Pope's child porn 'normal' claim sparks outrage among victims

Delirium

Benny has been speaking in public again, and has subsequently sparked outrage among victims of child abuse.

Victims of clerical sex abuse have reacted furiously to Pope Benedict's claim yesterday that paedophilia wasn't considered an “absolute evil” as recently as the 1970s.

In his traditional Christmas address yesterday to cardinals and officials working in Rome, Pope Benedict XVI also claimed that child pornography was increasingly considered “normal” by society.

“In the 1970s, paedophilia was theorised as something fully in conformity with man and even with children,” the Pope said.

“It was maintained — even within the realm of Catholic theology — that there is no such thing as evil in itself or good in itself. There is only a ‘better than' and a ‘worse than'. Nothing is good or bad in itself.”

The Pope said abuse revelations in 2010 reached “an unimaginable dimension” which brought “humiliation” on the Church.

Asking how abuse exploded within the Church, the Pontiff called on senior clerics “to repair as much as possible the injustices that occurred” and to help victims heal through a better presentation of the Christian message.

“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.

But outraged Dublin victim Andrew Madden last night insisted that child abuse was not considered normal in the company he kept.

Mr Madden accused the Pope of not knowing that child pornography was the viewing of images of children being sexually abused, and should be named as such.

He said: “That is not normal. I don't know what company the Pope has been keeping for the past 50 years.”

Pope Benedict also said sex tourism in the Third World was “threatening an entire generation”.

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.

“Catholics should be embarrassed to hear their Pope talk again and again about abuse while doing little or nothing to stop it and to mischaracterise this heinous crisis,” said Barbara Blaine, the head of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests,

“It is fundamentally disturbing to watch a brilliant man so conveniently misdiagnose a horrific scandal,” she added.

“The Pope insists on talking about a vague ‘broader context' he can't control, while ignoring the clear ‘broader context' he can influence — the long-standing and unhealthy culture of a rigid, secretive, all-male Church hierarchy fixated on self-preservation at all costs. This is the ‘context’ that matters.”

The latest controversy comes as the German magazine Der Spiegel continues to investigate the Pope's role in allowing a known paedophile priest to work with children in the early 1980s.

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I'd love for him to give one example of where child pornography is now acceptable by society.

Galvasean

I wasn't personally around in the 70s, but was paedophilia considered tolerable back then?

latenia

koth wrote: »

I'd love for him to give one example of where child pornography is now acceptable by society.

Posession of child pornography is still 100% legal in Japan and Russia.

optogirl

It never ceases to amaze me how little responsibility the catholic church & Vatican take for this epedemic. Every single bit of evidence has had to be dragged out of them and still they try to underplay it by using Canon Law, societal persepective in the 70's etc as excuses - it's just utter bullsh*t. Anyone who was an adult in the 70's knew that raping a child or anyone for that matter is plainly and simply a crime of the worst kind. Allowing men in a powerful position to continue to do it is also a crime.
I find it very hard to understand why anyone remains a member of this institution. You can believe in god, christ, religion without accepting this particular brand - they have shown themselves to be rotten to the core and it makes me sick to think of the stronghold they had over this country. When you think of the outrage and resignations that arose for priests who had consensual affairs with adult women (Casey, Cleary etc) while child rapists were moved about from parish to parish and escaped de-frocking or criminal investigation. It's time the RC called time on the organisation - they are redundant and have been rightly exposed as the corrupt, morally bankrupt business that it is.

baalthor

Galvasean wrote: »

I wasn't personally around in the 70s, but was paedophilia considered tolerable back then?

From my dim recollection, sex between adults and underage teens was more acceptable.
Also from the sixties onwards some people predicted that paedophilia would be the next taboo to go after homosexuality. In Ireland paedophiles were often seen as 'dirty old men' who would 'make a grab' at you, they were often seen as needing treatment instead of punishment.

DeVore

latenia wrote: »

Posession of child pornography is still 100% legal in Japan and Russia.

You talk some awful nonsense.

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

"Production, distribution and possessing for sale or distribution of child pornography depicting real children is illegal and strictly enforced."

DeV.

The Mad Hatter

latenia wrote: »

Posession of child pornography is still 100% legal in Japan and Russia.

Incorrect.

The Mad Hatter

optogirl wrote: »

It never ceases to amaze me how little responsibility the catholic church & Vatican take for this epedemic.

