Speaking truth to power: abuse victim Jamie Carrillo
An amazing and compelling video is slowly making its way into the mainstream media.
Last week, twenty-eight-year-old Jamie Carrillo garnered the courage to confront the California public school teacher who molested her years earlier starting at age 12 and continuing until she was around 20.
In the video, Carrillo telephones her abuser, Andrea Cardosa, who was serving as an assistant principal at a different high school, and Carrillo secretly records Cardosa admitting to the abuse.
[Note: The volume in the video is quite low, and thus we recommend turning up all available volume controls.]
Since the video became public, Cardosa resigned from her administrator position at the high school. It has also been reported that Cardosa was actually investigated for abuse back in 1999, when the abuse of Carrillo first began, but – unbelievably – she was "allowed to resign and continue working as an educator with no professional repercussions."
Because the school never let anyone know about the serious allegations against Cardosa, Cardosa was able to get hired as an assistant principal at another school. This form of cover-up in the public school system is widely known as "passing the trash."
Moreover, a second accuser has now reportedly come forward to allege abuse by Cardosa.
TheMediaReport.com salutes the brave Ms. Carrillo, and we hope that this dramatic video awakens the mainstream media to finally report on the pervasive abuse and cover-ups still happening today in our nation's public schools rather than continually recounting accusations against priests (half of whom are dead) about abuse alleged to have happened decades ago.
[HT: Dennis Ecker]
Powerful video.
Dave,
If only for a minute I will take my gloves off and say Thank You for doing a short story based on a very brief comment of two words. FIGHTING BACK.
Can this be record I am more anti-sexual abuser then I am anti-Catholic ? Can this show record I know the Catholic church does not hold a patent to child abuse ?
I left that comment for people to see the face of a hero. I also wanted to show the pain a victim suffers does not end when the physical attack is over. In this young ladies case she tells of the pain she has suffered for years, the same pain other victims tell you and others they have suffered for decades.
The other reason why I made that comment was in hope if any victims who may read your blog will see the video and know it is never to late to come forward.
I will not question why you did this story and only be glad you did, and have the thought if only for a moment we were both on the same page.
Thank You,
Dennis Ecker
eckerdennis@ymail.com
Dennis very nice.
This site is violently anti-abuse and sometimes that gets lost in the arguments here. I am sorry for that. No should ever forget the awfulness of sex abuse and the unbearble pain which victims feel.
The point of the site is that if you treat only the Catholic church one way and let everyone else off the hook for sex abuse (which is what I think happens) then you cause more abuse and harm to children–not less.
Thank you again
Nobody said you were the only group that had child abusers. The responsibility resides with the men who transfered known abuser priests to new innocent parishes; hoping against hope that the perpetrators would stop. but these sad people didn't stop and they did offend again and again. And more children who didn't have to be were devastated. Needlessly. Needlessly.
Clue for Dennis who asked about the posting of this story: School "passed the trash" as it is normally done in the public school system. Also make note of the lack of any explanation anywhere on public school sites of the precautions they take to protect students. Maybe, you could work on that in your spare time.
Thank you Dennis.
“Dennis” comes (the 22nd, 658PM) to announce generously that he will for a moment “take the gloves off”. A rather violent image, but he is characteristically given to such hyperbole. Yet I always suspect Abuseniks bearing gifts, so let’s see what we have here.
Omitting the exaggerated formatting, we see that he is going to cast this article as a support for his trope of “fighting back”. (Which, but of course, presumes that there is something to fight-back against.)
Then a characteristic incoherence of expression: “Can this be record I am more anti-sexual abuser than I am anti-Catholic ?” [sic] The infelicities of that “anti-sexual abuser” aside, I presume he’s going for something along the lines of: Can it be put in the record that Dennis is more of an opponent of sexual-abuse than he is an anti-Catholic and that he ‘knows’ that “the Catholic church does not hold a patent to child abuse”? (Did you notice that for this matinee “Dennis” has capitalized “Catholic”?)
I don’t see how the record “Dennis” has compiled here on this site could support that bow to his newly-embraced preference or convenience. Although, of course, when has any “record” ever stopped Abuseniks from re-casting the past?
What is interesting here, I would say, is the difference between a) this video evidence and b) the gaping lack of evidence in so very many of the allegations against priests. Presuming that the American media and the torties would never pass up such a rich opportunity, then we have no such evidence as this video ‘confession’ (using that word colloquially and not formally and technically) in the Catholic Abuse cases.
