PRIESTS COMMIT NO MORE ABUSE THAN OTHER MALES
PRIESTS COMMIT NO MORE ABUSE THAN OTHER MALES
http://www.newsweek.com/priests-commit-no-more-abuse-other-males-70625
The Catholic sex-abuse stories emerging every day suggest that Catholics have a much bigger problem with child molestation than other denominations and the general population. Many point to peculiarities of the Catholic Church ( its celibacy rules for priests , its insular hierarchy , its exclusion of women ) to infer that there's something particularly pernicious about Catholic clerics that predisposes them to these horrific acts. It's no wonder that, back in 2002—when the last Catholic sex-abuse scandal was making headlines—a Wall Street Journal-NBC News poll found that 64 percent of those queried thought Catholic priests "frequently'' abused children.
Yet experts say there's simply no data to support the claim at all. No formal comparative study has ever broken down child sexual abuse by denomination, and only the Catholic Church has released detailed data about its own. But based on the surveys and studies conducted by different denominations over the past 30 years, experts who study child abuse say they see little reason to conclude that sexual abuse is mostly a Catholic issue. "We don't see the Catholic Church as a hotbed of this or a place that has a bigger problem than anyone else," said Ernie Allen, president of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children . "I can tell you without hesitation that we have seen cases in many religious settings, from traveling evangelists to mainstream ministers to rabbis and others."
Since the mid-1980s, insurance companies have offered sexual misconduct coverage as a rider on liability insurance, and their own studies indicate that Catholic churches are not higher risk than other congregations. Insurance companies that cover all denominations, such as Guide One Center for Risk Management, which has more than 40,000 church clients, does not charge Catholic churches higher premiums. "We don't see vast difference in the incidence rate between one denomination and another," says Sarah Buckley, assistant vice president of corporate communications. "It's pretty even across the denominations." It's been that way for decades. While the company saw an uptick in these claims by all types of churches around the time of the 2002 U.S. Catholic sex-abuse scandal, Eric Spacick, Guide One's senior church-risk manager, says "it's been pretty steady since." On average, the company says 80 percent of the sexual misconduct claims they get from all denominations involve sexual abuse of children. As a result, the more children's programs a church has, the more expensive its insurance, officials at Guide One said.
The only hard data that has been made public by any denomination comes from John Jay College's study of Catholic priests, which was authorized and is being paid for by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops following the public outcry over the 2002 scandals. Limiting their study to plausible accusations made between 1950 and 1992, John Jay researchers reported that about 4 percent of the 110,000 priests active during those years had been accused of sexual misconduct involving children. Specifically, 4,392 complaints (ranging from "sexual talk" to rape) were made against priests by 10,667 victims. (Reports made after 2002, including those of incidents that occurred years earlier, are released as part of the church's annual audits .)
Experts disagree on the rate of sexual abuse among the general American male population, but Allen says a conservative estimate is one in 10. Margaret Leland Smith, a researcher at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, says her review of the numbers indicates it's closer to one in 5. But in either case, the rate of abuse by Catholic priests is not higher than these national estimates. The public also doesn't realize how "profoundly prevalent" child sexual abuse is, adds Smith. Even those numbers may be low; research suggests that only a third of abuse cases are ever reported (making it the most underreported crime). "However you slice it, it's a very common experience," Smith says.
Most child abusers have one thing in common, and it's not piety—it's preexisting relationships with their victims. That includes priests and ministers and rabbis, of course, but also family members, friends, neighbors, teachers, coaches, scout leaders, youth-group volunteers, and doctors. According to federal studies, three quarters of abuse occurs at the hands of family members or others in the victim's "circle of trust." "The fundamental premise here is that those who abuse children overwhelmingly seek out situations where they have easy and legitimate access to children," he said. "These kinds of positions offer a kind of cover for these offenders."
