Personal | I'm Just Sharing

Penn State & Joe Paterno – My Take

Posted by Mitch Mitchell on Nov 14, 2011

I know someone out there has been saying “Is Mitch afraid to have a take on what’s going on at Penn State and with Joe Paterno”? Who me, scared to have a take on something? Ain’t no way! It’s not going to be overwhelmingly popular, but I don’t care; it’s my take.

A little quick history for those of you who aren’t up on this or aren’t from this country. Last weekend it came to light that a former football coach had been accused of molesting young boys initially about 13 or 14 years ago. Then around 2001 or 2002 an assistant football coach told his head coach, Joe Paterno, that he’d actually seen the guy doing something with a young boy in a shower. The head coach passed the information along to the people he reported to, the coach was dismissed, and somehow that ended things.

Only it didn’t end things. Last weekend it comes out that the two men Coach Paterno had reported the incident to had been called before a grand jury and asked about these things, and they had lied about it. They were arrested for keeping their silence and for lying, as child molestation is a big deal. Suddenly however, it threw Coach Paterno into the mix because many people believe he should have gone to the police with his information instead of just following the rules of his state, which said that he was under no legal obligation to do so and instead reporting it to his superiors. The assistant coach who’d seen the action also didn’t report it to the police, following the same process the head coach did.

This turned out not to be good enough for the representatives of the university, who this week fired the coach, who is 84 years old and has been coaching at the school for 62 years and had been head coach for 46 of those years, fired the president of the college, who I assume had some knowledge of this issue and didn’t do anything, and put the assistant coach who brought it up to begin with on paid administrative leave for some reason, although it seems his life was being threatened for not going to the police either.

Word has subsequently come out saying that this coach has not only “allegedly” molested at least 9 children (possibly tens of kids but nine “confirmed” accusations to date), but may have run kind of a (ugh) child prostitution ring, doling out young boys to rich people; it gets more and more disgusting as it goes on. So, this is truly a major deal, and it’s tarnished a program that, as far as anyone knows, has never done anything wrong that the school has been accused of, especially the head coach, always known for being overtly moral in all his dealings.

Okay, that’s some history, and I hope I got it all right. Here come my takes on everything.

One, some people needed to be fired. The two men that have been accused of lying to the grand jury, strangely enough, resigned rather than being fired. Supposedly the university couldn’t fire them for some reason but they knew what was coming. The president was fired because he basically said he and the university would stand fully behind these two men; the board of trustees didn’t like that.

Two, I’m not sure it was totally fair to fire the head coach. I certainly know it wasn’t fair to fire a man who personified the best the university had to offer for as long as he did via a cell phone call. If this man didn’t deserve the dignity of being told to his face that he was being relieved from his job I don’t know who did. That was a cowardly act and I deplore that kind of disloyalty. On the other front, the coach had announced earlier in the day that he would resign at the end of the year; after 62 years he didn’t deserve that much?

Three, did the coach have the responsibility of calling the police to report an action he was told about? This is an interesting morality question, since legally it seems he didn’t do anything wrong by the laws of the state of Pennsylvania. On this one I pull out two scenarios, both of them true in my life.

One, I have a friend who was accused a couple of times of molesting his own daughter when she was younger. These accusations were the result of a custody battle, but the police had to investigate each time. I know Dr. Phil says that when it comes to children everyone should take the action to protect them but there’s always this stigma that sticks around someone accused of this sort of thing, even when it’s proven not to be true, and it wasn’t true for my friend. So, is it fair to totally stigmatize someone who you didn’t see doing something?

Two, what about other types of abuse you know is happening? I’ve known a few women over the years that I’ve worked with that I knew were being physically abused at home. They’d come to work with bruises and say things like they fell down the stairs or ran into a door or something else stupid. I wanted to step in a couple of times but was always told not to interfere. The only thing I was ever able to do was ban this one guy from coming into the hospital at all unless he was coming into the emergency room as a patient. Someone’s going to say “you should have called anyway”; trust me, it’s not that easy to do because the victim, and I’m going to use that term, will almost always side with their abuser, and it makes you look bad.

Three, and be truthful with yourselves, how many of you would take the chance of stepping outside of the chain of command where you work and going directly to the police based on something someone told you? If the assistant coach who saw it went to the police because he’d seen it, that’s one thing. If you’re being told something yet didn’t see it, and you report it, basically it’s just hearsay, so you end up following company rules, which are to move it up to the chain of command. Now, if either of those two other guys hadn’t lied during the grand jury testimony, this whole thing would have gone away and people would be praising the coach for speaking up in the first place.