Well, how could it be their fault? They're perfect.

latenia

DeVore wrote: »

You talk some awful nonsense.


DeV.

If either of you had bothered to scroll down the page:

Japan, along with Russia, are the only two member countries in the G8 that have not outlawed the simple possession of child pornography itself.[15]

DeVore

Fair enough,apologies, though the original question you were answering was about it's acceptibility in society. Its clearly not accepted in Japanese society.

DeV.

gbee

Generally, I've mentioned previously that the Roman Catholic Church was created in the dying embers of the Western Roman Empire to facilitate an elite and shroud their behaviour and practices.

As most know the Roman Empire was increasingly sex centric and because of the actions of one Roman Emperor who killed children afterwards [instead of sending them home with gifts, as was the custom] gave this crime a heinousness that lasts to this day.

The Holy Roman Catholic Church Empire was created to embrace these still powerful people, but who were now criminals.

The Roman Catholic Church is not the church of Christ, never was, it just usurped the following that Christianity had and moreoeless continued to dominate people, practice their crimes in private and collect taxes from people willingly.

They saved a fortune in not having a standing army to enforce their ideology, the Church was what it was set up to be and as we see from recent incidents, they were extremely good at it.

baalthor

With regard to child porn I think it has always caused outrage but up until the internet era many experts claimed it was a moral panic and that there was just a small number of harmless photos of naked children in circulation.
They claimed that the majority of people arrested on child porn charges had been entrapped by the authorities.

Marcus.Aurelius

latenia wrote: »

If either of you had bothered to scroll down the page:

I was just about to say the same before I saw the last post. It is not illegal in Russia or Japan to possess child pornography.

It is however illegal to possess, process or distribute it for the purposes of selling it.

And you would be surprised how widely accepted child pornography and child abuse is in Japan and Russia. Both countries oppose it and condemn it in public, but in private some horrific abuses are conducted, just as they were (and no doubt are) in many other countries around the world.

In a sense Ratzinger is correct, it was more widespread and generally par for the course for many years before a real shake-up of the moral Zeitgeist made it truly public in all its putrid and fetid glory.

And not one iota of this effort can be attributed to his "ring" of friends.

Saruman

I am no Catholic nor pope advocate but it seems to me a lost in translation thing.

I reckon he simply means it is far more prevalent in society now. Also the sexualising of under age teenagers (children) on TV and movies and the music industry is "normal" these days so he might be referring to that.

I doubt he simply meant viewing child pornography is now considered normal by society. I reckon it is a translation misquote.

Handsome Bob

The man speaks sense, as always of course.

PDN

It constantly amazes me (in a happy way, since the decline of Catholicism in Ireland is a bonus for me) that one of the richest organisations in the world can't hire a decent PR adviser.

I was listening to Brian Darcy on Newstalk yesterday, and I thought his take on this was very good. He said the Pope has certain hobby horses that he loves to bang on about, and one of them is the notion of absolute morality versus the relativistic view of morality frequently promoted, among other places, in this forum.

So, while discussing child abuse, he could not resist using the outrage over child abuse to say, "Look, there is such a thing as absolute evil, and if we as a Church had recognised that instead of getting all fluffy with our Vatican II theology then we wouldn't be in this mess now." It is a refrain, by the way, that we often hear from some of the more fundamentalist Catholic posters over on the Christianity forum.

It's a dumb argument on several levels, because, as Darcy pointed out, Vatican II never denied the notion of absolute evil. But those who live in a defensive siege mentality do have a tendency to see everything they disagree with as a vast interconnected conspiracy. And, to use the issue of child abuse to prove a point, given the Catholic Church's record on this issue, is just plain crass.

DeVore

http://www.dangerousminds.net/comments/topless_male_acrobats_perform_sexy_time_for_pope_/

For light comic relief.

DeV.

keppler

Galvasean wrote: »

I wasn't personally around in the 70s, but was paedophilia considered tolerable back then?

definitely was more tolerable (well in terms of jail sentences anyway).... have you ever read up on Roman Polanski?

mikhail

keppler wrote: »

definitely was more tolerable (well in terms of jail sentences anyway).... have you ever read up on Roman Polanski?

