Writing for another blog, I opined that Mike McQueary was taking the fall for Penn State University. I pointed out that McQueary is the actual whistleblower in this situation—the only person who voluntarily came forward and reported the rape. That he spoke out at all—well, here's how I put it: "But how many other people would have?" I pointed to psychological research, starting with Stanley Milgram's "obedience" experiments at Yale, where subjects (supposedly) shocked a stranger as they screamed, even when these strangers indicated they were experiencing heart attacks.
And that was in a fake situation with subjects responding to an authority figure, the experimenter, they didn't know and who had no real impact on their lives! As for Penn State, I said, "how many others in fact observed suspicious behavior by Sandusky, or his actual sexual assaults on children, without saying anything to anyone? My bet is that there are several—perhaps many—such individuals."
Many HuffPo readers rejected my analysis, and heaped added scorn on McQueary, to wit, from oftenfrustrated: "His continued inaction makes him even less than that, a moral failure, a coward, self-serving. That is why he has earned our scorn and outrage and that has nothing to do with the Milgram experiment."
But my favorite reaction was this this one, from ZanZig: "The fact that you can seriously ask this question is quite damning of you." So not only is McQueary guilty—so am I, for even suggesting there were many who closed their eyes. For her part, ZanZig is completely sure of her reaction: "I cannot think of any universe in which if I saw a grown man sodomizing a child I would not call the police, after first rescuing the child. That McQueary did none of this is unbelievable."
After my piece, several notable comments were entered on the subject. Writing in the NY Times, conservative columnist David Brooks described what we know from the literature about people's self-assured assertions that they—unlike those other cowards—would have stood up to Sandusky and the entire Penn State power structure:
Unfortunately, none of us can safely make that assumption. Over the course of history—during the Holocaust, the Rwandan genocide or the street beatings that happen in American neighborhoods—the same pattern has emerged. Many people do not intervene. Very often they see but they don't see.
But an even braver piece, an Open Letter to Mike McQueary by Jane Leavy, appeared in GRANTLAND. This long post was remarkable for both its bravery and understanding. It pointed out that McQueary, a former Penn State football player who grew up in the region, was himself completely enmeshed in the school's "Happy Valley" universe. It is amazing that he had the courage to speak up in this environment, which no one else was willing to do.
Here Leavy quotes Richard Gartner, author of Betrayed as Boys, "the definitive book on male survivors of childhood sexual abuse," a person who is well aware of just how many people will let the greatest atrocities proceed apace:
He [McQueary] at least tried to get the information to the authorities and pretty much right away, the next morning. It's sad, but not surprising that he is the focus of the rage. It's easier to demonize those we don't know much about, but harder to criticize those we idolize.
What does Gartner mean, we would rather trust those higher up on the totem pole? Nobody's doing that, are they? Well, here's one response to my post in HuffPo, from Barandy: "I am more amazed that so many take McQueary's word over Coach Paterno, Schultz and Curly (respectively, Penn State's head coach and the administrators above him, all of whom have been relieved of their duties)." Wait a sec: If we agreed with Barandy and followed the lead of Paterno, Schultz and Curly, then Sandusky's reign of terror would still be going on!
There are two truths about human beings. They believe that their reality is everyone's reality—that the way they and the people around them act is right; in fact, that it is God's and nature's will that people should be the way that the person and his associates and superiors are.
And the second truth is that people will always side with, agree with, believe in, and support the groups they are a part of and the leaders of these groups. Like priests, like police, like soldiers— like all of us. To do otherwise, to be in a word a whistleblower, runs against these most fundamental of human impulses, as I point out in my post about in-group identification. And if we're counting on people to do this, we will always be wrong.
Well-connected people like Sandusky will always be allowed to roam free. I know, you want to label Sandusky a "monster." But until a short time ago, he was among the most respected members of the Penn State community—deal with it.
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P.S. (Nov 23). The New York Times did a detailed analysis of one case of a boy Sandusky repeatedly raped over years. Many people were aware of the accusations. Nothing was done to Sandusky. The boy, of course, was deeply affected. And a coach who tried to help him was himself fired in the aftermath due to the sensitivites created by Sandusky's behavior.
No one spoke out publicly. Quotes from the article below:
The assertions by prosecutors are terrible and terrifying: the boy was 11 or 12 when he first met Sandusky. Sandusky, according to the charges, gave the boy gifts—golf clubs and a computer and cash—and took him to professional and college games. Sandusky also victimized the child repeatedly over many months in Sandusky’s home.
Late in 2008, concerns about Sandusky’s possible abuse of the boy made their way to the authorities, and over the ensuing months, the boy, high school officials and at least one other coach at the school testified under oath about Sandusky.
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According to Hunter, school officials, once aware the boy might have been molested by Sandusky, took some degree of care, telling Hunter he should not be alone with the boy, but never saying exactly why. Hunter, whose relationship with the boy deepened through months of coaching and the boy’s recovery from a serious car accident, was ultimately let go by the school. Hunter’s e-mail communications with the boy—aimed at dissuading him from abandoning track this past summer—were deemed a breach of the school’s rules on maintaining distance between coaches and student-athletes, particularly the boy now known as Victim 1.
