The mob mentality is always the mentality that keeps justice from being done. And it's always based on ignorance. What always motivates the mob is their own perverted and sanctimonious ideas of justice and what is true which excludes the facts and due process and substitutes their own beliefs and in many instances outright lies to justify their mob behavior.
The storyline concocted by the journalistic mob, the lie they repeat over and over again to themselves and those watching or reading to justify their mob mentality is that Joe Paterno knew a 10 year old boy was being raped in the shower and did no more than report it to the AD. This of course is an out and out lie, but a lie that allows the mob to carry their torches, feel holier than thou and delude themselves into thinking they are acting nobly.
This lie was repeated so often by so many people in the media they have accepted it as fact. And the mob is so convinced they are on the side of right that they did not once stop and think that they had no proof. Thinking is not an attribute of a mob. Which is why they are always wrong. It should be noted that Linda Kelly the Pennyslvania Attorney General has singled out Tim Curley the AD to whom Paterno reported McQueary's allegations, and Gary Schultz, Penn State's senior vice president for finance as the culprits, the ones who didnt do their jobs and who shirked their responsibilities in notifying the police. Both have been indicted. But not Paterno. No mention of Paterno by the Attorney General who does have the facts, when discussing who she holds accountable.
The trustees, displaying none of the values Penn State is supposed to stand for, nevertheless caved in to the mindless mob of psuedo-moralistic journalistsbecause they couldnt stand the pressure. They threw Joe Paterno to the mob.
What happened to Joe Paterno was not justice. It was mob justice. When it comes to any mob it is always justice, they say, that motivates them. And the news media mob is no different. But like all phony moralists and mobs everywhere their actions are inevitably immoral. They use morality as the excuse for their immorality. And so their ideas of justice produce injustice. Which is what happens with a mob of people too cowardly to stand alone but get brave in a mob.
On ESPN Lou Holtz became the only one who told the truth. He said over and over again in answer to questions, " I don't have all the facts...". Does anyone in the news media have facts that Lou Holtz didn't? Any of the sanctimonious ESPN journalists or those at other media outlets calling for Paterno's head? The answer is no. But when you're a member of the mob you dont need facts.
And while not having the facts kept Holtz from joining the mob, it didn't stop anyone else at ESPN, or Sports Illustrated or Time Magazine for that matter from carrying their burning torches demanding Paterno's head in the name of morality.
I have a friend who is not into sports and knows nothing about college football. But with all the media coverage over the last few days, the television reports, the front pages stories, the stories at online media sites, catching glimpses of headlines and pictures but without actually reading the articles, based on what she was exposed to she thought Joe Paterno was the one who had molested the young boy.
I explained that what she was seeing was actually Joe Paterno being molested by the media.
As of this writing still no one knows for sure what Paterno was told and exactly what he knew, but the sanctimonious moralists pretend they did and Paterno is gone.
Paterno wanted to clear the air and will tell exactly what he was told. But the university muzzled him, then threw him overboard to satisfy the media mob of phony moralists without anyone knowing for certain what he knew.
What is even more amazing, is that, now that the goal of the mob has been reached, after all the damage has been done, an ESPN anchor led into the a segment entitled, "Was firing Joe Paterno the wrong thing to do"? I didn't bother to watch. The segment was repeated on "Outside the Lines".
As a matter of justice there is an easy way to look at the actions of the mindless mob of journalists and judge it by asking this question: If Tim Curley, the AD Paterno went to with the information he gave him had called the police and Sandusky was arrested in 2002 would Paterno have been fired? Would any of this even be a story? Would people be saying he didnt do enough? The obvious answer is no. So Paterno was fired, not for what he didn't do, but for what Tim Curley didn't do. And its worth noting it was Tim Curley and Gary Shultz who was indicted. But it was Paterno that the press chose to attack. Because, as a friend said, Paterno had a reputation worth destroying and Tim Curley didnt.
To make the point even clearer, a reader pointed out that the boy's mother did in fact go to the DA, a man by the name of Ray Gricar, in 1998 with Sandusky's admission that he had molested her son. And what did Gricar do? He did nothing. Ray Gricar, the DA ignored the evidence of Sandusky's molestion in 1998 and yet he isn't even mentioned by the torch carriers at ESPN, Sports Illustrated and Time.Instead its the fiction that it was Paterno's inaction that allowed a predator to go free all these years. How many journalists who called for Paterno to be fired even knows the name Ray Gricar?
And even if they did, the name Ray Gricar does not sell newspapers, get ratings or web site hits. The name Joe Paterno does. So while the mob was busy attacking Paterno for his so called moral failures for which they had no proof, they've made no mention of a DA who was told of the molestation in 1998 by the boy's mother and did nothing. And what about the boy's own mother? She went to the DA and he did nothing and so she dropped it for 13 years? If it was me I wouldnt stop until justice was done. And what could the mother have done? How about going to the, uh, you know, the news media. What do you think a reporter on the Daily News, the paper that splashed Paterno's picture all over the front page with the word "Shame" would have done with a mother of a young boy telling him Jerry Sandusky, defensive coordinator for Penn State for 26 years admitted to her he had molested her son and the DA has done nothing? How many people do you think he would have run over jumping over his desk running to tell his editor?
