I am no Maureen Dowd fan, but her op-ed today has me cheering:
The church gave up its credibility for Lent.
HA. And:
Canon 1404 states that “The First See is judged by no one.” But Jesus, Mary and Joseph, as my dad used to say. Somebody has to tell the First See when it’ blind ‚Äî and mute ‚Äî to deaf children in America and Italy.
And, number four in the Vatican’s playbook on handling the scandals:
Demonize gays, as Karl Rove did in 2004.
In an ad in The Times on Tuesday, Bill Donohue, the Catholic League president, offered this illumination: “The Times continues to editorialize about the “pedophilia crisis,’ when all along it’ been a homosexual crisis. Eighty percent of the victims of priestly sexual abuse are male and most of them are post-pubescent. While homosexuality does not cause predatory behavior, and most gay priests are not molesters, most of the molesters have been gay.”
Donohue is still talking about the problem as an indiscretion rather than a crime. If it mostly involves men and boys, that’ partly because priests for many years had unquestioned access to boys.
Read it all, as they say on the internet.
(h/t Dan Savage)
I have always wondered why FEMALE victims of abuse are barely a part of the conversation. SNAP-Survivor work for those abused by priests, include many females as well.
The gender bias when it comes to sexual abuse of children and teens is considerable and dangerous.
The Catholic Church maintained a network of punitive institutions called “Magdalene Laundries” reserved for women and it’s inmates were young women who were anything between flirtatious to rape victims or involved in pre marital sex. And these jails harbored all kinds of abuses for those trapped in them.
Mind you, the rapists, boyfriends nor any male component in this suffered similar incarceration.
Within the abuse scandal is the assumption that the priest involved with same sex abuse are homosexual. This confuses the issue of sexual predators and THEIR nature. Most sexual abusers are MALE, their targets are essentially those they consider weaker and easier to humiliate, dominate and control. Hence, same sex abuse is perpetrated by MALES who identify as hetero, against males they think likely to be gay or simply more vulnerable.
Rape and sex abuse experts will tell you that it’s not the sexual orientation of the perps that matters, but their targets.
And enough gay men (when they can report the abuse) were raped or assaulted as boys by straight men testing their alpha male dominance.
Even in larger society dominating the gay male is clearly evident in every socio/political aspect of every day life.
And females are traditionally part of that dominance as well.
Within the church hierarchy, nuns are required to be sub serviant to priests, and the power structure favors ALL males.
But where the protection of young people, especially males doesn’t seem to carry as much concern, is the sexualization of teen males by adult women.
Despite the numerous stories of female middle school teachers and their charges, or neighbors or other adult females, no one is nearly as concerned as they should be by this abuse. They don’t seem to think there is emotional damage, or risk involved.
Regardless that young adolescents don’t have the physiological make up any more than than girls their age to handle adult situations.
Emotional manipulation by adults carries the risks of suicide, homicide, pregnancy, disease and depression.
Female abusers deserve the full extent of the law to be thrown against them, but it doesn’t happen.
I’m sick to death with the gender/sexual orientation bias that pushes the criminal and legal aspect of this discussion and hides it behind homophobia and misogyny.
Until that part of is it honest, informed and principled, we’ll make no more progress on preventing or being closer to eliminating this problem.