The school's superintendent, principal, and two football coaches were charged with failure to report, felonies of obstruction of justice, and the like.
This, from a school and a town all but run by some perverse combination of the "Big Red" football program and the Mafia (no joke!!), all but certainly -- a combination which led the football players (at least IMHO) to attempt murder, raping and leaving for dead a girl who fled for West Virginia to get away from the abuse "Big Red" was heaping on her. Let there be no doubt in my opinion: That that girl lives today was a mistake in the eyes of "Big Red".
Never mind that's a violation of no less than the Lindergh Federal kidnapping laws.
On top of that: One of the places she was, apparently, raped was the mother of one of the players -- who is also a local assistant district attorney. A local PROSECUTOR...
And a couple or three weeks ago as well, we now learn that the rape kit taken from a woman tied to Heisman Trophy winner (and BMOC of College Football this year, and the man ESPN used to place Florida State in the BCS National Championship Game) Jameis Winston had Winston's DNA in it.
Why was he basically acquitted without trial? Not guilty by reason of football in a city that is so "football", by the police's own statements to the victim, the victim was, at the least, almost-certainly threatened/intimidated into non-cooperation?
My first inclination at the Winston story would be that Florida State should've been ineligible for any bowl (since this incident occurred in December of 2012, Winston would, materially, be an ineligible player).
There's a problem here, as a close friend and contributor has pointed out: Since when has ESPN shown this degree of integrity?
My friend is correct. Penn State, anybody?
I do only have the one question: Why do we get this story IN NOVEMBER? Even with the investigation's resurfacing becoming public, especially with Winston poised to win the Heisman Trophy (Yahoo! Sports reported upon the rape kit report that many Heisman voters wanted a quick resolution in the case, one way or the other, in the two weeks they had left before they had to vote on the most outstanding player in college football, and, when charges weren't pressed, the winner in a landslide), why then and not almost a year beforehand?
(And that Winston won the Heisman in the seventh-largest blowout in history -- which would've been made larger if he wasn't left off about 13% of the ballots. Out of the 785 ballots he was on, 668 voted him first.)
Nothing in the sports machine occurs on accident. NOTHING.
On the other side of the coin: I am mentally reminded, however, of a comment by the renowned wrestling announcer Gordon Solie about Terry Funk, in character. His character was so crazy that "... it might give him the edge, or it might cost him the edge."
(Terry Funk, out of character, was one of the most level-headed guys out there.)
It's not out of the question that this Winston story could actually BENEFIT Winston in the eyes of the owners of college football and of many fans of college football. Not only could this kid being a potential rapist give him "street credentials", but it could endear him to what is believed to be the entire package of football and the privileges extended to the *inhale* gaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahds (hat-tip, again, to JBL) we consider football players to be.
It would remove the "aw shucks" that might actually be INHIBITING Winston from getting respect from his peers and actually make him enough of a gangster thug Neanderthug Felon to fit into the mold of the Neanderthug Felon League.
And how do I come to that conclusion?
Rape, sexual assault, and misogyny have become central tenets to this country, especially to our inflated sports culture.
Let me bring in Keith Olbermann on that one, talking about a sports-radio incident from earlier in November...
I wanted to start this video in the right spot, but, for some reason, the embed code won't let me, so start this at 1:49, where my old favorite sports-talk radio station gets in hot water again.
You see, I used to live in San Francisco, so I am familiar with the likes of Lee Hammer and KNBR.
I used to listen to Damon Bruce quite a bit.
This is for a November 7, 2013 rant by Bruce on his afternoon show, in which he basically bundles open misogyny and veiled homophobia in the defense of Richie Incognito and trying to beat the fuck out of somebody to make them a man (or an inhuman beast, more likely) on the football field.
Hammer is being placed on the World's Worst top step for not suspending/firing Bruce on the spot (akin to another KNBR controversy, where several were canned for a racist comment (and a follow-up on the next morning's morning show) on "brain-dead Caribbean hitters" on the Giants several years back), with a second "victory" the next night for not suspending him for longer when Bruce "apologized" the next day (using such "apology" to reinforce his statements)...
For this (snippets from apparently an eight-minute rant on the subject)...
"We've got women giving us directions. For some of you, this is gonna come across as very misogynistic. I don't care because I'm very right. I'm very, very right."
You know, there were times in my life, Mr. Bruce, that I could've used a direction or two more from women I cared about. Just sayin'... I'll show you one in a second, in a position in sports you might well like...
"See, here's the thing: I'm willing to share my sandbox, as long as you remember -- you're in my box. I didn't get into yours."