Thus too then, that it is insufficient for “Dennis” to then swing into his ‘come forward’ vaudeville, since what is most essential here is not more stories being put-forward, but rather the evidence of the video.
And then “Dennis” implies that there are some grounds to “question” why TMR published this article (although he himself will not indulge in questioning).
He then invites himself “onto the same page”. But I can’t quite see that: a) the record of his submissions here (and on the BigTrial site) and b) the vital element of the video-as-evidence are simply too strong to be wished-away.
Thus too the comment by ‘Peter’ (the 22nd, 746PM) deploys once again the Abusenik tendency toward hyperbole in the bit about “this site is violently anti-abuse”, which is a point that this commenter thinks “sometimes gets lost in the arguments here”.
But is there something wrong with being “anti-abuse”? We are faced here with an incoherence. Or is “anti-abuse” a code or short-hand (which, if it is, is insufficiently clear)? Perhaps he means something like ‘anti-Abusenik’.
This tendency to hyperbole is self-serving: you can’t look very ‘heroic’ if you’re not fighting a mighty and powerful monster, thus your opponents have to be hyperbolically inflated (which will, nicely, also keep anybody from examining your assertions too closely).
I also note the concomitant Abusenik looseness with definitions: anybody who has gone out on the internet can easily realize just how genuinely (if only verbally) ‘violent’ the internet can get, especially when one encounters material from various types of commenters. That is not often seen here, and when it is seen here, it is more often from the Abuseniks.
But I also note that in the Abusenik dictionary, sustained questioning and close assessment (of Abusenik material that offers no such evidence as a video confession) somehow equates to the questioners being “violently” opposed to Abuseniks. This type of misconception or mis-definition can actually serve a useful purpose for the Playbook: if the Abuseniks claim (hyperbolically) to be “violently” opposed, then that simultaneously i) makes them look both more victimized and more heroic, and ii) paints those whom they target as being “violent” and perhaps guilty of this, that, or the other thing.
Unfortunately, this kind of thing is still pervasive in the public school system. Sheltered from media scrutiny and tort liability, public school administrators act as if we're still in the benighted 1970s when it comes to how we understand and react to sex abuse of children. In my neighborhood elementary school a few years ago, a credibly accused abuser (he won acquittal at trial due to a top-notch defense attorney being able to unravel a seven-year-old accuser on the stand, but the teacher admitted under oath to very inappropriate behavior with the boy) was transferred and promoted to vice-principal. Parents got wind of his recent past and raised hell, which eventually caused the county administration to transfer him again, with another promotion, to an administrative position at school headquarters, but there was never any admission that putting this man into a position of close contact with and authority over young children was imprudent.
Precisely
http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/cgi-bin/displaycode?section=pen&group=00001-01000&file=630-638
This video cannot be used in a court of law except as evidence against this unfortunate young woman for her violation of her alleged abuser's privacy rights. Jaime could be sued and/or prosecuted for what she has done.
So what do you think of her story without the benefit of the video? Sounds just like one of the old church abuse stories, doesn't it?
Starting way back in 1997 or 1998, when she was 12, Jaime was "sexually abused" by her teacher, a woman. What constitutes this "sexual abuse?" At 12 Jaime was certainly post-pubescent. So, let's be clear that this is not pedophilia but something much less insidious because it involves a young woman of sexual maturity. Whatever it was that 'sexually' happened, Jaime kept coming back to that 'abusive' teacher for more, when she was 12 and when she was 13 and 14 and 15 and 16 and 17 and 18 and 19 and 20. Eight years? That teacher must have been really manipulative. And Jaime never told anyone? And then she did not tell anyone for eight more years after the abuse ended? Was the woman still her teacher all the way through high school? How did these two keep seeing each other for more years of abuse beyond middle school? Then, Jaime didn't go AWAY to college, I guess? Did she go to college? Jaime must have cut off from this lesbian relationship (she is of majority for the last two years of the "relationship" with her former teacher, so lesbianism or female homosexuality is at issue) and then gotten pregnant right away because she is now only 28 but has three kids. Presumably, one or multiple male partners produced these children with Jaime. So there is a certain level of indiscriminate sexual activity there with Jaime. Did the alleged abuse cause her behavior or was she like this already? Jaime says that she is really messed up and has three kids to feed. She has no college education. Does she just need money? I could go on and on with this Publion-like question-and-speculation analysis. Pretty sick, right?