You mean the film director who was convicted of statutory rape for plying a 13 year old girl with alcohol (and drugs, I think) and raping her, and fled America before he could be sentenced? Yeah, I've heard of him. How does his story indicate that sentences were lighter in the past?

sink

I don't know about prison sentences but sexualized images of children were certainly not seen as taboo as today.

This is an advert from sometime round the 1950's/60's.

Saruman

Jaysus....

krudler

Saruman wrote: »

I am no Catholic nor pope advocate but it seems to me a lost in translation thing.

I reckon he simply means it is far more prevalent in society now. Also the sexualising of under age teenagers (children) on TV and movies and the music industry is "normal" these days so he might be referring to that.

I doubt he simply meant viewing child pornography is now considered normal by society. I reckon it is a translation misquote.

Thats christianity's excuse for everything :pac:

"loaves and fishes?" "no it was loads of dishes, Jesus held a bbq, the crowd brought their own food"

Ah the pope, what will the batty old fcuker say next.

liamw

latenia wrote: »

Posession of child pornography is still 100% legal in Japan and Russia.

Check out this game on sale in Japan:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RapeLay

gbee

Saruman wrote: »

Jaysus....

Thing is, this did not cause too much of a stir, because, whilst there were always a few pervs, the minds of most adults were also innocent.

keppler

mikhail wrote: »

You mean the film director who was convicted of statutory rape for plying a 13 year old girl with alcohol (and drugs, I think) and raping her, and fled America before he could be sentenced? Yeah, I've heard of him. How does his story indicate that sentences were lighter in the past?

this is a quote from wiki,

On 11 March 1977, Polanski, then 43 years old, was arrested for the sexual assault of 13-year-old Samantha Geimer during a photo shoot for French Vogue magazine. Soon after he was indicted on six counts of criminal behavior, including rape.[46][48] At his arraignment Polanski pled not guilty to all charges.[49]
Geimer's attorney next arranged a plea bargain, which Polanski accepted, where five of the six charges would be dismissed.[50] Polanski then pled guilty to the charge of "Unlawful Sexual Intercourse," with a minor,[51] a charge equivalent to statutory rape in California.[52] Polanski was then ordered to undergo 90-days of psychiatric evaluation at Chino State Prison.[53]
On release from prison, Polanski expected that at final sentencing he would be put on probation. However, the judge had apparently changed his mind in the interim and now "suggested to Polanski's attorneys" that more jail time and possible deportation were in order.[52][54] Upon learning of the judge's plans Polanski fled to France on February 1, 1978, just hours before sentencing by the judge.

Do you think if one was to stand before a judge now for the same crime, the judge would honestly have to think about whether more jail time was possibly in order?
In any case if Polanski had not fled i doubt the man would have got more than six months, if even that

Dades

PDN wrote: »

It constantly amazes me (in a happy way, since the decline of Catholicism in Ireland is a bonus for me) that one of the richest organisations in the world can't hire a decent PR adviser.

^^ This.

People bang on about how intelligent and what a great theologian the Pope is (including that D'Arcy chap) - but honestly - he lives on a different planet.

He's the Prince Philip of the religious world.

krudler

Dades wrote: »

^^ This.

People bang on about how intelligent and what a great theologian the Pope is (including that D'Arcy chap) - but honestly - he lives on a different planet.

He's the Prince Philip of the religious world.

Its like a bad movie, think King Ralph with papal infallibilty. Does the vatican upper management do a unison facepalm every time he goes on tv to mutter his ramblings?

robindch

PDN wrote: »

It constantly amazes me (in a happy way, since the decline of Catholicism in Ireland is a bonus for me) that one of the richest organisations in the world can't hire a decent PR adviser.

Well, as The Mad Hatter pointed out above in a different context, why would Ratzinger feel the need for a PR adviser when he already believes that he can be infallible?

Dades

robindch wrote: »

why would Ratzinger feel the need for a PR adviser when he already believes that he can be infallible?

We'll see how 'infallible' he is after a couple of disgruntled cardinals leave a skateboard at the top of the stairs. :pac:

magicbastarder

that's one of his biggest problems - the RCC have painted themselves into a corner with the infallibility thing.

PDN

magicbastarder wrote: »

that's one of his biggest problems - the RCC have painted themselves into a corner with the infallibility thing.

Unfortunately they haven't. Papal infallibility, in Catholic dogma, means that a papal statement is only infallible if it is defined as being something that the Pope received by divine revelation and is now defining as dogma. The last time this is claimed to have happened was, as I understand it, in 1870.