Priests may also appear more likely to molest children because cases of abuse come to light in huge waves. One reason is delayed reporting: less than 13 percent of victims abused between 1960 and 1980, for example, lodged a complaint in the same year as the assault. Two thirds filed their complaints after 1992, and half of those were made between 2002 and 2003 alone. "Offenders tend to be manipulative, often persuading children to believe that this is their fault," said Allen. "As a result, the children tend to keep it to themselves. There are countless victims who thought they were the only one." So what looks like high concentrations of abuse may simply reflect long and diffuse patterns of abuse that mirror those among all males.
Another reason is that the church has historically been bad at punishing (or preventing) molesters, so that many cases might come to light when just one priest is finally exposed. A single predator priest with ongoing access to children might be responsible for an immense raft of abuse cases. (Marie Fortune of the Faith Trust Institute , which focuses on clerical-abuse issues, says Roman Catholics tend "to have many more schools and other programs that involve children." "Plenty of other congregations have these problems, for instance, if they have a youth ministry.") That helps explain the 200 children who were abused at a school for the deaf. It didn't happen because the school was full of rapists; it happened because one man was never stopped. Overall, the John Jay study found that 149 priests were responsible for more than 25,000 cases of abuse over the 52-year period studied.
Allen suggests a final reason we hear so much more about Catholic abuse than transgressions in other religions: its sheer size. It's the second largest single denomination in the world (behind Islam) and the biggest in the United States. (Fifty-one percent of all American adults are Protestant, but they belong to hundreds of different denominations .) "When you consider the per capita data," says Allen, "I don't think they have a larger incidence than other faiths."
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It's a shame I have to seed a seven year old article to try and short circuit anti-Catholic bigotry on this site, but it is becoming obvious that I do.
So find a newer one. Or is the fact that this seven year old article is the ONLY thing trying to disprove that Priests should not be around children?
Another person that cannot think for himself. But we don't need this article or topic to see that.
I CAN think for myself. That's why I reject the Catholic / Christian Church and all their terrorist threats and dogma.
"...based on the surveys and studies conducted by different denominations over the past 30 years, experts who study child abuse say they see little reason to conclude that sexual abuse is mostly a Catholic issue. "We don't see the Catholic Church as a hotbed of this or a place that has a bigger problem than anyone else," said Ernie Allen, president of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children . "I can tell you without hesitation that we have seen cases in many religious settings, from traveling evangelists to mainstream ministers to rabbis and others."
Since the mid-1980s, insurance companies have offered sexual misconduct coverage as a rider on liability insurance, and their own studies indicate that Catholic churches are not higher risk than other congregations. Insurance companies that cover all denominations, such as Guide One Center for Risk Management, which has more than 40,000 church clients, does not charge Catholic churches higher premiums. "We don't see vast difference in the incidence rate between one denomination and another," says Sarah Buckley, assistant vice president of corporate communications. "It's pretty even across the denominations." It's been that way for decades."
New studies show sexual abuse in the Church is about 7% of clergy.
Mandatory celibacy and a culture of secrecy created by popes and bishops are major factors in why such high rates of child abuse have occurred in the Catholic church, a comprehensive study has found.
The patriarchal nature of Catholic institutions meant that abuse went unchallenged and, while a small number of nuns were abusers, the report found the risk of offending was much higher in institutions where priests and religious brothers had minimal contact with women. The report estimated about 7% of clergy had abused children between about 1950 and 2000.
"Most child abusers have one thing in common, and it's not piety—it's preexisting relationships with their victims. That includes priests and ministers and rabbis, of course, but also family members, friends, neighbors, teachers, coaches, scout leaders, youth-group volunteers, and doctors. According to federal studies, three quarters of abuse occurs at the hands of family members or others in the victim's "circle of trust." "The fundamental premise here is that those who abuse children overwhelmingly seek out situations where they have easy and legitimate access to children," he said. "These kinds of positions offer a kind of cover for these offenders.""
Amen???
Priests commit no more abuse than other males? Wow, that is a seriously low bar for a priest. If that is the standard then fine - people should stop viewing priests as anything more respectable than any random guy on the subway.
