Please freepmail me if you want on/off this list
Posted on 03/29/2010 6:37:38 AM PDT by marshmallow
“In the United States alone, there are reportedly some 39 million victims of childhood sexual abuse.”
” Hofstra University professor Charol Shakeshaft reports that 6-10 percent of public school students have been molested in recent years—some 290,000 between 1991 and 2000.”
Er, well actually I don’t buy this for one second.
“Er, well actually I don’t buy this for one second”
Same here. Once you have an entrenched industry devoted to “finding” abuse, it’s amazing how you’ll find it everywhere.
Kinda like autism today.
Thanks for posting this. This is exactly my take on the whole situation. The gates of hell are always upon us.
Well, I do buy these facts. I substituted in numberous schools — almost all of the schools in my district’s residence area) — and you would be surprised at the behaviors I witnessed, the stories told by the teachers, etc. etc.
But that doesn’t make all schools bad, does it?
Likewise, because one priest sinned, does that make the entire Catholic Church bad?
Or because one minister molests children, does that make all Protestant and other ministers bad?
Go figure?????
Oops
numerous
If such abuse is so common, and so intractable, then obviously children need to become inured to it. That is, to resist, but if still abused, then for them, the children, to minimize their emotional and spiritual damage.
This should be looked at from four angles. The first is that an abused child should “get over it” as soon as possible, instead of indulging in feelings of victimization. For them to remain victims, and to think of themselves as “damaged goods” for the rest of their lives compounds the injury. Instead they should be encouraged to “shrug it off”, even though it is up to them to do so. They cannot be made to do so, but they can be encouraged to do so.
The second angle is the noteworthy FBI statistic, that adults who were abused as children are much more likely to be sexually assaulted as adults. This indicates that they, as people, give off body language or other signals that attract aggressors. Such signals are well known to muggers searching for victims, so it is not improbable that sexual assault victims do so as well. Importantly, it does not matter if they have always projected such signals, or if they do so now because of their abuse. But it is important that they stop doing so.
It is also known that martial artists are surprisingly less likely to get into fights, because other people pick up on their body language and moods that tells them to fight someone else. So there is common sense in teaching abuse and assault victims self defense.
The third angle is based on the idea that the abused often grow up to be abusers. This is because the abuse they were subjected to had a strong element of domination, which creates a distorted view of how superior-subordinate relationships work. Just because you are put in charge of a group does not mean you need to dominate them sexually.
This misunderstanding needs to be watched out for and corrected as soon as possible in an abuse victim. Otherwise it is like the bullied child who themselves become bullies.
And the fourth angle is to protect the abused child from those who would capitalize on their abuse for profit or political power. Yes, indeed there are scoundrels out there willing to compound the abuse at the expense of the abused.
The most probable pedophiles in order are:
Fathers
Teachers
Coaches
Protestant ministers
Priests are way down on the list.
So if a father is a teacher of mid-high history, coaches the girl’s basketball team and is a youth minister at his church on weekends/Sundays — watch out! He would be much more prone to pedophilia that any priest.
Sexual Abuse of Children by Protestant Ministers
Report: Protestant Church Insurers Handle 260 Sex Abuse Cases a Year
Abuse by Protestant Ministers of Every Denomination
Child Sexual Molestation by Various Protestant Clergy
"Yeshiva" of Brooklyn also Guilty of Child Abuse
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Teachers and Pedophilia - In YOUR Backyard
Washington Post -- D.C. school officials reported 220 abuse allegations against teachers
Sex Abuse by Teachers Said Worse Than Catholic Church
WHEN BOYS ARE MOLESTED BY TEACHERS AND OTHERS IN POSITIONS OF AUTHORITY
**According to other recent studies, 2 percent of sex abuse offenders were Catholic priests—a phenomenon that spiked between the mid-1960s and the mid-1980s but seems to have virtually disappeared (six credible cases of clerical sexual abuse in 2009 were reported in the U.S. bishops’ annual audit, in a Church of some 65,000,000 members).**
Did you miss this fact?
