stefanb
05-22-2009, 06:43 PM
How the Catholic Church managed to lower their already astoundingly low standard for human decency.
By: Stefan Banda
If something is called cliché, that is because it is already known to all, thus it does not typically need to be said aloud. Yet, in spite of that simple fact, I find myself sitting down to write something that most likely fails to rise above the time-honored cliché otherwise known as: Actions speak louder than words.
Writing it down does not really add anything new to the debate, but it is astonishing how often we apparently need to have someone say it out loud for us. How about we go on a thought experiment together: Say I repeatedly punch you in the groin, and then deny it happened for some amount of time north of sixty years. Then, when I finally admit to doing it, I apologize whilst simultaneously delivering yet another punch to the groin. Sandwiched between multiple groin punches and a sixty odd year long denial of this behavior, it becomes rather easy to observe just how little the apology part of it really means to anyone with a properly functioning fontal lobe. Yet somehow, Cardinal Seán Brady, speaking for the Catholic Church in Ireland, managed to do even better than that this week: He managed to replace groin punching with child sodomy.
Following the publication of a 2600-page report on child abuse by Ireland's Catholic religious orders, Cardinal Brady opened by saying, “I am profoundly sorry and deeply ashamed that children suffered in such awful ways in these institutions.”
Now, before we go any further, is it not a rather simple observation to make, that truth telling quite typically precedes apologizing? At the very least it does when you expect someone to take your apology seriously. That is to ask the question, is a person honestly sorry about something if they are still actively working to cover it up? If they are actively working to cover it up, any reasonable-minded person might just easily conclude that they are not offering a sincere apology at all. I don’t think many people will stand up to disagree with me on that position.
Regarding the abuse issue at hand, the report did not name any of the abusers because The Christian Brothers order had previously successfully sued the investigators to keep the identities of the abusive members out of the report. This omission from Cardinal Brady’s statement was the best he could do to build a facade over just how ridiculously hollow his apology really is. Yes, we are terribly sorry that several of our brothers sodomized you, beat you, and robbed you of your childhood, but as a token of our remorse please allow us to continue protecting the identities of our rapist members, after a mere sixty years of denying they actually did anything wrong to you to begin with. Are you kidding me?
This farcical position simply would not be tolerated from any organization other than a religious institution. Imagine a public-run elementary school acting this way. Teachers rape and beat the children on a schedule frequent enough as to be called 'systemic', and the school subsequently refuses to identify the teachers responsible. Oh, you would have a problem with that? Well, imagine a day-care acting this way. You drop your precious toddler off for a day of beatings and sodomy, only to have the day-care deny everything at first, and to later say “sorry” while still refusing to identify the offending child care worker. Oh, that is not an acceptable response to you either? Well, imagine Wal-Mart acting this way. When you complain about a store manager sexually invading your child, he is simply transferred to manage a different Wal-Mart, in a different city, presumably free to sexually invade other customer’s children. Oh, is that not the justice you had hoped for when you filed the complaint?
Just how much would the game change if we quit offering the assumption of morality to the institution responsible, on the basis of its religious identity? It is beyond me how stating a belief in discredited bronze age stupidity makes child rape more acceptable, but it is also fairly clear that nobody would tolerate this protection of child rapists if the rapists in question were not self-described ‘holy’ men, and all members of the same ‘moral’ institution (cough, cough).
They are not going to name any of their child-rapist brothers, but they say they are really sorry they allowed these members to sodomize children for years on end. They are especially sorry for the sixty years they spent denying the truthful allegations of this misconduct. However, they are apparently not so sorry about the lawsuit they then filed to protect the identity of the specific child rapists responsible. Cardinal Brady continued on to apologize, “openly and unreservedly to all those who have been hurt either directly or indirectly as a result of the deplorable actions of some brothers, or by the inaction or inappropriate action of the congregation as a whole.”
Is it not at least somewhat unsettling to listen to someone apologize ‘unreservedly’ after they have filed a lawsuit specifically to reserve the names of the people responsible for the actions they are apologizing for? Now, perhaps the word ‘unreservedly’ has a definition I’m unaware of, but I can safely lay claim to a healthy understanding of the definitions of the words ‘disgusting’, ‘deplorable’, and ‘absurd’.
To add grievous insult to grievous injury, Brady continued on to say, “I hope the publication of today’s report will help to heal the hurts of victims and to address the wrongs of the past.” He is, of course, referring to the same 2600-page report that fingers absolutely nobody as the perpetrators. Yes, let the healing begin. How about, just to create a sense of equality, we shove the healing up his ass on a daily basis for the next twelve years?
