Like many others who have heard about Notre Dame football player, Manti Te’o and his fake dead girlfriend, I’m struggling with whether or not I believe that Manti was tricked or in on the whole charahhhd. This kid is either the saddest little Mormon since Julie from Real World: New Orleans or a sociopath. Though, there is a third option that I’m not sure anyone else has thought of:

In this scenario, he’s still pathetic, but instead of falling in love with a girl on twitter, he makes up a girlfriend so he has an excuse as to why he can’t date rape freshmen with the rest of his teammates on Friday nights. Eventually, the other boys get suspicious.

“Manti, why doesn’t Lennay ever come visit you? Is she coming to the big game today?”

“Uh… she can’t…”

“Again?! I’m starting to think that you don’t really have a girlfriend.”

“No, I have a girlfriend! She just can’t come because she’s… dead.”

“She’s dead? Why didn’t you tell us?”

“Well… she only died like… 12 hours ago…”

“Wait, didn’t your grandmother die yesterday, too?”

“It’s been a real humdinger of a week.”

“I’m so sorry, man. How did Lennay die?” Manti looks around nervously and catches a glimpse of fellow teammate, Luke, at his locker.

“Luke….kemia.”

END SCENE

If this was the case, I almost feel some sympathy for the guy. He probably never thought it would go this far, and people probably lie about having significant others all the time. Do you remember Boyfriend in a Box?

They used to sell them at Claire’s back when that store was a 90′s Spice Girl fantasia full of hair mascara and magnetic earrings. They were these little kits filled with wallet sized pictures of a cute boy, a couple notes from him, and a little backstory. Apparently, they sold pretty well, but some pictures and a note isn’t enough to keep a lie like that going. And your “girlfriend” having a Twitter account doesn’t prove she’s real either.

Regardless of whether this guy was in on the hoax or not, the real idiots here are the journalists.

Did this story not sound at all strange to any of them? A young 22 year-old is dying, and she tells the love of her life not to attend her funeral? Right there, someone should have realized that something was off. I don’t know any young woman that would tell her boyfriend to play football instead of attending her funeral. That’s something your dying, selfless mother tells you to do. Any self-respecting woman wants her boyfriend at that funeral, front and center, eulogizing to all your family, friends, and acquaintances that he may never love again. That is the fantasy. It does not take Veronica Mars to figure that one out.

And yet, as careless as those journalists were, there is no one as stupid as the Notre Dame football coaches. Stupid, might not be right. What’s the word for awful, a-moral, good ole’ boys who put football before the safety of young women? It’s the antonym of “Coach Taylor”. Idk, lemme know if you think of it. I’ll just call them jerks for now.

Those jerks are standing behind Manti (fine), but what chaps my ass is that they are calling him a “victim”.

A victim of whom? His parents for never letting him watch Cruel Intentions? Obviously, they didn’t teach him that not everyone is a Mormon, Sleepy Time tea drinker who wouldn’t think to lie and manipulate another one of God’s creatures just for fun. Or perhaps he’s the victim of a negligent teenage babysitter that let him roll off the couch as an infant because only a severe childhood head trauma could explain this level of naïveté. This kid is just stupid or maybe a liar.

If you want to talk about a real victim, Lizzy Seeberg was an actual living girl who is now dead. 

When she was allegedly sexually assaulted by a Notre Dame football player, nobody called her a victim or even investigated her claim until 15 days after she made the report or 5 days after she killed herself. Another young woman was attacked by a Notre Dame football player but never reported it because some players harassed her until she was too afraid to come forward. When you think about what his teammates have probably done, Manti doesn’t seem so bad, after all. So he probably pretended to have a girlfriend.  Who hasn’t lied at a family party that you’re “seeing someone special” when in reality you went on one blind date 6 weeks ago and haven’t heard from them since?