It’s easy to throw rocks from the outside.
You can sit at a computer in New York or Chicago or Los Angeles and type the words “Penn State should get the NCAA death penalty” and not pause to think about what might happen if that bomb were truly to land here in Centre County.
You can be the head coach at Alabama and say that Penn State sports fans should pay a fee on every ticket they buy. You can be the Big Ten commissioner and make the outlandish suggestion that a conference should be allowed to fire coaches at individual schools.
Sitting here amid the wreckage caused by child abuse and indifference, I struggle with what stones to throw.
Would the perspective gained by a football shutdown be overshadowed and overwhelmed by the impact such a move would have on the people who live, study and work in our community? I don’t know the answer.
I do know that I’m struggling to envision, after all that’s transpired, fans pouring into Beaver Stadium this fall and singing with the Blue Band, “For the glory of old State ...”
I have trouble picturing football players running onto the field, led by cheerleaders waving flags and a student in a Lion costume working the crowd.
At this moment, I can’t comprehend a Saturday afternoon filled with cheers of “We are ... Penn State” echoing across this once-happy valley.
Perhaps, as “George” said in an email to the Centre Daily Times, the editor is “one miserable human.”
Most mornings when I awake and wonder what new bombshells the day will bring, “miserable” is about as good an adjective as any.
George wrote: “Do you live in a cave or what? The university does so many great things ... Do a front page article every day that is positive not negative.”
And George added: “Chip is a Penn State grad (but) every thing he does is negative. He must be one miserable human. After reading your paper it is like I got beat up with a 2X4.”
George, most days I feel the same way.
But the story rolls on relentlessly all the same.
It is my job, and that of many other dedicated professionals here at this newspaper, to chronicle the news — both good and bad — and to ponder what it all means. To find words that bring perspective.
And to consider burning questions, such as: Should there be football at Beaver Stadium this fall?
Can we play the games in the wake of such horrific revelations, after a former assistant coach has been convicted of abusing young boys on the Penn State campus, after an investigation has shown that the most powerful people at the university harbored the abuser and kept secret his vile crimes? I’m torn, troubled, conflicted.
I want to stand with those who say the current players and coaches don’t deserve such a fate, that the community shouldn’t bear the burden for the sins of a few.
But part of me believes that only separation can bring the insight that we need. That only a time without football will remind us that it is just a game, and always was.
And that we can never again allow ourselves to put a sport or an institution above the welfare of others. Of innocent children.
That stone is cold and heavy in my hand. Its edges are rough, cutting the skin.
George, what do you think?
Chip Minemyer is the executive editor of the Centre Daily Times. He can be reached at 231-4640. Follow him on Twitter@MinemyerChip.
