[Gunnair]

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

Gunnair Gunnair:

I could be wrong, but I believe Bart is Catholic

You are and I am not.

Ahh, apologies then. I thought I recalled you mentioning you were Catholic in a past post.

[Gunnair]

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

Read the bloody article people, and read it carefully. The man is not defending anything, he's being critical.

I really expect better of most of you than to simply believe the spin that is put on a story.

Child porn was normalized in the 1970's. Look at some of the movies of the period like "The Blue Lagoon" which was child porn dressed up as an art house picture. And then there was "Pretty Baby" which was outright child abuse. "Taxi Driver" was also another example of lightly veiled child porn and so was "The Little Girl who Lives down the lane".

Public sensitivity to the topic is not nearly what it once was.

And the man is also being critical of his own church for being too accepting of this heinous atrocity against children.

Again, read it carefully and you'll see he's on your side.

$1:

“We cannot remain silent about the context of these times in which these events have come to light,” he said, citing the growth of child pornography “that seems in some way to be considered more and more normal by society” he said.

Ahhh, yes, he's critisizing society which he believes is normalizing child pornography - the same society which has been flogging the Catholic church relentlessly for the past several years on its tacit approval of child fucking because of its defence of its priests. I can't say I've seen anything that is suggesting child pornography is being normalized nor do I buy into the spin that a few questionable movies from the 70's andf 80's suggested society in general didn't mind the concept of child pornography. Utter bullshit.

You can drink the koolaid, but I choose not to.

[Brenda]

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

Read the bloody article people, and read it carefully. The man is not defending anything, he's being critical.

I really expect better of most of you than to simply believe the spin that is put on a story.

Child porn was normalized in the 1970's. Look at some of the movies of the period like "The Blue Lagoon" which was child porn dressed up as an art house picture. And then there was "Pretty Baby" which was outright child abuse. "Taxi Driver" was also another example of lightly veiled child porn and so was "The Little Girl who Lives down the lane".

Public sensitivity to the topic is not nearly what it once was.

And the man is also being critical of his own church for being too accepting of this heinous atrocity against children.

Again, read it carefully and you'll see he's on your side.

I read it 3 times. I read it from my normal (slightly biased, because "yo, it's the goddamned POPE") point of view, with an open mind, looking at what is actually says, and from the "He is a religious leader, adored and idolized by millions), and everytime, I came to the same conclusion, which is obviously not yours.

[Freakinoldguy]

Gunnair Gunnair:

Freakinoldguy Freakinoldguy:

Gunnair Gunnair:

And? The Catholic church seems to attract those kind of creatures and seems to go out of its way to protect them as well.

Catholics.... hmmmm.

We spend a lot of time looking at the actions of Muslims outside of North America but forget about what Catholics did and are still doing here.

You'd probably be better served labelling all Christians as pedophiles since there have been other religions who have had this dark stain associated with them. Maybe not to the extent of the Catholic church but, who are still quilty of having ministers, priests or church elders involved in this disgusting, disturbing, illegal practice.

I agree, though it seems to be the Catholics that have been the worst culprits as well as the ones doing their damndest to hide it.

That being said, I don't really buy much into what I posted. As I pointed out to Bart in my tit for tat neg rep, he's quick to condemn an entire religion for the actions of a few, why not condemn all Catholics for the actions of their religious leadership and for the lack of groundswell backlash from the grass roots against these actions. Or, as you say, let's just condemn Christianity for warmaking and childfucking.

Fair enough. But just to level the playing field why don't we just condemn everyone for something and be done with it.

[Gunnair]

Freakinoldguy Freakinoldguy:

Fair enough. But just to level the playing field why don't we just condemn everyone for something and be done with it.

I like the cut of your jib, sailor!



Blue Bucks for everyone!

[Lemmy]

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

I think he's criticizing society for normalizing these things. And he's right. The concepts of absolute right and wrong have been eroded and the acceptance and even active promotion of pre-pubescent sexuality has been rife since the 1960's and 1970's.

To reinforce his point we have school districts teaching sex education to six-year old kids, 'alternative lifestyles' are now actively promoted in the schools, and while there's much condemnation against religious polygamists who marry young girls there's a deafening silence on the topic of gay and lesbian pederasty and gay and lesbian pedophilia.

Bear in mind that most of the sexual assault cases the Roman Catholic Church has had to deal with are concerning homosexual pederasts and homosexual pedophiliacs.

