Phil Knight eulogizes Joe Paterno

yep...they sure are....nike jumped the shark in 1987. does anyone remember when nike let people personalize their shoes and this guy wanted to have sweatshop stitched in his nikes? then he published the correspondence concerning the matter. decades ago the US manufactured shoes in this country. then phil knight wrote an ma thesis at stanford how he could manufacture shoes cheap in poor countries exploiting cheap (child) labor and then he did it. and then everyone else had to do so to compete.

there is no excuse for defending joe paterno or phil knight

Almost as bad as Mitt Romney and his multiple wives.

Joe had a moral obligation to do more than he did, and I don't understand how anyone can say that the correct response to learning about the @ss raping kids is to report it and forget about it. The Penn State community has painted itself as one of the more morally corrupt bunch in modern history. They are defending the undefendable.

Let's review the Grand Jury Report:

Joseph V. Paterno testified to receiving the graduate assistant's report at his home on Saturday morning. Paterno testified that the graduate assistant was very upset. Paterno called Tim Curley ("Curley"), Penn State Athletic Director and Paterno's immediate superior, to his home the very next day, A Sunday, and reported to him that the graduate assistant had seen Jerry Sandusy in the Lasch Building showers fondling or doing something of a sexual nature to a young boy.

If your very upset subordinate reported a sexual attack on a young boy at your workplace would you sit on it for a day then let it get swept under the rug in the months and years to follow??? I would hope not.

I agree that Joe did plenty of good in his life, but his behavior during this scandal couldn't have been much worse. When Knight brought the child sexual abuse matter up at the funeral, he opened it up for all to rehash. He should have kept his mouth shut and stuck to the other parts of Joe's life, which can be painted in a vey different color.

You need to look at this more critically.

A day might or might not actually be enough time to make a decision this big.

And it doesn't matter how upset the subordinate looked. That doesn't make his accusation the TRUTH. It's still just hearsay and a rumor. He didn't let anything get swept under the rug. He told his superiors under the assumption that they would conduct an investigation. That's all that he was morally and legally required to do. If his superiors did nothing afterwards, then that means that their investigation found nothing wrong or that it was dealt with PRIVATELY and none of Paterno's business. That is how investigations and many legal situations are dealt with (why we will never know the truth about Mark Zuckerberg or Michael Jackson).

He didn't know whether or not the subordinate was telling facts or not. And he was not qualified to discern and investigate whether or not they are facts. That would have been morally and legally wrong to do so an unqualified person (would you want an unqualified hostage negotiator?). Institutions of this size deal with these types of true and false accusations ALL THE TIME.

"All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing."

'Nuff said

Edmund Burke wrote:

"All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing."

'Nuff said

except for that he didnt do nothing. he did what he was supposed to do and all that he was qualified to do

Nothing= meeting the barely minimum threshold. What the bare minimum legal standard is and what's MORAL can be worlds apart.

If that were your kid, would you say JoePa did enough, even after being told by the AD "we told him (Sandusky) not to bring kids on campus anymore". WTF? What's up with that?

This was managed so as to ensure "plausible deniability" by all involved and to protect the institution first. Period.

Indefensible...

And Knight is a sick freak whom Bowerman would disown were he alive today. Pre, too.

what exactly else was he supposed to do??

and no, i would NOT want anyone unqualified to get involved in something serious that had to do with me and my family

Ask McQueary EXACTLY what he saw

Confront Sandusky

Ask university police exactly what they know of previous reports of abuse

Contact the state police

Call all board members of Second Mile and demand they conduct an investigation.

What to do is easy. Deciding to do it is difficult. A true moral dilemman existed: bring down a university by exposing one of its leading ex-coaches (and a presumptive heir apparent to JoePa at one time), or sweep it under the rug and preserve the donations and mythical image of Happy Valley.

Remember, JoePa RAN that university. A billion $ + in donations says so. Got a Dean of Students run out of there (she voluntarily resigned after fighting too many battles over his players).

A guy with that kind of obsessive control over his team could not NOT have known. He was a good man who made a conscious decision to be intentionally ignorant and look the other way. JoePa allowed horrific acts to take place under his watch. Unfortunately, that will now be a big part of his legacy.

sports$$$>child ass raping

cant believe it wrote:

and no, i would NOT want anyone unqualified to get involved in something serious that had to do with me and my family

Good point. You would certainly want the school to involve those who were best qualified to conduct the investigation. That would be the police. Not the University rent-a-cop variety, but real Pennsylvanian lawmen. The last thing you'd want would be for those who had an interest in covering up the abuse of children on their property to be heading the investigation. Yet that's what happened.

Remind me where in the timeline the school involved the local, qualified legal authorities? And when it was that Joe followed up on the investigation of the abuse from his locker room?

prefan wrote:

If a subordinate came to you in your workplace, told you a story about seeing someone raping a boy in the workplace bathroom, you reported it to your boss, who was also the boss of the rapist in question, would you not feel like you had taken the right step? Would you continue to pursue the issue afterward, although you had no legal standing to do so?

If it was a a situation where a man was accused of raping a boy and after I reported it (which would have been to the actual police, not a campus head) the accused man had not been investigated by police, arrest, or taken to court, then I would most certainly follow up. Rape is not to be reported and left alone. Joe would never have wanted kids to get raped, but he clearly didn't do everything he could/should have to protect children.

Your point is insane.

Those kinds of Italian and European peoples enjoy sex with youngsters of various ages. It is an accepted part of their unique heritage and culture. You read about European peoples in America raping children in the newspapers every day and see the news reports of child rapes by European peoples in America on television regularly. I don't think it is necessary to sensationalize Paterno and Sandusky's appreciation for little boys and attempt to make it out to be something unusual for those kinds of peoples.

I think the hardest thing for me to understand in all this nonsense is how people make such quick and harsh judgements. Did Joe do what he should have? Is he a vile monster, a hero? I didn't know the man myself, people are saying things both ways, so I guess I'll never know for sure. A lot of people here are naive. Naive about their perfect fantasy world. Naive about the idea that a supposed fantasy world is actually a living hell.

Someone said something about the Penn State community being one of the more morally corrupt in modern history. That is so offensive.. a handful of disgusting people get away with something and now the millions of people who have a connection to penn state, their culture and second home is now just pure evil and corruption? All of their friends and memories and great experiences were nothing but an illusion? They are all at fault?

Just a question: how is it heresay or rumor if Paterno had an eyewitness (McQuery) who saw the whole thing?

atownrunnin wrote:

Just a question: how is it heresay or rumor if Paterno had an eyewitness (McQuery) who saw the whole thing?

atownrunnin wrote:

Just a question: how is it heresay or rumor if Paterno had an eyewitness (McQuery) who saw the whole thing?

Maybe because that is literally the definition of hearsay.