OT: Serious allegations against Northwestern, Pat Fitzgerald

[VUaskew]

An interesting side note to all this is that the AD is former VU WE Derrick Gragg. Just an interesting coincidence, not an allegation of any kind.

[Johnmn555]

I don't mind the firing of Fitzgerald, even if he may be something of a scapegoat, but if Fitzgerald loses his job (career?) they have got to come down on some specific players. There are criminal hazing laws. The DA should be involved.

[BrentVU]

An interesting side note to all this is that the AD is former VU WE Derrick Gragg. Just an interesting coincidence, not an allegation of any kind.

With allegations now also being lodged against the baseball coach, it's possible that Northwestern may feel it needs to clean house, and Gragg could be a casualty.

[vandy05]

Definitely not a master class in PR from Northwestern. I agree that there could likely be some players in line for discipline. I do think that the coach has to bear the ultimate responsibility. It looks like (from what is publicly available) that he knew what was happening and encouraged it. That's fireable. Did the AD know (I sure hope our VU guy didn't know)? But even if not, he could be in trouble. The university president just started last year, but he could be on thin ice too for botching this. He wasn't their first choice. Their first choice was diagnosed with an aggressive form of cancer (she died earlier this year and was actually a family friend of ours) and couldn't take the role when she was supposed to start last summer. They want to this guy Schill pretty quickly (who was probably the second choice). But he may be on the ropes now.

[alathIN]

The whistleblower has now been quoted by the Daily Northwestern as wanting to “absolutely seek to get Fitz out of the Program”.

Sorry I may be old and insensitive, but innocent until proven guilty means something. Allegations from someone with a motive, from the me first generation… just don’t carry weight to me.

I think it’s a bit over the top to refer to this as a “motive”. Fact is anyone who was subjected to what was described, with the coaches approval, would logically and justifiably want them removed from the position of power that they abused. I’m not saying he did or did not do it, but that them wanting the coach removed is hardly a reason to dismiss their claim outright.

If we are talking about criminal charges, then yes, the coach is innocent until proven guilty. It would have to be shown that he promoted this, or at lest, was aware and did nothing to stop it.

However, the bar for being in a leadership position is higher. The leader is responsible for what happens in is organization. If there is a major organizational failure - especially one that the leader didn't try to fix - the leader isn't fit to lead.

I am sure that some whistle blowers are making things up or exaggerating to promote their own agendas. But I don't think this should be our baseline assumption that they're all making it up. I doubt this is the majority, especially when the whistle blower is describing something humiliating or degrading that was done to them, and they do not stand to gain anything material by going public with something that stigmatizes them. They can't assume they'll remain anonymous forever and they surely know that there will be backlash. It would be very unusual for someone to do this just for fun.
Also, in this case, another player apparently corroborated the story. It would be even more unusual for a second person to come out and say, "Yeah, I'll publicly humiliate myself too. Looks like fun."