Joe Paterno's life has become a blot upon the history of Penn State, my undergrad Alma Mater. It might be easier to remove the statue altogether. But it would be even better to keep the statue and change the message.The message should be emblazoned ON the statue and on the wall nearby, that Paterno's hubris led him to do wrong. His need to win and his attempt to maximize his fame led him down a path that hurt others. The message should state that as a powerful leader, he failed to do the job he should have done.
Poets should be invited to add their words. Sports announcers who are outraged by Paterno's behavior should have their words etched in metal plaques that are clearly shown.
Paterno was a hero to Penn Staters. He still is to some. Keeping the statue but drastically changing the message could be a major part of the healing process for Penn State and its Students and alums, taking an active step that acknowledges Paterno's and the school leadership's wrongs. There should be a ceremony that will get national attention, one in which the new message, that Paterno and the University lost their way, is told.
Paterno's story is sad. He was revered as a hero and leader. It was his failure as a leader that has permanently destroyed his legacy and place in history. Such a fall is rare and a re-labeling of the statue can, at least, establish a message about hubris and failure to lead and fulfill the responsibilities that come with power.
Rob Kall is an award winning journalist, inventor, software architect,
connector and visionary. His work and his writing have been featured in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, CNN, ABC, the HuffingtonPost, Success, Discover and other media.
Check out his platform at RobKall.com
He is the author of The Bottom-up Revolution; Mastering the Emerging World of Connectivity
He's given talks and workshops to Fortune
500 execs and national medical and psychological organizations, and pioneered
first-of-their-kind conferences in Positive Psychology, Brain Science and
Story. He hosts some of the world's smartest, most interesting and powerful
people on his Bottom Up Radio Show,
and founded and publishes one of the top Google- ranked progressive news and
opinion sites, OpEdNews.com
more detailed bio:
Rob Kall has spent his adult life as an awakener and empowerer-- first in the field of biofeedback, inventing products, developing software and a music recording label, MuPsych, within the company he founded in 1978-- Futurehealth, and founding, organizing and running 3 conferences: Winter Brain, on Neurofeedback and consciousness, Optimal Functioning and Positive Psychology (a pioneer in the field of Positive Psychology, first presenting workshops on it in 1985) and Storycon Summit Meeting on the Art Science and Application of Story-- each the first of their kind. Then, when he found the process of raising people's consciousness and empowering them to take more control of their lives one person at a time was too slow, he founded Opednews.com-- which has been the top search result on Google for the terms liberal news and progressive opinion for several years. Rob began his Bottom-up Radio show, broadcast on WNJC 1360 AM to Metro Philly, also available on iTunes, covering the transition of our culture, business and world from predominantly Top-down (hierarchical, centralized, authoritarian, patriarchal, big) to bottom-up (egalitarian, local, interdependent, grassroots, archetypal feminine and small.) Recent long-term projects include a book, Bottom-up-- The Connection Revolution, (more...)
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