Internal Review

Sport's most intoxicating characteristic is binarism. Winners and losers. Good and evil. Our team and your team. We crave the extremes, and fortunately, the real narratives often fill them well. When they don't, we have sports coverage to help push things to their extremes. Questionable calls become terrible calls. Someone suffering from substance abuse is a traitor to the game. A person who seems to be decent is canonized.

When these narratives are broken, sports coverage swings the pendulum back the other way. A loser becomes a winner. Shame begets redemption. Heroes become villains. Swinging the pendulum back is not easy, though, as it must fight against both pre-existing notions and rising apathy about the subject. Is Lebron finally good again, or is he still evil? We don't know because we got sick of talking about him and Steph Curry is more interesting. How do we feel about Pete Rose, Lance Armstrong, Barry Bonds, OJ?... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

STICK TO SPORTS... until you win and "save a city." Whatever, it's complicated. Anyway, any comment on your hairline?

During the quest to flip the narrative while keeping our interest, we question whether we really care or not. It's exhausting. Eventually we just don't want to talk about it. This often happens with things that aren't fun to talk about: student-athletics, steroids, domestic abuse, bigotry. In those cases, the pendulum often doesn't swing enough because the momentum of the conversation is halted by subject fatigue. Should we strip Lance Armstrong of every trophy? Should Adrian Peterson be in jail? Should North Carolina stop playing football and basketball? Eh, whatever, it's not worth getting into.

Most of the time, the arguments don't matter much besides to those directly involved. Someone cheated. Someone isn't a good person. Someone should be in a jail. But there is one very clear example of when changing the narrative became so exhausting that we gave up far too early. The systemic coverup of the raping of children at Pennsylvania State University is the most unforgivable crime in the history of sports. Would this have happened without sports? In some form, perhaps, as it happens without athletics or institutional compliance far too often around the world. But these rapes were allowed to happen because of sports, and after a couple years of thinkpieces and flame wars we found ourselves arguing about a statue. 

I use the word rape because using molestation strangely softens the crime. It conjures images of touching children, of someone who couldn't help themself, of inappropriate behavior. What Jerry Sandusky did, and was allowed to do, would be a crime even if the children were adults. He raped children for decades, and according to recent claims reportedly based off of sealed victim testimony, Joe Paterno, a high-ranking employee at a state institution knew about it as early as 1976. Now, CNN is reporting victims saying they told Paterno about being raped as early as 1971 and Paterno told them to drop it.

When the scandal first broke, everyone wanted to know how high it went and what the timeline was. When did Paterno know? When did athletic director Tim Curly know? When did school president Graham Spanier know? How was Second Mile involved? Before we could even discuss consequences and preventative measures for the future, we had to know what happened. It seemed like whatever was going on must be bigger than just one pedophile, because why would an administration risk everything to protect a single pedophile ex-coach? Maybe mainstream America was going to learn that massive sex-trafficking rings aided by extremely powerful people don't just exist in Europe. Maybe... if not for Louis Freeh.

A man of his word is only helpful if he is giving his word to you.

Determining whether or not an attorney is a company man can be difficult. Because their careers often vacillate between representing individuals, corporations, governments, and can even include the seemingly independent role of a judge, it's hard to tell if they are driven by career ambition, political motivation, money, or a sense of justice. Louis Freeh, however, is clearly a company man. 

He was an FBI field agent, first lieutenant in the Army Reserve, and worked as an Assistant US Attorney in New York's Southern District. His name-making case as a prosecutor in the Southern District was the "Pizza Connection Trial," where Freeh successfully convicted over two dozen mafia members who were running heroin and laundering money through pizza restaurants. Massive drug busts are so loved at the federal level because they serve the dual role of showing justice being served and also eliminate competition for the government's own lucrative enterprise.

