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Larry Nassar, USA Gymnastics, and Michigan State : Sports Abuse Scandals
enlightenedbum
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Today is day three of an originally planned four day sentencing hearing for Larry Nassar. The sentencing hearing is being extended into next week because thus far 105 women have requested to give statements that he molested them while he was supposed to be treating them as a doctor for USA Gymnastics, Michigan State's athletic department, or in his private practice. He was previously convicted on federal charges of child pornography, including making some of him molesting his victims. He has been sentenced to 60 years for those crimes. He pled guilty in the state of Michigan on criminal sexual conduct charges and faces between 40 and 105 years of prison. He is also facing charges in Texas for alleged abuse at the Karolyi ranch, where Olympic gymnasts and Olympic hopefuls go to train. Prominent victims include McKayla Maroney (gold medalist team, silver in vault, meme generator extraordinaire), Gabby Douglas (two time team gold medalist, individual gold in 2012), Aly Raisman (two time USA team captain at the Olympics, double team gold, individual bronze 2012 and silver 2016), and Simone Biles (individual gold in 2016, generally recognized as the best all-time among women).
The uncovering of his crimes dates back to an Indianapolis Star report in 2016. That got the ball rolling. At last count more than 150 women have come forward alleging he abused them.
There's a deeper issue here, which the Star got into with how USAG covers up systematic abuse of their athletes. A number of coaches and doctors were accused of sexual abuse and USAG failed to respond. This is especially troubling with women's gymnastics' emphasis on training from a very young age so many of the victims were too young to stand up for themselves and needed adults to supervise and step in. They did not.
Late breaking news as I wrote this though, USAG is finally cutting ties with the Karolyi Ranch where significant portions of Nassar's abuse of US Olympians/hopefuls took place. So Simone Biles (and in theory Raisman or Douglas, though at their mid 20s they will be ancient by women's gymnastics standards) will not have to return to the scene of the assaults to train for Tokyo 2020.
The other major institution to fail utterly was Michigan State University. As this was the Michigan portion of the trial, a lot of the victim statements we've been hearing over the last three days are from MSU students, especially MSU athletes. They were nearly universal in placing their blame on MSU, even those who graduated or played for the school. The most powerful was perhaps (there have been lots of powerful statements) former MSU gymnastics captain Lindsey Lemke (and still a student, injury ended her career). Today the State News, MSU's student newspaper, called for the University President to resign. Said President, Lou Anna Simon, has been atrocious during this scandal. Her worst moment, I think, was this one:
So they didn't try. The Detroit News had a report this morning that indicates 14 different MSU employees were informed of Nassar's behavior over the course of 20 years, and nothing was ever done. The behavior of the former gymnastics coach, Kathie Klages, feels to me like it rises to criminal. Consistently covered up for her good friend Kathy, told her athletes they were wrong about what he was doing to them, and asked her team (including a number of victims, like Lemke) to sign a card in support of him when the story finally came out.
Four prominent Michigan lawmakers, including the Speaker of the House, and both the State Rep and Senate Senator representing East Lansing have also called on Simon to resign. Thus far the elected Board of Trustees has issued her votes of confidence. They gave her a $150,000 raise three weeks ago, though she was at least smart enough PR wise to turn it down and make it a scholarship. They even issued a vote of confidence for her today. They did set aside $10 million for a fund to pay victims, but given the number of victims (150+) and the lawsuits that will not be sufficient. Inevitably taxpayers will foot the bill. Two members have their eight year terms expire this year and are up for re-election in November. They are Brian Breslin (son of Jack Breslin, for whom the basketball arena on campus is named) and Mitch Lyons (EDIT: I forgot, he's the Trustee who OUTED A WHISTLEBLOWER IN A DIFFERENT SEXUAL ASSAULT CASE). So if you're in Michigan vote against those jackasses.
MSU needs to clean house, and the only ones demonstrating leadership on campus are the victims and the student newspaper. That's embarrassing.
This is probably the worst sports scandal in American history and certainly in recent American history. It dwarfs the Sandusky scandal, which a number of people thought should have caused Penn State to be shut down in its entirety.
The uncovering of his crimes dates back to an Indianapolis Star report in 2016. That got the ball rolling. At last count more than 150 women have come forward alleging he abused them.