The Mad Hatter

Dades wrote: »

We'll see how 'infallible' he is after a couple of disgruntled cardinals leave a skateboard at the top of the stairs. :pac:

No, you're thinking of unfallable.

fisgon

Nothing that this guy (Il Papa) says is innocent or by accident. The crack about child porn being more acceptable now is absolutely part of his wider message, which he bangs on about over and over again, namely, that modern society is sick, and needs healing.

This is not unique to Benny, it is common in most religious rhetoric, modern society needs to be healed, and they are the men for the job. It's similar to what you can read in Alive, a view of the world that sees modernity as corrupted because it has abandoned religion, and the only way to fix it is to enslave yourself again to the great wisdom of the RCC. It's the same rationale behind the doctrine of original sin, make up some imaginary stain that you have to wash off, but of course you can only do this through christianity, you are sick, or society is sick, and the pope and his cronies are there to make it all better. Exaggerate the problems of a god-less society to prove that religion is not irrelevant, it's all part of his agenda, insidious propaganda that seeks to undermine any gains of a modern, progressive society that has abandoned religion.

King of Kings

I don't see the reason for the all outrage - the pope is against child porn / abuse which can only be a good thing. Or at least he claims to be.

He states that these are more acceptable in society - the church is constantly banging on about the ills of society drugs, greed etc.... and what evils are acceptable etc...

He has a point despite all out moral outrage against child exploitation there is a roaring trade in the child sex in certain parts of the world.
So to a sizeable (probably more sizeable than we'd like to believe) minority it is ok.
Like ffs how many people in ireland buy ballymuloe (sp?) products despite Tim Allen getting done for possession child porn. I brought this up at a dinner party once and they thought I was for the birds.

I think that's what the pope is talking about - but I guess to a large proportion of society they hate the pope and the church and will lambast him anyway regardless of whether he speaks the truth or not.

DeVore

He has a point despite all out moral outrage against child exploitation there is a roaring trade in the child sex in certain parts of the world.

Yeah....Artane, Letterfrack, Dangean.


Society IS sick and needs healing. Religion is the sickness.

DeV.

Dave!

DeVore wrote: »

http://www.dangerousminds.net/comments/topless_male_acrobats_perform_sexy_time_for_pope_/

For light comic relief.

DeV.

Popey's face from 15 seconds onwards is hilarious

Looks a bit like Mr Burns !

Then lol @ the nuns throwin their knickers around at 1:10

Wolfe Tone

Pedophilia was once acceptable, in ancient times, not the 70s

Dave!

liamw wrote: »

Check out this game on sale in Japan:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RapeLay

Any word on that coming out for the PS3...?

magicbastarder

PDN wrote: »

Unfortunately they haven't. Papal infallibility, in Catholic dogma, means that a papal statement is only infallible if it is defined as being something that the Pope received by divine revelation and is now defining as dogma. The last time this is claimed to have happened was, as I understand it, in 1870.

i read an article recently which stated that the ban on condoms in humanae vitae was made with the infallibility hat on - seems that was wrong.

robindch

fisgon wrote: »

This is not unique to Benny, it is common in most religious rhetoric, modern society needs to be healed, and they are the men for the job.

You'll find that time and again in religions who declare the existence of some undisprovable problem X, then declare that only they can fix X.

To wit,

PDN

magicbastarder wrote: »

i read an article recently which stated that the ban on condoms in humanae vitae was made with the infallibility hat on - seems that was wrong.

Not quite, the ban on contraception is seen as infallible, but not because of papal infallibility.

The Catholic Church also teaches that anything that has been the historical teaching of the church throughout history is infallible. Most Catholic theologians therefore teach that In Humanae Vitae was not in itself an infallible pronouncement, but that it was the restating of a dogma that was already infallible.

(Posted with the obvious proviso that I personally believe in neither the infallibility of the Pope nor of the Roman Catholic Church)

housetypeb

magicbastarder wrote: »

i read an article recently which stated that the ban on condoms in humanae vitae was made with the infallibility hat on - seems that was wrong.

