<p>I heard on the news this morning the school is considering formally cancelling next years season. The mayor stepped in and said that he wants to talk about that before a final decision is made. Sounds like the mayor does not want the suspension to go beyond this year. </p>
<p>ETA: Forgot to add the school finally suspended seven students.</p>
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<p>I’m waiting to see if the allegations are proved true. They are definitely serious, criminal allegations and, if true, are stunning. But I want the justice system to do what it’s supposed to do. Remember the Duke lacrosse players?? Let’s take it easy here. </p>
<p>Let’s stop tip-toeing around the harsh realities of the allegations; this is rape. </p>
<p>There are knuckle-draggers everywhere, including on high school teams, but I have a hard time imagining this kind of thing happening and no one speaking up when I played ball. If I had been attacked, either I or the perp would end up beaten senseless. If someone dear to me was attacked, then I’d end up in prison.</p>
<p>Also, some of the parent comments from the booster community are repugnant. But typical, sadly.</p>
<p>We are all waiting to see if the allegations are proved true. But there is an awful lot of smoke here.
On the news today (101.5fm), they used the word rape which is appropriate based on what has been alleged. They didn’t use the term hazing. </p>
<p>I agree that if what is alleged happened, it is rape. </p>
<p>But I just keep thinking “Duke lacrosse players,” so I’m trying to keep an open mind and wait for more facts. I think everyone should. </p>
<p>You’re right, VeryHappy. It remains to be seen what the truth of this is.</p>
<p>Frankly, I’m amazed that there aren’t photos. Maybe kids have actually learned that taking photos of yourself raping someone is really, really dumb. But then, they also did this in the dark. Didn’t want the victim or others to be able to swear who did it?</p>
<p>I hope and believe that investigators are interviewing graduates of this football program, to see what happened in previous years.</p>
<p>How soon we forget. This same kind of nonsense was uncovered at a Long Island football power house not long ago. Right under the noses of coaches, supposedly. Hmmm. Coaches KNOW! Everyone on staff knew about Sandusky at PSU.</p>
<p>Penn State pulled the offer from the captain.</p>
<p>Interesting that none of the accused kids are publicly saying they are innocent. Probably following advice of their lawyers to lay low, but no lawyers making statements of innocence either seems odd to me. Usually they say at least something, “wait for the facts”, “my client is cooperating and the truth will come out” but nope, radio silence.</p>
<p>I’m not sure whether the captain was one of the students arrested for the rapes, but if the allegations have any merit, Penn State may feel that the captain of the team had the responsibility for knowing about the hazing by rape and stopping it. Either he knew or he should have known.</p>
<p>He is supposedly one of the accused. The newspapers reported the police went to his home and that his dad followed the police to the police station.</p>
<p>The LAST thing Penn State needs is a player accused of raping younger boys.</p>
<p>^understatement of the year?</p>
<p>You do realize that James Franklin (or Jimmy Frank as those of us who are NOT fans call him) is still involved in the Vanderbilt rape case which is close to trial. The defendants were his recruits and it is just a terrible situation. I absolutely don’t hold him responsible,but there are questions about what he knew after the fact. </p>
<p>I am sure some of the boys involved had this done to them which is sad. I wonder if they will go back to former players and charge them?</p>
<p>Goodness MWC, I had forgotten about Franklin’s Vanderbilt connection and the legal problem at that campus.</p>
<p>At least some of them were in court today so maybe we will find out more soon.</p>
<p>I would just like to note that the whole story could also evaporate if the facts don’t fit the worst version of what is being transmitted to the media. It is telling that the entire football season was cancelled, so certainly the school administrators don’t think it’s going to evaporate. But it still could. What if (for example), there was hazing, but the worst sexual elements aren’t really true (or at least, can’t be proven)? I always try to reserve judgment until there are more facts, whether it involves football or anything else.</p>
<p>From everything I had read and heard of the case, it sounds like there are kids saying this happened in prior years as well and it wouldn’t surprise me, usually things like this don’t come out of nowhere in my experience. And this is not one kid complaining, there were complaints from multiple kids who had been assaulted and at least one person who witnessed it, and I think I suspect that is why the superintendent acted. I don’t think there will be physical evidence in this case, but hopefully kids who witnessed this going on (and there had to be kids witnessing it) will step forward now that it is out and testify. I think one of the reasons the superintendent acted the way he did was there are according to the paper almost 80 kids on that football team (it is a big school, like 2500 students), and no one said anything about it. I feel sorry for the kids who will be hurt by this, the kids who were counting on football scholarships, but there also are consequences in life and I doubt very much that the other kids didn’t know this was going on. </p>
<p>Personally, I would fire the coaches, especially the head coach, I don’t care how winning the team is,it sounds to me like somehow he failed to communicate that when you are a team, you look out for each other. I suspect having been involved with football that the coach was probably one of these “whatever happens in the locker room, stays in the locker room” kind of idiots and as a result kids were afraid to come forward, while the coaches I worked with would have been more angry at those who either stood bye while it was happening or didn’t report it. </p>
<p>I also have read comments online, on the websites of newspapers reporting it, that made me sick to my stomach, people basically trying to laugh this off, or saying these kinds of things ‘toughen kids up’ and so forth. When will the troglodytes grow up and realize that bullying and abuse doesn’t make anyone tougher, doesn’t make anyone better, it is just abuse, pure and simple? I am not sure what the legal definitions of hazing are, but things like being forced to sing the school fight song standing on a table, or pushing a penny up a wall, are not what happened here, this was abuse, pure and simple, pretty vile abuse, and for anyone to defend it means they are really sick. I think the other thing that troubles me is when this turns into discussions of ‘conservative’ or ‘liberal’ values, self described ‘conservatives’ saying ‘liberals’ wanted to end football or that these kind of things happen because of ‘liberal’ values (hate to tell the people who wrote that, Sayreville is not exactly a bastion of liberal elites, it is a working class area, not known for being the Greenwich Village of NJ exactly). This isn’t about politics, it isn’t about liberal or conservative values, if what is alleged is true (and it seems like there are too many accusers for this to be smoke and mirrors, unlike Duke where there was a single accuser), it is about a bunch of young men who apparently hadn’t learned anything from what has been going on in the NFL and college ball, they still seem to think they are like Ray Rice and Jameis Winston and others believe, that because they are on the football team that is given high status, they can get away with anything, that is the problem. </p>