Then there is all the hush money the church has paid out to the victims to make the numbers appear lower.
You will pile on religion in any way you can.
Not necessarily. But this isn’t the first time you’ve insisted that clergy shouldn’t be held to a higher standard than any other average person when it comes to sexually abusing minors.
The difference is that Catholic priests all swear a vow of celibacy before their god so, either they don't really believe the crap they sell or they are truly sick and perverted beyond their own control. Either way, they don't belong in the positions that they are in.
With every comment you make you sound more biased against the Catholic faith.
The Catholic Church as well as Christianity seems to require defending at every turn. The pedophile issue was a blight, but it isn't as if this behavior doesn't rear its ugly head in every nook and corner of the world. True, this involved men of God which made it worse.
BUSTED: US Olympic Committee covered up sexual abuse …
... US Olympic Committee covered up sexual abuse and child ... together to cover up years of sex abuse and child ... School Network in America ...
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Public school defends role in alleged cover up of abuse at Christian camps
Winchester College knew in 1982 about allegations of abuse at the camps but says it didn’t go to the police to save the victims further trauma
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An Oklahoma school and its board of directors are being sued on behalf of 15 girls who say they were molested by a teacher's aide.
The federal lawsuit filed Friday in Oklahoma City seeks unspecified damages from the Perry school district and the school board for allegedly failing to protect the elementary students from molestation by 86-year-old Arnold Cowen.
Former principal Kenda Miller and former teacher Jeffrey Sullins face charges of failing to report child abuse .
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Iowa boarding school director found guilty of abuse
KEOKUK, Iowa (AP) — A southeast Iowa jury on Friday found a former boarding school director guilty of abusing students, days after he tearfully testified that he hadn’t hurt any children.
The jury found Benjamin Trane guilty of assault with intent to commit sexual abuse, sexual exploitation of a child by a counselor and child endangerment, according to the Burlington Hawk Eye. The jury didn’t find Trane guilty of a more serious charge, third-degree sexual assault, which could have meant a 10-year prison sentence.
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Collusion, cover-up and child abuse in the Church of England
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Others do it so it's less bad? Sounds like the the trumpskis and their but Clinton did it too mantra.
Sounds like you don't read the news..
You can't go a day with out some liberal female teacher banging one of her grade school students.
No, but it makes less unique and should make it less the first thing non Catholics think about when the hear the words 'Catholic Church'.
Really? Show me one from today.
The difference is the vigorous effort by the church itself to, not only protect, but to enable these child molesters.
Cheap but,good!!
Personally, I don't defend the Catholic church (my pagan bais) Yet I recognize my bias and take it into consideration when commenting on the subject.
But, statistically, in reality, you have a far greater chance of being molested in a public school than by a priest. Public school teachers (male and female) must be held to the same standards as everyone else. Priests included, in secular society, there is no saintly class held above reproach, or not held responsible for their actions.
Any institution that has allowed children to be harmed by predators deserves to be taken to task for it. No institution should get a pass. And no profession should get a pass. Not preachers, not priests — not even teachers.
Especially not teachers. And yet …
Consider the statistics: In accordance with a requirement of President Bush's No Child Left Behind Act, in 2002 the Department of Education carried out a study of sexual abuse in the school system.
Hofstra University researcher Charol Shakeshaft looked into the problem, and the first thing that came to her mind when Education Week reported on the study were the daily headlines about the Catholic Church.
"[T]hink the Catholic Church has a problem?" she said. "The physical sexual abuse of students in schools is likely more than 100 times the abuse by priests."
So, in order to better protect children, did media outlets start hounding the worse menace of the school systems, with headlines about a "Nationwide Teacher Molestation Cover-up" and by asking "Are Ed Schools Producing Pedophiles?"
No, they didn't. That treatment was reserved for the Catholic Church, while the greater problem in the schools was ignored altogether.
