To the editor:

Actions by some men’s basketball and football student-athletes this week at Kansas University are certainly disappointing for them personally, the athletic department and the university community. Culpable individuals should be held accountable. They will be — and, hopefully, the young men will mature and make the necessary changes to prevent similar incidents in the future, not only during their time at KU, but over the course of their lives.

As KU student-athletes, the individuals do represent more than themselves. They do at least an acceptable job in that representation a significant majority of the time. Part of the media’s job may be to hold people in elevated positions accountable to a higher standard. Simply reporting the embarrassing events, however, does that sufficiently. What in the track record of the athletic department and university makes it necessary for the media to then become gossip-motivated holier-than-thou cynics? Why is it necessary for the media to have a showdown press conference with student-athletes that make mistakes? What does it solve, who does it help, and why is the media entitled to such action?

Lew Perkins, Mark Mangino and Bill Self do their jobs, at the very least, competently. They have been major catalysts for the athletic program’s upward progress. Trust them, write the news, and save the “soap opera” conjecture and “high-horse” demands. That may just be a good example for the young men. And, in some small way, may serve as a foundation for moving forward.