say it ain't so, joe (paterno)

joe paterno of penn state coaching fame was fired late last night. a child sex abuse scandal broke and it turns out it all happened under joe's nose.

at first i didn't know how to feel about it. i freaking loved joe paterno. i'm an avid football fan and if you would've asked me what i thought was the most awesome thing in all of football existence, i probably would've either said, jets rocking the world with a superbowl win, blue turf in boise, or motherfucking joe paterno.

the man's a legend. he's coached the same team for decades. he holds the record for most wins as a head coach. dude's been doing it well and right for too long. and throughout his whole tenure he was a cool customer. as his career stretched into the early 2000's, he grew to be like your awesome grandpa out there on the sideline still getting it done, still churning out quality football teams.

and he always tried to do things at a higher standard. his emphasis was on doing it the right way. he wasn't only a coach responsible for great players, he was responsible for helping to mold children into men and he wanted them to be great men.... it was more important to joe for them to be great human beings off the field than great players on it.

and this was supposed to be joe's legacy. when he called it quits and hung up his hat, he was supposed to hang his hat on the most secure and awe inspiring of legacies. when it was all said and done, who could be considered a greater force for all that is great about the sport of football than joe paterno?

and then this happened. inside the shadows a beast was lurking, something we were unaware of but it was waiting and couldn't hide forever. who knew it would all end like this? leaving behind a trail of sadness and anger and questions that will probably remain unanswered for a long time.


why???? why would you say nothing joe? why didn't you try to do more with the knowledge you had? why didn't you go to authorities? sure, you told your higher ups, but if they weren't going to do anything about it, why didn't you go out of your way to make sure this monster was squashed as early as possible?

and why the fuck would someone do such a thing? SANDUSKY. jerry sandusky. a name that will go down in infamy and will forever be synonymous with child sex abuse. you sexually abused children. you did more than just simply tarnish the name of an institution and end the tenure of a broken legend. you are the monster for which there are no kind words for. if you spent the rest of your life dodging rocks and spit, you'd be a lucky son of a bitch. i'd hope for justice to be served. but there's no true justice. there's no payback for what you've done. you can't give back and repair the childhoods you ruined. you can't unrape 10 year old boys. SANDUSKY, the reason people hope a place called Hell really exists because anything short of eternal suffering is getting off easy.

i was very saddened by all of this and at first very confused. they went after joe pa with a fury and i didn't want them to. somewhere in my head i wanted joe pa to have some sorta exemption, some sorta excuse, some sorta rational reason why his indifference should get a pass from us.

but he can't. him, all other coaches, all other authority figures who had any sort of knowledge of this horrendous situation should go and go immediately. walk west and never look back. you've lost your penn state privileges.

in the end i hope joe pa quietly walks away. i'm sure there will be court proceedings that will be splattered all over our tv's. i just hope joe keeps it quiet and fades off into the sunset. joe paterno. the name used to conjure ideas of high morality and ethics and consistency. now..... not so much.

i don't want joe to be the poster boy for what went wrong here. cuz at the end of the day, SANDUSKY's the one. SANDUSKY's the evil fucker for which there are no nice words. but guys like joe were supposed to protect us from the SANDUSKY's of the world.

joe's the poster boy for something different. perhaps it's indifference. or perhaps it's the concept of not rocking the boat too much and worrying more about the institutions we serve instead of serving ourselves. i'd like to think that anyone with a half a heart or conscience of any sort that is removed from an institution would call the cops or tell someone that could do something. it's not good enough to just tell your boss and forget about it. especially when you're joe paterno. don't you know what you stand for?