Posnanski wrote an absolute dagger of a column about his feelings and how this alters his Paterno project. While some Penn State students expressed themselves by rioting and flipping a TV news van in the wake of Paterno's firing, and others are kicking up a storm of speculation about criminal charges he could face, Posnanski says what most people are feeling: The whole thing is just plain sad.
Posnanski susses up the maturity that many in sports media haven't found, neither calling for the old man's head nor defending the coach's alleged inaction. "[P]eople are complicated and contradictory and mysterious and often bewildering. Good people do bad things, bad people do good things, happy people get lost, lost people become heroes. This is the wonderful and depressing and daunting challenge of writing about people. Things don’t always make sense," he writes.
I'll refrain from quoting the piece further and diluting its rawness and disappointment. Just go read it.
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Caught up as we are in the rhythms of daily life, it's easy to forget that evil is real and exists all around us: in churches, in schools, in locker rooms. No one who had knowledge of this child rape, Paterno included, should be granted a free pass for any reason. Joe Paterno's legacy will forever be stained, as well it should be.
Shame on this article and shame on Joe. Being a journalist means you DON'T respond personally about a story. You are supposed to report the facts. He says it's crazy how the media has grabbed this story. Why? It's crazy how the community, including the police, kept this silent for so long allowing many more children to be hurt. It's shameful and so are the people trying to defend the school and the coaching staff. For now, you should be reporting what has happened and leave your personal feelings off the air and out of the papers.
No matter what we all do, at the end of the day, the things we do or say when we think nobody is looking, are what defines us as people.
To call Paterno's sanctioning of child rape a "mistake" is an insult to humanity. I made the "mistake" the other day of typing a "0" instead of a "9" on a report. I made the "mistake" of feeding my dog too much food at lunch the other day.
To keep quiet about a pervert on your own staff molesting children in your locker room shower is not a "mistake". It is collusion.
Seriously? This is what you get from the whole thing? You are as bad as the people who will soon be in jail. You most likely would not report a damned thing. You are a flipping idiot. Nobody here gives a crap about JoPa, JoPo or any book coming about. People care about kids. Obviously you do not. You obviously only care about a stupid ass sport.
Question: Would Joe Po be defending Joe Pa if he wasn't writing a book on him? Fact he, he rarely delivered columns containing any type of constructive criticism in Kansas City. He gets too close to his sources and subjects and only writes of a world where everyone has white, picket fences and pet unicorns.
The fact that it's hard to tell whether Joe Po is Joe Pa's PR representative or a journalist is not a good sign
Is it any surprise the Pitch would gush over this article? After all, they've previously defended the "free speech" of the Westboro Cult.
How can anyone defend Paterno when at best he showed apathy towards child rape, or at worst covered up child rape? Legally, Paterno may have done enough, but holy fuck you are delusional if you think this guy doesn't deserve partial blame for this resulting in his termination. The raping was done by his right hand man of 20 years. It happened in the showers at PSU. It happened in 1998 after which he was allowed to, out of the blue, retire from PSU (as if that wouldn't raise questions). He got caught again in 2002 actually buttfucking a kid, JoePa was told by the witness and NOBODY FOLLOWED UP WHEN THE POLICE DECIDED NOT TO PRESS CHARGES. That's assuming they weren't actively involved in covering it up. He was doing this though his charity/rape dating service, which everyone knew was his, so if there was even a hint of child rape that should have set off alarm bells. Paterno, the AD, the business VP and the President were all rightly fired for their apathy or cover up (depending on what you want to believe). McQueary still needs to be fired as he witnessed the guy having anal sex with a 10 year old, and didn't follow up after he saw his superiors do nothing/very little. This rapist was still taking kids to fucking road and bowl games up to 2009 on the University's dime! He just wasn't allowed to bring them on campus. But clearly he was allowed to rape them wherever else he wanted to.
At least I know where the Pitch stands as far as having your bro's back when your bro rapes some kids. Bro's before ho's?
Pitch has swallowed the JOPO koolaid. Posnanski is wimping out here because he can't write the sunshine and lollipops book he wanted to write.
Anyone who knew and did not report to authorities should be charged, including Paterno and the GA who witnessed the act. At the time the GA witnessed the rape, the GA should have stepped in and beat Sandusky to within an inch of his life.
We don't have Posnanski himself, just others reporting what he's saying, but he sounds a great deal like a Paterno apologist here: http://deadspin.com/5858278/
If that's indeed the case, and he's been quoted accurately, I think he's got some explaining to do about why his sympathies appear to be with the man, Paterno, who let a child rapist walk the streets for nearly a decade.
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