Super Bowl Officials Support Pete Townshend Despite Sex Offender Status
Wednesday, January 13th, 2010
As media outlets report that Super Bowl entertainer Pete Townshend of The Who was a once-registered sex offender in the U.K., a couple of items come to light: 1.) Most Americans did not know about Townshend’s sex offender status; 2.) They are furious that the NFL would hire Townshend for the primo family show of the year.
The NFL and halftime sponsor Bridgestone, however, are standing behind their man, and support Townshend’s “research” excuse he used when he was caught accessing and paying for online child pornography. Even so, the NFL and its Super Bowl sponsors have been sent disclosure documentations from our over-seas friends at Child AbuseWatch that leave them in no doubt as to Townshend’s confession of guilt which earned him his sex offender status. That leaves them in the position of knowingly hiring a sex offender.
Of course, if sponsors decided not to support the NFL’s choice of “entertainment,” the NFL would be forced to drop Townshend from the line-up, a decision that should come as relief to parents everywhere.
On a side note, a registered sex offender—past or present—cannot land a job even as a groundskeeper at Land Shark Stadium under usual circumstances…it will be interesting to see just how serious stadium officials are about enforcing their own guidelines to help keep kids safe.
