It's Not Just Penn State....They Just got Caught

After watching the video about Rene Portland and her anti-lesbian policy at Penn State, and in light of the Sandusky fiasco at the same Penn State, I found many parallels, and these same parallels were a major reason that both affairs escalated to the level they did.

In both instances we witnessed an person in a position of power abuse it. I have previously discussed Sandusky in my former blog post, but Portland's openly anti-lesbian policy and the harm it caused is still very serious itself, as both negatively affected the lives of innocent young children and adults. The damage that Portland caused many young developing young women was obviously long lasting and changed many of the women in the movie lives' forever, often for the negative. This is eerily similar to the affect Sandusky has had on his victims, although obviously not on the exact same level.

The most disturbing fact of the Portland and Sandusky cases were how long they were able to continue. The standing university policy discussed in the video was that a superior must be informed of the situation and then action will be taken. The only problem with this was that in both instances this procedure was followed, and in both instances nothing significant happened. This lack of discipline showed by those with more power than Portland and Sandusky is despicable and cowardly.

But Penn State is not the only place this occurs. In the past year or two college athletics has seen more scandals of similar power abuse than in recent memory, and possibly in history. This exposure of power corruption shows that Penn State is not the only place that despicable acts are carried out and covered up, the only difference is that Penn State got caught with two particularly despicable examples.

The effect this has on sport, and particularly women's sport, is shown by the power structure that allows this to happen. It is still male dominated and as such the equality needed between male and female sports will not occur, especially when proper use of power is not enforced. To remedy this situation, a comprehensive NCAA review of all schools must take place in order to address the corruption that seems to have become more commonplace than rare.

Brandon Robison section 6