Thursday, November 10, 2011
Penn State
So with Penn State's scandal and JoePa being the biggest news at the moment, when I was looking over my notes from the excerpts from The Prince, it seemed to make some connections. It may be a stretch for some of them, but I feel like there are ideas that can very well relate. For example, in the beginning it talks about good and bad behavior - virtues and vices. The article states the opinion that what ever will increase your chances to stay in power is better, not what is "right". Joe Paterno knew about the child molestation like 6 or 7 years ago. He reported it to whatever higher official he needed too, in order to be legally right, but morally, he didn't do much about it. He did what he needed to and went on his way. By laws of the university, he did what was expected, but if he wanted to really do what was right, which in my head, morally, would be more than just letting it go after telling someone that didn't do anything about it, he could have. Because of his name, if he wanted an investigation 7 years ago, there would have been one, but instead he let it go, not causing any controversy with his job or institution, but not thinking about how other peoples lives could be jeopardized. Another note that I had written down in class explaining the end of 18th chapter we read, is how it discussed that as long as you appear to be playing by the rules, that's all that matters. No one will intrude if it looks like everything is going good. This all has to do with image management. I think that one of Penn State's biggest issues in general is image management, because they try to always portray a "WE ARE the best" image.... They didn't act on a life-changing problem, probably to save their image, when they found out, but it blew up in the faces now. I don't know every detail about the whole scandal, and I am not saying that Joe Paterno should have been fired or not, because I am not educated on the whole situation enough. All I was doing was connecting some points I found could be related, because all I do know is that Joe Paterno was aware of the situation, and morally, he should have done more about it. Instead, he let it under the carpet for years, and more boys lives are jeopardized and possibly ruined.
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Its interesting that you are drawing these parallels between the ethics we studied and Penn State. I'm not sold on the Machiavellian but it seems you have an interesting point about the image management part of it. I still believe that image management is going on and I'm positive that the firing and resignation of various members of the Penn State faculty/staff is a part of it as well. The board members have an image to maintain and they seem to take the position that anyone who gets in the way of such an image is to be let go. I'm not voicing my opinions about anything just my simple observations.
ReplyDeleteIt is really interesting to see you making a connection with what happened with Penn State. Penn State definitely had image management in mind when they fired coach Paterno and their school president. I don't think it was the best idea to fire Joe Paterno, especially after the mayhem it caused in State College.
ReplyDeleteI think the board fired Joe Paterno and the school president simply to make it look like they were taking care of this problem. If as many people knew about this abuse as the media has shown, then there were deeper problems than the head football coach and the president. The board saw the media running with these horrible accusations and simply did something to try and remedy the situation, but didn't do enough to actually remedy this problem. I don't think there is a simple way to handle this situation, but I do not agree with how the board of trustees handles everything in the end. They tried to create an appearance of control iin this situation, but think it is out of their hands at this point.
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