Penn State Scandal: The Hypocrisy of Our Outrage Against Joe Paterno

I need to preface this article by saying that no one is more disgusted or appalled at the apparent nature of the allegations recently brought to light than I am.  It is truly impossible to comprehend how a human being could stoop to such a level, or how a grown man could so thoroughly abuse his position of confidence with young children, in the way that Jerry Sandusky allegedly did.

It is often said that the cover-up is worse than the original crime.  That saying doesn't really apply for Sandusky in this instance, but it is certainly true for Joe Paterno.  It appears that Paterno knew more or less what Sandusky had supposedly done, having been informed shortly after one incident occurred, but chose to simply inform his supervisors and then leave it at that.

The general feeling, and rightfully so, is that Paterno had a moral obligation to go the police with what he knew, confront Sandusky about his actions, and do everything he could to eradicate this type of behavior from his football program and from the university itself.

He instead chose to do what so many others have done when confronted with a difficult moral decision: to cover up, essentially putting football ahead of the health and welfare of those young boys that were being allegedly abused.  

I was surprised yet pleased to hear about the dismissal of Paterno from Penn State football yesterday. This was not a time for inaction, and the university had little choice but to distance itself from the names and people who were ultimately responsible for committing and covering up what had taken place.

There is, however, an element of hypocrisy in the national uproar and subsequent campaign to run Paterno out of his job.

Joe Paterno was put on a pedestal at Penn State, and throughout the college football world.  Now the all-time leader in wins for Division I football, Paterno was built up to the point where football became his only identity.  He lost sight of what was really important.

Any person in their right mind would instantly put a stop to the type of behavior that he heard Sandusky was engaging in, but it seems that at Penn State, as with many other big athletic institutions across the country, nothing else really mattered as long as the team was winning games.

Many individuals and media members skewered the Brigham Young University basketball program last spring for suspending star forward Brandon Davies for a violation of the university code of conduct, but an admiral number also defended the school for not taking the easy way out.

It was not an issue of whether or not people agreed with university standards, but of supporting the school for enforcing those standards, instead of engaging in some sort of rule-bending to accommodate one of the most successful regular-season campaigns in BYU basketball history.

In an era where many universities place athletic success above honor, integrity or anything else, the BYU story stands in refreshing contrast to the scandal and cover-up at Penn State.

In trying to cover up, Joe Paterno put his image as a football icon at Penn State ahead of the safety and welfare of those boys.  He had become something bigger than just a coach, and had lost sight of what had gotten him to that status in the first place.  He was wrong to do what he did, and is now suffering the consequences of a lost legacy as a result.

Whether we look at university athletics, corporate bailouts or big government spending, a common theme that surrounds is to build up the things and people we believe in, simply because of their position in society, until they themselves start to believe that they are too big or too important to fail. Power does funny things to people, and a lot of the powerful people in society are too far out of reach for us to have much of an impact on them.

But athletes and coaches are another story.  They are subject to public opinion.  We essentially create them to be who they are.  Let's be careful not to continue creating more Joe Paternos, who see themselves as too big to fail.