Shame on the Moon
The horror of what happened at Ohio State
I think it’s important for me to state, as a professional writer, that not only have I never cared for THE Ohio State University (there are very few teams they could ever play in football that would make me root for them1). I also have to add that I have also also always despised Congressman Jim Jordan, a poster boy for racist Christian Nationalism, and someone who is a little too mentally challenged to actually serve the American Public. I feel it’s important, before talking about Surviving Ohio State, to go on record with my prior biases against both. Given those biases, it would be very easy for everything I say in this entire post to be dismissed as biased since written by a “liberal hater.” I also don’t believe that writing this—and reviewing Surviving Ohio State—is going to convince anyone that Jordan, and what happened there while he was a wrestling coach, was not just morally reprehensible and unspeakably vile, but criminal as well…but I think anyone with no opinion on either would despise them with the same level of loathing I have for them both after watching this documentary.
To give credit where it is due, they have a storied athletic department. Their football team is always successful when it comes to wins and losses, and wins championships (conference and national) regularly. As I said, I’ve never rooted for them. Growing up watching college football, I always thought Woody Hayes was a psychopath who shouldn’t be around young men. That made it hard for me to root for them. It was no surprise to me when he attacked a Clemson player in a bowl game while having a fit of uncontrollable rage. That finally got his psychotic ass fired, since all that mattered before that incident was he that won games.
I’ve never forgotten that Ohio State 2will put winning about everything else—even their athletes.
I knew about this scandal, having caught news stories about it, but I didn’t follow the story too closely. I did also know the vile traitor Jim Jordan was involved (like Colonel Klink in Hogan’s Heroes, he’ll die on his “I knew nothing” insistence—despite the fact that some of the victims distinctly remember telling him and the head coach, and that good Christian Republican didn’t do a fucking thing. I would ask him about it every chance I got were I a reporter) despite all his lies to the contrary.
I mean, we’ve seen the kind of person he is since he entered public life, and I wouldn’t believe that man if he told me the sun rose in the east and set in the west.
What I didn’t know was how just how bad it actually was, and frankly, Ohio State fans should be calling for the university to take some accountability and pay the victims what they deserve. But they won’t, of course. Winning is everything,3 after all, and so what if you have to break a few eggs to make that omelet the fans demand?
Again, I cannot deny that a higher percentage of LSU fans would react the same way—not caring about the nuts and bolts as long as the Tigers win—but I am not one of those Tiger fans.4
Part of being a coach is molding young men into responsible adults. Maybe that isn’t the case anymore, and I am merely remembering the college athletics mentality of years past; I can be naive, always, as well as obtuse and oblivious; but I can’t imagine Nick Saban or Kirby Smart covering up this sort of thing. Maybe that’s my own naivete, and maybe I should stop giving athletic programs the benefit of the doubt and just assume there’s all kinds of shenanigans going on all over the country that are being covered up (that series about Aaron Hernandez certainly didn’t make Urban Meyer or the University of Florida look very good).
Surviving Ohio State does not depict THE5 University in a very good light—but given the subject matter, I don’t see how they could have been portrayed positively. The truth is, Dr. Richard Strauss sexually assaulted and abused any number of male athletes at THE University for decades, while the coaches and administration either looked the other way or didn’t consider it a big enough deal to do anything about; and even after everything came to light, THE University has fought against the athletes and any kind of restitution they deserve.
You failed to protect your student-athletes, and then won’t do the right thing afterwards?
Sorry, The OSU: I believe the victims.6 And their stories are believable. Why would any man, for the record, ever come forward (especially a collegiate athlete) and make up being sexually assaulted? And there are plenty of victims…which doesn’t even scratch the surface of those who haven’t come forward.
A statistic I would like to see is how many of their male student-athletes committed suicide?
I also think it’s incredibly horrible and disgusting that the only person who tried to stop Strauss was the fencing coach… a woman trying to protect her young male athletes from a predator, only to be brushed aside and ignored.
And for the university and the wrestling coaches to pretend they didn’t know is even more reprehensible.
I could also understand how the athletes didn’t “punch him out” or any of the violent things straight male commentators (who probably weren’t collegiate athletes) said they would do in the same position. If you weren’t then shut the fuck up.
If you assaulted THE TEAM DOCTOR, and it became a he said/he said thing, whose side do you think the university and athletic department would take? Based on how THE university responded to the allegations, I think it’s pretty safe to assume the athlete would lose his scholarship and be expelled. Many of these kids were naive, from small towns, and didn’t really know much; remember when you were eighteen and off to college for the first time? Would they think that maybe what the doctor was doing was normal for an athletic doctor?
We so easily forget that college athletes are really just kids themselves, with all that entails.
It’s a harrowing watch, but I recommend it. It’s very well done.
Notre Dame is the only one I can think of off the top of my head, and if they did play I usually don’t watch because my happiest outcome—they both lose—is impossible.
In fairness, this isn’t endemic or particular to Ohio State, either. Check out the Penn State Sandusky cover-up or the Dr. Larry Nasser disaster at Michigan State. I know LSU has made some bad decisions in the past in which winning won out over morality and common decency, and probably most schools with winning programs will choose winning over the health, safety and well-being of their athletes; I’m cynical that way. But this? Is so disgusting on so many levels that watching the documentary literally made my stomach turn.
I’ll never forget how the Penn State student body rioted when the Board of Trustees rightfully fire Joe Paterno when the extent of Sandusky’s crimes and the cover-up came out. I mean, how dare anyone fire a winning football coach who looked the other way about sexual abuse of minors? Priorities.
LSU did have a scandal; last decade, there were allegations about athletes and coaches sexually assaulting (or domestic abuse of young women and nothing being done about it. It was ten young women and ten different athletes; so yes, there was a sexual assault/domestic abuse cove-up culture. The football coach overseeing this was fired (Les Miles, but I suspect the story might have been different had he been winning the SEC and beating Alabama regularly), as well as several employees. LSU settled with the young women. It didn’t go on for decades, and wasn’t all at the hands of ONE person that the Athletic Department and administration knew about and covered up. It never should have happened at LSU; shouldn’t happen anywhere, really, and maybe I don’t think it’s as bad or the same thing because I am an LSU fan. It’s possible—but if and when there’s a documentary made about it, I will watch and I will write about it, and I will not be an LSU homer, either. I may go ahead and look up the LSU scandal and the allegations and the result of the investigation so I can write about it.
The fact they insist on calling it THE Ohio State University is annoying. As opposed to all those imposter Ohio States? Bitch, please, and get over yourselves, seriously.
And yes, had this happened at LSU I would still believe the victims.