Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : Ask Michael Burke -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Knighty Tin who wrote (121941)	4/12/2010 11:02:50 AM
From: Freedom Fighter	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 132070

KT, >A lot of people are missing the point here. Punishing the priests should happen, if they are proven guilty, but getting them off the job in the meantime is essential. < As usual you are the one missing the KEY point. The point is that in the 1950s etc... the psychiatric community was retarded and the Catholic church was both sexually naive and retarded. So some honest mistakes were mixed in with the sexual abuse cases and the abuse of power. In 1950 if the local psychiatrist told the head of a parish he could treat a priest guilty of inappropriate behavior with a teenage boy and he was treated and reassigned exactly as was suggested by those that supposedly knew what was best, that's a gigantic error of ignorance, not of intent, that lead to repeat cases. If the same thing happened in 2005, it's an entirely different case because we know so much more. Now buried within those decades ago cases ARE ALSO cases of priests, parish heads, bishops, and even a couple of cardinals that knew they were doing something wrong when they covered up a case and reassigned a priest where he remained in contact with kids just to avoid embarrassment and scandal. Those are the scumbags that should have been prosecuted if they did something illegal but at a minimum removed from power for horrid judgment when they did not. The other issue is that the Church chose NOT to abandon and defrock some priests/bishops etc.. that were guilty of either abuse or cover ups and reassignments etc... immediately because the process of defrocking is even more complex and lengthy than a high profile murder case in the US. There are loads of appeals etc... There is also an element of compassion in not abandoning the emotionally ill and misguided. So once again you have to look at the individual case. Was the offending priest/bishop etc... not defrocked because he was old and going to die before the process was over anyway thus saving a lot of time and money? Was the offending priest/bishop etc... not defrocked but instead reassigned to a position where his faulty judgment was not going to be a factor and/or he was not going to come in contract with children? Was the offending priest/bishop etc.. not defrocked, kept in power, and kept in contact with children despite a clear understanding of the dangers etc... Those are the scumbags you have to get. If you don't look at the details of each case and evaluate it on its own merits but instead lump them all together as the worst possible scenario, you are basically a scumbag with an agenda yourself. That's how you know much of the press has an agenda.