As the National Catholic Register's reporter Wayne Laugesen points out , the federal report said 422,000 California public-school students would be victims before graduation — a number that dwarfs the state's entire Catholic-school enrollment of 143,000.
Yet, during the first half of 2002, the 61 largest newspapers in California ran nearly 2,000 stories about sexual abuse in Catholic institutions, mostly concerning past allegations. During the same period, those newspapers ran four stories about the federal government's discovery of the much larger — and ongoing — abuse scandal in public schools.
Many people hate the Catholic church (I'm one of them) I'm not willing, however, to sacrifice the emotional and physical wellbeing of children to further my grievances against them. Molest a child and go to jail, and then be banned by law from having contact with any and all children in any professional capacity.
the federal report said 422,000 California public-school students would be victims before graduation — a number that dwarfs the state's entire Catholic-school enrollment of 143,000.
What political party do public school teachers and their union overwhelmingly support?
Does it have any effect on the reporting on the subject?
No amount of news articles and statistics can tell us what we already know.
Sexual abuse of children happens everywhere!
Joe Paterno was the football coach at Penn State University and a financial benefactor of the school.
The football field at Penn State (and a university library) is STILL named for Paterno , even though he was fired for covering up child sex abuse committed by one of his long time assistant coaches.
"An investigation conducted by former FBI director Louis Freeh concluded in July 2012 that Paterno concealed information relating to Sandusky's sexual abuse of young boys. [5] [6] The investigation also uncovered information that Paterno may have persuaded university officials not to report Sandusky to authorities in 2001."
Look over here! These guys do it too! Yaaay for us!
If you want to believe that is the point, knock yourself out. The Catholic Church should take responsibility for what it did. So should everyone else. Anti-Catholic bigotry is not going to be accepted. Unless you criticize also those groups that have committed similar offenses as the Catholics, we will assume you are anti-catholic first and concerned with the kids second.
I really had to turn around to see if a monkey flew out of my butt because I agree with you on this one John.
That said, many Christian organizations, Catholic being the most prolific only in the media sense, have not helped their cause with how they handled the abuse issue some of their clergy had. They were so afraid of not being able staff all their churches, their main source of revenue, they made the wrong choices.
But appearances can carry a lot of weight with the masses. It looks much worse when a person in a position of influence ,like a priest or a teacher, is the abuser. People automatically default to thinking it's worse when in the end it really isn't. Abuse is abuse regardless of who the abuser is.
But like I've said many times here, haters gotta hate so hate they do. Atheists attack people of religion, people of religion attack people of no faith and the wheel goes round and round.
Good seed though, I agree with the premise that Catholic Priests are probably no more predisposed to abusing others than anyone else.
But they do have an organization that pays hush money to protect them and cover up their crimes and that is not common in business or most other organizations.
Oh it's quite common actually, paying hush money that is.
I'm clearly not defending the practice but that doesn't change the fact that I don't think Catholic Priests are any more or less predisposed to abusing others than anyone else
This all started IMO when a member referred to the Catholic Church as a pedophile cult. Issue was taken. I don't know how that turned out and don't care.
This has gone overboard! It doesn't matter who has the most pedophiles. What matters is that there are pedophiles.
Do we all agree that they are everywhere? Do we all agree that if there are two pedophiles in the Cub Scouts and five in the Boy Scouts it doesn't make the Cub Scouts better? They are both disgusting.
If I had my way these animals would be taken to an island and left to fend for themselves. They have no right to live!
I'm trying to figure out why anyone thinks this let's these bent priests, much less the catholic-fucking-church's (my ex-faith) hierarchy, off the hook. It was my belief that priests were to be held to a higher standard (much higher) than other men. Was that always just BS?
I'm putting this article in my Damning By Faint Praise File.
You don't hold teachers to a high standard?
No one wants to let priests off the hook.
I am just sick and fucking tired of anti Catholic bigotry. And atheists are not the place to expect fair treatment for any church.
