Actually, you and John are both right. People need security. They need to know that there is a competent authority overseeing things. (Government, of course, is an inherently incompetent authority.)
Picture a 14-year-old girl whose father just found out from the school that she was caught stripping naked in the locker room with some older guy. On some level, she WANTS her father to raise holy hell about what she was doing, to make her afraid of it, to know that he is confident about his morality, to know he will provide consequences. Instead, he just sits quietly, afraid of "losing her."
When finally he finally skips up and lets a trace of his outrage be sensed by her, she hates the contradiction of his scorn, but lack of exercising authority. He is a cowering wimp, and she hates him for it. "Who are you to judge me? I'm a grown up!" she declares with genuine but misdirected fury.
Benedict, then, is like that grandfather (her father's father), who doesn't QUITE feel HE has the authority to lay down the law, but at least can say to her, "He's your father. And you know what you did was positively wrong!"
If she's not too far gone, she will love him for saying that.
(God is the only competent authority to oversee us, of course... but parents can still teach us right from wrong, and Christ founded the church to do just that.)
(Benedict IS like a grandfather here, I believe.. He wants to assert some order in the church, but is concerned that he cannot contradict the local bishops - who have immediate authority through their positions in the office of the apostles - too much, so he moves slowly.)