# It's time to officially Pit Joe Paterno and the Penn State football program. **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [November 7, 2011, 2:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-time-to-officially-pit-joe-paterno-and-the-penn-state-football-program/602167 "2011-11-07T14:23:58Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 105
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 12:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-time-to-officially-pit-joe-paterno-and-the-penn-state-football-program/602167/2081 "2012-01-17T00:01:59Z")
> [@RaftPeople](#): > > Hey **SA** , you said you would answer the question if I provided you a quote. > > What is your response? You didn’t provide a quote, and frankly I’m surprised at your duplicity and dishonesty in this regard. For some reason I’d pegged you as having more integrity than that. But don’t feel bad. Yours is hardly the first instance of a poster starting out as a dishonest wolf in honest sheep’s clothing only to reveal his true nature in the end. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 12:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-time-to-officially-pit-joe-paterno-and-the-penn-state-football-program/602167/2082 "2012-01-17T00:08:00Z")
He was \*quoting \*you, dumbshit. ---
**Author:** ![Kolga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/e56c9b/32.png) [@Kolga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kolga)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-time-to-officially-pit-joe-paterno-and-the-penn-state-football-program/602167/2083 "2012-01-17T00:11:00Z")
> [@mnemosyne](#): > > Why do I keep coming back to this goddamned thread? :smack: Because you, being a reasonable and intelligent person, are having a difficult time comprehending exactly how obtuse and intellectually dishonest a person can be. This thread is like a textbook example of “I’ve made up my mind, don’t confuse me with the facts.” I wish I could figure out a way to use it in my classes to illustrate to my students how people refuse to read and process information that they don’t like. ---
**Author:** ![RaftPeople](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/6f9a4e/32.png) [@RaftPeople](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RaftPeople)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-time-to-officially-pit-joe-paterno-and-the-penn-state-football-program/602167/2084 "2012-01-17T00:11:34Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > You didn’t provide a quote, and frankly I’m surprised at your duplicity and dishonesty in this regard. For some reason I’d pegged you as having more integrity than that. But don’t feel bad. Yours is hardly the first instance of a poster starting out as a dishonest wolf in honest sheep’s clothing only to reveal his true nature in the end. Here’s the fun thing about all of this **SA** , I don’t need to be dishonest, you provide all kinds of fun contradictions, etc. Are you saying these aren’t your words? > [@Starving Artist](#): > > …had neither the training nor legal standing to do more… Or are you saying that “do more” does not include calling the police and thus I’ve twisted your words? ---
**Author:** ![mnemosyne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c4cdca/32.png) [@mnemosyne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mnemosyne)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 12:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-time-to-officially-pit-joe-paterno-and-the-penn-state-football-program/602167/2085 "2012-01-17T00:19:51Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > **mnemosyne** , I was with you up to the point where you veered from Paterno’s likely role in mentoring horny college age boys on the proper way to behave with their girlfriends to his presumed role in being on the lookout for sixty-something college football coaches screwing ten-year-old boys in the butt in the school’s shower. The first is commonplace and reasonable, the second strains credulity to the breaking point and Paterno can hardly be blamed for not fulfilling his role as mentor for not being aware of and guarding against it. I didn’t say he had to be “on the lookout” or “guarding against” 60-year old college football child rapists. For a man nattering on about quotes and integrity, you seem to fail at that very thing on a frequent basis. Your claim is that Paterno didn’t understand the words or the meanings of the terms for the acts that McQueary used in describing what he saw. My counter-claim is he knew damn well what those words meant, and that he’d likely used similar words or mentioned similar acts as part of his job - not just in the context of how to behave with their girlfriends, but in discussing the news reports of male-on-male sodomy and sexual assault in college and high school sports hazing. I think it’s much more likely that Paterno told McQueary “I don’t want to know” than it was that he didn’t understand what was being reported to him, as you have claimed. And, again, Paterno _himself_ used the words “fondling or doing something of a sexual nature to a young boy”. Those were _Paterno’s_ words. He knew what they meant then, what they mean now. He knew what they implied, what they imply now. ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 12:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-time-to-officially-pit-joe-paterno-and-the-penn-state-football-program/602167/2086 "2012-01-17T00:24:10Z")
> [@jtgain](#): > > I came back to this thread after reading the Paterno interview thinking that some of you may concede that **Starving Artist** has a point. I was wrong. > > It really doesn’t change anybody’s mind that Paterno did not hear any details? Remember from the early pages of this thread where it was asserted that McQueary gave graphic details that would lead any reasonable person to immediately know without a doubt that Sandusky was anally raping the boy? Well, it seems that didn’t happen. > > It also seems that Joe wouldn’t even know what McQueary was talking about if he had given him the details as he is from another generation where that stuff wasn’t discussed openly. That doesn’t matter, though. He should have been Elliott Ness on this case…carry on… Thanks for the good word, **jt** , but at this point I have no real expectation that anyone is going to come around on this issue. It’s obvious that for every mitigating circumstance in Paterno’s favor, a new and different way will be found to attack him. For example, first we had people claiming Paterno knew from McQueary’s account full well what Sandusky was doing and therefore he was a knowing participant in covering up or enabling child sex abuse. Then I pose a credible explanation as to why Paterno may not have grasped the implications in McQueary’s due to the fact that he grew up in an era where things like that were discussed and that Paterno therefore may very well have been unaware that such things ever happened, and what is the response of the anti-Paterno crowd? Why, he’s a doddering old fool who probably isn’t even running his own football team and he therefore has no business coaching college football. :rolleyes: This is the problem with hysteria. Common sense and reason go out the window and the accused is considered guilty even if the reasons keep changing. Prior to this thread I couldn’t understand how someone like Nancy Grace (drink up, **Guin** ) could marshall enough of an audience to stay on the air; now, after seeing the way people in this thread are behaving, I’m wondering why she isn’t bigger and richer than Oprah. ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 12:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-time-to-officially-pit-joe-paterno-and-the-penn-state-football-program/602167/2087 "2012-01-17T00:27:46Z")
> [@ElvisL1ves](#): > > He was \*quoting \*you, dumbshit. He quoted me out of context in an attempt to make it look like I said something I didn’t. That is dishonest. ---
**Author:** ![VinylTurnip](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/b2d939/32.png) [@VinylTurnip](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VinylTurnip)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 12:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-time-to-officially-pit-joe-paterno-and-the-penn-state-football-program/602167/2088 "2012-01-17T00:33:18Z")
Perhaps this illustrates a need for some sort of rudimentary sex education refresher course for the elderly faculty and staff of our learning institutions. This goes in there, some people like to put it there, you shouldn’t put it in there, etc. ---
**Author:** ![RaftPeople](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/6f9a4e/32.png) [@RaftPeople](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RaftPeople)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-time-to-officially-pit-joe-paterno-and-the-penn-state-football-program/602167/2089 "2012-01-17T00:35:21Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > He quoted me out of context in an attempt to make it look like I said something I didn’t. That is dishonest. > [@Starving Artist](#): > > You might have a point if it weren’t for the fact that Paterno did EXACTLY what he was supposed to do according to both the law and established practice. **He didn’t try at all to dissuade McQueary from reporting what he saw, and he reported what McQueary told him immediately and accurately. It was not his job to do more. He had neither the training nor legal standing to do more,** thus to claim that by not doing more his actions border on criminal is nonsense. Here, I read your position as Paterno had no training or legal standing to do more. Like call police. So, we’ve already dismissed the “legal standing” bit. Now we are focused on training. The question remains: what training do you need to call the police? Note: if you feel I’ve misrepresented anything in your complete quote, or if you would like to change the wording of any of your position, please feel free. ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 12:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-time-to-officially-pit-joe-paterno-and-the-penn-state-football-program/602167/2090 "2012-01-17T00:36:36Z")
> [@mnemosyne](#): > > I think it’s much more likely that Paterno told McQueary “I don’t want to know” than it was that he didn’t understand what was being reported to him, as you have claimed. There is no evidence in the grand jury testimony to support this belief of yours, which renders it nothing more than a product of your fevered imagination. > [@mnemosyne](#): > > And, again, Paterno _himself_ used the words “fondling or doing something of a sexual nature to a young boy”. > > Those were _Paterno’s_ words. He knew what they meant then, what they mean now. He knew what they implied, what they imply now. :smack: He was reporting what McQueary told him, not what he understood to be happening as a matter of fact. ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 12:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-time-to-officially-pit-joe-paterno-and-the-penn-state-football-program/602167/2091 "2012-01-17T00:38:15Z")
And now, it’s been fun but I got chit to do so I’m out for a while. ---