I think it's going great.
I know there is anti-Catholic bigotry on Newstalkers. You are proof of that.
I am pointing out facts to those who need to or want to hear them.
Shouldn't we have a vote? Oh, we already did that.
What religions have you seen me shit on? lol.
You seeded three fake news articles last year about Pope Francis murdering and eating babies.
Be grateful that you have someone willing to tolerate that sort of crap from you on a constant basis.
You brag about posting fake news.
At the time, you claimed it was legitimate and did not tag it as satire.
Like I said, be happy you have someone who allows you to post such crap.
WGAF?
That's not fair to say to just John. He actually rarely posts about religion while others post far more. And why should member crap on another?
These articles have gotten worse since Trump was elected. The evangelical articles continuously. On and on the hate and ridicule.
We all need a time out!
What about the people's who's faith you mock? The ones that you tell are not going to heaven if they don't believe in Jesus your way.. or believe in Jesus at all? How do you think you make them feel? Don't you think they feel like you trolled them?
Do you not get the irony of that statement? You want to post your beliefs but everyone else is a troll if they disagree. Furthermore, some of your beliefs are in direct conflict with other people's religious beliefs.
In this sense I have to agree with BF. No one is going to change anyone else's mind here.
I agree Mags.
Well, at least you admit your comments are crap. We are making some progress.
Why should they? That would be a suppression of freedom of speech. And if you are going to post stuff about your faith that insults other people's beliefs and non beliefs are they not allowed to counter? If that's what you need then you don't belong in a discussion forum.
It's nice that constantly having your fake news exposed amuses you so much. I am happy for you.
“What religions have you seen me shit on? lol.”
The Mormons. Am I the only one that remembers John’s remarks about Romney during the 2012 election when he claimed the Mormons were a cult?
You have posted dozens of fake news articles to this forum over the past couple of years. The ones about the pope were interesting because after the first one was exposed as a fake , in which you extolled a non existent international tribunal in Brussels, which existed solely in the deranged mind of a defrocked priest in Canada who was creating anti-Catholic websites with phony official titles.
"
The International Tribunal into Crimes of Church and State or ITCCS (allegedly est. on June 15, 2010) [1] is a one-man blog that pretends to be a tribunal established to enforce common law . [2]
Kevin D. Annett (born in 1956) [3] [Note 1] of the Nation of Kanata Canada is the founder and operator of a series of crank one-man blogs and phony organisations, the most famous among these being the above mentioned juridical quagmire [Note 2] of nonsense and pseudolaw , the ITCCS. Annett is also a pseudohistorian , an enthusiastic supporter of the freeman on the land movement, [4] a " bankster " and chemtrail truther [5] and a defrocked [6] United Church of Canada
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/5a/Wikipedia%27s_W.svg/24px-Wikipedia%27s_W.svg.png 2x"> minister, who thinks they're not nearly transphobic enough. [7] He regularly accuses the Vatican, the government of Canada and the United Church of Canada of being worse than Hitler . [8]
Annett has his own page on whale.to [9] and has received support from other freeman [10] and militia movement [11] cranks, as well as David Icke -esque new age cranks. [12] That being said, other conspiracy theorists aren't so enamored of him. [13] [14]
Annett has also fraudulently claimed to be a Nobel peace prize nominee, [15] a laughable claim which is completely out of the question. [16] Even so, being nominated doesn't mean squat. [17] Oblivious to all this, some crackpots connected to the militia movement took the time to congratulate Annett on this non-existent Nobel peace prize nomination. [11] "
After this information was given to you, a week or two later you seeded another article sourced to the same crackpot, again with no satire tag.
You have been a fake news hack, although I do have to admit you have scaled back. Is it permanent?
I don't know why you are laughing. You were duped by a couple of this nutjob's phony websites.
You are digging your own grave here and you don't even have the sense to realize it.
