Yesterday the New York Times carried an article -- along with some inevitable words of opprobrium by a representative of SNAP -- about a Catholic priest who sexually assaulted a woman.
Question 1. Does this case have a connection with the issue of celibacy? Question 1A. Are celibate male clergy members more likely to stalk and sexually assault women than non-celibate male clergy are? Is that hypothesis counterintuitive? Are there statistics to back up that hypothesis?
Question 2. Do non-celibate non-Catholic male clergy members stalk and sexually assault women more often than celibate Catholic clergy members do?
Question 3. What is newsworthy about this story about a male Catholic priest who sexually assaulted a woman? Has no Protestant male clergy member recently sexually assaulted a woman? I don't understand the point of the story -- unless, that is, I impute base motives or prejudices to the New York Times.
The dynamic evidence page
It's here: the law of evidence on Spindle Law. See also this post and this post.
13 comments:
From blog "The Silent Majority:
Adult Victims of Sexual Exploitation by Clergy," at http://www.adultsabusedbyclergy.org/misconduct_priest_pastor_rabbi_hindu_evangelical_clergy_minister.html#clergy_jail_sentence_2010
News Articles Reporting Allegations of Sexual Misconduct by Ministers, Priests, Rabbis and Other Clergy
Experts from many denominations have reported on the dramatic extent and harmful impacts of sexual boundary violation of adults by ministers, pastors, priests, rabbis and other clergy. News accounts and online reader comments below, however, show confusion among the general public about the nature of sexual exploitation of adults by clergy. Some of these articles have online reader comments illustrating the often vicious retaliation alleged victims suffer in their own community.
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2009 articles
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* "Former employee files lawsuit against pastor (John Hunter) of First African Methodist Episcopal Church, alleging sexual impropriety." Los Angeles Times (November 4, 2009).
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* Nick Madigan. "Women tell of abuse by rabbi (Jacob Max): Long silence broken with accounts of mistreatment by synogogue's [sic] founder." The Baltimore Sun (October 4, 2009).
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* "N.J. investigating Rev. John H. Harris and Galilee Baptist Church in Trenton for sexual harassment and retaliation." newjerseynewsroom.com (September 25, 2009).
* Jacqueline L. Salmon. "Many women targeted by faith leaders, survey (by the Baylor University School of Social Work) says." Washington Post (September 10, 2009).
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* Tristan Scott. "Former SHEC pastor (John Kameron Erbele) arrested in Minn. prostitution sting." Missoulian (September 4, 2009).
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* "Mega-Church Pastors Zachery and Riva Tims' divorce is finalized after Zachery admits to a year-long adulterous affair with a stripper." BCNN1.com (August 20, 2009).
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* Paul Walsh. "Relationship with exotic dancer costs pastor (Mark Ostgarden) his job." Star Tribune (July 9, 2009).
* George Conger. "Vero Beach minister (D. Lorne Coyle) who had adulterous affair is defrocked." TC Palm (July 2, 2009).
* Mike Saewitz. "Chesapeake pastor (Bob Groves) who resigned apologizes for affair." Virginia Pilot (June 26, 2009).
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* Kate Wiltrout. "Navy chaplain Shane Dillman could face up to nine years in jail." The Virginian-Pilot (May 27, 2009).
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* Annysa Johnson. "In wake of scandal, (Rembert G. Weakland) will return to East Coast, publish memoirs." Journal Sentinel (May 7, 2009).
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* Curtis Lum. "Former Kaneohe pastor (Manuel Guillermo Taboada) pleads guilty to sex assault, to serve at least 6 years." Honolulu Advertiser (May 1, 2009).
* "Founder of JMS cult convicted (Jung Myung-seok)." JoongAng Daily (April 24, 2009).
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* "Rabbi (Jacob Aaron Max), 85, found guilty of fondling woman." UPI.com (April 15, 2009).