**Author:** ![Huerta88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/82dd89/32.png) [@Huerta88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Huerta88)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 12:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-time-to-officially-pit-joe-paterno-and-the-penn-state-football-program/602167/2092 "2012-01-17T00:40:20Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > Paterno therefore may very well have been unaware that such things ever happened, That is your testimony, but you don’t get to testify. Man on boy sodomy was known of in Ancient Greece (it’s probably one of the top five things the average Westerner knows about in Ancient Greece). It was known of by the late '90s because of dozens of cases of man on boy priest rapes. Even Paterno couldn’t in his latest interview (with weeks to prepare, a friendly interviewer, and his lawyer and PR flack in attendance) muster a complete sentence saying he thought sexual assault and rape by a man on a boy was impossible or unthinkable. Instead he muttered some fragment to the effect of "I didn’t know, a man, a rape . . . " and trailed off because it sounded so stupid and lame. Nor as you pretend is human nature so determined by past beliefs that a person cannot when confronted with new and compelling evidence ever shake the (alleged, again, which is to say, made up by you, with a lot of folderol about how an oldster would believe raping a boy was impossible because oldsters believed (you make up this “fact”) that the boy would bleed to death) old notion. I had never heard nor conceived of furries in my first 30 years on this planet, but I’d seen enough to convince me of the genuine and extensive perversity of some human sexuality. The minute someone gave me a credible description of the furry subculture, I did not sit there helplessly shell shocked or experience grave cognitive dissonance or find myself faintly waving my hand saying, no, no, shut up, I won’t, I can’t hear of it. I said, GD, that’s some f’d up stuff, but there you go, and could have applied my knowledge of that f’d up stuff right away for whatever purpose necessary. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 12:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-time-to-officially-pit-joe-paterno-and-the-penn-state-football-program/602167/2093 "2012-01-17T00:42:54Z")
[Deadspin](http://deadspin.com/5876432/joe-paterno-wants-us-to-believe-he-has-never-heard-of-rape-and-a-man-joe-paterno-is-full-of-shit) explains it better: > [@](#): > > But when you say that you’ve literally never heard of “rape and a man,” implying that you’re too old and too fucking stupid to understand the particulars of that? BULLSHIT. TOTAL BULLSHIT. Joe Paterno studied the classics, for fuck’s sake. You can’t read Ovid without encountering 90 different rape scenes. An entire Greek city was founded on a man-boy rape myth. ---
**Author:** ![Jack\_Batty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jack_batty/32/3201_2.png) [@Jack\_Batty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jack_Batty)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 12:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-time-to-officially-pit-joe-paterno-and-the-penn-state-football-program/602167/2094 "2012-01-17T00:46:06Z")
> [@Jack\_Batty](#): > > I would expect any normal football coach who heard, “Sandusky was fondling a naked little boy in the showers,” not to respond with, “duuuyyyaahhh, what’s a fondling?” > [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > **That’s not what Paterno was told** , and what he was told left plenty of room for doubt as to what McQueary actually saw. > [@mnemosyne](#): > > And, again, Paterno _himself_ used the words “fondling or doing something of a sexual nature to a young boy”. > > Those were _Paterno’s_ words. He knew what they meant then, what they mean now. He knew what they implied, what they imply now. > [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > :smack: > > **He was reporting what McQueary told him** , not what he understood to be happening as a matter of fact. Beg pardon? (bolding mine) ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-time-to-officially-pit-joe-paterno-and-the-penn-state-football-program/602167/2095 "2012-01-17T01:05:26Z")
> [@RaftPeople](#): > > Here, I read your position as Paterno had no training or legal standing to do more. Like call police. > > So, we’ve already dismissed the “legal standing” bit. > > Now we are focused on training. The question remains: what training do you need to call the police? > Note: if you feel I’ve misrepresented anything in your complete quote, or if you would like to change the wording of any of your position, please feel free. IIRC, the context of that paragraph was in response to allegations that Paterno should have questioned Sandusky/conducted an investigation to find out who the kid was/held the administration’s feet to the fire until Sandusky was proven guilty/etc.. I have had to repeat myself over and over in this thread simply trying to keep straight the things I’ve actually said vs. the way people try to misconstrue it into something indefensible, and yet such an obviously stupid assertion as my saying that Paterno had no standing or training to call the police has drawn nary a peep from anyone but you. You are obviously and dishonestly trying to include calling the police under the heading of “more” and you aren’t fooling anyone. Now I’m out. ---
**Author:** ![mnemosyne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c4cdca/32.png) [@mnemosyne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mnemosyne)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-time-to-officially-pit-joe-paterno-and-the-penn-state-football-program/602167/2096 "2012-01-17T01:05:50Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > There is no evidence in the grand jury testimony to support this belief of yours, which renders it nothing more than a product of your fevered imagination. I didn’t claim he said that. I claimed that it’s likely that he didn’t ask for or stopped McQueary from giving more details because he didn’t want to know them. I think it’s _possible_ that he preferred to not have to think about it rather than to face it. That is my opinion. > [@](#): > > :smack: > > He was reporting what McQueary told him, not what he understood to be happening as a matter of fact. So…ten years later…he repeats words that he didn’t understand…in a grand jury testimony…while explaining to the grand jury what HE, Paterno, TOLD Schultz what McQueary had told him? > [@](#): > > Joseph V. Paterno \*testified \*to receiving the graduate assistant’s report at his home on a 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 Sandusky in the Lasch Building showers fondling or doing something of a sexual nature to a young boy Paterno’s own words of how he relayed information to Curley. Not really ambiguous at all about whether he believed McQueary, since uses the rather absolute terms of “had seen…Sandusky fondling.” He knew what he was saying, he knew what McQueary had witnessed, and he knew what all the words meant. Paterno is not as stupid as you’d like him to be, **SA.