In a post-Sandusky world, a new challenge

By Michael Bennett

The Jerry Sandusky story has come to a close, but our understanding of the roots of child abuse is still in its infancy.

For Jerry Sandusky, justice has been served. The 68-year-old went from State College saint to American monster, and following a speedy yet troublesome trial, Joe Paterno’s former right hand man now spends his days behind bars. Cheers followed the verdict. Millions exhaled. We’re safe from old man Jerry.

 
But amid the relief, have we reached any sort of resolution? Have we stopped to realize that Sandusky has yet to even admit to these horrible crimes? We might want to believe that courthouse verdicts fix the problem, but in many ways, one man’s public punishment only masks the broader problems that we must continue fighting to address. 

 
I’ll admit it: I’m happy to hear the media reports that Sandusky hates his prison food. Like many others, I found it funny that his fellow convicts reportedly taunted him with Pink Floyd lyrics. And yet, what has justice done if this so-called “monster” can’t even recognize his actions? If his fervent denials reveal anything, it’s that he, like many others out there, is a very sick man. So while we might sleep a little better knowing that Sandusky is being punished, we have made little progress in the realm of prevention. 

It’s in that vein that we need to continue to investigate this nightmare for more lessons we might learn from it. We can’t treat Sandusky’s crimes as an isolated incident, as just one case of one man abusing his power as a local legend. The fact is, there are many more people out there committing the same horrible crimes of which Sandusky was convicted. What are we doing to stop those, and how can we better prevent them from happening in the first place? Justice after the fact is a weak substitute for ensuring that this kind of serial abuse isn’t allowed to start. 

 
Emphasizing prevention over persecution will require a shift in our thinking, one that takes into account the situation not just of the potential victims but also the potential criminals. The urge to commit pedophilic acts should never be accepted or tolerated, but it must be better understood. It’s easy just to label people like Sandusky as monsters, as something subhuman. But that does nothing to help us comprehend, and hopefully remedy, the psychological issues or other problems at the root of these crimes. We’ve learned so little about what differs pedophiles from the rest of the general population during an era in which we’ve learned so much about nearly everything else. To fail to change that merely because the subject is uncomfortable would be pitiful.

The first step is admitting that this is not a one-time thing, and the high-profile Sandusky case has given all of us the opportunity to do that. There are surely other men (and women) out there that cover their sickness with sainthood. We need to make the decision now that we will no longer be blinded by the façade of goodness. We need to commit to investigating any suspicious activity regardless of a person’s public standing. 

And we need to make sure that people like Sandusky can ask for help, before they succumb to their temptations. Before they destroy the lives of innocent children and submerge themselves in a hidden web of criminal manipulation. Only when we’ve done that can we say that we’ve made significant strides toward preventing child molestation. The spotlight has dimmed on the Sandusky trial, but the road to prevention has just begun.

Michael Bennett is a contributor to Began in '96.