Joe, Joe, What Did You Know?

I’m not much of a sports fan, but even I know Joe Paterno, the grandfather of college football, whose very name evokes his long-standing image of being the kind of coach you’d like your kids to have.

You know . . . paterno, sounding so much of paternal, or fatherly. But it turns out Paterno is a place name for a town with ancient roots in Sicily and that the name paterno comes from the Greek paeter, meaning fortress.

Given recent events, it is the image of the fortress rather than the protecting father that comes to mind.

The repeat of Mr. Paterno’s name in the title above is the cadence of the biblical lament . . . the signal of pain so deep that the words seeking to express the pain must be repeated. And it is pain that the nation is experiencing. . . the pain of disappointment and shock and disbelief . . . the pain of betrayal . . . the pain of looking in the mirror and not liking what we see.

Reflecting on the depth of pain expressed on the national stage, I am struck by the fortress image.

What causes otherwise good, kind, and even noble human beings to run and hide from ugly truths, particularly about people we like or revere?

Why is it so easy for some of us to believe the worst and for others so virtually impossible to believe anything but?

Why can we not take people as they are, sometimes noble and sometimes incredibly stupid, ignorant, frightened, and just plain wrong?

In June of this year, David McRaney posted an article on his blog You Are Not So Smart, a piece titled The Backfire Effect, the thesis of which is: When your deepest convictions are challenged by contradictory evidence, your beliefs get stronger.

In other words, contrary facts make us believe what we believe more rather than less.

Or stated even more simply, don’t bother me with the facts.

McRaney makes a strong case. I hope he’s wrong, which may simply be evidence of my own backfiring effect.

I hope McRaney is wrong, but his theory is the only explanation I have for the response of some to give Herman Cain more money and support in the face of not only allegations, but also two legal settlements of sexual harassment claims against him and for students marching in support of Joe Paterno in the face of his concealment, passive or active, of allegations of child sexual abuse by a colleague and subordinate.  Whether we like Mr. Paterno or not, under the circumstances, an honoring parade hardly seems appropriate.

Avoiding a rush to judgment is one thing; insisting that these things simply could not be true and attacking those making the allegations is quite another.

The truth the Backfire Effect seems to be getting at is this: it is easier to simply hold to our beliefs rather than to reexamine them. It is more comfortable to continue to believe that we are right rather than accept that our judgment might have been wrong. It feels more honorable to claim honor for those who do not deserve it rather than acknowledge that they and we are broken and sometimes simply cannot be trusted.

In 12-Step programs, the word for the phenomena is denial, the refusal to believe or accept that something is true because the believing and accepting would require some unwanted action on our parts.

In spiritual terms, the same word might apply. Denial protects us from having to do the hard work of being human together, of having to look at ourselves and each other with the divine love that would hold us accountable, knowing that that very accountability is itself an expression of great love.

By hiding in our national tendency to denial, it seems to me that we do ourselves, as well as others, a great disservice. And we get the questions that need asking wrong. The question to ask ourselves about Herman Cain is not, I submit, whether he did or did not sexually harass female colleagues. The question is whether someone who has settled two claims of sexual harassment (because that is the fact) is someone I want to be my president. Sexual harassment is the term we use for behavior that, when it moves from the verbal to the physical, is criminal. We can dress it up any way we like, but that’s what it is. 

In the situation of Joe Paterno, the question is not whether he is a good football coach or even a generally good and likeable man. The answer to both seems to be yes. But that is beside the point. The question is whether an employee of a college can continue to remain in his position after failing to notify legal authorities of allegations of child sexual abuse on the part of another employee of the institution. That answer is equally clear: no.

Isn’t it time we took seriously our duty to Truth to name things as they are? Isn’t it time we come out of the false paeter fortress of our own construction and into the arms of wisdom, knowledge, truth-telling, and courage that we might deal with the destruction we do singly and together?

Isn’t it well past time that we ask ourselves how it is that we have built a society together in which people believe themselves to be good and honorable while concealing the exploitation of children and settling claims that they sexually exploit those who work for them? 

Neither of these episodes represent good and honorable behavior.

Isn’t now the time to simply sit with the enormity of those realities and come to some answers about who we are and who we wish to be?

Isn’t it time?