What do these two iconic figures have in common? One is the object of top administrators allowing a colleague to molest/rape children. ABUSE. The other is an iconic sports figure who killed dogs in the dogfighting ring he operated at his Bad Newz Kennels when they didn’t perform to his satisfaction. ABUSE.
WHY DO PEOPLE STILL SUPPORT SPORTS FIGURES AFTER THEY ALLOWED KIDS TO BE MOLESTED/RAPED OR KILLED INNOCENT ANIMALS?
Below you will find the following about Joe Paterno, Penn State and the cover-up sex scandal from Wikipedia:
“Former FBI director Louis Freeh, whose firm was hired by the Penn State Board of Trustees to conduct an independent investigation into the scandal, concluded, after interviewing over 400 people and reviewing over 3.5 million documents, that Paterno, Spanier, Curley and Schultz had deliberately conspired to conceal Sandusky’s actions in order to protect publicity surrounding Penn State’s vaunted football program. Freeh’s investigation found that by their actions, the four men “failed to protect against a child sexual predator harming children for over a decade.” The report concluded that Paterno, along with Schultz, Spanier and Curley “concealed Sandusky’s activities from the Board of Trustees, the University community and authorities.” Emails uncovered by Freeh’s team revealed that Paterno had lied to the grand jury when testifying that he was unaware of any possible child abuse by Sandusky prior to the 2001 incident in the Lasch showers. In fact, he had closely followed a 1998 investigation surrounding allegations that Sandusky had molested another young boy in the Lasch showers and whose mother had complained to police. Following McQueary’s report to Paterno of the 2001 rape in the Lasch showers, additional e-mails discovered by Freeh’s investigation revealed Paterno had pressured Spanier, Curley and Shultz not to report the incident to police.
In addition, the report said that even after Sandusky’s retirement in 1999 Paterno, Schultz, Spanier and Curley “empowered Sandusky to attract potential victims to the campus and football events by allowing him to have continued, unrestricted and unsupervised access to the University’s facilities and affiliation with the University’s prominent football program.”
It appears the late Penn State football coach, Joe Paterno, along with three other top officials knew about the sexual abuse Sandusky was involved in while at Penn Sate and did NOTHING. Why? According to the report, ” they deliberately conspired to conceal Sandusky’s actions in order to protect publicity surrounding Penn State’s vaunted football program.” In other words, they put the football program and status ahead of the welfare of boys being molested and raped.”
Michael Vick had everything going for him. He was one of the best football players. He had money, fame and glory. He had a $130 million contract offered to him in 2004. As I’m sure everyone is aware, Vick was found guilty of running a “cruel and inhumane” dogfighting ring and not for killing underperforming dogs in his dogfighting ring. The botttomline is Vick killed dogs through electrocution, hanging, drowning and slamming their bodies against cement. Vick was caught breaking the law numerous times for drugs and was also sued for transmitting an STD.
Does anyone believe that none of his former teammates knew he ran a dogfighting ring? Read the following about Vick’s “motivational speech” to the Eagles team prior to a game.
“Vick, who was playing in his first NFL game since serving an 18-month prison sentence, called the 10-minute story “really motivational,” and reportedly failed to understand why his graphic recounting of how Zebro ripped out Maniac’s larynx caused teammates to stagger out of the player tunnel and onto Lincoln Financial Field with their heads hanging.
“I don’t know what their problem is, because that story pumps me up every time,” Vick said during a postgame press conference. “It’s a classic underdog story: On one side of the dogfighting pit you had Maniac, who was a beast, and on my end you had Zebro, who was pretty good, but not great. Yet we had trained him hard. We strengthened his hind legs by forcing him to constantly jump at a teasing stick; we emotionally tortured him so that he would attack everything in sight; and from the time he was a little puppy, we toughened him up by beating him with a metal baton.”
“I told my teammates that the stakes were high, because if Zebro had lost, I would have either electrocuted him, drowned him, or slammed his body to the ground until he was dead,” Vick added. “How is that not inspiring?”
According to Eagles players, Vick’s voice increased in intensity at key moments throughout the pep talk, and he was at his most impassioned when he spoke of how Zebro continued to fight despite the fact that numerous chunks of flesh had been ripped from his body.
Vick also sought to motivate his team by comparing the Eagles’ weekly preparation to Zebro’s, saying that just as Vick had forced his pit bull to drag a tire with his mouth for hours on end to strengthen his jaw, the Eagles defense had put in the training necessary to stop quarterback Matt Cassel.”
Think he didn’t tell any former teammates? Think again. For a man to boast and use an episode of dogs ripping each other apart as a motivational speech shows the true mentality of the person. Many of the Eagles team players were sickened by the speech and left during it. Thank goodness, there are still decent players.
If he was proud after his sentencing, can you image what he was like when he ran the dogfighting ring? He wants another dog! He will eventually be allowed to get one. Unreal!
What does this say about us,as a society, when we elevate sports figures to God-like personas even after being found guilty of either allowing abuse to continue against kids or after knowing one was so proud he killed his dogs?
Let me put it another way…if your son or daughter was molested or raped, would you be singing the praises of those who allowed it to continue? Would you defend those who turned their heads so they wouldn’t wreck the Penn State name?
If your dog was one of the dogs that was stolen to be used in Vick’s dogfights, would you still want to see him in action? Your dog gets ripped to shreds by dogs that Vick taught to kill. He would probably be bragging about it now. TELL me how you could stand by him.
What is wrong with today’s society? Placing sports figures ahead of the welfare of kids and animals is positively mind-boggling to someone like me. I respect some sports figures for the work they do outside of the stadium but in no way do I look upon them as a hero of any kind as an athlete. I can appreciate the dedication, perserverance they put into the game and that’s all. At one time, I was a fitness trainer with my own business. I used to train heavily for a woman and can also appreciate the physical training involved to stay in shape, without a doubt. I also can enjoy a ball game. But, I have never looked upon them as a hero. For what reason should they be considered a hero?
I also worked briefly as a social worker in the child abuse dep’t. I saw firsthand what monsters do to kids. Viewing the graphic photos was so disturbing to me, I had to run out of my dep’t and outside to get fresh air. NO PARENT can tell me they would defend JoePA or the other three officials at Penn State for allowing Sandusky to continue his horrific crimes after seeing or hearing what he did to their child.
So what do Penn State and Michael Vick have in common? They don’t care about abuse against the weak, young and those without a voice.
More importantly, what does this say about us?