Home > Dr Howard Fradkin Interview with Gayle King

Dr Howard Fradkin interviewed by Gayle King

G: And we are talking to a man next, Danny and I were just talking about Penn State, who was part of one of the most powerful Oprah shows ever, we are coming back with Howard Fradkin, and we are talking about the Penn State story, we'll be right back...

G: As we all know, last week the sexual abuse bombshell rocked The Penn State campus, and it is still being rocked. We wanted to focus today on what really matters most, and to me and most people I know is the victims. Joining me via webcam is Psychotherapist Howard Fradkin, and Howard, the reason we wanted to talk to you is because this is something you specialize in, and you've talked candidly about your own experience, and we wanted to shift the focus, what about the victims. It is so much more than a football program. Hello Howard and welcome

H: Thank you Gayle for this opportunity.

G: What are your survivor clients saying to you about Penn State?

H: They are really traumatized. Many of them have had to reexperience their own victimization; they've been traumatized by watching the media and seeing so little attention being paid to the victims themselves; and that has been very upsetting, because they want the story to be told about how horrible this has been for the victims themselves.

G: They suspect there will be more than 8 victims; don't you suspect this too, Howard?

H: I absolutely expect that there will be more victims, and I just want to say to those 8 guys, I know that they are probably struggling, many of them if not all of them with a lot of mixed up feelings, because they've been very courageous to speak their truth, and the consequences for doing so have been humongous; but one of the great consequences of it is that they are helping to change the culture of our country in helping people realize if you see a kid being abused; do something; don't just stand there and witness it; contact the police and protect a child. They deserve it.

G: We've had a couple of interesting anologies this morning: Mayor Corey Booker talked about if you saw a child being stabbed, you would intervene. If you saw a child drowning, you would jump in and save him. So to walk into a locker room and see this little boy being abused and to walk out and say nothing at the time, and they said they made eye contact; and I can only imagine what this little boy might have been thinking at this particular moment, oh there is help coming; and then the guy turns around and walks away; and we live in a society where if you see something, say something, and that hasn't happened this time, did not happen this time.

H: That's right, with sexual abuse people tend to get a lot more uncomfortable because Jerry Sandusky was such a powerful guy

G: And a well-liked guy

H: And a well-liked and respected guy, and these men coming forward, I am so proud of them, MaleSurvivor is so proud of them, every man I have talked to who is a survivor is proud of these men for having the courage to stand up and speak their truth.

G: Can you talk about the guilt? One of the attorneys this morning who is representing one of the victims said that his client is so conflicted that he feels guilt, he has feelings for Penn State; when you think about these little boys, who were brought onto the campus, they get to hang out with the players, go into the locker rooms, for them it was a lot of fun. And they are feeling that because they are speaking up, it has caused this big scandal at Penn State; the football program is no longer thought of the way that it was; that for many of these victims they feel enormous guilt for speaking up.

H: Sure, the way that I think about recovery is that when you are abused, you learn to be loyal to dysfunction, and

G: Wait, I love that phrase, say that again, loyal to dysfunction

H: So what they learned is to be loyal to Jerry Sandusky, who is this very dysfunctional man, who gave them all these great gifts as you say so it made it very difficult for them ; very conflicted even in the midst of knowing he was doing something wrong to them, but they were getting all these gifts, and these are very vulnerable boys; so what they need to do to recovery is to learn how to be loyal to functionality, and they've been very functional by speaking their truth.

G: What do you think, Howard, Penn State needs to do? What would be the most helpful thing ? because I feel, I was watching the Penn State game for the first time ever, and I don't watch college football, because I quite frankly didn't want to see them celebrating at this particular time. I am so keen on everything being focused on the victims. I have a nephew who goes to Penn State, and he said to me, there are so many people who are not to blame, we didn't do anything, and so does everybody get penalized for things they did not do?

H: The fact is that everybody gets traumatized by this trauma; that is one of the things that happens with trauma is that people who observe the trauma, and I am not just talking about the witnesses, but I am talking about everybody at Penn State who is also traumatized. So what does Penn State need to do? They need to take full institutional responsibility for their failure to protect these children; they could have stopped most of these abuses and should have.

G: Yes, you know when you read that Grand Jury report, I don't know if you've read it, Howard, have you?

H: Yes I have

G: It is stomach churning, and some of these allegations go back to 1998; I keep thinking the incident we've all been talking about was in 2002; I keep thinking about how many more people could have avoided the trauma if someone could have spoken up and as Oprah always says, keep speaking until somebody listens to you.

H: Well, if someone had spoken up in 1998, if those janitors who had observed, I am not trying to shame or blame them, but the fact is they had some power there, they had some responsibility , and they felt too afraid so Penn State and every institution needs to institute a culture that says we want you to speak the truth; we want you to be able to when you see something dangerous going on, to speak about it so we can help and intervene.

G: Yes, not only Penn State, but let this be a teachable moment for us all that you need to speak up that is this agregious that is happening.
Howard, I really wanted to speak to you after the Oprah show when 250 men came and spoke their own personal truth, and I know you know a lot about the subject, so thank you for being here.

H: Thank you, I appreciate it.

G: I appreciate it too.