[Sakugenken]

Originally Posted by sudsterkel

Re: Catholic Rape Stuff
I think the problem people have with this is that it also seems hypocritical to condemn so wildly the church and by extension religion in overstating the problem. According to a survey 11,000 allegations (remember, these are allegations, not convictions – innocent until proven guilty) had been made against 4,392 priests in the USA. This number constituted approximately 4% of the priests who had served during the period covered by the survey (1950–2002). But according to the Department of Defense estimates there are also about 19,000 sexual assaults in the military per year. And there’s the public schools too - “An Associated Press investigation found more than 2,500 cases over five years in which educators were punished for actions from bizarre to sadistic. There are 3 million public school teachers nationwide, most devoted to their work. Yet the number of abusive educators _ nearly three for every school day _ speaks to a much larger problem in a system that is stacked against victims. Most of the abuse never gets reported. Those cases reported often end with no action. Cases investigated sometimes can't be proven, and many abusers have several victims. The seven-month investigation found 2,570 educators whose teaching credentials were revoked, denied, surrendered or sanctioned from 2001 through 2005 following allegations of sexual misconduct.” And also “According to a December 2000 report entitled “The Sexual Victimization of College Women” by the National Institute of Justice (NIJ) at the U.S. Department of Justice, a college with 10,000 students could experience as many as 350 rapes per year.” So it seems to me the problem is that any institution of considerable size is going to end up having sexual abuse issues. So the argument is sort of correct that this is a nasty part of human nature and it is not specific to religious institutions. This doesn’t excuse the problem in any way - I just think the problem is one that wouldn’t be lessened much if there were no Catholic Church. Yet the vilification of the Church and religion by popular media seems unwarranted when not balanced by the vilification of other institutions or just humanity in general. The righteous anger seems unequal is all I’m saying. In India a woman is raped every 22 minutes. In South Africa an estimated of 500,000 rape cases take place in the country, every year. By your estimation we should just bomb these countries. Yet I don’t hear you calling for that. You said “you just know by what you read” (paraphrasing) but what if what you read is grossly disproportionate to the problem? What if you read about more church abuse cases because it is a more tantalizing story? It’s not as good a story to just point out how horrible humans are globally than to have a single villain character or a devious cabal to point at. That is more comforting because it gives us a bogeyman to point at instead of our own wicked nature.

Okay, I guess you're right, raping priests are okay (statistically speaking).