First let me say that I'm sure some will disagree. Let me also say that I have no real horse in this race, as I don't love or hate Penn State. However I do have some thoughts on this that I wanted to get out. This seemed the appropriate place.
Things that I don't understand
I have been reading reaction on this scandal for three days. I've read almost every thread on this board and a host of articles from elsewhere. Each and every talking head that I've heard is in favor of the entire thing being blown up. It's almost mob-like at this point.
There are lots of things that people are missing, though, at least in my opinion.
My first issue is with people filling in facts on their own. I've read the grand jury presentment. There is a lot of good information there, but there are many holes, too. What I've read is a lot of people filling in these holes on their own. I don't understand the rush to condemn. The facts will come out eventually. It seems pigheaded to base conclusions on your own set of facts when you have no idea whether or not those facts are true.
The second deals with the treatment of Mike McQueary. One of the biggest problems here is that each and every person passing judgment has the benefit of a 23-page grand jury presentment. They have the benefit of 10 years of evidence. They have the benefit of hindsight. They have the benefit of acting outside of the moment.
Mike McQueary had none of that. No one wakes up in the morning and says, "What will I do today if I find someone that I respect having sex with a 10-year old boy?" This isn't at all similar to being a second baseman and preparing yourself for if the ball is hit your way. McQueary doesn't have the benefit of knowing that Jerry Sandusky is a lifelong pervert. It seems to me that people have lost all ability to judge his actions in context. They're looking at him from the outside and not even attempting to put themselves in the exact position he found himself in.
Likewise, I think people, being obsessed with this story for the last three days, are going crazy on what McQueary was supposed to do. So what did he do? He consulted with someone he trusted (his dad). He then told his immediate boss. He also told two superiors, in detail, what he saw. In all, the guy told 4 people, three of them being in his direct chain of command. When McQueary left the meeting with your AD and Schultz, I have little doubts that he was told, "We will look into it and take care of it." If I'm Mike McQueary, I'm not going to be a vigilante. I have a career, bills, my health, my family, and 100 other things to think about on a day to day basis. I told a large number of people in power what I saw. They told me they'd deal with it. I'm trusting them to do so because, 1) I don't have time to be a vigilante for justice every day of my life - I'm not a cop and 2) this is how these things are handled.
It seems to me that the university is a different kind of place. The police force is under the control, at least partially, by the administration. This isn't like seeing a rape on the highway where the police are the only guys with power. This happened at the university. And McQueary approached three people in the university structure who he trusted to do the right thing.
Now, there's also the point that McQueary "left" the boy to be raped. This is what I'm talking about above with filling in the facts. What we do know is that both the boy and Sandusky saw Mike. What is more plausible? The two just look at him and Jerry gives him a wink and keeps going? Doubtful. More likely is that Jerry is spooked, tries to act like nothing is happening, and the act stops. Again, WE DON'T KNOW the details here. I'm offering an alternative that is at least as plausible as the one people seem to be believing. In order for Sandusky to get away with this for so long, he had to be calculated and careful. It seems highly unlikely that Sandusky would see McQueary and keep pounding away. I'm not sure how people are missing this.
As for what "you would have done," I've seen a lot of people talking about how they would have killed Sandusky, beaten his ***, or whatever. First, you don't know until you're in that position. As has been mentioned before, this type of thing has a crippling effect on people. It almost killed a war vet who has seen it all. Secondly, I don't know why anyone expects Mike McQueary to give up his freedom by committing a crime in response to a crime. This is a very strange view on situational ethics.
So should McQueary have called the police? Looking back, with 10 years of evidence, and knowing that Sandusky is a pervert? I would obviously say so. This would have been the quickest way to bring the police into play immediately. But things look differently when you have the benefit of an outside lens. When you're in the moment, things aren't nearly as easy. Why McQueary should be expected to act perfectly in a high-pressure, highly traumatic situation is beyond me. People rarely act perfectly in the best of conditions, much less in a stressful situation like that one.
It's important to keep in mind what McQueary did do. He DID tell four people. He did IMMEDIATELY alert his superiors. He did follow up with another meeting in which he gave great detail. He did cooperate with the grand jury.
It seems to me that people expect the average citizen to be the police. They expect someone in the position of Mike McQueary to take justice into his own hands and beat up a rapist. They expect Mike McQueary to march into the athletic director's office on a weekly basis to make sure the guy is doing his job. This is unrealistic. Mike McQueary has a life to live. "Hey, you're my boss, I know, but are you doing your job right now?" The answer McQueary is likely to get is, "We're taking care of it."
