Don’t whitewash Paterno, but don’t cancel him, either

The Paterno exhibit controversy is a microcosm of a larger American struggle: how do we honor the past without sanitizing it? Jonathan Zimmerman's piece lands in the uncomfortable middle ground that often gets lost in today's polarized discourse. On one side are those who view Paterno as a victim of a scandal he didn't commit, pointing to his decades of philanthropy and his record as one of college football's greatest coaches. On the other are those who argue that any memorial that fails to confront the abuse of children is itself an act of complicity. Zimmerman's position—don't whitewash, but don't cancel—offers a third path that requires more intellectual honesty than either extreme. What makes this case uniquely difficult is that Paterno's failure was not one of direct action but of inaction. He reported the 2001 eyewitness account of graduate assistant Mike McQueary to his athletic director, but did not follow up with authorities. Whether that constitutes moral culpability or merely a lapse in judgment remains fiercely debated. The exhibit's decision to omit these details suggests the university is still wrestling with how to present its own history to a public that remains deeply divided. But as Zimmerman rightly notes, omitting the scandal doesn't make it disappear—it simply makes the memorial dishonest. The broader theme here is the tension between remembrance and accountability. Institutions across the country are grappling with similar questions about statues, building names, and exhibits dedicated to figures with flawed legacies. The Paterno case is distinct because the harm was so profound and the victims so vulnerable. That gravity demands a response that neither trivializes the suffering of Sandusky's victims nor reduces a complex human life to a single failure. Zimmerman's essay is a reminder that the most honest memorials are those that tell the whole story—the triumphs and the tragedies, the good and the grievous. At Poli Split, we believe the facts should speak for themselves, and here they do: Paterno won 409 games and helped shape countless young lives, but he also failed to do enough to stop a predator. Both truths can coexist. The question for Penn State—and for all of us—is whether we have the courage to hold them together in the same frame. Source: https://thehill.com/opinion/education/6075384-whitewashing-joe-paterno-legacy/