I worked the prev detail for a couple of years and you are wrong.
If you know my posting history, I've never bashed any religion, (Not even Mormons) but let me assure you the Evil One does his foul thing just about equal within both traditions.
Now if you are talking about taking the church building fund and running off with the Organist .... then you are correct.... Protestants lead the way.
What? 6 cases? What does that havoe to do with wild claims about 39 million sexually abused children.
I said I didn’t believe that 39 million children have been sexually abused nor do I believe that 10% of all school children are sexually abused.
This reminds me of the “Satanic Child Murders” that the shrinks were claiming was a widespread national phenomenon. The FBI proved it was entirely bogus. Or the “Repressed Memory Syndrome”. Another psychological industry fraud where hundreds of people were prosecuted and convicted based solely on the word of a child coached by a shrink. Just liars trying to amass money and political power.
None of this passes the smell test.
Why not decry pedophiles wherever they are, instead of trying to prove with statistics that Catholics are no worse than everyone else? Robotic defense of one’s own denomination is a distraction from the real issues.
It didn't say that there were 39 million children who had been sexually abused, it said that there were 39 million "victims of childhood sexual abuse". That would include adults who were molested as children.
That number seems high to me, but not unbelievably high.
Okay. That would mean 13% of the population. No way to know really.
It IS a good article. I am constantly amazed at how we are often *surprised* at the extent of sexual abuse when our culture seems obsessed with sex. It is any wonder?
Setting the record straight in the case of abusive Milwaukee priest Father Lawrence Murphy
Long Applause for New York Prelate Who Defends Pope
NYT UNFAIRLY CITES POPE'S ROLE [Catholic Caucus]
Scoundrel Time(s)
The Pope and the Murphy case: what the New York Times story didn't tell you
It is in this context that the defense of Benedict and even of the Catholic Church, not as a clerical bureaucracy or a sociological category but precisely as a church is not "robotic" and is not a kind of partisan team-spirit. It is very much part of the work of defending the innocent --- and bringing the guiilty to judgment.
Maybe the biggest catastrophe is this: the fact that those in the Catholic Church who have fought and are fighting with determination, intelligence, and moral uprightness against the forces of corruption, are themselves being attacked.
According to this article by George Weigel (Link)-- which maybe I should run as a thread in itself --- Sex abuse by priests is "a phenomenon that spiked between the mid-1960s and the mid-1980s but seems to have virtually disappeared (six credible cases of clerical sexual abuse in 2009 were reported in the U.S. bishops’ annual audit, in a Church of some 65,000,000 members). ...The Catholic Church is, by empirical measure, the safest environment for young people in America today."
But this is not in the news; or I could say, it's the news nobody knows: the thorough self-examination, investigation, and internal cleansing which has transformed and is transforming the Church in the USA, in the past 20 and especially the past 12 years, since the introduction of the VIRTUS child-protection program (Link) in Catholic parishes and schools.
It's a story that needs to be told. And Pope Benedict has been the captain leading the way.
But instead, we have the corrupt, like the New York Times and the pro-sodomy "moral ethicist" Daniel Maguire (Link) targeting the upright (Benedict) for destruction.
Maguire and the New York Times have their own reasons for attacking the very people who uphold the moral law. And that very attack is one of the most outstanding features of this very disturbing drama.
We all know the agenda of the anti-Christian Left. Still, that should not prompt anyone to robotically defend the Catholic Church vis-a-vis all other groups. That is what detracts and distracts from the main problem. I guess I am thoroughly sick of the denomination wars, and everyone's eagerness to jump back into them at the mention of anything to do with Catholicism when a larger issue is before us.
Pope Benedict is the one person at the Vatican who has done the most to fight the moral rot in the Church. The one thing the New York Times attacked then-Cardinal Ratzinger for during the years when he was head of the CDF, was his opposition to churchly corruption and his defense of the moral law.
And those who defend the moral law, defend children.
The attack on him now, at this time, is a strategic move to protect the corrupt.
And once again, the Lie is running around the world, while the Truth is still tying its shoes.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.