JoePa Dies at 85

[nwfisch]

University of Iowa was the first party I ever went to with an entire basement of people doing coke and meth.

Still the only one as well.

Were you the delivery man?

:twigg:

 

[NAHSTE]

Except it's universally seen as a "great university" even by those who had a Joe PA death countdown clock going on.

Absolutely, but there is a danger to a university's identity being so closely tied to its football program. Joe Paterno WAS Penn State University, for better or for worse, and the very institution he created served to corrupt the entire university's decision making process.

I realize I am articulating this point poorly, because so much of the focus has been on Paterno the individual and what he should have done. Whenever these scandals arise, we point fingers and shout and assess blame and then go on feeling better about ourselves, but it's more of a societal problem than an individual problem.

We have over prioritized football to the point where our favorite teams' success is more important than individual lives. People like Declen Sullivan, the Sandusky victims, Devaughn Darling, Ereck Plancher and countless of other students, employees, faculty members and human beings have had their best interests superseded by this institution, football, which we all invest too much faith in.

 

[FedEx227]

No, I think Iowa produces plenty of meth on it's own. Doesn't need Illinoisians bringing it in.

 

[FirstTimer]

Absolutely, but there is a danger to a university's identity being so closely tied to its football program. Joe Paterno WAS Penn State University, for better or for worse, and the very institution he created served to corrupt the entire university's decision making process.

I realize I am articulating this point poorly, because so much of the focus has been on Paterno the individual and what he should have done. Whenever these scandals arise, we point fingers and shout and assess blame and then go on feeling better about ourselves, but it's more of a societal problem than an individual problem.

We have over prioritized football to the point where our favorite teams' success is more important than individual lives. People like Declen Sullivan, the Sandusky victims, Devaughn Darling, Ereck Plancher and countless of other students, employees, faculty members and human beings have had their best interests superseded by this institution, football, which we all invest too much faith in.

:hulkchamp:

Disagree there but. I see your point.

 

[FedEx227]

It's definitely something that a lot of universities are going to have to look in the mirror and decide if they want to take that risk.

If you're going to use your football team as a major selling point of the university, you have to understand in the long run it may become a determent to the overall brand. If you sell the team and the leadership then they turn around and get in trouble what does that do to the reputation of the university?

Ohio State seems to have escaped any long term effects but Penn State probably never will. I have no idea about a school like SMU but I'd imagine there were some huge effects in that fallout.

 

[NAHSTE]

Well... I can't speak for SEC schools or people in those areas... but probably most SEC schools.

I think that's a huge selling point for a lot of kids. Of course it's not the ONLY selling point but having a good program and the ability to party all day every Saturday for half the year is pretty appealing I'm sure.

Well the thing about growing up in the south is that we have very few viable college options in the region. That whole reconstruction thing where the federal government went out if its way to oppress the region economically for a half-century kind of stunted our development. The best universities, and the only ones with any resources, are the giant land-grant state schools. If you grow up in the northeast, you have hundreds of liberal arts and private schools at your disposal, but in the south those are all crazy bible schools.

So anyway, long story short ... you are pretty much resigned to going to a state school anyway if you want to stay in the south, so you might as well choose the one with the football team that you grew up rooting for.

I chose LSU because I knew I would get in, I knew I could get in-state tuition thanks to being a legacy, and they had a nationally prominent program for my curricula of choice.

But I'd venture to guess half of the out of state kids from my incoming class chose to go there because they won a national championship the year we were filling out applications.

 

[Warner2BruceTD]

JoePa, as far as we know, didn't do any raping.

Its easy to point fingers at one guy and cast judgement on a situation where we can all simply project what we think we'd do and yet ignore the fact that this was an entire institutional breakdown...its deflecting attention from the rapist (Sandusky) and putting the blame on someone that wasn't involved in any of the actual wrong doings. Yeah, the old man had poor judgement in regards to the lengths he should have gone to reporting the crime, but so did dozens and maybe hundreds of people over the years involved with and around Sandusky.

It was poor judgement and a mistake, but lets not replace Sandusky's dick in those children with JoePa's.

Best post in the thread.

All i'm going to say is this, and then you guys can go back to kicking a corpse.

If everybody here was as self righteous and hollier than thou as they expect others to be, we would all be living in the clouds with Care Bears and there would be no sin.

I would simply suggest that before you castigate others, before you make broad and damaging assumptions on someone's character, you look at yourself and ask yourself 'have I ever been tested'? 'Have I ever made bad judgements'?

Does making one bad judgement (or even two or three) make you evil? Even if you may have thought you were doing the right thing at the time? Be careful how you answer.