George H.W. Bush appointed Freeh district court justice of the Southern District in 1991, and then Bill Clinton made him head of the FBI in 1993. In two years he went from second-in-command in one of 93 US Attorney districts to head of the FBI. Why would it be so important to get Freeh in as head of the FBI in such a hurry?

When Freeh took over in 1993, the FBI was investigating both the federal government's role in murdering 70 men, women, and children in Waco, Texas in 1993, and the federal government's role in murdering a wife and son at Ruby Ridge, Idaho in 1992. In both of those cases, Freeh found the government was not accountable for any deaths, and even publicly denounced a county prosecutor's charges of manslaughter against an FBI sniper at Ruby Ridge. In the rest of Freeh's illustrious career of the FBI he oversaw the at-best-incompotent but probably far more sinister investigation of the Oklahoma City Bombing, the botched frame-up of Richard Jewell for the Atlanta Olympic Bombing, and the ignoring of evidence of a looming terrorist attack before 9/11. He resigned amid allegations of corruption and incompetence in May 2001. 

Does this seem like the man to hire if you want to get to the truth? Of course not, but we were fine with that, because we didn't want the truth. We only wanted to consider two "extremes": either nobody knew Sandusky committed these acts, or only Paterno and a couple others knew but were reluctant to do anything because of careerism or lack of evidence. Freeh gave us the latter option: Paterno knew of one incident in 1998, but he heard about it second-hand, told his superiors, and Sandusky was asked not to bring children around the football facilities anymore. It's not the prettiest bow to wrap something up in, but it would do just fine. 

But our nation, and its insatiable hunger for the truth, wasn't going to just take Freeh's word for it. No, sir! We were going to have a long, heated debate about whether it was really as bad as Freeh said. Maybe Freeh was wrong and JoePa is a saint, goddamnit! Then the other side yells back that he ignored one rape he heard about second-hand. A statue seems like the proper stakes for this sort of argument.

The most recent allegations and judge's ruling, though, makes something clear. We were only arguing about the best case scenario. We were told the truth had to fall somewhere between incompetence and a white lie. We didn't ask any questions about the mysterious death of a US Attorney who chose not to investigate claims of sexual abuse against Sandusky in 1998, or the roles children's foundations have played in systemic sexual abuse operations in the past, because even entertaining the possibility of something more sinister having occurred at Pennsylvania State University would mean one thing was true: everyone is full of shit. Louis Freeh didn't ask these questions. Pennsylvania State University didn't ask these questions. The National Collegiate Athletics Association didn't ask these questions. The Entertainment and Sports Programming Network didn't ask these questions. President Obama didn't ask these questions. If you aren't asking obvious questions about something this important, is it because you already know the answer?

"I do not believe that being comforted by government lies is addictive..."

Those same people that didn't ask these questions just want us to move on. Talk about bowl bans. Use acronyms to help us forget the reasons the institutions were founded in the first place and instead see them as letters on a score ticker. Just cover the public hanging of one sick man and then discuss whether or not Christian Hackenberg can become an elite quarterback. Argue about a statue.

Paterno's greatest legacy is that he was such a towering figure that he became the ultimate stopgap. Nothing could be bigger than Paterno. If this was an institutional coverup then it ends with Paterno, because he was the institution. His timely death meant that we can throw whatever other dirt we find on top of his grave and take a long, hard, look at the record books and think about what we've done.

The coverage of the allegations when they first came out changed nothing. The sins of a deviant, and maybe some people trying not to scare away recruits, were punished. We needed to have a conversation about how unchecked social and political power is a terrible danger to everyone, especially children, and we got the bizarro version of that. We talked about how the all-powerful NCAA was wrongfully punishing 75 kids who didn't do anything wrong, by saying they couldn't go play in the music city bowl. It's this same "think of the troops" logic that has allowed endless wars and countless deaths around the globe.

