Should we protest against the pope's visit?

One eyed Jack wrote: »

eviltwin wrote: »

Are you going? :eek::D

I’ll turn up so long as it’s a jolly occasion


For the benefit of those who don’t get the reference -

In an interview on Ireland's The Late Late Show with Gay Byrne and Sinéad O'Connor in February 1989, Everett was challenged by O'Connor about his support for the Tory Party in the light of his homosexuality and the Conservative's Section 28 addition to the Local Government Act. Everett clarified that he was not a "full Tory", but that he had been appalled by the actions of Arthur Scargill, whom he saw as "inciting violence" and "rabble rousing" [sic] and who he thought looked like "Hitler reborn". He had consequently supported the actions of Margaret Thatcher in opposing Scargill. He said he would stand up for gay rights if he were asked providing "it was a jolly occasion", but he also felt that being in a minority and in the public eye, he could do more for gay rights by showing that he was funny and human rather than by marching in the streets.


To be completely honest with you, I despise the way some people turn child sexual abuse into a sort of political football to humiliate people who don’t share their ideas. To me it just sounds like an insincere attempt to use an issue which they know full bloody well people are repulsed by. I had lads try to claim I was a paedophile and a paedophile supporter when this stuff was coming out back in the 90’s. Because I knew myself I was neither a paedophile nor a paedophile supporter, their opinions made no difference to me, but they weren’t going to convince me either that they actually gave a shìte about children who were sexually abused. For them it was just about point scoring, as it is now for some posters in this thread. I don’t include you in that obviously.

But for some posters here it’s as though it really is only point scoring for them, as though it hasn’t occurred to them that many people who have experienced child sexual abuse at the hands of members of the clergy, and have experienced the cover ups, are also still devoutly religious, and are active within the Church, campaigning against the Church Hierarchy which is responsible for covering up the abuse, because that’s not something that they want in their Church. They hold the people responsible for perpetrating child sexual abuse and covering up child sexual abuse responsible for their actions, and they don’t view other members of the Church responsible for the actions of a small minority who used the structure of the organisation to have access to children to sexually abuse them and try and cover it up. They’re working every day to ensure that it doesn’t happen again and that those opportunities aren’t available to paedophiles and child molesters.

I won’t be attending any event that Colm O’ Gorman is at, because personally, I can’t stand him tbh.