** ---
**Author:** ![mnemosyne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c4cdca/32.png) [@mnemosyne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mnemosyne)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 1:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-time-to-officially-pit-joe-paterno-and-the-penn-state-football-program/602167/2097 "2012-01-17T01:07:58Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > IIRC, the context of that paragraph was in response to allegations that Paterno should have questioned Sandusky/conducted an investigation to find out who the kid was/held the administration’s feet to the fire until Sandusky was proven guilty/etc.. . No one said this. Everyone said he should have contacted the police, so that THE POLICE could question Sandusky/conduct an investigation to find out who the kid was/held the administration’s feet to the fire until Sandusky was proven guilty/etc (and I’m going to assume “etc” includes “or shown to be innocent”). You are lying about what people have said. Perhaps you’ve been watching too much Nancy Grace? She may be rubbing off on you… ---
**Author:** ![RaftPeople](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/6f9a4e/32.png) [@RaftPeople](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RaftPeople)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 1:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-time-to-officially-pit-joe-paterno-and-the-penn-state-football-program/602167/2098 "2012-01-17T01:51:36Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > IIRC, the context of that paragraph was in response to allegations that Paterno should have questioned Sandusky/conducted an investigation to find out who the kid was/held the administration’s feet to the fire until Sandusky was proven guilty/etc.. I have had to repeat myself over and over in this thread simply trying to keep straight the things I’ve actually said vs. the way people try to misconstrue it into something indefensible, and yet such an obviously stupid assertion as my saying that Paterno had no standing or training to call the police has drawn nary a peep from anyone but you. You are obviously and dishonestly trying to include calling the police under the heading of “more” and you aren’t fooling anyone. When people say “Paterno should have done more”, the thing at the top of the list is “should have called the police”. It’s what we’ve been going back and forth about this entire thread. Ok, so to clarify your position, based on what you just posted above, you think that Paterno could have done more by calling the police, right? (note that I said “could have” not “should have”, in other words, if he had called police, we would all consider that as “doing more” than what he did) ---
**Author:** ![Huerta88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/82dd89/32.png) [@Huerta88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Huerta88)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 5:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-time-to-officially-pit-joe-paterno-and-the-penn-state-football-program/602167/2099 "2012-01-17T05:28:29Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > You are obviously and dishonestly trying to include calling the police under the heading of “more” and you aren’t fooling anyone. You (an obvious troll and pervert-enabler) invited this comparison by complaining that Paterno could not have “done more” than he did, and your implication that for Paterno to have “done more” would have been affirmatively improper. Nor did you distinguish whether “done more” meant confronting Sandusky (as any real man, a category into which Joe P. does not fall, would have done) vs. calling the cops. Hey jackasss – could Paterno have properly “done more” by calling the police (as opposed to asking his decades-long acolyte if he was showering with a young boy)? Answer it, you troll. If so, why did he not “do more?” Troll. ---
**Author:** ![Fotheringay-Phipps](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/d9b06d/32.png) [@Fotheringay-Phipps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fotheringay-Phipps)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 3:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-time-to-officially-pit-joe-paterno-and-the-penn-state-football-program/602167/2100 "2012-01-17T15:18:49Z")
The more substantive part of Paterno’s interview is where he actually discusses why he did not do more than he did. (Strangely, this seems to have been ignored by all the highly intelligent and rational posters here, what do you know.) Basically, he said he did not know how to deal with sex abuse situations, and turned it over to people whose expertise in this area he trusted more. He did not follow up any further for fear that he would be perceived as attempting to influence the investigation in one direction or the other. This is his story, FWIW. [Re the “rape and a man” quote, it’s hard to figure out what he meant, and I suspect that either his words were garbled or his thought was incomplete. Possibly he meant he had never heard direct reports of such a thing, i.e. that he had never dealt with it, and was thus inexperienced in such situations. But I don’t know.] [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-time-to-officially-pit-joe-paterno-and-the-penn-state-football-program/602167.md?page=104) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-time-to-officially-pit-joe-paterno-and-the-penn-state-football-program/602167.md?page=106)