The public consumption of sports is mostly useless. We all acknowledge this. It's escapism, nostalgia, and vicariousness. But we also know that sometimes sports are something bigger. Sometimes they push us forward as a society, make us face our bigotry, help people empathize, help people heal, show us the heights of physical endeavor. Sometimes they help shine a light on a serious issue, and our escape ends up becoming our therapy. What happened at Pennsylvania State University was one such opportunity, and we've ignored it. We've learned nothing.

Of course it's exhaustive, I'm exhausted just reading the title!

When I was in middle school, a new coaching staff coached our 7th grade team. There was a head coach and his two assistants. Most of the community didn't know much about the new head coach; I'm not sure how he got the job. He wasn't from the area, didn't teach at the school, didn't have any children, and hadn't coached at any other levels within the district. We loved him, though. He was tough, and cool, and joked with us about all the things we cared about in 7th grade, mostly jerking off, our developing muscles, and girls. 

One of the assistant coaches had been my football coach in 3rd grade. The other assistant I didn't know anything about. Some of the kids on the team knew him, though. He had been their baseball coach. The kids said they heard he was gay. This was a very big deal to my 7th grade football team and our nearly universal homophobia. We made jokes about it behind his back, freaked out when he hit our butts, and said we would never be caught in a room with him alone. 

Part of me always felt uncomfortable with that. I knew calling someone "gay" or a "fag" was wrong, but it's what everyone else did. But I was sure he wasn't gay. I don't know why, maybe because I didn't have much exposure to openly gay adults, or he didn't match a stereotype, or I was merely basing it on the absurdly low accuracy of middle school rumors. But I felt sorry for that assistant coach. 

After a game near the end of the season, our head coach pulled us aside. He said we may hear something about that assistant tonight on the news, and not to talk about it or be concerned. Because we are born trolls, and our trollbrains peak during puberty, this was the most exciting thing we'd ever heard. What could it be? What did he do? Was he a drug dealer?

No, he was a pedophile. Some of his former baseball players accused him of molestation. His home was raided; it was full of child porn, some homemade. Open and shut case, and we all were shocked. Completely shocked. Did anything happen with anyone on our team? No, at least not that anyone ever came forward about.

I can't even remember discussing the assistant coach's arrest with my parents. It was the sort of thing that everyone talked about, but nobody discussed. It was gossip. It was the pastor cheating on his wife. An isolated incident that we were fortunate to not be hurt by-- the type of darkness that you don't mention for fear it would spread.

That spring our school had a two day, drug-awareness retreat. It was like summer camp. We were gonna stay in bunks for a night and do activities during the day, team-building, learning about the power of being drug-free, all that stuff. We heard our head football coach was thinking of being one of the counselors. "I don't know," he said. 

"What, why not?" we all asked, and by all I mean 30 of us that swarmed him as soon as we saw him at lunch. 

"You guys are gonna get me in trouble." 

"What, why?" 

"Because, you'll tell your parents that I was swearing, or that I was dipping and it's supposed to be like this drug-free school-sponsored thing, and there's gonna be other kids in the bunk because they won't put all football players in one bunk. I don't think I should." We all convinced him we wouldn't say anything, and the other kids wouldn't say anything either. He said he'd do it.

All the other kids had to be in bunks with teachers-- boring, stuffy, supremely uncool teachers. Ten of us were put in the coach's bunk, along with some other kids.

The night in the bunk, after lights out, we started joking about the stuff we always joked about. One of the kids said he had some porn (they had it in magazines back then, children) and was gonna jerk off. He talked about spitting on his hand and going to town, started making sound effects and moaning. We were all rolling in our beads with laughter. It was an extension of the same conversation we'd been having for 2 years-- we crowd-sourced how to jerk off, how to get more porn, what girls were sluts (none yet), and what teachers we heard posed for playboy or used to date members of modestly popular rock bands (an impossible number).

