I don't think you are being realistic about the number of abuse cases in our area (Boston).
The number of priests _we know about_ so far is about the same percentage wise with the general population, but the number of abused, and the _help_ they received is what sets these cases apart from the norm. If a basketball coach was accused of molesting boys, very few would be told, "Hey, I know you have a problem. But that's not important now. Want to coach the boys swim team? Just troubled boys with no other parental supervision? Want to live in?" This is more along the lines of what went on up here. As for the "summer of the shark", it would be like tying pork chops to swimmers, and throwing them into known breeding grounds. And then denying that anyone went swimming at all. Candygram. There is more than enough fire under all this smoke, IMHO. Jerry Johnson >>> [EMAIL PROTECTED] 12/06/02 01:35PM >>> > -----Original Message----- > From: Mark Smyth [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] > Sent: Friday, December 06, 2002 3:33 AM > To: CF-Community > Subject: RE: Warning: This may offend if religious > > > all the priests i have met have been nothing but gentlemen > > but to state that what child abuse within the clergy is > mostly media invention is absolutely ridiculous > > unless you can prove me wrong with facts........ The point is that we're not seeing a snapshot in time - we're seeing, in a very short period, the abuse of decades. Made worse by the fact that some priests were chronic offenders allowed to move from area to area and repeat their crimes. The point being that the media has exploded this to the point where the general public believe that the church is rife with molestors and every other priest is looking for a grope. That's a media invention as (at least as far as I've seen) there's no evidence that a priest is any more likely to be a child molestor than anybody else. The abuse itself is not a media invention, but many of the ideas that have arisen are mostly media invention (namely that priests are more likely to be molestors). We're also seeing a lot of bogus claims ("recovered memories" and such, see the writings of Elizabeth Loftus for more information) and false accusations due to the ideas invented by the media. The crimes, like so many other crimes, have been sensationalized by the media to point that an honest appraisal of the facts is impossible. As I said this was also true of "The Summer of the Shark" last summer in which shark attacks did not, in fact, increase dramtically. Jim Davis ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Archives: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/index.cfm?forumid=5 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/index.cfm?method=subscribe&forumid=5 Your ad could be here. Monies from ads go to support these lists and provide more resources for the community. http://www.fusionauthority.com/ads.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=89.70.5