The leader of Christian Brothers in Ireland, Brother Kevin Mullan, said the organization had been right to keep names of even the most well-documented abusers out of Wednesday's report because, “perhaps we had doubts about some of the allegations.” Here is where we get to see how a pedophile apologist thinks: A gruesome elderly pervert sexually violates dozens of different children, but since we perhaps have doubt about some of the allegations, we need to protect his identity from all of the allegations. If these people placed this much doubt on their own religious convictions, they wouldn't have a job. To the fair-mindedness of anyone reading this I must submit the following questions: Is not a single proven allegation enough? How many children does someone have to rape before we can allege they are a child rapist, and as such attribute their name to the allegation? Does a single false allegation mitigate the several factual ones? Who would possibly defend this position except for the most degenerate of sexual predator apologists? He continued on to say, “But on the other hand, I'd have to say that at this stage, we have no interest in protecting people who were perpetrators of abuse.”
I assume he was not joking, but it is difficult to understand who could possibly take him seriously here. He clearly does have an interest in protecting people who were perpetrators of abuse. Specifically, he is the head of the organization that filed the lawsuit to protect the child rapist’s identities. This observation of the completely obvious does not require any specially heightened sense of justice. If they do not have an interest in protecting the perpetrators, they could have quite simply dropped the lawsuit and quit protecting them. It really is that simple. They could even publish the names on their own. To file these lawsuits is to take on a very serious interest in protecting them. Saying the opposite in public simply does not make it so. Mullan concluded by vowing to co-operate fully with any further investigation. Well, that was certainly nice of him. Maybe he should consider co-operating fully with the current investigation, and then we could take more seriously his vow to co-operate with future ones.
Unfortunately, this is not a new issue, or even a surprising revelation. This is certainly not an isolated incident. This is part of a long-standing pattern of behavior that took place in Catholic institutions from the easternmost parts of Europe to the westernmost parts of North America. This is what happens when child abuse becomes institutionalized. This is an organization virtually built on misconduct towards children. As millions of dollars are paid out in legal settlements year after year, to settle allegation after allegation, from victim after victim, one thing becomes increasingly clear to anyone paying attention: Anyone who puts money in the collection plate of a Catholic Church, anywhere on this planet, is directly and unashamedly funding pedophiles and the legal defenses of pedophiles. Anyone giving money to the Catholic Church should be thought of, and openly treated as an apologist for pedophiles. You see, unlike Kevin Mullan, I quite honestly “have no interest in protecting people who were perpetrators of abuse.” If you have read this far, you now know the opinions of someone who states that claim, but actually means it.
Best Regards,
Stefan Banda
http://www.irishexaminer.com/ireland/sncwcwmhey/rss2/
http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/capress/090521/world/ireland_catholic_abuse_3
By: Stefan Banda
If something is called cliché, that is because it is already known to all, thus it does not typically need to be said aloud. Yet, in spite of that simple fact, I find myself sitting down to write something that most likely fails to rise above the time-honored cliché otherwise known as: Actions speak louder than words.
Writing it down does not really add anything new to the debate, but it is astonishing how often we apparently need to have someone say it out loud for us. How about we go on a thought experiment together: Say I repeatedly punch you in the groin, and then deny it happened for some amount of time north of sixty years. Then, when I finally admit to doing it, I apologize whilst simultaneously delivering yet another punch to the groin. Sandwiched between multiple groin punches and a sixty odd year long denial of this behavior, it becomes rather easy to observe just how little the apology part of it really means to anyone with a properly functioning fontal lobe. Yet somehow, Cardinal Seán Brady, speaking for the Catholic Church in Ireland, managed to do even better than that this week: He managed to replace groin punching with child sodomy.
Following the publication of a 2600-page report on child abuse by Ireland's Catholic religious orders, Cardinal Brady opened by saying, “I am profoundly sorry and deeply ashamed that children suffered in such awful ways in these institutions.”
Now, before we go any further, is it not a rather simple observation to make, that truth telling quite typically precedes apologizing? At the very least it does when you expect someone to take your apology seriously. That is to ask the question, is a person honestly sorry about something if they are still actively working to cover it up? If they are actively working to cover it up, any reasonable-minded person might just easily conclude that they are not offering a sincere apology at all. I don’t think many people will stand up to disagree with me on that position.
Regarding the abuse issue at hand, the report did not name any of the abusers because The Christian Brothers order had previously successfully sued the investigators to keep the identities of the abusive members out of the report. This omission from Cardinal Brady’s statement was the best he could do to build a facade over just how ridiculously hollow his apology really is. Yes, we are terribly sorry that several of our brothers sodomized you, beat you, and robbed you of your childhood, but as a token of our remorse please allow us to continue protecting the identities of our rapist members, after a mere sixty years of denying they actually did anything wrong to you to begin with. Are you kidding me?