Our coach came out of his room to see what we were laughing about. We quickly shut up. He told us we weren't gonna get in trouble, what was it? After some embarrassment and assurances someone mentioned that one kid, Mike, said he had some porn. The coach responded with the way we knew such a cool coach would, "Yeah? Let's see it! C'mon!" We were all dying of laughter. Mike was one of our good friends, but he wasn't on the football team. He didn't know coach like we all did. Maybe he didn't have any porn, maybe he was just too embarrassed, or maybe he didn't trust the coach, but he never got it out, despite the coach's persistent pleas. It was a big disappointment for the rest of us. 

The next day coach pulled a few of us aside and said that we shouldn't tell anybody about that stuff. He was just joking around, but it might not sound good. "And remember, don't mention the dipping either," he said with a lipful of tobacco. We assured him we wouldn't tell anybody. Of course the next day at lunch we told everybody, because like a lot of things in middle school, it was the most amazing, hilarious thing ever. It never got back to any teachers or parents, at least not that we heard of.

A couple years later, when I was in high school, I was in a bookstore. My mom was outside in the car as I ran in looking for something. I saw my old head coach sitting in the magazine section. I was excited to see him and sat down next to him. We caught up for a second. He asked if I still played football, I said no, just playing basketball now. "That's too bad," he said. "You were always fearless out there, you know. You weren't afraid of anybody or anything. That's why we tried you at center. Coach Matt (the coach I had in 3rd grade) told me, 'Put him in there. He'll go hit that middle linebacker. This kid's not afraid of anything.'" It made me feel better than almost any compliment I'd ever gotten. 

I said "thanks, coach" and looked at the floor, a forced stoicism that I picked up from my brother and seeing the way he handled compliments. While looking for something to fill the silence, I noticed what the coach was looking at. It was a bodybuilding magazine. I had never seen someone look at a bodybuilding magazine-- greased up dudes in speedos flexing peak-steroid-era muscles. Coach saw me look at the magazine, and looked back down at it himself. He slowly flipped through a couple of pages. 

"See this guy? That guy is jacked." It's the same way my teammates and I would talk about some older football players. 

"Yeah, he is." I responded, not getting into specifics over what particular parts of his body were especially jacked. 

"Oh man, look at this guy. You think I could ever look like that?" I looked at the photo a little closer, just another shining, ripped dude.

"I guess, maybe."

"Eh, probably not. Look at how jacked that guy is. I bet the ladies would like it if I looked like that, huh?"

"Maybe. I mean, you could always tell them you used to look like that, but were in an accident or something, and you'll be like that again someday." He laughed and went back to his magazine. I said my mom was waiting, and got on my way.

I didn't think anything of it. It was great to see my old coach. Nice to be told I was fearless. It only occurred to me 15 years later that maybe he was gauging my interest. That maybe it wasn't a total coincidence that his good friend was a pedophile. In a scenario where you would think I would be skeptical of someone, I had all the trust in the world in him. Even thinking of the possibility that there was more to the story than one deranged pedophile was so horrifying that it never crossed any of our minds.

Oh, okay. The institution changed so now we don't have to.

Schaudenfruede is such a big part of hardcore sports fandom. Your team will rarely win a championship, so the delightful failures of others has to fill the rest of the time. Whatever happened in Happy Valley was so bad that joking about it was shunned. It was something we couldn't take pleasure in. So we moved on. We are inherently trained to fight against growth, because it necessitates the understanding that we are flawed. It's time to acknowledge how terribly flawed we are. Not only are we capable of letting something like this happen, we are too stubborn to learn from it and not let it happen again. So we argue about a statue, and talk about wins records, and laud the efforts a state-funded institution made to take a hard stance against this kind of thing by hiring a coach who also may have covered up rapes. We've stopped blaming them for making us think about all this. But there is no "them" and there is no "us." It's all our responsibility to stop not just the raping of children, not even just the cover-up of the rapes, but the cover-up of the cover-up. We are arguing over whether or not our own punishment is enough to stop the institution we are all complicitly a part of. We are Penn State.