Forget the video for a moment and ask yourself if you believe Jaime's story. Do you want to believe her? Would you want to believe her video-less story, if she was accusing a nun or a priest? What if Jaime was a 28 year old man and not an attractive young woman?
For the record, because we are keeping a record, I believe her even without the video. That she has that video, that she did it, is amazing. Sexual abuse of young people occurs world-wide in humans. No person or institution involved in the sexual abuse or any abuse of young people should be exempt from accountability or from doing everything that can be done, indeed should be done, to make young people safe(r). And if you are a person in that minority that suffers from some sort of sexual attraction to young people, you will always be driven to find ways to be around young people. It is up to the rest of us, however much it is within our power, to stop you and to keep the young safe. Catholic church included. No free passes just because you're doin' better now and that stuff from the past can't be proved. Believe these stories of abuse when you hear them. Unless, there is really good evidence that the story is NOT true. That evidence beyond a reasonable doubt is not available to support a story of abuse is not a sufficient reason to reject the story. That level of evidence is almost always absent or, like in Jaime's case, is inadmissible.
Now, I am not saying throw people in jail for suspicion of some crime. Jail or even just criminal prosecution may not be effective or possible or appropriate. But if there is reason to suspect that someone might be an abuser, try to improve the situation by addressing it. Remove that person or those young people, depending on the situation. By analogy, if you thought that your controller was stealing money from your company but could not prove it, would you keep him/her on? If someone applied for that open job in accounting and then you found out that the person had been accused of stealing money at the previous employer but that nothing could be proven, would you hire that person? Why take the risk? Just get someone else. Tell that employee that he/she is fired and that they should get a job that does not involve such responsibility for money. These things actually occur. So why not approach teachers, coaches and priests in the same way. These are just jobs too. Teachers should not teach young people any more and coaches should not coach any more and priests should not priest any more, if they are credibly accused – even though the accusation cannot be proven in a court of law. It is more important to protect young people than to keep this person in their job or even in their profession when children are involved. Go get a job with adults. There are plenty of others who can take your place.
LDB speaks the truth about the video being used in the state of California as evidence against this school teacher. The state of California has a two person law when it comes to recording a telephone conversation meaning every individual must be aware they are being recorded.
However, not all states have this law. If you live in New York they have the one person law where only one person has to be aware the conversation is being recorded and that one person can include the person who initiated the conversation and who is doing the recording.
In addition all states will allow transcripts of the conversation that took place to be entered into evidence.
Please check your state for which you live.
In an uncharacteristically lucid posting, sustained pretty much over its entire length, LDB comments on the 23rd at 1233PM.
I will happily avail myself of this break in the usual cloud cover. Let’s see what we have.
LDB accurately points out that this video cannot be introduced in evidence in court. (Which is precisely why I said it was ‘evidence’ only “colloquially and not formally or technically”.) And also accurately points out the potential legal liabilities involved in the type of surreptitious taping that this young woman effected.
Thus then in considering the ‘story’ we move from the legal forum to the personal and public forums.
LDB asks if we – as individuals and as members of a public – “think of her story without the benefit of the video?”. And LDB further sharpens the point by pointing out that her story “sounds just like one of the old church abuse stories, doesn’t it?” – to which I would have to respond: Yes, it does.
So far so good.
In the lengthy third paragraph, LDB recites the story (or a story) – even taking care to note the distinction between “pedophilia” and otherwise in considering “what constitutes this sexual abuse”. S/he intersperses his/her own questions as to various aspects of the story s/he is telling, apparently trying to mimic some version of what questions s/he thinks I might raise.
At the end of which exercise in fantasy – and in a familiar trope recently deployed by both LDB and “Dennis” – LDB then merely states “I could go on and on with this Publion-like questioning-and-speculation analysis” . But while LDB does manage to fulfill the “questioning” part of this mimicry, s/he then derails the fantasizing with the odd phrase “speculation analysis”; do I often “speculate”? Or – at least in LDB’s mind – are “questioning” and “speculation” synonymous?
Then, after what appeared at the outset to be a lengthy and (one had hoped) substantive paragraph that turned out to be nothing more than LDB’s attempt at mimicry of assessment and raising questions designed to test for connecting-dots and assessing probability, LDB merely (but manipulatively) draws our conclusion for us: “Pretty sick, right?”.