Four, we all might possibly say we’d have done this or that, but it’s a lie. People don’t like getting involved in anything for fear of getting in trouble. It’s turned into a big scandal because people have been confronted with their own reality. Every day in a big city somewhere a person is murdered and hundreds of witnesses disappear. In China two weeks ago a 2-year-old girl was run over twice and no one did a thing for about 10 minutes until a homeless person ran over to her and started calling for help; she died. We see mothers and fathers slapping their children in public places or yelling and cursing at them and we do nothing because we want to avoid becoming their target, or having someone else say it’s none of our business. So the majority can be as sanctimonious as they want to be; I know they’re just being phony.

And five, I can say this because I’ve kind of been there as the protector. In my late teens and through my mid 20′s I was the protector. I was the guy who’d step in the middle of fights for people I knew and protect them. I used to step in ready to take the punch for my friends into my early 30′s and did so without any worry as to what could happen to me; I have witnesses. Online now, if I see a friend of mine being taken on by someone I’ve stepped into the fray; I’ve done it on this blog and on other blogs.

But in general, as I’ve aged, I’ve realized that it’s not always taken well. People say they want help but they really don’t. Is there a moral obligation to help others? Well, ask yourself how you felt the last time someone tried to talk you into joining their religion because they feel it helped them, and now they want to help save your soul. We don’t want help unless we specifically ask for it.

Does this absolve the guy who did what he did? Nope; he’ll get his. Does this absolve the two guys that lied to the grand jury? Nope, and they’ll get theirs. Does this absolve the head coach, Joe Paterno? In my mind, for a number of factors, yes it does. Could he have done more; yes. Should he have done more; probably. Should he be castigated because he followed the rules and did what pretty much 99.93% of the populace would have done? No.

Look at yourselves first and examine your previous actions in things that have been similar, if not as awful as this scandal, then answer truthfully.

Who’s scared now?

Personal | 18 Comments

My Colonoscopy Story

Posted by Mitch Mitchell on Nov 12, 2011

Yesterday I had to have a colonoscopy. For those that don’t live in the United States, it’s recommended that once someone reaches 50 that they have one to verify they don’t have colon cancer and to check for other stuff. I at least got to defer for a couple of years since I rarely go see my doctor for a checkup, but I finally got cornered so it was my turn.

Now, these are fairly common, but there can be issues here and there. They do knock you out, and you do risk a perforated colon, internal bleeding, and a couple of other things. So you can’t just shrug it off and say it’s nothing to worry about, though for the most part it’s relatively safe.

My issue is that I couldn’t get any real information from anyone as to just what could happen being diabetic. You have to fast, and with the medications I take, I’m supposed to have food with them. So, what would happen to me going through the process? That’s the main reason I made the video.

But there’s a few things I didn’t mention in the video while trying to keep it under 15 minutes. For one, By 4PM of the day I was fasting I started getting this massive headache, and that stayed with me almost the rest of the night. I couldn’t take almost anything for it because I wasn’t eating, though my wife did give me an Advil eventually and that took the edge off it.

I was really hungry all day, but wasn’t so hungry the day of the procedure for whatever reason. I still craved pizza, though we had fried rice instead since it was much lighter. That’s their recommendation, eat light and get used to eating again, so I ate small portions pretty much every hour because I was really hungry; today I’m getting my pizza!

They will ask you over and over what your name is, what your date of birth is, the last 4 digits of your social security number and what you’re having done. Initially I worried they didn’t know what they were doing until I realized that it’s a safety procedure that they’ve put into place to make sure that physicians won’t be doing the wrong procedures anymore, what with all those errors in Florida some years ago. They also kept asking me what I was allergic to.

After the procedure you’ll expel a lot of gas, and that makes them happy. This is one of those “dignity” things I mentioned in the video. There’s stuff we wouldn’t walk around doing in public that they’re expecting you to do. Thing is, there’s no smell because your entire system is cleaned out, and what they’ve done is pushed a bunch of air into your body through your rectum so it has to come out. And be thankful it’s coming out, otherwise you’re going to get cramped and it’s going to hurt. I had that problem during the virtual colonoscopy in the x-ray department, where you’re not under anesthesia and just have to lay there and take it. That’s when you’re on either your side or back; once you roll over onto your stomach, since they take the views from 3 directions, even adding more air wasn’t bad at all.

One last thing. In the video I said that I came out of the anesthesia pretty easily. Most of that is true. I felt clear headed and knew exactly what I was saying and what was going on. I even felt that if I’d had to I could have driven home, which it turns out is illegal once you’ve had anesthesia in New York for at least the day. However, when I had to get up and get into the wheelchair, I found that I wasn’t okay at all, and luckily I didn’t just try to force myself into the chair because I’d have fallen and the nurse wasn’t close to big enough to have held me up if I’d gone down. So, always respect the anesthesia.

