendum: Just came across this article from a writer who is either either on point or totally off the mark. Think Dodd hit it pretty well, especially in this part:
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The Onion sure didn't waste any time:
http://www.theonion.com/articles/joe-paterno-dies-in-hospital-doctors-promise-to-te,27125/
http://www.theonion.com/articles/joe-paterno-dies-in-hospital-doctors-promise-to-te,27125/
The Onion sure didn't waste any time:
http://www.theonion.com/articles/joe-paterno-dies-in-hospital-doctors-promise-to-te,27125/
Oh my, that's good.
Yeah really. You should have seen the candlelight vigil the asshats held the other night.
The flowers & candles at the foot of his statue look like it should be in Lourdes.
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Here are some Joe Paterno quotes regarding his role in the scandal:
“I didn’t know exactly how to handle it and I was afraid to do something that might jeopardize what the university procedure was."
“You know, he didn’t want to get specific,” Paterno said. “And to be frank with you I don’t know that it would have done any good, because I never heard of, of, rape and a man. So I just did what I thought was best. I talked to people that I thought would be, if there was a problem, that would be following up on it.”
So basically - University Procedure and the fact that the old man never heard of man-on-man rape took precedence over little boys getting raped in the shower.
There is no doubt that he was a great coach but, a lot of us lost respect for him after the child abuse scandal. It might be to early to joke but, now he at least has a legit excuse for not saying anything, right? But, at the end of the day, none of us want anyone, old or young, to die of cancer. RIP JoePa!
I wonder how the parents of one of the last kids to be raped feels about him dying. You know, one of the ones who could have been saved from such a horrible fate if this guy had gone to the police in the first place.
I get very surprised when there is a debate about right and wrong when it comes to doing something, or NOT doing something when it comes to protecting children. I think the question is this...please don't mind the run on sentence/question...
If JoePa had been told about it when child number 3's innocence was being ripped from his soul......and YOUR son was child number 5....KNOWING in retrospect there were people that KNEW about it but not only didn't stop it, but basically let it happen over and over for many many years while continuing to support the monster beast named Sandusky's charity while having knowledge in the back of your mind what you were approached with years before.....is there any way you can morally forgive these inactions?
It's tragic that his legacy led to this, but he ultimately did it to himself, and there are many children out there with RUINED souls and lives due to nobody stopping this. They ALL have blame to share, and nobody should be dismissed because of the things they did on a football field.
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Thank you, you made my point as I was typing.
If JoePa had been told about it when child number 3's innocence was being ripped from his soul......and YOUR son was child number 5....KNOWING in retrospect there were people that KNEW about it but not only didn't stop it, but basically let it happen over and over for many many years while continuing to support the monster beast named Sandusky's charity while having knowledge in the back of your mind what you were approached with years before.....is there any way you can morally forgive these inactions?
It's tragic that his legacy led to this, but he ultimately did it to himself, and there are many children out there with RUINED souls and lives due to nobody stopping this. They ALL have blame to share, and nobody should be dismissed because of the things they did on a football field.
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Thank you, you made my point as I was typing.
There is a lot of "sporting" hate for Paterno among sports fans. But that needs to be seperated from the legal issues surrounding the Sandusky case.
Paterno was a guy I loved to hate in terms of college football (though I was never a big consumer of the sport). But the Sandusky case is a whole different kettle of fish. While we don't yet have all the facts, it's obvious to me that Paterno made a grave error in judgment in the way he handled things. He selfishly put his program first, even though serious crimes were being committed. He must take responsiblity for that, even while we remember that it was Sandusky who ultimately bears responsibility for what he did.
In the end, Paterno ruined his own legacy through a misguided attempt to protect it. Had he really blown the whistle on Sandusky as soon as he found out about the latter's activities, he might have come in for some criticism but ultimately people would say he did the right thing.
Pure vengeance is a hollow "recompense" for anything as far as I'm concerned. Only a troubled mind could truly enjoy someone else's death.
Paterno was a guy I loved to hate in terms of college football (though I was never a big consumer of the sport). But the Sandusky case is a whole different kettle of fish. While we don't yet have all the facts, it's obvious to me that Paterno made a grave error in judgment in the way he handled things. He selfishly put his program first, even though serious crimes were being committed. He must take responsiblity for that, even while we remember that it was Sandusky who ultimately bears responsibility for what he did.
In the end, Paterno ruined his own legacy through a misguided attempt to protect it. Had he really blown the whistle on Sandusky as soon as he found out about the latter's activities, he might have come in for some criticism but ultimately people would say he did the right thing.
Mac'nCheese said:
Pure vengeance is a hollow "recompense" for anything as far as I'm concerned. Only a troubled mind could truly enjoy someone else's death.
He wouldn't have received a single word of criticism - or shouldn't have.
To the general public and tech geeks on these forums, if they can even remember JoePa past the latest #FF or headline, let alone a few years, they might have an issue with his actions.
To the sports community, they'll recognize the terrible chapter in JoePa's extensive life story, but take into consideration the whole story - not just a single chapter.