Manti Te'o

[Gismo]

That Texas AGs website is AWESOME!!!

Ya, TexAgs is a cool board, it doesn't have as many of the great features that thebullspen has, but it is very active, with many sub boards, and it's pretty relaxed and with lot of humorous threads and great photo blasts and gifs and photoshops. During the SEC move it was the place for rumors and info, flight tracking of university planes and all that stuff.

[EduBull]

A couple of issues with that:

 

1.  At some point Manti MUST have made the conscious decision to, at a very minimum, continue to lie and mislead people about something he knew to be untrue (even if he himself was duped originally, which I doubt).

 

2.  The way this story was played by both Manti and Notre Dame as part of a Heisman campaign seems obvious, and Notre Dame needs to be called out on it as one of a limited number of possibilities are certainly true:  

 

           a.  Notre Dame knowingly mislead the media and public by failing to disclose the facts when they discovered those facts;

           b.  Notre Dame was so desperate to regain their mythical status that they willfully ignored obvious warning signs and fanned the flames of a hoax;

           c.  All of the above.

 

Also, if Manti was really so utterly naive and gullible as to have been catfished, then clearly he lacks the maturity to manage his own affairs and Notre Dame should have assigned him some sort of guardian or otherwise provided for in loco parentis, as they were obligated to do.  I mean come on... how can he manage his finances or make other personal decisions if he's just a walking mark begging to be conned?  

 

Here's a editorial from Steve Roseblum making a similar argument:
http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/college/chi-manti-teo-girlfriend-hoax-notre-dame-20130118,0,5636007.column

 

If Manti was truly an innocent victim, then I have to seriously wonder if he has some sort of developmental disability, cognitive and/or emotional impairment and if so why no one was watching out for him.  This isn't something an even marginally well-adjusted person of normal intelligence falls for.  

Edited January 18, 2013 by EduBull

[Gismo]

For laughs... for some reason I can't get video embedded.. 

 

Edited January 18, 2013 by Gismo

[NCBull]

A couple of issues with that:

 

1.  At some point Manti MUST have made the conscious decision to, at a very minimum, continue to lie and mislead people about something he knew to be untrue (even if he himself was duped originally, which I doubt).

 

2.  The way this story was played by both Manti and Notre Dame as part of a Heisman campaign seems obvious, and Notre Dame needs to be called out on it as one of a limited number of possibilities are certainly true:  

 

           a.  Notre Dame knowingly mislead the media and public by failing to disclose the facts when they discovered those facts;

           b.  Notre Dame was so desperate to regain their mythical status that they willfully ignored obvious warning signs and fanned the flames of a hoax;

           c.  All of the above.

 

Also, if Manti was really so utterly naive and gullible as to have been catfished, then clearly he lacks the maturity to manage his own affairs and Notre Dame should have assigned him some sort of guardian or otherwise provided for in loco parentis, as they were obligated to do.  I mean come on... how can he manage his finances or make other personal decisions if he's just a walking mark begging to be conned?  

 

Here's a editorial from Steve Roseblum making a similar argument:

http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/college/chi-manti-teo-girlfriend-hoax-notre-dame-20130118,0,5636007.column

 

If Manti was truly an innocent victim, then I have to seriously wonder if he has some sort of developmental disability, cognitive and/or emotional impairment and if so why no one was watching out for him.  This isn't something an even marginally well-adjusted person of normal intelligence falls for.  

 

This....if anyone wants to give Manti the benefit of the doubt, give him the benefit of thinking he's not enough of an absolute idiot to fall for something this obviously fake.

 

As for me, I think his family is covering up for him.

[Who'sYourData?]

More people coming out now saying they know the people behind the Lennay character.  The main guy had two cousins helping him out.  Says it was done to another guy before him, and whenever there was a meet set up the Ronaiah Tuiasosopoo character would show up instead.  Says he showed up with a kid, and later told the guy that the kid had Lupus.  Not sure if it is on this thread, but this Ronaiah Tuiasosopo tried out for The Voice and had a convoluted story about his singing group at church having been in a big accident one person nearly died of a head injury.

 

I think it is nearly impossible to believe now that he wasn't duped.  Still think he exaggerated his side of the story.

[Who'sYourData?]

http://espn.go.com/college-football/story/_/id/8857057/friend-says-ronaiah-tuiasosopo-confessed-manti-teo-girlfriend-hoax?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

[NCBull]

More people coming out now saying they know the people behind the Lennay character.  The main guy had two cousins helping him out.  Says it was done to another guy before him, and whenever there was a meet set up the Ronaiah Tuiasosopoo character would show up instead.  Says he showed up with a kid, and later told the guy that the kid had Lupus.  Not sure if it is on this thread, but this Ronaiah Tuiasosopo tried out for The Voice and had a convoluted story about his singing group at church having been in a big accident one person nearly died of a head injury.

 

I think it is nearly impossible to believe now that he wasn't duped.  Still think he exaggerated his side of the story.

 

Impossible?!  Can you explain how he fell asleep every night talking to this non-existent girl?  So some girl in on the scam talked to him every night for three years?  Or what about the story about how they actually met?  How can anyone be that naive??

[Gismo]

More people coming out now saying they know the people behind the Lennay character.  The main guy had two cousins helping him out.  Says it was done to another guy before him, and whenever there was a meet set up the Ronaiah Tuiasosopoo character would show up instead.  Says he showed up with a kid, and later told the guy that the kid had Lupus.  Not sure if it is on this thread, but this Ronaiah Tuiasosopo tried out for The Voice and had a convoluted story about his singing group at church having been in a big accident one person nearly died of a head injury.

 

I think it is nearly impossible to believe now that he wasn't duped.  Still think he exaggerated his side of the story.

 

Impossible?!  Can you explain how he fell asleep every night talking to this non-existent girl?  So some girl in on the scam talked to him every night for three years?  Or what about the story about how they actually met?  How can anyone be that naive??

What he means is that Manti was duped... but Manti also made up all of the details about the extent of their relationship, but he still thought Lennay was a real person the entire time. 

[Gismo]

So Manti is guilty of making up all of these details to play it up to the media... but the whole time he thought his story was based in some reality that Lennay existed. 

[NCBull]

The reality where he supposedly met her??