Teaching sex education hasn't got a thing to do with making pre-pubescent sexuality "acceptable". We teach kids lots of things way before we expect them to use that knowledge. I suspect that's the ridiculous leap that offended Brenda.

[Gunnair]

Lemmy Lemmy:

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

I think he's criticizing society for normalizing these things. And he's right. The concepts of absolute right and wrong have been eroded and the acceptance and even active promotion of pre-pubescent sexuality has been rife since the 1960's and 1970's.

To reinforce his point we have school districts teaching sex education to six-year old kids, 'alternative lifestyles' are now actively promoted in the schools, and while there's much condemnation against religious polygamists who marry young girls there's a deafening silence on the topic of gay and lesbian pederasty and gay and lesbian pedophilia.

Bear in mind that most of the sexual assault cases the Roman Catholic Church has had to deal with are concerning homosexual pederasts and homosexual pedophiliacs.

Teaching sex education hasn't got a thing to do with making pre-pubescent sexuality "acceptable". We teach kids lots of things way before we expect them to use that knowledge. I suspect that's the ridiculous leap that offended Brenda.

There were a few ridiculous leaps. The promotion of alternative lifestyles in school would be one of those as well.

[Laura Adams]

"Angry abuse victims in America last night said that while some Church officials have blamed the liberalism of the 1960s for the Church's sex abuse scandals and cover-up catastrophes, Pope Benedict had come up with a new theory of blaming the 1970s."

I blame the 80's. It was the mixture of saccharine pop music and trashy clothes that were clearly responsible for the sex scandal. Flock of Seagulls and the Madonna look brought them down.

I was living in the Boston Metro area back when all Hell broke loose in Boston, which was ground zero for the priest sex scandal. I heard a lot of "priest stories" from locals. The whole area was screaming for the head of Cardinal Bernard Law, lawsuits were being filed on a daily basis, the arch-diocese was facing bankrupty, and the Church was hemorraging Catholics. The Papal Legate wrote an op/ed piece that was in the Boston Globe. In it, he blamed the "permissive media".

But what more can you expect? This type of fingerpointing goes back to Genesis. Eve blamed the Serpent for her choosing to eat the forbidden fruit. Adam blamed his wife for his own bad decision-making.

[Gunnair]

Yep. The Church did a bad thing, but it was society that fostered the atmosphere for that bad thing to happen.

Yeah, that's taking responsibility.

Sounds like those slimy defence lawyers that blame bad parenting in particular and society in general for the choices of their murdering junkie clients.

[BartSimpson]

If you look at how this pope speaks to certain issues, he's got a very oblique, intellectual way of addressing topics. While his manner of speaking is readily understood by many academics most people (including myself) have to really stop and pay close attention to what he says to get his meanings.

[Gunnair]

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

If you look at how this pope speaks to certain issues, he's got a very oblique, intellectual way of addressing topics. While his manner of speaking is readily understood by many academics most people (including myself) have to really stop and pay close attention to what he says to get his meanings.

Well, it seems, in the end, that both sides can read into the Pope's remarks to interpret them how they wish.

[Brenda]

Gunnair Gunnair:

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

If you look at how this pope speaks to certain issues, he's got a very oblique, intellectual way of addressing topics. While his manner of speaking is readily understood by many academics most people (including myself) have to really stop and pay close attention to what he says to get his meanings.

Well, it seems, in the end, that both sides can read into the Pope's remarks to interpret them how they wish.

Exactly.

[andyt]

Here's what he said:

$1:

Pope Benedict's claim yesterday that paedophilia wasn't considered an “absolute evil” as recently as the 1970s.
“In the 1970s, paedophilia was theorised as something fully in conformity with man and even with children,” the Pope said.

He's talking about the past. Personally I think he's full of shit. I don't know what some academics theorized back then, but the average person did not think pedophilia was normal. What was different was that it was swept under the rug back then, ignored even if it was obvious in many cases. The church was part of that denial, but so was society in general

[BartSimpson]

Gunnair Gunnair:

Well, it seems, in the end, that both sides can read into the Pope's remarks to interpret them how they wish.

Then one side will be wrong.

I was really hoping that I didn't need to bring up an example of what I'm talking about but it seems some folks can only manage primary colors.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regensburg_lecture

[Brenda]

All I can say... Lost in translation...