One of the most bizarre parts of all of this is that Sandusky seems to be getting a pass. I know that sounds odd, but it's almost true. The witch hunt is out in such force that the extraneous parties are bearing the burden. On the list of people I would heap blame on, the list is not linear. We don't live in a black and white world. Human beings and their ethics are complicated. It's possible to assign levels of blame all across the board, yet some people want to assign one type of blame to all involved. My chart would look like this:
Sandusky
Curley/Schulz/Janitor staff that didn't report a thing
University President
DA who chose not to prosecute Sandusky
Paterno
McQueary
Somewhere in there, we have to throw Sandusky's wife who probably ignored the signs (here we are making up facts again). We also have to throw in the victims of the crime, as they are to blame. If the first one goes to the police the next day, then this doesn't happen to others. Don't you see how complicated this gets? We should also remember that McQueary is, in an indirect way, a victim of this crime. He was minding his business, getting his work done, finishing up a long day, when he was exposed to a horrific, life-altering scene. Think about that before you pass such harsh, black and white judgment.
As for Paterno, this is where things get complicated without the facts. Do I think it is plausible that Mike McQueary, out of respect for an OLD man that he respects, didn't come out and say the words "*** rape"? I think that's entirely possible. If Joe got a watered down version of the facts, then I don't know what else he was supposed to do. He referred McQueary, the guy with the story, to the people in charge. McQueary apparently felt more comfortable giving details to those guys, and that makes sense to be honest.
This all changes quite obviously if Paterno knew a lot about the prior activities of Sandusky. But that hasn't been proven or strongly suggested even.
We also seem to be forgetting that Paterno didn't see anything. He wasn't a witness. What is he going to call the police and say? I heard from someone that something weird might have taken place in our showers. Looking back, the correct move was to refer McQueary to the police. "Mike, call the cops." But that's assuming that McQueary was completely up front about what he saw. If he didn't give Joe a ton of detail, then why would Joe immediately move to calling the police? It all hinges on the facts, which people have conveniently filled in for themselves.
Likewise, it is VERY easy to assume to that Joe had to know something after we have read a grand jury report. But again, try to look at things through the lens of the person involved. Joe had (apparently) no knowledge of anything in the report. Instead, he knew Sandusky as a trusted friend, coach, and a person who had the respect of the community. It's easy to see Sandusky as a monster now, but it was probably a little more unbelievable then. This again comes with the caveat that if Joe knew of Sandusky's past transgressions, then he is a lot harder to defend. Without knowing how long this has gone on, it's hard to say. Given Paterno's history, I give him the benefit of the doubt in this spot.
Likewise, I'm not sure why Paterno is expected to launch some investigation. He is not the police. He is a football coach who (it seems) received somewhat vague allegations of something that happened in his building. He didn't see it. There's also the fact that he passed things along to the next person up the chain who, presumably, would have more time and resources to handle the things appropriately. The fact that one of those superiors was at least partially in authority over the police department complicates matters here. Can this be described as going to the police? Weakly. But it does complicate matters. This wasn't a case where Paterno sat on his hands. It wasn't a case where he quietly told the AD to take care of it. This was a case where he told two of his direct superiors what he had been told. He also told McQueary to tell them the details.
Perfect move? No. Call the cops. In hindsight, that is the right move. But Joe wasn't a witness. And there's also the point that this is a university, where there is a structure. Even the police fits into that structure in a strange way. This is a strange case where the cops have the ability to arrest their direct superiors.
I have no defense for the idiots in the higher-reaches of the admin who sat on the information. I'm also struggling to find their motivation. My guess is that they believed that they could keep it quiet. They also believed that the damage from the public learning about the incident was too great to risk. This was a huge miscalculation on their part. They were far enough removed from the incident that they viewed the "victim" as more of a threat than an actual person. Then they lied about it. These guys are crummy and it's hard to view it any differently.
Doing what we need to do (viewing the incident through the past lens), it is hard to come up with any justification. Mike McQueary felt strongly enough about the incident that he climbed WAY up the food chain to report it. Paterno apparently had multiple meetings with them. My assumption is that both were told that it would be taken care of. Why they chose not to is no mystery. How two people so accomplished could make such an error in ethics, morals, and strategy is tough to imagine, though.
The last point that I've seen mentioned time and again is in regard to McQueary and how he could "see Sandusky" around the place without being appalled. We don't know how McQueary felt. Likewise, it seems that people are looking at this with the benefit of outside perspective. Had McQueary known that Sandusky was going on raping little boys, his actions probably would have been different. But six, seven, eight years later and you haven't heard or seen anything, it's easy to see where McQueary might think that it was an isolated incident. People make mistakes, right? Even horrible mistakes. I also doubt that Sandusky continued to bring little kids around McQueary.
It seems to me that people wanted McQueary to spend the last ten years of his life making sure that Sandusky was prison raped in Sing Sing. That's just not realistic, though. It's not a realistic expectation and it's not how things work.
A little bit of perspective and taking a moment to THINK without your emotions is needed by all involved in offering opinions here. Whether Penn State rids itself of these people is another story. There is a benefit to "starting over" after something like this. But without all of the information and with some of the assumptions that have been made, it seems like the criticisms are a bit unfair on some points.
Just my $.02.
