Monday, November 14, 2011

Alternative theory on Penn State....

....given by Paul Greenberg, one of my favorites. And it also appears that the man who didn't risk a confrontation with a man 30 years older is also out of coaching.  I wish Mr. McQueary well as he repents from a grievous sin here.

And, given that it's estimated that 3% of adult men have sexually abused a minor, it's my prayer that more people stand up to abusers and talk to the police.  Do some math;100 D1-A football programs with ten coaches apiece, and up to 3% of them have a horrible secret.  Maybe others have some talking to do.  It sure beats drinking one's sorrows away at not standing up to protect a child.

6 comments:

Gino said...

"And it also appears that the man who didn't risk a confrontation with a man 30 years older is also out of coaching."

i'm not a jock, and never hung around with the 'manly' jock crowd. but i'm damn sure that any member of the slacker/stoner/outcaste/nerd/band crowds i flowed among would have been man enough to go straight to the custodian to clean up the blood that would have been splattered all over the shower tiles if they had been where McQueary was.

Bike Bubba said...

You never know what you would do,but if your courage keeps you from even filing a police report after such a situation, you probably ought to kiss coaching good-bye.

And again,there are probably 20-30 other D1-A schools--probably including one of my favorites or least favorites--where somebody is double-checking your whiskey reviews and wondering whether to come forward.

Gino said...

in that case, they really need to check out Bulleit. it'll bring the man out of anybody.

pentamom said...

"Do some math;100 D1-A football programs with ten coaches apiece, and up to 3% of them have a horrible secret."

Watch that math -- a disproportionate number of abusers are probably professional and social failures. So I wouldn't put the chances of a man in a high prestige profession like that at 3%. Obviously, QUITE obviously, it's there, but the chances have to be somewhat lowered by the fact that the abusive personality type 1) tends to go with other traits that don't make for great personal success, not least of which is lack of self-control, 2) tends to sabotage a career if it's even once found out and pursued and 3) is MUCH more common in chronic abuse victims themselves, which means their background stacks the deck against them to begin with -- they don't tend to have a lot of the social and educational tools necessary for professional success.

So while your point is valid, I'd definitely not quite go with the math as such.

Bike Bubba said...

Jane, I hope you're right, but keep in mind that except for the top guy, college football coaching isn't a high prestige position, and it's not exactly (recruiting trips, away games, hours spent watching tape on Saturday and Sunday) good for the family life, either. Couple that with the well-known difficulties in impulse control among the players (from whence the coaches come, of course), and we might find that this group (along with politicians) fits the risk factors better than we'd like to admit.

I hope I'm wrong, but...

pentamom said...

Well, I think it's high prestige in the sense that it's something people really want to do, maybe in hopes of reaching a higher level. I'll bet there are a lot more guys out there who would LOVE to be assistants at DI schools, than there are assistants at DI schools -- even if the job isn't as much fun as they think it will be.

In that sense, it's higher prestige than the dead-end jobs usually held by convicts and people raised by child-molesters, so as I said, I'm not meaning to imply that it's extremely rare in that population, just that I don't think you can extrapolate the 3% straight across -- there will be some skewing.