There's a deeper issue here, which the Star got into with how USAG covers up systematic abuse of their athletes. A number of coaches and doctors were accused of sexual abuse and USAG failed to respond. This is especially troubling with women's gymnastics' emphasis on training from a very young age so many of the victims were too young to stand up for themselves and needed adults to supervise and step in. They did not.
Late breaking news as I wrote this though, USAG is finally cutting ties with the Karolyi Ranch where significant portions of Nassar's abuse of US Olympians/hopefuls took place. So Simone Biles (and in theory Raisman or Douglas, though at their mid 20s they will be ancient by women's gymnastics standards) will not have to return to the scene of the assaults to train for Tokyo 2020.
The other major institution to fail utterly was Michigan State University. As this was the Michigan portion of the trial, a lot of the victim statements we've been hearing over the last three days are from MSU students, especially MSU athletes. They were nearly universal in placing their blame on MSU, even those who graduated or played for the school. The most powerful was perhaps (there have been lots of powerful statements) former MSU gymnastics captain Lindsey Lemke (and still a student, injury ended her career). Today the State News, MSU's student newspaper, called for the University President to resign. Said President, Lou Anna Simon, has been atrocious during this scandal. Her worst moment, I think, was this one:
“virtually impossible to stop a determined sexual predator and pedophile."
So they didn't try. The Detroit News had a report this morning that indicates 14 different MSU employees were informed of Nassar's behavior over the course of 20 years, and nothing was ever done. The behavior of the former gymnastics coach, Kathie Klages, feels to me like it rises to criminal. Consistently covered up for her good friend Kathy, told her athletes they were wrong about what he was doing to them, and asked her team (including a number of victims, like Lemke) to sign a card in support of him when the story finally came out.
Four prominent Michigan lawmakers, including the Speaker of the House, and both the State Rep and Senate Senator representing East Lansing have also called on Simon to resign. Thus far the elected Board of Trustees has issued her votes of confidence. They gave her a $150,000 raise three weeks ago, though she was at least smart enough PR wise to turn it down and make it a scholarship. They even issued a vote of confidence for her today. They did set aside $10 million for a fund to pay victims, but given the number of victims (150+) and the lawsuits that will not be sufficient. Inevitably taxpayers will foot the bill. Two members have their eight year terms expire this year and are up for re-election in November. They are Brian Breslin (son of Jack Breslin, for whom the basketball arena on campus is named) and Mitch Lyons (EDIT: I forgot, he's the Trustee who OUTED A WHISTLEBLOWER IN A DIFFERENT SEXUAL ASSAULT CASE). So if you're in Michigan vote against those jackasses.
MSU needs to clean house, and the only ones demonstrating leadership on campus are the victims and the student newspaper. That's embarrassing.
This is probably the worst sports scandal in American history and certainly in recent American history. It dwarfs the Sandusky scandal, which a number of people thought should have caused Penn State to be shut down in its entirety.
The idea that your vote is a moral statement about you or who you vote for is some backwards ass libertarian nonsense. Your vote is about society. Vote to protect the vulnerable.
So It Goes on
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ALL OF THE TRIGGER WARNINGS, obviously
Sheer stupidity and/or laziness? Was it the adjacent prestige because he was the nat team doctor?
Prestige, as well as it was just women making the complaints. There have been a number of scandals in academia as of late where abusive men were protected because of their reputation.
Is it the authority and power these higher level positions afford you that enables this awful predatory type of behaviour or is it people with predatory personalities that seek out these positions? All these stories about men in power abusing their power so easily seem so foreign to how I think and who I am as a person that I wonder how my career will play out.
Basically, will I miss out on better job opportunities because I am not a giant asshole or will I get them and then turn into one?
I have 549 Rock Band Drum and 305 Pro Drum FC's
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The vast majority of people in these positions do not victimize children and the powerless. (Discussions on how authority and social structures enable those who do is something separate). But yes, the ability to victimize without repercussion is certainly something those who want it are aware of.
Conversely, I don’t get why USAG protected him? They were losing talented athletes because of his evil.
For years I (and probably everyone else) always wondered why athletes would retire when they were young enough to try and make another run (Maroney being an example). I always just assumed it was fatigue since they had trained for their entire lives, but this whole case has put a much darker spin on that.
It turns out when you make college athletics super super important and profitable, a lot of people are willing to cover for you raping children as long as the wins and medals keep rolling in. Which should be in no way surprising.
