Fuck the rest of the PAC. They not only did nothing to go to bat for USC when the NCAA was trying to ruin the the program, they actually considered adding their own sanctions on top of it. USC had to threaten to go independent to get the league to have a 6 game season during the COVID bullshit. Most of the rest of the conference wanted either no season or a shortened season in the Spring. USC is supposed to be the flagship team for the conference, but hasn't been treated with the level of respect that teams like Alabama and tOSU get from their conferences.
Because of how fucked up the conference is as a whole due to Larry Scott's idiocy, there's a solid chance that USC would have been looking to go independent anyway. Especially if the football team does what most seem to think it will under Lincoln Riley.
The only reason they told those fucks this early is because they had to.
As
@CorpRebel said, the days of singing Kumbaya together ended a long time ago.