I also mentioned that I was given propofol, the same stuff Michael Jackson was given by that doctor. Let me tell you, I understand why he would have wanted this stuff. Although I wasn’t happy with the pressure my head felt when it started to take effect, I feel like I slept well in that short period of time, and I ever dreamed; I’ve never dreamed while under anesthesia before. In its proper dosage it’s wonderful stuff, but I can also tell why one should never, and I mean ever, use it at home.

That’s all I have other than the video below, but if you have any other questions go ahead and ask. This is one of those things that, as younger people we avoid talking about because it kind of scares us, but once you reach the proper age you’re probably going to have to go through. At least I’m telling you what might be coming.

Diabetes, Personal | 16 Comments

When Things Get Personal, Part Two

Posted by Mitch Mitchell on Oct 18, 2011

Last year I wrote a post titled When Things Get Personal On Blogs. That post was about a tete-a-tete I got into with some folks over the topic of Akismet and spam and such. It got a lot more responses than you’ll see if you visit the post because there were a lot of attack comments that came here based on that post that I simple deleted. I knew they were coming, and I knew I was going to delete them. I didn’t need that on my blog, I didn’t trust the people I knew were going to send them (whom I mention in the post), and, as I’ve always said, this is my space, I pay for it, and I get to decide what stays and what goes. Some might call it censorship; personally I don’t care. You behave in someone else’s space or deal with the consequences.

by Olivier Hodac via Flickr

I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately as the last couple of months have been somewhat interesting around here. I’ve had some things going on in my personal life that made me not be as diligent as I should have been. I feel as though I allowed certain behavior to go unchecked around here, and I don’t like myself for that. It’s not behavior that I exhibited either; that’s probably the worst part.

Not that I’ve always been nice here. For the most part I am, but I will go after someone that goes after a friend of mine or someone that’s done something ice for me or others. Loyalty is one of my big things; I think I’ve said that before.

Last September I wrote a different kind of post titled De-Stressing Life By Not Commenting. On that post I indicated that when I felt I couldn’t comment on something without getting into an emotional firefight that I just wasn’t going to do it anymore. As I said, some people strive on attack mode; I don’t. I don’t thrive at all on negativity; never have. I don’t expect everything to be Andy Griffith, but I do expect a certain amount of decorum.

And I expect that here. That’s why I feel so bad that I’ve allowed a few people to be attacked in some fashion here over the past couple of months. And none of it was constructive; it was personal, and that just shouldn’t have been allowed. And none of it was specifically directed to me until last week; that makes what I allowed to happen become even worse, because I should have nipped it in the bud much earlier.

I can guarantee this won’t be a problem in the future. From actually last week, but since I’m writing today I’ll say today, I will not allow any more personal attacks in comments on this blog, or any other blog I write. If I feel the comment is personal, whether it’s towards me or anyone else, it’s gone, plain and simple. If you want to personally attack someone, take it to a newspaper site since they don’t ever seem to want to censor anyone. Behave or be gone; no one wants to deal with that mess.

Why am I doing this? I want to encourage people to comment here, and I want it to be a safe haven. We can disagree with each other, but we’re going to treat each other with respect. I can’t change the world, but I can certainly change things here. I pay for this, and thus my rules. In a weird way I was inspired to finally write this post after reading a post by Marcus Sheridan titled The Lie that is Online Transparency and ‘Being True to Self’, where he talks about people that cuss a lot saying they’re just being true to themselves and how he believes they’re lying to themselves. So do I, and this has always been a no-curse-words zone, since I don’t cuss (and yes, I did just interchange ‘cuss’ and ‘curse’); never have, never will.

So, for those of you that may have found certain posts here with comments that might have put you off, please know that I apologize for that and know that you will never have to worry again. For those of you who had to deal with a personal attack in the last couple of months, that being John, Ken and Chris, I’m sorry I didn’t step in earlier. I’m not putting up with it against me; I’m certainly not ever going to put up with it against anyone else again.

That is, unless it’s nice; if someone makes a love connection make sure to invite me to the wedding, as I love wedding cake.

Personal | 29 Comments

What Makes People Change?

Posted by Mitch Mitchell on Oct 4, 2011

I have a story to tell. Back in 1993, I heard that a big blizzard was coming to the area. Instead of staying in my apartment I decided to go out of town to my parents house to ride out the storm. I got there just as the snow started to pick up, and by the time it was done where they lived there were 34 inches of extra snow on the ground.

The problem is that where my parents live, as well as where I live, we already had at least 3 to 5 feet of snow on the ground. Since I was at my parents house, we had to deal with the fact that the driveway had totally filled up with snow about four feet high, which meant my car was totally covered. As a matter of fact the entire driveway was so high that there was no way we could have gotten out to the street if an emergency had happened. This was definitely problematic.

Still, Dad and I had to try. So we went out there with our shovels and we started digging. After three hours we actually made a path that allowed us to make it to the street, but it was so thin that it really couldn’t do us much good. We knew there was no way we were ever going to be able to dig out all that snow on our own. We also knew we didn’t have many options.

But something great happened. The guy across the street from my dad looked over, saw the problem we were having, and came over with one of those super heavy duty snowplows. It took him about an hour, but he was able to clear the entire driveway of snow except for around my car, which Dad and I took care of. We were very thankful that he did that for us, and that was the day we met Doug.

Doug and his family were very nice to us, and we tried to be nice to them. His daughter Mackenzie became a fan of my dad, and he would always talk to her when he saw her outside. Whenever I would visit Doug would pop over and say a few words to me, but I never really got to know him all that well. However, the day my dad passed away, as he was being driven to the hospital in the ambulance, Doug came over and put his arms around me as I cried for the first time since I was nine years old. The next day he said that he would always look out for my mother and make sure that she would be fine.

A couple years later Doug’s life changed. His mother passed away, he got divorced from his wife, and she and his daughter moved away and we’ve never seen them again. I noticed some changes in him as well even though I didn’t see them all that often. I don’t think one ever forgets what it looks like when someone may be doing certain types of drugs, and even though it’d been years since I’d seen it in someone, I knew it was there.

Then at some point some people moved into his house, and I would see these children sitting out on the front step or playing in the driveway. I didn’t get to meet any of them until the day we buried my grandmother, when I had to go over to their house to pick up some flowers that have been delivered to our house, but nobody had been home and they had been left at his house. On that day I met his new wife and one of her three children, and he seemed very happy.

Last Wednesday I went to visit my mother, and after I parked in the driveway something said to me that I should go over and talk to Doug. I still had a bad feeling about things and I wasn’t sure why. But I decided it wasn’t my place to intrude so I didn’t go. Sometimes you just can’t act on the Spidey senses if you know what I mean.

Friday night I got a call from my mother saying that there were a lot of police cars and a couple of ambulances across the street at Doug’s house. She didn’t have any idea what was going on, and she hadn’t seen anybody including the children, but it reminded her of when they took my grandmother to the emergency room.

My mother is not necessarily the nosy type, so she wasn’t about to go outside to find out what was going on. But the next day we found out. Based on the information we have, Doug’s new wife had been stabbed to death and he was charged with second-degree murder. I don’t know if the children saw anything, but at least the children were safe. When I saw his picture in the newspaper I was sad; how had things gone so wrong in this man’s life?

I wonder about the types of things that make people change so drastically. When I met him he seemed to have a very good life. His house was brand new just like my parents house. His daughter at the time was maybe two years old, and his wife was very attractive. He had a very good job as well; it was one of those jobs where if he hit his yearly quota early he could take the rest of the year off, and he had done that for a few years in a row. He seemed to be the nicest guy, always in control if a little crazy.

But strange as it seems, most of us change in some fashion as time goes on. We have certain life events that we end up taking new clues from and altering our perceptions in some way. I know that I’m more sensitive to things both personal and in the world since my dad passed away. I’ll also cry from time to time if something hits me a certain way, and for someone who went 34 years between crying that’s somewhat irksome.

But I’ve retained my integrity, and in some ways I’m less forgiving than I used to be when people violate my three principal mores of loyalty, honesty, and trustworthiness. I like to think that the changes I’ve allowed to be made in my life have not impeded the way I try to treat people. Unfortunately, even though there’s still a trial to come, I know I can’t say the same thing for Doug.

Sometimes relatively good people do bad things that are just unforgivable. In this instance there are three children who don’t have a mother and will have to find their way on their own in life. How do these things happen?

Personal | 45 Comments

September 11, 2011; Ten Years Later

Posted by Mitch Mitchell on Sep 11, 2011

Today is the 10th anniversary of the most vicious act of terrorism ever on American soil. Four airplanes caused a lot of people to lose their lives; three of those airplanes caused mass destruction as well. And the world hasn’t been the same since.

A couple of days ago a friend of mine asked me why we couldn’t just move on, not necessarily forget but ease on the pain and move on. I said that this is a country that honors those who were killed mercilessly, who were caught up in the madness of someone else. That’s why there’s tribute for Oklahoma City; that’s why there’s tribute for the Lockerbie airplane bombing; that’s why there’s tribute to Pearl Harbor. And that’s why there’s tribute to those killed on 9/11/01. The pain may ease, should ease, but we’ll never forget; just not in our nature.

The video you’re about to watch, if you do, are my thoughts on what happened that day and what’s happened to the world since that day. It’s a much different place than it was 10 years ago. And I also honor and give tribute to some people, and have always been thankful, though it might be selfish, that I didn’t know anyone who lost their life on that day.

You might be surprised by one thing I say in the video after you see the links, if you visit any of these links that I post. First the video, then the links, from this blog and my business blog.