A Cultural Analysis of the 2011 Penn State Football Child Abuse Scandal Kyle J
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Bucknell University Bucknell Digital Commons Honors Theses Student Theses Spring 2018 Heroes and Villains: A Cultural Analysis of the 2011 Penn State Football Child Abuse Scandal Kyle J. Adams Bucknell University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.bucknell.edu/honors_theses Part of the Arts and Humanities Commons Recommended Citation Adams, Kyle J., "Heroes and Villains: A Cultural Analysis of the 2011 Penn State Football Child Abuse Scandal" (2018). Honors Theses. 432. https://digitalcommons.bucknell.edu/honors_theses/432 This Honors Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Student Theses at Bucknell Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Honors Theses by an authorized administrator of Bucknell Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. iv Acknowledgements This work would not have been possible without the assistance of Erica Delsandro, Ghislaine McDayter, Peg Cronin, Deirdre O’Connor, and Bill Flack. I also owe a debt of gratitude to my family and friends for their unwavering support throughout the research and writing processes. Finally, I would like to express my sincerest thanks to Professor John Hunter for his guidance, insight, and encouragement at all stages of the thesis. v Contents Chapter Page Introduction: Facts and Icons .......................................................................................................1 Before We Begin .........................................................................................................................1 A Timeline of Events ...............................................................................................................3 Thesis Goals and Scholarly Context .......................................................................................12 Literature Review...................................................................................................................13 Chapter One: Not-so-Happy Valley ...........................................................................................18 Classification of Verbal and Nonverbal Rhetoric .................................................................18 Select Insider Perspectives ......................................................................................................20 Penn State Student Body and Fan Base .................................................................................20 Local Retail Business Owners ...............................................................................................32 The Paterno Family ................................................................................................................35 Select Outsider Perspectives ...................................................................................................42 Outside Media ........................................................................................................................42 The NCAA and Louis Freeh ..................................................................................................47 Chapter Two: We Are! ................................................................................................................52 Penn State Forever ...................................................................................................................52 vi The Siege Mentality: Who Are the Real Victims? ................................................................60 Gender: Associative Emasculation and the “Unspeakable” Offense ..................................69 The Financial Engine ...............................................................................................................79 Chapter Three: Beyond Beaver Stadium ..................................................................................86 Introduction to Comparative Analysis...................................................................................86 The University of North Carolina ..........................................................................................87 The Scandal in a Nutshell ......................................................................................................87 The Influence of Big-Time College Sports ............................................................................89 The Involvement of Legendary Coaches ...............................................................................92 Community Defense ..............................................................................................................97 Conclusion: College Sports Creating Community ...............................................................101 The Catholic Archdiocese of Boston ....................................................................................103 A Crisis in the Archdiocese .................................................................................................103 Religion and Sport ...............................................................................................................106 The Culture of Cover-Up .....................................................................................................109 Masculinity and Power ........................................................................................................111 Responses to the Boston Scandal .........................................................................................113 Conclusion: What is to be Done? ..........................................................................................118 Works Cited ................................................................................................................................123 Appendices ..................................................................................................................................138 Appendix A: Dramatis Personae ..........................................................................................138 Appendix B: Sample Merchandise Sold Following Scandal ..............................................140 Appendix C: Sample Editorial Cartoons Published Pertaining to the Scandal ...............142 vii Tables Table Page 1. Timeline of Significant Events in Sandusky Scandal (Adapted from Louis Freeh’s Investigative Report and CNN’s Sandusky Scandal “Fast Facts”) ..................................................3 viii Illustrations Figure Page 1. Beaver Stadium During a “White Out” Game .............................................................................1 2. Penn State Students Celebrate After Toppling WJAC News Van .............................................18 3. Shop Window in Downtown State College ...............................................................................52 4. University of North Carolina Football Helmet ..........................................................................86 5. T-Shirt likening NCAA to Communist institution...................................................................140 6. “O’Brien’s Lions” T-Shirt .......................................................................................................140 7. T-Shirt depicting Joe Paterno’s feet and the number 409 ........................................................141 8. “We Are More Than Football… We Are Still Proud!” T-Shirt...............................................141 9. Untitled Cartoon by Rob Tornoe (2012) .................................................................................142 10. Pope JoePa by Rob Rogers (November 10, 2011) ...............................................................142 11. Wait, JoePa Was Fired? by Charley Gifford (November 13, 2011) ....................................143 12. Untitled Cartoon posted on SC6 “Cartoons of the Week” by Mark Reino (July 15, 2012) ..143 13. Paterno Statue by Rob Rogers (May 12, 2014) ....................................................................144 ix 14. Paterno fumbles moral obligation by Jeff Darcy (November 12, 2011) ..............................144 15. Jerry Sandusky horsing around by Jeff Darcy (November 18, 2011) ..................................145 16. Penn State penalty severity by Jeff Darcy (July 25, 2012) ...................................................145 x Abstract In the wake of the sexual abuse of young boys being revealed to the public in November 2011, the Penn State community was launched into the forefront of public attention. Loyal Penn Staters were obviously shaken by the news, reacting in a manner consistent with trauma or crisis response. Select subgroups of those affiliated with Penn State, including fans, students, the Paterno family, and local retail business owners, employed many defense mechanisms in responding to the scandal. The defense mechanisms employed by Penn Staters included, but were not limited to, simple denial, appeals to the inherent morality of Penn State (and its football program), self-victimization, focus on icons, and the elimination of Sandusky’s true victims from public consciousness. Further, hegemonic institutional ideology played a distinct role in conditioning the behavior of these “insider collectives” in the wake of the scandal. The need for the PSU community to protect normalized conceptions of acceptable masculinity in a football setting, as well as the financial well-being of the community (capitalist interests), played a significant role in motivating the inability to acknowledge the true victims of the scandal: