Cultural Differences

Published by

Clarissa

September 30, 2014

There is an interesting discussion taking place at Jonathan’s blog:

Most child abuse is not by the hand of priests. Yet we are more outraged by their abuse than by almost any other set of child abusers. Why is that? The church is supposed to be better than that. So outrage at those scandals is actually a back-handed form of respect: we respect those institutions implicitly, police or church, and hold them to a much higher standard.

I was really surprised by this statement because I never felt this way and assumed nobody else did either. Here was my response:

This really depends on who the “we” are. I’m definitely not one of the “we” because I don’t come from a strong religious tradition. Since I don’t come from the school of thought that expects anything better or anything just even remotely positive from priests, I’m not more outraged by child abuse by priests. I’m a lot more outraged by parental child abuse.

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8 responses to “Cultural Differences”

Bardiac

September 30, 2014

I think we’re most outraged by abuse done by powerful people against whom children have little recourse or safety. So parents, absolutely. Priests, because they have so much apparent moral authority. Teachers, except I rarely hear of teachers being abusive these days in the ways that I hear of priests being abusive. So partly it has to do with people also having access, probably.

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Z

September 30, 2014

With priests, isn’t it also the hypocrisy? They are famous for prohibiting masturbation, etc. And then — !

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1. Clarissa
  
  September 30, 2014
  
  I grew up in an environment where a priest automatically meant a hypocritical evildoer, so I don’t really expect anything better from them.
  
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  1. Z
    
    October 1, 2014
    
    I have that attitude about the police.
    
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  2. b g
    
    October 1, 2014
    
    Well, I only met two good pastors, but they were great people. They truly walked their talk. Both were thrown away; one by jealous deacons, the other by nasty female gossip.
    
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Benoni

October 1, 2014

I always thought the reason child-abusing priests get so much publicity is because the Catholic Church is protecting them from the law.

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1. Clarissa
  
  October 1, 2014
  
  So nobody cares about the abused kids? It’s all about a belated rebellion against a paternal figure of the Church?
  
  Man, that’s bleak.
  
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  1. Z
    
    October 1, 2014
    
    No — it’s that not only does this happen but the Church actually protects and helps perpetuate it. Not only does it happen but recourse is blocked. Etc.
    
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