The mother could have gone to any print or TV reporter and that story would have exploded in 1998 and tremendous pressure would have been put on the DA to DO something. She could have gotten a lawyer herself to handle it. But its Joe Paterno who had a sanitized, watered down version of what McQuery saw and reported it to his superrio who didnt do enough.
The news media went after Paterno and didnt lay a glove on the mother for only one reason -- cowardice. They were afraid of a backlash if they attacked the mother for not doing enough even though she didnt, and there may have been some sense of sympathy but if she had done the things she should have done, this would never have happened. So much for moral responsibility. And moral failures. And courageous journalism.
The refrain that Paterno knew what was going in the shower and shirked his responsibilites, is so utterly stupid and has become so pervasive that even when presented with a different set of facts that might call that into question, anchors at ESPN sing the old refrain. An ESPN reporter Thursday morning told the anchor that Joe Paterno intends to speak and clear the air about exactly what he knew and what he was told. The anchor in wrapping up the segment said, " we are all looking forward to hearing Joe Paterno give us an explanation as to what he did not do and why".
Another member of the mob, Sean Gregory, wrote in Time Magazine:
" By failing to alert authorities that Sandusky, his long time assistant allegedly raped a 10 year old boy in the Penn State football showers Paterno simplified the board's decision indeed".
Where to start with this journalistically corrupt and factually dishonest piece of nonsense except to say any smear merchant or fascist government propaganda machine would say "well done".
First we know that Gregory himself, an alleged journalist, had no facts to support what he wrote and that all the known facts available at present contradict everything he wrote. There is no evidence that Paterno knew a 10 year old boy was being raped. None. But that didn't stop a hack journalist from saying so anyway.
The grand jury, prosecutor and attorney general, the only people presently in possession of all the known evidence essentially say Sean Gregory is a liar and that Paterno never had any such knowledge. If he had he would have been indicted and in fact Paterno himself says he was not told of the specific nature of what McQuery saw.
The second piece of Sean Gregory nonsense is that Paterno didn't report what he knew to "authorities". Everyone knows he did report it. Gregory just doesn't like the authority Paterno reported to which was the AD who, by the way, had direct access to the head of campus police.It was Tim Curry who didnt act, but its Joe Paterno in the mind of Sean Gregory, who is supposed to be everyone's daddy.
Penn State's board of trustees simply buckled in the face of a news media with the values of a Sean Gregory and took the cowards way out by throwing Joe Paterno to the mob because, as they essentially admitted, they couldn't take the pressure anymore.
One last point. If there is any question, any doubt as to the cowardice of the Penn State trustees in dismissing Paterno and that it was done soley because they buckled under pressure and that their decision had nothing to do with culpability, if there is,any question about the true injustice and immorality surrounding the decision to fire Joe Paterno it's answered by this: Mike McQuery, the assistant coach who was the eyewitness to Sandusky's child assault, the person who saw it but didn't intervene or try and stop it, the person who didn't go to the police but instead went to Paterno the next day with a sanitized and watered down version of what he saw, this person had his job until he was placed on leave when people started questioning why the trustees hadnt fired him.
If you want culpability what about the parents? This has been going on for 13 years. Thirteen years. I know one of the mothers went to the DA and the DA did nothing but if it was my kid I wouldnt stop until something was done. Id go to the newspapers if I had to. Id take Sandusky on publicly. But I wouldnt stop till something was done. You could make a good case that the parents didnt do enough. And what about the DA who did nothing? Not only didnt he do enough, he did nothing. Then there is Tim Curley the AD and Gary Shultz two administrators at Penn State who did nothing.
Joe Paterno was a football coach. He is not their daddy. He is not CSI. He is not the DA. He is not the president of the university and he is not the Athletic Director or an administrator and he is not a cop. He was a football coach. By going to the Athletic Director with the sanitized waterdown version of events given to him by Mike McQueary which did NOT include knowing a 10 year old boy was anally raped no matter how much the media and the likes of a Sean Gregory want to lie and say he did, Paterno did all he was supposed to, legally AND morally.There was no reason for him to believe Tim Curley would do nothing and it was not his job , especially based on what he knew, to look over Curley's shoulder.
When it comes to morality and integrity just about everyone knows that Paterno has more of it in his pinky than all the commentators and phony moralists in the media have in their whole bodies combined. Because when it comes to the immoralistic mob, what matters most, what makes them feel the biggest, is when they get the chance to think they are morally superior. And the bigger the person they can bring down the better. Which always comes out making them look small.
UPDATE: ESPN is reporting (Friday) that a trustee has told them Joe Paterno was fired solely because of media pressure and scrutiny which they felt was bad for the university. They voted to fire Paterno to end it. So, as postulated here, Paterno is gone because of everyone's sins but his own.
Marc Rubin
Copyright Marc Rubin 2008
Copyright Marc Rubin 2008
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