In a recent post, I talked of national gymnastics team doctor Larry Nassar who has just been given a jail sentence of 175 years. His crime was the sexual abuse of pre-teen and teenage girls. There is no point here in dragging out what has already been said. While 
I am aware they will be dragging him back into court to face another group of young women he allegedly molested, the damage has been done. The young women will yell and weep, curse and cry, but at the end of the day Nassar will return to his cell and he will be out of public sight.
Many of the young women will live with the scars of his abuse for the rest of their lives. However, they also need to understand that Nassar did not act alone.
Ethical Holiday
In a Wall Street Journal article in February 1, 2018 entitled: “Olympics Officials Didn’t Act on Gymnasts’ Abuse Allegations in 2015,” we have yet again the opportunity to view what happens when ethics are put on hold. According to the article:
“The U.S. Olympic Committee didn’t intervene in USA Gymnastics’ handling of sexual-abuse allegations against longtime national-team doctor Larry Nassar in 2015, even after USA Gymnastics’ then-president told two top USOC executives that an internal investigation had uncovered possible criminal behavior by the doctor against Olympic athletes.”
The article goes on to ask why officials at the United States Olympic Committee (USOC), which knew of potential problems at USA Gymnastics didn’t reach out to athletes, law enforcement or Dr. Nassar’s other employers.” Nassar continued his abuse for more than a year after the complaints were known. Naturally, the USOC is declining requests for comment which is surprising no one, and after all, none of their children suffered abuse!
However, the USOC has announced just this past week (the last week of January 2018), that an independent investigation “to determine what complaints were made, when, to whom, and what was done in response,” is about to be launched. This is rather a strange time to launch such an investigation given that the USOC was well aware in the summer of 2015 that something was very wrong. In the summer of 2015, “USA Gymnastics indicated they were in the process of contacting the appropriate law enforcement agencies.”
Frankly, I would be curious to know just how much time it takes to “dial” a telephone number and report a problem? What we do know is that about two years later (summer 2017), “USA Gymnastics’ leaders expressed their ‘deepest regrets’ to athletes…and the organization’s entire board of directors resigned (as) part of an overhaul of the group prompted by the Nassar scandal.”
As the investigation has unfolded is has become patently clear that the “adults” were wringing their hands and dragging their feet while Dr. Nassar’s “treatments” were carried out on young girls. USA Gymnastics mentioned Dr. Nassar by name back in 2015, but the USOC stated that “nobody at the organization knew Dr. Nassar was the alleged abuser until media reports in September 2016.”
The Blame – Larry Nassar
What this medical-ethical scandal has descended into is a back and forth between USA Gymnastics, the USOC and Michigan State University, where Nassar worked for two decades. Some are even suggesting that when the FBI was informed, the FBI did nothing so as to not compromise the allegations.
Board members are resigning, executives are resigning, everyone is talking about their “worst fears being realized,” but at the heart of it all, no one is claiming ethical responsibility for what Nassar was doing to these kids. Someone, somewhere in the USOC hierarchy needed to stand up in a meeting and scream that Nassar should be immediately removed. No one stood up. They played politics like a group of corrupt politicians, each waiting for the other to develop a backbone.
Larry Nassar committed the actual, physical act of abuse, but the USOC in all of its indifference might be seen as having equal culpability. Two years is a very long time in the life of a young person. Two years of carrying the trauma of sexual abuse, of not being believed in regard to that abuse, is an eternity.
-YOUR COMMENTS ARE WELCOME!
