There was an episode of “The Twilight Zone” wherein some very large Martian type creatures come to earth in spaceships and offer tours of their planet to earthlings.

A government agent is skeptical and has his agency work on a translation from the Martian. The agency soon translates the title: “To Serve Man.”

The skeptical agent then agrees to visit Mars himself, and, as he is in a crowd, being herded into the spaceship, his secretary calls out to him from the crowd still on the ground, “Mr. Smith, the book, ‘To Serve Man,’ it’s a cookbook!”

I was reminded of this when I read “Game Over,” a book about the serial pedophile, Jerry Sandusky. His autobiography, was titled, “Touched, The Jerry Sandusky Story.”

Sandusky founded “Second Mile,” an organization for troubled kids. Second Mile became the “farm team” for Jerry’s victims.

These victims were systematically and patiently groomed to be the object of Sandusky’s illicit sexual perversions. Sandusky showered them with gifts, took them to workouts and games, worked out with them, and then, showered with them. You can imagine the rest of the story.

Sometimes I work as a substitute teacher, and I, as all other teachers in California, am required to report suspected incidents of child abuse. If I do not, I myself am criminally liable.

Pennsylvania has a similar law. In 2001, a Penn State employee and former quarterback witnessed Sandusky apparently abusing a child in the showers at a Penn State facility and reported it to head coach, Joe Paterno. Paterno reported the incident to the then chief of the campus police, Gary Schultz, and the athletic director, Tim Curley.

The two men, in turn, reported it, allegedly sanitizing the story, to the president of Penn State, a man named Spanier.  

There was no formal investigation and Sandusky went on molesting young boys until the next time he was caught in flagrante in 2008.

Worse yet, there was a mother who had reported to the campus police, in 1998, that her son had been with Sandusky and came home with wet hair. And, she learned that they had showered together. There was no independent investigation (from an agency not connected to Penn State) and nothing came of the allegation.

Ex-FBI director Louis Freeh was asked by the school to do an investigation. Freeh excoriated the school and the people involved. Schultz and Curley are charged criminally, and, after 66 years of apparent good works, Paterno, was fired and his reputation forever fouled.

Yuck! What brought this up? The Paterno family hired an investigator to do another investigation, allegedly to clear Joe Paterno’s name. And, I heard a radio sports talk show in which alumnae (Penn Staters) were calling in defending Penn State and Paterno.  

Clearly, the men involved, in their attempt to protect “the brand,” gave Sandusky a 10-year “get out of jail free card,” and, by so doing, allowed him to abuse young boys for another generation.

I have this to say to the Paterno Family: In the name of all that is decent, shut up!

Nelson Strasser lives in Lakeport, Calif.