Oh, the old "Sand in the Vagina" routine!!! Yeah, that's the ticket.
And who the fuck are you in the first place? You're some podunk sports announcer from Schenectady, New York who came out to San Francisco and has bounced around a bit. If there even was a right to what you assert, Mr. Bruce (and I'll get to that, too, in a second!), you aren't an athlete-type to have earned it!
"The amount of women talking in sports, to the amount of women who actually have something to say, is one of the more disproportionate ratios I've ever seen in my frickin' life."
You know, there's a reason for that.
That reason is MEN. First, what we consider a "real man". Second, what the men in power want to see out of women...
Has anyone ever really asked the question as to, just for one example, why Danica Patrick has a top-level ride in the NASCAR Nextel Cup?
She is, and her results showed it this year, at best, marginally above field-filler as a rookie.
Mr. Bruce, the only reason she has a ride with Stewart-Haas Racing on the Nextel Cup is your stands on American sport.
(Here's a hint: There's even a little splash of it in the title to the FOX Sports webpage on the story.)
(Here's another, from December 9, 2013 in Las Vegas, and the American Country Awards:)
Sports fans should not care about this, unless it's the only damn reason a man will allow a woman on the track!
Right, Damon???
"But here's a message for all of 'em. This is for all the women, all the guidance counselors, all the sensitive men..."
Wow, so not only are we going to broadside the women, but let's broadside the people trying to keep people on an even keel (I happen to have known and worked with a couple such people in San Francisco), and let's throw in a splash of homophobia (which he can't say that directly in San Francisco, because he's not big nor strong enough in that city to be homophobic and not get his ass kicked!!)...
"All of this world of sports -- alright? -- especially the sport of football, has a setting. It's set to men. That's the setting. It's set to men. Women, ladies, sensitive guys?"
And there it is.
So, sir, if the whole world of sports, especially the world of football, is so set to men, then it would appear to me that your only place for a woman in sports is something like THIS...
That's your place for a woman in sports, Mr. Bruce. You don't want to hear what a woman has to say. You want either the woman to dress like that and perform for you (and only either in her context or in Patrick's, above), or get out of your sandbox.
Now, I know that this is probably going to get me in a lot more trouble than anyone might realize at first, but I'm about four shades of IDGAF about this world in general, so I want to clue Mr. Bruce (and a lot of other people who might eventually see this) in on a few things right here.
Do not accuse me, Mr. Bruce, of being any degree of a "sensitive man", homophobia or otherwise. Most people wouldn't even see me as a "man" at all...
Want proof? It's in the picture above you.
That woman, Deborah Gibson (performing at a Knicks game on November 14, 2013 with the Knicks cheerleaders -- photo from the Huffington Post) had to have me arrested in 1998.
The story was several years in coming, frankly, and, depending on who you talk to and who you believe (and I will exclude myself, to the extent possible, from that discussion), started anywhere between about January of 1989 and March of 1998.
I will, however, admit one thing: As much as I may have felt something you would never believe for that woman, I finally had to admit she was hot enough for me to have a sexual fantasy about.
Unlike most of you, I saw this as a PROBLEM. A problem in need of a solution.
That solution eventually ended up with me in the New York papers, in international magazines, on almost every national entertainment media program of the day, and 8 1/2 months in Riker's Island.
Now, why have I gone through explaining all this, Mr. Bruce?
To show you that I fit into none of your little fucking boxes.
This is your vision for women in sports (and almost-certainly far more, but your statement applied to just sports). Near-naked and performing for you, all but so you can get it out and stroke it.
Here's the problem: A lot of men, the men who often participate as the center of this man-led paradigm you are talking about take women dressed like that and have their way with them. Think Mr. Winston here, for which the only question, now, appears to be if she was coerced into "consenting" after the fact.
Because, in this Winston case, it was either coercion after the fact of the victim or gross incompetence of the entire investigation, one or the other.
And then you blame THE WOMAN for getting herself into it (whichever way it goes), when the fact is she had no say one way or the other. It isn't the short skirt, the leotard, the showgirl outfit, etc. and so forth and so on. She has no place (in your eyes or a lot of others) in "your sandbox" unless you're banging her, consent of the woman be damned.
All of the discussion of the outfit is CODE-SPEAK.
And it's her fault, right?
When she really probably had no say to be treated legitimately, fairly, legally, or even like a human being, right??
*vomit*
And we can go back to Danica Patrick... If Danica Patrick were not (*considered*, YMMV) a world-level babe GoDaddy bikini model who could drive a car, she wouldn't have GoDaddy as a sponsor, hence neither a ride on NASCAR's top level, and probably would've never gotten an Indy ride either before it.