"why should member crap on another? "
That is a comment to you on this thread by the person who has allowed you to perpetrate all your stupid 'pranks'. Now that you have revealed your true motivations we will see if there will be a difference.
You have said, in multiple replies now, that you often make comments that are intended only to 'crap' on another member, not make a viable point of any other sort. One of the reasons you were allowed to seed all that fake news was that "one man's fake news was another man's truth" or some such rationale, but now you admit that you post fake news stories, without the satire tag, just to try and irritate another member.
Let's see if the new light you have shed on your own posting is put to good use by other people here.
I am not a member of that crusade. I find it puzzling that evangelical Protestants backed the twice divorced Trump over other more religious conservative candidates, but I found nothing acceptable about Clinton being the Democratic candidate.
I voted for neither, but viewed Trump as the lessor evil of two undesirable candidates capable of leading the US into a future of more technology and more innovations that will present unique challenges of what to do with people in a shrinking job market, who are not employable, and also, an aging population that will continue to grow and be a drain on the economy as their expenses will continue to exceed their incomes.
We needed leadership with an eye to the future instead of status quo or regression. Trump was the answer for people who are desperate for low skill jobs that don't require much, if any, education. I understand their desperation, but their jobs are gone and will never return in meaningful numbers. We need leadership who cares and can address their plight in meaningful ways instead of using rhetoric to gain political office.
Pot calling the kettle black because you do the same making posts that have only one purpose to crap on another member as witnessed here.
There are many more trolls on this website,
If you want a safe space or a space to proselytize unchallenged then an open forum on the internet is not the place that you will be able to do so, nor is a public street corner or any other public place where people of differing beliefs are in attendance.
If you want or require a safe space to proselytize unchallenged, then you need to seek out private places that do not allow opposing views and restrict free speech.
So what is your problem with people discussing their experiences with religion and why they do not believe?
One of your major problems with being in an open venue is thinking that you can tell someone what they can say and then calling it a discussion.
I can talk about my religious experiences and why I left the Christian religion. I left because there is no way that I can find evidence of Yahweh anymore than I can find evidence of any other of the tens of thousands of gods that I was taught were myths.
In my life, the Bible is no more relevant than any other book of ancient tales that contained some truth and some fiction.
My life is so much better without the belief that some god was idly watching children be raped, killed, starved and actively deciding football games.
I want to share my "good news" just as much as any Christian wants to share their Bible stories.
And there are people of different religions that neither of us have heard of that are happily living their lives with belief systems that we know cannot possibly be true because we are positive that we have this all figured out if people would only listen to "reason".
I try to be respectful of differing belief systems because I realize that no one is born believing in a god or belief system. It is usually our parents who indoctrinate us into their belief system - which we may or may not accept when we are exposed to differing belief systems and knowledge of the world and history.
In the end, we should all be able to make the case for our beliefs, but not one of us should expect that others will respect those beliefs. I mean can you honestly say that you respect the teachings of Scientology? Should you be dishonest and pretend to respect anything that you find completely insane? I am more of a fan of people who are honest than I am liars. I would rather people dislike/hate me for who I am than like/love me for who I am not.
I believe that most people expect evangelicals and Catholics, who seem to love pushing their morality on others, always pointing out others flaws and discriminating against people because they consider their life styles "immoral", would be held to a higher standard than just having the same percent of pedophiles as other secular groups.
The fact that the percent is almost identical proves one thing to me, there is no supernatural or divine hand guiding any of them. If their God can't keep his supposed house free of pedophiles then he's very likely not at home.
Funny how you feel threatened by someone challenging your religion or beliefs.
And if you don't want to hear religious claims being challenged, you can keep off these threads too. See how that works?
Given your reaction and outbursts whenever someone dares to challenge you or religion, it seems more probable it's your beliefs that are fragile.
My dad told me when I was a teenager, "There are two things you shouldn't discuss with people you don't know: politics and religion because no matter what you say, no matter what your stance, you are going to piss someone off".
I think I my dad nailed it.
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