Sandusky is the devil, here. Misplaced blame, misplaced anger, can be frivolous. Paterno may have made a mistake. I don't hate him for being human. I dont need to hate him to hate child abuse.

 

[SethMode]

Well the thing about growing up in the south is that we have very few viable college options in the region. That whole reconstruction thing where the federal government went out if its way to oppress the region economically for a half-century kind of stunted our development. The best universities, and the only ones with any resources, are the giant land-grant state schools. If you grow up in the northeast, you have hundreds of liberal arts and private schools at your disposal, but in the south those are all crazy bible schools.

So anyway, long story short ... you are pretty much resigned to going to a state school anyway if you want to stay in the south, so you might as well choose the one with the football team that you grew up rooting for.

I chose LSU because I knew I would get in, I knew I could get in-state tuition thanks to being a legacy, and they had a nationally prominent program for my curricula of choice.

But I'd venture to guess half of the out of state kids from my incoming class chose to go there because they won a national championship the year we were filling out applications.

That'll learn you Southerners to think twice about seceding.

 

[FedEx227]

I do want to say though I'll be saying the same things when Sandusky goes and really hope it happens when he's in prison and not by suicide or natural causes.

Just want to make that clear. I'm not taking blame away from Sandusky, I totally agree he's the devil in this situation but I also not comfortable ignoring Paterno's place in it.

 

[NAHSTE]

That'll learn you Southerners to think twice about seceding.

Oh we plan on doing it again soon. We've already pulled a coup on the national championship game, shutting out the rest of the country.

:kobe:

 

[FedEx227]

Worst post in this thread: Liquid comparing PSU's situation to my avatar.

 

[mcstl25]

I think we can all agree that Paterno could have done more to address the Sandusky scandal. However, not one of us knows all of the details, nor how we would react in a similar situation so it's probably best not to pass judgement.

 

[SethMode]

Oh we plan on doing it again soon. We've already pulled a coup on the national championship game, shutting out the rest of the country.

:kobe:

Surprised you could manage to use the term "shutting out" in that sentence, after what happened a couple of weeks ago.

 

[EmpireWF]

I think we can all agree that Paterno could have done more to address the Sandusky scandal. However, not one of us knows all of the details, nor how we would react in a similar situation so it's probably best not to pass judgement.

You can take the high road, but the man himself said he wished he'd done things differently. He never spoke about specifics but it's a shame no one helped all of the alleged victims of Sandusky. Not one person at PSU, not one.

 

[NAHSTE]

I think we can all agree that Paterno could have done more to address the Sandusky scandal. However, not one of us knows all of the details, nor how we would react in a similar situation so it's probably best not to pass judgement.

No, I know exactly how I would react in a similar situation. Especially if my calling card in life was being the most principled man in college football and I made millions of dollars off of portraying that image to the nation.

If someone is touching children, you call the fucking cops. Some things are absolute.

 

[FedEx227]

I probably wouldn't endorse him to run a new football program at a satellite campus.

:kanye:

 

[NAHSTE]

Surprised you could manage to use the term "shutting out" in that sentence, after what happened a couple of weeks ago.

OH I SEE WHAT YOU DID THERE

:fuckyou:

 

[mcstl25]

No, I know exactly how I would react in a similar situation. Especially if my calling card in life was being the most principled man in college football and I made millions of dollars off of portraying that image to the nation.

If someone is touching children, you call the fucking cops. Some things are absolute.

No, you don't know because you don't know all of the things that happened behind the scenes that haven't been exposed in the media. It's easy to sit behind a computer and throw stones, but until you are put in the exact same situation and have all of the same information, you can't know for sure how you'd react.

 

[NAHSTE]

No, you don't know because you don't know all of the things that happened behind the scenes that haven't been exposed in the media. It's easy to sit behind a computer and throw stones, but until you are put in the exact same situation and have all of the same information, you can't know for sure how you'd react.

Okay you are right, I wouldn't know because I've never been the most powerful man in an entire state before, powerful enough where I could stop the raping of children with one phone call.

However I can sit here and say I know exactly what Joe Paterno should have done, being that he was JOE FUCKING PATERNO aka the most morally upstanding moralizer the college game had ever seen! (Or so he said...)

 

[shag773]

No, you don't know because you don't know all of the things that happened behind the scenes that haven't been exposed in the media. It's easy to sit behind a computer and throw stones, but until you are put in the exact same situation and have all of the same information, you can't know for sure how you'd react.

It would of helped if Paterno was given an account was what actually happened. Not that I'm saying he would have done more, I have no way of knowing that, but let's not let facts get in the way of a cool story, bro...