Again, NOTHING happens by accident in sports.
And it's not just sports either: We've literally got shitheads in Congress in the Republican Party saying certain forms of rape are actually VALID and LEGITIMATE. We've got a prison system where the only real deterrent for many people (outside or in) is the concept of the proto-typical Bubba -- prison rape.
Since the entire world is made by, of, and for (certain) "men", this is what we get.
You see, I'm left to ask one real question: I'll accept the criminality, but what I won't accept is that I don't believe that belief of criminality would be applied universally.
If a "real man" athlete were to be the one to actually take Ms. Gibson and checklist everything I did (or that a "reasonable person" under relevant law believes I did and would have done), I get the assertion that she would've been told something akin to the old Bobby Knight quote.
So why do I go through all that description? It's because I have a question for Mr. Bruce.
Your assertion, quite clearly, is that the world of football (of sports in general, but football especially) is for only certain men.
So, then, what for the rest of us? Abuse? Rape, no more than if we were women (more on that in a second)? If we speak up enough about it, death?
Because there are two larger problems:
The first, if you believe this is all for REAL MEN: This is why you literally want to watch people snap their fucking necks in public on an NFL field, because it's a manifestation of real manhood -- and that those who wish to, effectively, kill themselves on any field (high-school on up) and be a real man as a result get whatever they want, including the panty-flashers on the sidelines (which is all what cheerleaders and halftime dancelines really are, up to and including the Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders), again, consent be damned.
And, for people like me, it's not only that I don't belong in your sandbox, I don't belong much of anyplace else either.
That isn't going to end well for somebody -- one of the main reasons I do this blog, Mr. Bruce.
The second big problem: It also isn't going to end well for a lot of the athletes either, as I will go into in my next post, above, about a veteran of the NFL who literally has a litany of injuries.
Anyway, continuing Damon's wittle want:
"You're willing to come on in and see how it operates. You're allowed in, here's your press credential. You can observe, you can be offended, you can report on it all. But we're not changing it for you."
What, so you can basically have MORE women to take your pick from? The fact that they are there to report on the contest and the participants irrelevant to the fact that they are little more than pieces of meat, in the final analysis?
What stops you motherfuckers from compromising THEM??
And now, the real issue:
"Guys like Jonathan Martin -- they're the ones actually distracting the locker room more than a guy who's an Incognito."
I WOULD GODDAMNED HOPE SO!!!
Here's the problem: If we're going to operate in your paradigm, Mr. Bruce, and that you want us out of your sandbox, then what's to stop "the locker room" (especially one similar to the Incognito-led Dolphins) to take people you "want out of your sandbox" and rape/disappear them in the name of the Real Manhood of American Sports Culture?
What for the rest of us, you piece of shit?
If this is "the locker room", any disruption to force these felonious animals into treating their teammates like members of the animal kingdom (rather than objects/property) would be an improvement!! I mean, Hell, what's the difference as to how Martin is being viewed by "the locker room" and one of the Miami Dolphin cheerleaders?
And you endorse this bullshit! The only real problem I have is that Olbermann put the wrong man up there on the step. I mean, basically, AT BEST, you're now basically putting Martin on level with a woman, if not far lower. Misogyny, at this point, is about the best I could give you for your stand on Martin, if not homophobia!
"I've said that from the minute it happened, I'm sticking with it, and now the world is coming around to me."
The same "world" that:
- Is completely fine with a group of Alabama fans cornering two fans, seeing one killed, because "THEY DON'T CARE ABOUT ALABAMA!"
- Rioted when Penn State University was exposed as a haven for pedophiles under the Joe Paterno administration, doubly so when Mark Emmert was emasculated the first time by ESPN...
- Has no problem threatening people with being knifed for actually demanding our sports be safer, rather than material blood altars to our (supposed) manhood.
- Has no problem giving a rapist the Heisman Trophy, even though it's clear to anyone who paid attention that he did it and got away with it.
- Believes that player safety, in any sport, will contribute to the "Pussification of America", with all the homophobic slurs to attach to it.
- Has no problem discarding our former athletes as damaged pieces of meat once we are through with them.
- Has no problem watching qualified players in your "world for men" be blackballed for even SUPPORTING views that would be inconsistent with your "world for men"... (Kluwe, the former Raven whose name I can never spell, etc.)
- ...
"ITS UNFAIR IN THE WORLD OF MEN!"
Treating Anyone But Yourself as a valid member of the human race is "Unfair in the World of Men", Damon, at least if you are to be believed...
"You are all high. Seriously high."
Nah, can't say I ever tried it.
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