Intellectual Viruses | The Paterno Travesty
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10/10
“A judge in Manhattan sentenced Faisal Shahzad to life in prison Tuesday for the botched Times Square car bombing, as the 31-year-old Pakistani-American defiantly warned in court to “brace yourself, the war with Muslims has just begun.” “The defeat of the U.S. is imminent, inshallah,” Shahzad said during the sentencing. Inshallah means “if God is willing.”… Shahzad interrupted the judge’s sentencing several times. He pointed to the ceiling and said “Allahu akbar,” or God is great, and he said he didn’t care about the sentence. “My sentence reflects life in this world, not life in the hereafter,” he said. “I’m happy with the deal that God has given me.”" – CNN.com 10/5/10
Of course we are aware of the grave dangers of biological viruses; yet there is another group of grave, very real viruses that, for social reasons, we have ignored despite the fact that they have already ultimately resulted in millions of human deaths. These are the intellectual viruses…
The script of a healthy intellect:
The necessary product of configuration “a” is:
The script of a fatal intellectual virus:
The necessary product of the ongoing performance of a fatal intellectual virus is:
The script of a fatal, and contagious intellectual virus:
The necessary product of the fatal, and contagious intellectual virus is two-fold:
The script of a fatal, contagious, and hostile intellectual virus:
The necessary product of the fatal, contagious, and hostile intellectual virus is three-fold:
When will the day come that modern society, as a whole, will have the clarity and bravery to combat these viruses? When will it be socially acceptable to say the simplest, most direct truth: Any belief that disallows its own evaluation is, at best, spiritually soothing but intellectually lobotomizing; and at worst, a fatal, contagious, and hostile virus?
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11/11
As I wade across the Penn State pedophile scandal reports to find other news, I am compelled to ask: Has anyone actually thought through Joe Paterno’s circumstance? It seems the answer is no.
Now before blood pressure tips the mercury, let us just lay out some undisputed facts that we all can agree on…
1. Pedophilia is a monstrous crime that should be punished severely.
2. It sure seems like ex-Penn State coach Jerry Sandusky is a pedophile, and if true he should be punished accordingly.
3. Penn State head football coach Joe Paterno was informed by a subordinate that pedophilia might have been occurring in the Penn State football facilities. Paterno advised his superiors of the incident.
We all good so far? OK, now here comes the independent thought…
If one operates in the middle of a tightly knit organization that has a history of ethical responsibility, when one is simply informed of a wrongdoing (implying that he has no direct evidence of the wrongdoing), what is he to do with this accusation?…
A. Do nothing, and continue his demanding job.
B. Report it to his superiors only, and continue his demanding job.
C. Report it to his superiors, and while continuing his demanding job, follow up with them to see if their professionals have corroborated the rumor, and if their professionals haven’t, then without any evidence whatsoever, breach the chain of command and report the rumor to the police.
For those of you that picked “C”, I would love to visit your planet, because on Earth things operate very differently.
Let me ask a very critical question that has yet to be asked: Did Paterno have any reason to doubt his organization’s follow through on the rumor?
Let me ask an even more critical question that has yet to be asked: If Paterno jumped rank on his superiors by contacting the police, and there ensued a scandal that pedophilia was occurring at Penn State, and it turned out that the rumor was a lie (that in fact Penn State’s professionals had successfully debunked the rumor), what would Paterno’s superiors have done, and what would have been the nation’s reaction?
Would his superiors have forgiven the besmirchment of Penn State’s name and congratulated Paterno for his moral fervor? Would the nation have lavished Paterno with praise? The fact is Paterno would have been lucky to have only lost the confidence of all in his organization, while keeping his job. If he was fired, its news would have been squashed behind a drove of Kardashian-Hilton-Palin gossip. That’s how planet Earth operates.
The fact is Joe Paterno did exactly what he was ethically and professionally supposed to do: report the rumor to his superiors, so that the established machinery of the organization could execute the appropriate steps in an investigation. But despite this, the Penn State machinery did fail, a heinous crime was committed, and society wanted blood, so it slaughtered the most accessible goat it could find: Paterno.
It should be admitted that there did exist a fantastic “Clear and Present Danger” scenario in which Paterno, between football practices, could have defied his establishment, interviewed witnesses, placed closed-circuit cameras in the showers, and at the very end saved the day. But because he didn’t, after 46 years of hallowed success, he is immediately unceremoniously fired, and his name is removed from the intercollegiate trophy.
And what makes this most recent mega-travesty unique is its consummate void of scrutiny– it seems every intelligent voice is either too scared (or indifferent) to rise to the occasion on this one. It seems this scandal confirms that moral clarity and justice is only as strong as the will to resist the collective hostility it may generate; and that, even more than the original event, is tragic.
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