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* Paul Pinkham. "Jacksonville church was aware of pastor's (Darrell Gilyard) sexual misconduct, insurer claims: Shiloh Baptist knew pastor's history, which limits payouts." The Florida Times Union (March 13, 2009).
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* Susan Donaldson James. "Ted Haggard opens up about his past in new documentary: New Life Church pastor, now a pariah, goes public in film about sex-drug scandal." ABC News (January 8, 2009).
Yep -- you're clearly on a campaign for... something, though I can't tell what. (It's your site, so, you know, ride whatever hobby horses you need to ride.)
Parental/familial sexual abuse of children is (to me) among the worst forms, though that's a bit like trying to rank the various forms of torture. That said, I think that there are at least a couple of important disanalogies between parents/cops/teachers on one hand, and organized religious institutions on the other hand. Nobody in the first group, so far as I know, runs a very centralized, hierarchical organization that constantly proclaims as its mission the divinely-inspired discernment and worldwide promulgation of an eternal, unchanging metaphysical and moral order.
Do you not see at least some prima facie reasons for thinking that the institutional and moral failings of people in that sort of organization are more... something (interesting? disappointing? NOT disappointing?) than the similar failings, by other people, you're highlighting here on your site?
And, really: Edward Koch is providing credible testimony about anti-Catholic motivation?
On what ground is sexual abuse by Catholic clergy members worse than sexual abuse by people in other groups?
Is it that Catholic clergy members commit sexual abuse more often than, say, school teachers? (Are you sure of your statistics?)
Is it that Catholic clergy members are religious? (Baptists etc. are not religious?)
Is it that Catholic clergy members belong to a hierarchical organization? (Does that make Catholic abusers worse than, say, Baptist abusers? Or is the point here that the Catholic Church has deep pockets and is therefore a tempting target for tort lawyers?)
Is it that the Catholic Church has the gall to insist on celibacy (for the most part)?
Am I "disappointed" when Catholic priests abuse minors? Of course, I'm disappointed! Am I disappointed when a Catholic bishop does not take adequate steps to reduce the chances of abuse? Of course I am disappointed? But I am also disappointed by murder, robbery, torture, etc. I am also disappointed when a Baptist congregation (etc.) does not do something about a pastor who, there are strong reasons to believe, rapes female members of the congregation.
I repeat my question: Does the New York Times focus disproportionately on the Catholic Church and, if so, why?
I repeat another question: Is the New York Times being fair in suggesting (and sometimes saying) that sex abuse is more common among the Catholic clergy than in other sectors of our society -- or is it just being stupid about statistics? (The latter possibility cannot be entirely discounted. Back in the 1980s and 1990s, I think it was, the NYTimes or the Boston Globe or both ran articles saying, for example, that one or two or three million children were "kidnapped" each year or that 800,000 or so people in Massachusetts "went hungry each year." [The latter statement, it turned out, meant that 800,000 or so people suffered an "episode of being hungry' each year, which meant, it turned out, that a representative sample of people reported having felt hungry at least once a year.])
I believe in (i) freedom of religion and (ii) facts. I do not believe in hysteria or the hounding of a religion that does not share the religious views of the hounder.
Examples of abuse (by various people & organizations) of (i) child abuse statistics and (ii) sexual misconduct statistics.
"Child Abuse: Threat or Menace?How common is it really?,"
Slate (Oct. 4, 1996), http://www.slate.com/id/2083/
Jack Shafer, "More Mythical Numbers, The GAO debunks the official human-trafficking estimates" Slate (Aug. 16, 2006),http://www.slate.com/id/2147876/
Reason magazine's blog, Hit & Run, calls our attention today to a new Government Accountability Office study that casts doubt on official U.S. government estimates that between 600,000 and 800,000 people are trafficked across international borders each year.
Scores of news organizations have accepted the 800,000 estimate as credible in their reporting of human trafficking in recent years. Within the last year alone, the figures have appeared, unquestioned, in the Los Angeles Times, the New York Times, the Chicago Tribune, the Washington Post, the Boston Globe, and NPR, just to name just a few outlets.
