NCAA hands out severe punishment for Penn State

[gauguin57]

164. NCAA sanctions did absolutely nothing to punish the people responsible.

Instead, they'll be punishing -- for YEARS -- those who had nothing to do with the Sandusky crimes or coverup.

There are crimes, absolutely. There was a coverup. Absolutely. But the entire former coaching staff is gone, and of the six men implicated in the crimes and coverup: one is dead, one is in jail for life, one has been fired and may face prosecution, two are fired and already facing prosecution and one has been fired and is not facing prosecution, probably because he was the whistleblower (McQueary).

NOT A SINGLE ONE OF THOSE MEN WAS PUNISHED BY THESE SANCTIONS.

Meanwhile, a bunch of student athletes who have committed themselves to a university, and have been practicing for months, have been punished. Sandusky was long gone before they first held a football.

The businesses of State College are going to be hurt economically; I know some of those business owners, and if they'd had an inkling that Sandusky was doing what he was doing, they'd have beaten the crap out of him and dragged him into the police station personally. But they're going to be hurt badly by these sanctions.

And who knows where those fines are going to come from. Will students be hurt by that, academically -- by the loss of scholarships or academic programs or something? Who in the goddamn hell does THAT benefit? If that happens, the NCAA will have REALLY punished the wrong people!

So, if you see some PSU fans are upset, it's not because we don't care about the abused kids (we Penn Staters are probably even more sickened and disgusted by it than outsiders are, because it happened on the campus of OUR alma mater, and involved a coach we thought, for years, was someone else entirely). It's also not because we worship Joe Paterno, or because we think Penn State shouldn't be punished in some way.

It's because the wrong people are being punished, and the right people AREN'T being punished by these sanctions.

In addition, the NCAA is full of crap when it says Penn State's football program ignored its academic mission. A small group of men ignored basic human morality -- BOY DID THEY EVER! -- but the football program DID NOT abandon its academic mission. On the contrary, it has one of the highest (if not THE highest) graduations rates in college football. Academics were always very important to the football program -- that was the whole point of Joe Paterno's "Grand Experiment" -- to emphasize academics along with athletics.

I'm sick of people accusing Penn Staters of ignoring the plight of those abused kids, just because we feel justice may not have been served in the appropriate way through these particular sanctions.

Penn State will survive this, and rise from the ashes someday better than ever. It is, was, and always shall be a great place to get an education. And, maybe, someday, it'll have a good football team again. Hopefully, the football program will continue to emphasize academics the way Paterno did.

The culture needed to change, but THAT PART of the culture SHOULDN'T change.