This farcical position simply would not be tolerated from any organization other than a religious institution. Imagine a public-run elementary school acting this way. Teachers rape and beat the children on a schedule frequent enough as to be called 'systemic', and the school subsequently refuses to identify the teachers responsible. Oh, you would have a problem with that? Well, imagine a day-care acting this way. You drop your precious toddler off for a day of beatings and sodomy, only to have the day-care deny everything at first, and to later say “sorry” while still refusing to identify the offending child care worker. Oh, that is not an acceptable response to you either? Well, imagine Wal-Mart acting this way. When you complain about a store manager sexually invading your child, he is simply transferred to manage a different Wal-Mart, in a different city, presumably free to sexually invade other customer’s children. Oh, is that not the justice you had hoped for when you filed the complaint?
Just how much would the game change if we quit offering the assumption of morality to the institution responsible, on the basis of its religious identity? It is beyond me how stating a belief in discredited bronze age stupidity makes child rape more acceptable, but it is also fairly clear that nobody would tolerate this protection of child rapists if the rapists in question were not self-described ‘holy’ men, and all members of the same ‘moral’ institution (cough, cough).
They are not going to name any of their child-rapist brothers, but they say they are really sorry they allowed these members to sodomize children for years on end. They are especially sorry for the sixty years they spent denying the truthful allegations of this misconduct. However, they are apparently not so sorry about the lawsuit they then filed to protect the identity of the specific child rapists responsible. Cardinal Brady continued on to apologize, “openly and unreservedly to all those who have been hurt either directly or indirectly as a result of the deplorable actions of some brothers, or by the inaction or inappropriate action of the congregation as a whole.”
Is it not at least somewhat unsettling to listen to someone apologize ‘unreservedly’ after they have filed a lawsuit specifically to reserve the names of the people responsible for the actions they are apologizing for? Now, perhaps the word ‘unreservedly’ has a definition I’m unaware of, but I can safely lay claim to a healthy understanding of the definitions of the words ‘disgusting’, ‘deplorable’, and ‘absurd’.
To add grievous insult to grievous injury, Brady continued on to say, “I hope the publication of today’s report will help to heal the hurts of victims and to address the wrongs of the past.” He is, of course, referring to the same 2600-page report that fingers absolutely nobody as the perpetrators. Yes, let the healing begin. How about, just to create a sense of equality, we shove the healing up his ass on a daily basis for the next twelve years?
The leader of Christian Brothers in Ireland, Brother Kevin Mullan, said the organization had been right to keep names of even the most well-documented abusers out of Wednesday's report because, “perhaps we had doubts about some of the allegations.” Here is where we get to see how a pedophile apologist thinks: A gruesome elderly pervert sexually violates dozens of different children, but since we perhaps have doubt about some of the allegations, we need to protect his identity from all of the allegations. If these people placed this much doubt on their own religious convictions, they wouldn't have a job. To the fair-mindedness of anyone reading this I must submit the following questions: Is not a single proven allegation enough? How many children does someone have to rape before we can allege they are a child rapist, and as such attribute their name to the allegation? Does a single false allegation mitigate the several factual ones? Who would possibly defend this position except for the most degenerate of sexual predator apologists? He continued on to say, “But on the other hand, I'd have to say that at this stage, we have no interest in protecting people who were perpetrators of abuse.”
I assume he was not joking, but it is difficult to understand who could possibly take him seriously here. He clearly does have an interest in protecting people who were perpetrators of abuse. Specifically, he is the head of the organization that filed the lawsuit to protect the child rapist’s identities. This observation of the completely obvious does not require any specially heightened sense of justice. If they do not have an interest in protecting the perpetrators, they could have quite simply dropped the lawsuit and quit protecting them. It really is that simple. They could even publish the names on their own. To file these lawsuits is to take on a very serious interest in protecting them. Saying the opposite in public simply does not make it so. Mullan concluded by vowing to co-operate fully with any further investigation. Well, that was certainly nice of him. Maybe he should consider co-operating fully with the current investigation, and then we could take more seriously his vow to co-operate with future ones.
Unfortunately, this is not a new issue, or even a surprising revelation. This is certainly not an isolated incident. This is part of a long-standing pattern of behavior that took place in Catholic institutions from the easternmost parts of Europe to the westernmost parts of North America. This is what happens when child abuse becomes institutionalized. This is an organization virtually built on misconduct towards children. As millions of dollars are paid out in legal settlements year after year, to settle allegation after allegation, from victim after victim, one thing becomes increasingly clear to anyone paying attention: Anyone who puts money in the collection plate of a Catholic Church, anywhere on this planet, is directly and unashamedly funding pedophiles and the legal defenses of pedophiles. Anyone giving money to the Catholic Church should be thought of, and openly treated as an apologist for pedophiles. You see, unlike Kevin Mullan, I quite honestly “have no interest in protecting people who were perpetrators of abuse.” If you have read this far, you now know the opinions of someone who states that claim, but actually means it.
Best Regards,
Stefan Banda
http://www.irishexaminer.com/ireland/sncwcwmhey/rss2/
http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/capress/090521/world/ireland_catholic_abuse_3