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Is Penn State the biggest sports scandal/tragedy/drama of our time?

Discussion in 'Sports and News' started by 21, Nov 14, 2011.

  1. Mystery Meat II

    Mystery Meat II Well-Known Member

    In no way diminishing the horrors of what happened at Penn State, but it's not the biggest tragedy of our time when contrasted to those that led to significant loss of life, be it athlete (Munich Games, Marshall football) or fan (Hillsborough).

    One that doesn't get much mention because of the massive coverup/downplaying from the government at the time is the 1982 Luzhniki/Lenin stadium disaster in Russia. The "official" death toll is 67, but it was likely well over 100, possibly as high as the 300s.
     
  2. TigerVols

    TigerVols Well-Known Member

    Sure they can, especially in terms of the number of lives impacted tragically.
     
  3. Azrael

    Azrael Well-Known Member

    But they were accidental.

    Evils done by choice are always the greater.
     
  4. Mystery Meat II

    Mystery Meat II Well-Known Member

    They're certainly more evil, but unexpected death is tragic no matter the cause, and mass violent deaths are especially tragic.
     
  5. The anniversary of the Marshall plane crash was yesterday.
     
  6. 21

    21 Well-Known Member

    Munich was a terrorist mass murder of such epic proportion that it's almost unfair to include it here. To me, the only comparison to PSU is that if the Sandusky allegations turn out to be accurate (or worse), there's no way time or history will ever mitigate the severity of the crimes.
     
  7. Mizzougrad96

    Mizzougrad96 Active Member

    Biggest scandal? Given the program and the parties involved, I would say yes.

    Tragedy? No... This is bad, but lives weren't lost.

    Drama? Too early to say, but it's off to one hell of a start.
     
  8. murphyc

    murphyc Well-Known Member

    As JD and HanSen both pointed out (and probably others did as well), the Penn State case is just at the start in terms of what we know about it. I shudder to think how many victims there truly are, how long Sandusky has been doing his thing and just how deep the cover-up was. We don't know how many young boys were scarred for life, killed themselves over it, or became Sanduskys because of what happened to them. We may never know.
    From what we know so far, I'd say this is the biggest scandal/drama of my lifetime. Part of that is the image Penn State football had before last week. If this happened at Miami or USC, to me that would make the story less powerful simply because those programs have been rocked before. Would anyone have thought of State Penn before this story broke?
     
  9. Mizzougrad96

    Mizzougrad96 Active Member

    So many college scandals barely even get a reaction these days.

    We're so used to hearing about players who were paid or have been arrested or are doing drugs and alcohol that it barely registers anymore. Maybe if you throw in some hookers, an abortion and a booster's yacht, then maybe we pay attention.

    This one is so much worse than any of that and it involves the school that many people thought was the cleanest of the major programs. I'm not saying that's actually the case, but that's the national perception of Penn State. You throw in a legendary coach trying to cover it up and yeah, this is the biggest sports scandal of at least my lifetime.

    I can't think of anything that even approaches this.
     
  10. Huggy

    Huggy Well-Known Member

    Munich was among my earliest TV memories. As a seven-year-old it was pretty freaky to see those guys on TV on the balconies with masks and guns, this was definitely no Hollywood TV show.

    Cosell by Cosell has a great chapter on the TV coverage of it.
     
  11. Mizzougrad96

    Mizzougrad96 Active Member

    Great call on Munich.

    I think that would be the runaway winner for biggest tragedy.
     
  12. Azrael

    Azrael Well-Known Member

    Also a remarkable drama played out worldwide on live TV; and a terrible scandal - not just in the failure of security and the rescue attempt, but in the aftermath when Germany gave up the remaining terrorists in exchange for hostages taken on a hijacked jet.

    Still stands alone, pretty much.
    S
     
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