This isn't a profit thing. At MSU only football and basketball are profitable.
-Indiana Solo, runner of blades
It doesn't have to be both. Prestige is more then enough.
No. And most of them don't.
The problem is never really the massive amount of sexual predators, it's the way people on a cultural, community and institutional level cover for them. So that they can keep molesting people for years and years and years.
That'll be up to the federal courts. Under a better administration, also the Department of Education's Title IX enforcement arm, but... Betsy DeVos.
Holy shit, this sack of fuck needs to go to fucking jail forever. Or be just straight up executed. And all the slimy assholes who cannot see past the end of their own nose need to get some new bracelets on the way to mandatory vacation.
Fuck.
I feel about Nasser the way I feel about a serial killer. I feel terrible for the victims, but I'm not even really angry at Nasser, because I can barely even consider him human at all.
But then there's the US gymnastics program, which apparently couldn't even be assed to do an absolute bare minimum job to protect children under their care. This fucker was taking unconscious girls up to his hotel room and getting away with it.
That's a level of criminal negligence that gets me so angry my hands start shaking. They didn't stop Nasser because they didn't even try to protect those kids, it didn't even seem to occur to them to do so. They didn't care about them as anything but tools to get medals.
As far as I'm concerned every adult in that program should never be allowed to work in athletics again, and anyone in a leadership position should be facing jailtime. I can't even conceive of people being that uncaring about children under their care.
I mean, how in the hell would you ever get approval to try that in the first place?
It is not a for real medical anything. Orgasms are an effective amateur DIY method of pain management, but for medical treatment it's not as good as drugs, and definitely not as good as managing the actual injury when trivial things can destroy an athletic career if not identified early.
Edit: what it IS, however, is an excuse for a creep to put his hands on a girl's privates. The fact that it sorta works let's him say, "See? I told the truth and wasn't just being a sick fuck." Because making victims feel like coming forward is a betrayal of somebody who's taking care of them is sexual predator 101.
He's 54, already facing 60 years in federal prison, and going to get at least another 40 in state prison on Monday or Tuesday. So he's never being released.
EDIT: MSU's student government also unanimously asked for her resignation.
Tell them that. Dunno if it helps, but they need to know how you feel anyway.
I seriously doubt Simon keeps her job by the end of of day.
Utterly horrifying.
When I get home from work I'll be composing that letter. Not to mention explaining my view in great detail to any telemarketer calling for donations.
Though she is not as furious as Rachael Denhollander is with MSU after she learned the board still supports Simon and will not be firing her.
Hopefully MSU students and alums take advantage of their nationally televised basketball game later tonight.
This isn't even the first time the issue's been on their desks. They gave her a vote of confidence and offered her a substantial raise (more than three Michigan median household incomes!) with this shit going on. This is the same lot that, the last time the university was wrapped up in a sexual abuse scandal, named and shamed the whistle blower to protect the accused.
I mean... Some awful people can see the writing on the wall and make the right decision out of political convenience. Historically, these have not been those people.
Are they all going to pretend what Nassar was doing was medical?
I'm still trying to find more concrete stuff in articles since this pretty much just happened (and a few people are probably going to have to get cornered and provoked to get the truth to slip out) but I'm thinking the idea is to throw Nassar and probably a bunch of other people in the athletics department under the bus and take the "What did the President know and when did she know it?" road to say she was never sufficiently informed to take proper action.
Basically, the age-old political argument that the head of a major organization should be held to a lower standard than the shift supervisor at your local McDonalds.
The most cynical explanation is that if they fire her for cause, that's powerful ammunition in the civil cases against MSU.
This is even more disgusting given that Simon folded like a cheap suit to Nazi and punch magnet Richard Spencer.
ESPN has a good article documenting the many people who were either indifferent or complicit
John Geddert, head coach of the Tristar girls program:
Kathie Klages, head coach of Michigan State gymnastics and a former colleague with Geddert and Nassar:
Destiny Teachnor-Hauk, athletic training supervisor at Michigan State
Brooke Lemmen, a doctor referred to during a title IX investigation in 2014 against Nassar.
Dr. William Strampel, Dead of Michigan State
Steve Penny, the president and CEO of USA Gymnastics
The only way the board gets rid of Simon is if donations dry up.
-Indiana Solo, runner of blades