I was referring, as I did in the quote, to Penn State as a whole. I have gone out out of my may to say that this is not a Penn State Football problem, but a Penn State problem. I have also noted that the Freeh report doesn't indicate that this is a "football problem."
Good heavens, failing to publicly report incidents, as required by law, is not an example of a cloistered environment? Come on!
Okay, but you made all these points in response to my statements that there is no substantive evidence of the football first environment. The Freeh report did indicate it was a football problem. In the early pages, the pages that so many people read and accepted without reading it in its entirety, it said that the cover-up was done to protect a football program. The NCAA used that finding to justify the sanctions with widespread ramifications. That the fans and students and alumni created this environment.
Part of my problem here is that when I was a student, "Penn State" meant the students, alumni, faculty. The administration was like this little group of corporate America drones who were trying to interfere, trying to control things to maximize revenue or increase standings or impress people on their resume, even if it meant breaking away from the traditions and the best Penn State had to offer. There was always animosity between the Penn State community and the bureaucrats hired to run the place. I'm pretty sure two out of my four years at University Park, there were petitions to oust GS. Unfortunately, they were never taken seriously because he always claimed he was not popular among students because he was trying to make it a dry campus. Granted, that made him no friends on campus, but it was not the only strike against him. When this scandal broke, almost everyone I talked to from Penn State was 110% positive that GS covered this up, and JVP did not even know about it. Because that fit with what we knew. Now knowing that JVP acted in concert with the administrators means he went to the dark side, the other team, the group he had previously fought on behalf of the student body who did not like or trust the administration.
When you are saying there was a cloistered environment within the administration, I completely agree. We have substantial evidence of that, and it fits well with what we already knew.
When someone says that there is a "Penn State way" or "Penn State culture" that condoned or encouraged this, I can not agree. The students, alumni, and faculty, as well as front-line staff (those interacting with the students on a regular basis) had a very different attitude, and they always have been the "Penn State" we talk about.
As for the Clery Act, I apologize for misunderstanding. I was not thinking of the failure to report because that's a failure with or without the Clery Act. I was thinking of the failure to follow the mandates set forth in the Clery Act for the training and education of the faculty and staff, and establishing of procedures for reporting abuse.