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That the official estimate is more fiction than truth does not mean that human trafficking does not exist, is not a problem, blah blah blah. Human trafficking does exist, and the "severe forms" of human trafficking, as defined by law, violate basic rights. But by conjuring hundreds of thousands of victims out of thin air, as the U.S. government appears to do, no one benefits but the bureaucrats who create and promulgate the fictive figures. As the number grows, so do their budgets and power.
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Although news organizations have feasted on the bogus estimates for years, few are helping themselves to the GAO findings. According to Nexis, both the Associated Press and Agence France-Presse moved stories about it on Aug. 14, but I can find no American newspaper that published them. Newsday also gave the study a fair hearing in an Aug. 15 story. The GAO debunking has been so underplayed that the 800,000 estimate may survive on its own inertia.
Another example of statistical nonsense -- this one about "missing children":
Christoper Ream, "800,000 Missing Kids? Really? Making sense of child abduction statistics," Slate (Jan. 17, 2007),http://www.slate.com/id/2157738/
Take it as read that neither of us is supporting child abuse, no matter where it happens or who's doing it. And maybe -- MAYBE -- there is something "unfair" about a focus on one organization to the neglect of other ones where child abuse has undoubtedly happened or is ongoing. (I see the point, but I must admit that I can't get myself too worked up about it.) What I was trying to express is said -- somewhat more colorfully than I would have said it -- by Dan Savage in a recent column, here
Philosoraptor, please see Alan Dershowitz, "Tho Shalt Not Stereotype," Huffington Post (April 9, 2010), http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alan-dershowitz/thou-shalt-not-stereotype_b_532106.html
Okay; I had seen that piece earlier.
Now what?
I don't have anything to add at this point. Now I will leave it to history (and perhaps even the courts) to decide if the charges against the Roman Catholic Church have been exaggerated or if the current Pope has been unfairly (and bizarrely) tarred. I think it may be decades before a fair-minded observer comes along, investigates the entire toxic business (involving both sex and religion!), and writes a book showing that some of the charges against the RC church and the Pope were largely or substantially rooted in some unsavory motives (e.g., in the desire for lucre without much regard for the truth of some or many charges, or -- worse? -- in prejudice against the Roman Catholic Church).
I apologize for my earlier smart-aleck comment/question.
I, too, look forward to a more comprehensive account, recognizing the tiny likelihood that I'll be alive (and compos mentis) when that account is made public! But even if people's motives in this an other instances include some unsavory elements, that doesn't make the bulk of the allegations false, does it?
Last point: did you read Kristof's NY Times column last week about the RCC? He makes what I think is a very wise and helpful distinction between "the Church" as a somewhat-dysfunctional hierarchy, and "the Church" as it's experienced in thousands of communities every day (e.g., in charitable works). One could certainly be "anti-Catholic" in one sense without being "anti-Catholic" full stop.
I took no offense!
Philosoraptor wrote: "But even if people's motives in this and other instances include some unsavory elements, that doesn't make the bulk of the allegations false, does it?"
My reply: The ad hominem argument is normally considered bad logical form. But in this case the people whose motives I question are (or claim to be) reputable sources of evidence, credible reporters & interpreters of evidence and facts. I question the trustworthiness of the testimony of some of these sources about, e.g., (i) the Pope's conduct or (ii) the comparative extent of abuse by Catholic priests.
Independent of the weight of the testimony of the NYTimes and tort lawyers, I feel it is important for me to speak out against prejudice, particularly when not many "respectable" academics and "public intellectuals" are doing so.
I will take on anti-Latvian prejudice on some other occasion. :-)
A celibacy rule is not the explanation for the following episode of sexual abuse: http://www.usatoday.com/news/religion/2011-05-09-vienna-virginia-church-abuse-case-lawyers-insurers_n.htm
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