Throughout the conversation during our last class, I couldn’t help but think of my friend from high school, who also goes to Penn State. He rushed a fraternity during the first semester of his freshman year, and about a month into his second semester, that fraternity became the subject of national media attention. My friend had rushed Beta. He wasn’t at the party that night, and was not associated with the terrible decisions that led to the death of Timothy Piazza.
He did, however, know every single one of the individuals that were charged with felonies on a personal basis. The young men that most people saw on television, receiving the criticism and scorn of an entire nation, were people that he spent much of his time with. Hearing him describe his personal perceptions of the young men standing trial, and then taking a look at news coverage detailing the same young men, it got me thinking. It didn’t change my own personal opinion of those young men; far from it, I am of the opinion that the dropping of charges for even those most directly involved in Timothy Piazza’s death is a bit ridiculous.
No, what struck me was that the common denominator was that every one of them “is a great guy.” Don’t believe what that article said about _____, he’s a great guy. I don’t doubt that my friend believes what he says, because it’s easy to imagine being in his shoes. And is he necessarily wrong? Does one terrible decision, even one as terrible as covering up a severely injured pledge at a party, leading to his death, define a person?
My first instinct is to say, “no,” as I am a strong believer in the ability for people to change and recover from life-altering mistakes. At the end of the day, the brothers of Beta facing the most serious charges, the ones who were most responsible for the death of Timothy Piazza, were young men who made terrible mistakes. If they are found guilty of the crimes they are accused of, they should be punished. But dismissing these young men as “disgusting,” or “vile,” is problematic to having any sort of actual discussion about the culture that led to this incident. Humanizing the offender in a crime is always a sensitive conversation, but the general consensus of our discussion in class seemed to be that there is a fundamental problem with Greek life, both at Penn State and across the country. In order to have this conversation, we have to remember that the brothers of Beta are not caricatures of abusive, evil people; they are young men, with biases and characteristics, positive and negative, like anyone else. I cannot reiterate enough that this is not to take any responsibility away from those that cost a young man his life, but rather to ensure that we aren’t taking away any responsibility from the culture that shaped these brothers and that led to them making the terrible decisions we all hate talking about.
Jake, I appreciate the way you approached this blog and how you made it clear that your intention was NOT to dismiss the accountability of those responsible for Tim’s death, but rather to attempt to humanize them and step into their shoes for a moment. A lot of people are hesitant to try to humanize the ‘villain’s’ of the situation and to try to see things from their perspective. The fact of the matter is that one of our own here at Penn State died and consequently it’s an extremely serious situation. However, I believe it’s always important to see things from both sides regardless of the situation. When I personally put myself in their shoes, I believe that I would have done everything in my ability to get help for Tim, but I honestly don’t know whether or not too many people at Penn State genuinely would have if they were there that night. It’s easy to assume that someone else has the situation under control or that it’s not your responsibility. I know this is a very unpopular and touchy subject to talk about, but I think that a tie can be made with the Sandusky scandal. Many people knew about what was happening and while they may have told someone about it, they didn’t do EVERYTHING in their ability to stop the horrendous actions that were occurring. We as a student body need to hold the safety of others higher than we currently do.