Strange that an old virgin who wears frocks and a pointy hat, who believes in the one true sky fairy along with talking snakes etc and who lives in a palace with other old virgins, should be so fixated on what we put on our penis before sex.
there must be a clue somewhere.

robindch

PDN wrote: »

Papal infallibility, in Catholic dogma, means that a papal statement is only infallible if it is defined as being something that the Pope received by divine revelation and is now defining as dogma.

Not quite true. The pope can make any declaration on "faith or morals" which, by the act of him declaring it "definitive", is, de facto, infallible:

http://www.vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p123a9p4.htm#889

As the rule almost makes clear, there is a faintly more infallible degree of infallibility which applies when the "body of bishops" agrees with the pope upon some infallible matter. In this latter case, the text appears to imply that the truth-claim is equivalent to a "divine revelation", which leaves me wondering what the pope must think about the source of anything that he declares infallible.

PDN wrote: »

The last time this is claimed to have happened was, as I understand it, in 1870.

The current rules for papal infallibility were enacted in 1870.

The last time that an infallible declaration was made was in 1950, when Pope Pius the Twelfth announced that, on pain of heresy, catholic christians had to believe that Mary flew up into the sky just after she died.

Panrich

He's a loathsome fcuker. Totally out of touch.

Galvasean

Panrich wrote: »

He's a loathsome fcuker. Totally out of touch.

I think the whole keeping in touch part is what has him in trouble!

*audience looks bored*

Plowman

This post has been deleted.

Rabble Rabble

What the Pope actually said was - in this typical taken out of context speech - is that there was a general tendency amongst society in the 70s and 80's to see child ( or more accurately teen age) sexuality as normal. This also affected the Catholic Church. He is opposed to the idea.

By and large the left was in favour of reducing the age of consent as low as possible, and there were excuses made for pederasty by some homosexual activists - David Norris and Peter Thatchell were two here - the North American Man/Boy Love Association club in the US was another. All were seen as fashionable.

Some of this still remains in the fashionably liberal world view about teaching sex education as young as possible ( as young as 5) , and cervical cancer vacines for pre-pubescents. The assumption here is that teenagers will have sex but only with each other. Of course the progressive mind of of two minds: teenagers will have sex so cervical cancer and sex education is a good thing, but two 15 year olds going at it is a bad thing, statutory rape in fact and the boy ( not the girl) is turfed into prison.


So why has a progressive move towards lower sex ages stalled ( where it has) - precisely because some of these man-boy relationships were Catholic. Not all, but nobody is counting the Anglicans, or summing the secularists, of wondering about the strange gait of the entire Eton educated upper classes.

Victor

I think a distinction needs to be made between different understandings of "normal".

Frequent / common / popular things are often called "normal".

However a distinction needs to be made, just because something is frequent / common / popular doesn't mean it is acceptable.

cc-offe

“It was maintained — even within the realm of Catholic theology — that there is no such thing as evil in itself or good in itself. There is only a ‘better than' and a ‘worse than'. Nothing is good or bad in itself.”

What a joke, those disgraceful catholic priests and nuns didn't think twice about telling children that they were evil and would be going to hell.

The church needs to stop this now, stop making excuses and playing it down, it is sickening.

scopper

Rabble Rabble wrote: »

So why has a progressive move towards lower sex ages stalled (where it has) - precisely because some of these man-boy relationships were Catholic.

I imagine this push stalled because noone had an idea just how depraved members of the Church could be. It was a warning signal that the law might prove problematic due to more unstable elements in society. It just so happens, the numbers are there to see, that priests are amongst the most unstable people in society (or were). This is not surprising since it is a job that requires one to opt-out of the social and miss numerous life-lessons.

Rabble Rabble

scopper wrote: »

I imagine this push stalled because noone had an idea just how depraved members of the Church could be. It was a warning signal that the law might prove problematic due to more unstable elements in society. It just so happens, the numbers are there to see, that priests are amongst the most unstable people in society (or were). This is not surprising since it is a job that requires one to opt-out of the social and miss numerous life-lessons.

That makes no sense. If you think that man-boy love is ok, then you are not going to be appalled by a priest and a teenager having sex because you think it is ok in the first place. You are using terms - like depraved - which the supporters of age reductions didnt believe.

Well unless it was a convenient excuse for anti-Catholic bashing.

( I should say here a lot of Catholic abuse was clearly rape anyway, i.e. forced). just poining out the context of the Pope's speech. Also interesting on how facts disappear down memory holes.

Here's thatchell on the age of consent.