From the "What Were You Thinking?" file...

Today, we're going to have a little test. A word problem, if you will. Here's the set-up:

You are a twenty-something male graduate student at a major American university. You're old enough to vote, drink and go to war, in good health and physically fit. One day, as you're walking through the football locker room, you happen to casually witness a senior coach, nude, doing something unspeakable to an eleven year old boy in the showers. What is the proper response?

1. grab the closest blunt instrument you can find and smack the offending creature as hard as you can across the back of the head.


2. grab the pathetic excuse for a human being by the hair, drag him off the child, throw him across the room, the entire time screaming obscenities at him.


3. stand at a safe distance and boldly shout something like "Stop that, you disgusting waste of skin!"


4. stand at an even safer distance and meekly say, "Excuse me, coach, but are you sure that's quite appropriate?"


5. slink away and tell your daddy.

Okay, pencils down. If you chose 1 or 2, then you're a decent, right-thinking person with enough of a spine to stand up and protect the most vulnerable people from the predators. If you chose 3 or 4, then you're a tower of jello who's more afraid of having your career options ruined than you are with doing the right thing. If you chose option 5, then you're a PennState grad student.

So what in the name of all that is holy were these people at PennState thinking? Listening to that interview with Sandusky yesterday, I was floored. Does this guy really, honestly see nothing wrong with a grown man showering with young boys whom he's not related to and playing grab-ass with them at the same time? Does this NOT sound inappropriate to him? Is there any rational, adult male who thinks that this would be acceptable behavior? Did Common Sense and Compassion take a vacation at some point? Did Decency go with them? In fact, was there not one person in this entire affair that had the cajones to stand up and put a stop to this thing? Apparently, there wasn't. Apparently, in the halls of power at PennState, some people are simply above things like law and ethics and morality. They get to make their own rules, and other people cover up their crimes rather than expose them because they don't want to ruin the reputation of a "good man." Never mind that the life of an innocent child has been irreparably damaged. Well, I personally hope that Sandusky goes from PennState to the state pen, into the open dormitory, where all of the biggest and worst of humanity can do with him as they please. Then he'll get to see what it's like to be vulnerable, to have no choice, to be used. I wonder if anyone will step in and help him? Probably not.