For Shame and "My Government Means to Kill Me"

Everybody loved Fitz.

Pat Fitzgerald was the coach of the Northwestern football. He was recently fired after a six month long investigation proved sexual abuse in the program. Fitz was a player for the Wildcats who when to the Rose Bowl in 1997/8.

As an alum, this hurts. It really, really hurts.

First, it is devastating that this happened under Fitz's watch. NU scored when we landed him as a coach. Since he was a player at NU and he grew up in Tinley Park, IL, he was a devoted Chicagoland guy. It was unlikely he was going to be recruited away to a football powerhouse like Notre Dame (see Ara Parseghian.)

Kudos to The Daily Northwestern for breaking the story. When I looked this story up in the New York Times, they referred to the articles published int The Daily.

This isn't like the Penn State scandal where that creepo coach was grooming children. This is where the NU players would haze and sexually humiliate the new players.

This is so wrong, and not because I am a prude. I am currently reading My Government Means to Kill Me by Rasheed Newson about a young, gay, black man in New York City in the 1985, the heat of the AIDS pandemic. It is a brilliant and engaging piece of historical fiction. There is also a lot of gay sex, and some pretty wild stuff.

So what is the difference between a gay bathhouse and a college football team? Heck, even a fraternity?

Consent.

The guys who went to the bathhouses went on their own free will. Fraternities used to haze--and probably still do--but again kids can choose or not choose to participate in Greek life.

When these kids joined the football team, they did not know they were signing up to be sexually abused by their teammates. These abused college athletes were in no way able to consent or excuse themselves from this hideous behavior. These were college freshmen--still kids--who were away from home for the first time. As NU is a Division I school, a lot of these kids were on athletic scholarships. To speak out against this abuse as freshman might have jeopardized their free ride.

These players are having their own #metoo movement, and in some ways against themselves. Some of the players who were perpetuating the abuse were probably also victims of it in earlier years.

This is so heartbreaking. I feel bad for everyone involved.

Yet, the abuse needs to stop and people need to be responsible for their harmful behavior.