So this lengthy paragraph of LDB’s turns out to be nothing more than an amalgam of fantasy and manipulation.
LDB then urges us to “forget the video” and ask ourselves if we “believe Jaime’s story” (referring back, apparently, to the previous paragraph’s fantastical mimicry).
And then quickly raises a familiar LDB trope (already discussed at length in recent comments): “Do you want to believe her” – thereby again introducing into the assessment (such as it may be) of the story the separate issue of whether what we “want to believe” is relevant to the evidence LDB has (not) presented. Which thus demonstrates yet again that for the Abusenik mind, ‘evidence’ is there in front of you if you “want to believe” it is there, thereby conflating ‘belief’ and ‘evidence’, and to the detriment of the latter. Thus this gambit of LDB (and the Playbook) reveals itself as nothing more than a variation of the old saw that ‘it’s all on the level if you just hold your head at the right angle’.
Then LDB takes a swipe at “the record”, since Abuseniks – as I have often said before – do not like it at all when one refers to their prior statements as constituting a “record” with which their current statements, assertions, and stories can and must be compared for coherence.
Then LDB expresses his/her belief in the story even if there hadn’t been a video and that’s LDB’s right. Although I note the hyperbolic “amazing” about the video being made at all; it serves to ‘hero-ize’ the thing, a gambit dear to the Abusenik heart.
But then LDB goes on, reasonably and accurately enough, that “sexual-abuse of young people occurs world-wide in humans” – which cuts rather uncomfortably close, I would imagine, to undermining the sense of uniqueness or exclusivity in the specifically Catholic instances (such as they may be) of this phenomenon. One wonders for a moment why LDB would even venture this close to the conceptual edge, but that wonder is quickly answered by the immediately-subsequent remarks about “the Catholic church” (nicely capitalized, as we have seen before in recent comments) not getting a ‘free pass’ “just because you’re doin’ better”. Had anybody suggested that the Catholic Church deserves a “free pass”?
But the slightly affected “doin’ better” is a giveaway: it works to reduce (or ‘minimize’, as the Abuseniks are fond of saying) the success of the Catholic Church in effecting substantial (and demonstrably successful) safeguards for what is fundamentally, as LDB has already said, a world-wide and even species-wide phenomenon. The Ball must be Kept Rolling, and thus ‘past’ and ‘present’ must be conflated if not also deliberately confused.
And LDB then puts nails down the give-away with the immediately subsequent assertion that those hypothetical “free passes” aren’t going to be forthcoming just because “stuff from the past can’t be proved”. Which is – if I may – huge: we see here one of the key elements of the Anderson Strategies (and in a larger sense of the entire Victimist approach), i.e. that just because there’s no evidence doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. Which flies in the face of any process of rational assessment and also in the face of the entire genius of Western law. But it is through this gambit that the Stampede has managed to reach and sustain the proportions it has.
(I read today that the government has just issued a ‘report’ that sex-assaults (however defined) on college campuses are “epidemic” (the numbers are claimed to be in the millions) – which is a claim that has been around for almost two decades now, despite massive efforts to reduce it by universities in the meantime.)
Then, further, LDB insists that we “believe these stories when we hear them … unless there is really good evidence that the story is NOT true” [exaggerated formatting retained]. In the legal forum, this utterly reverses both the presumption of innocence of the accused and the entire process of rationally determining actual truth. In the public and personal forums, this gambit deranges the integrity of the individual’s and the public’s competence to weigh and sift and establish accuracy or even simply probability. And it opens up the door for all sorts of mischief when persons or interests so inclined and sufficiently enterprising seek to get their claims, stories, allegations and claims accepted.
And, as I have said in prior comments on this site, a general acceptance of this approach among the public and among enough individuals (who comprise that public) lubricates a subsequent and consequent derangement in the legal forum where – as we have so often seen – even the justicial system effectively reverses fundamental Western legal principles in the absence of any evidence beyond stories, claims, and allegations.
LDB then repeats a Victimist mantra that in sex cases “that level of evidence is almost always absent or, like Jaime’s case, is inadmissible” – the Victimst conclusion in the light of that fact being that if we presume the existence of the crime but there isn’t enough evidence of it, then the evidentiary principles governing in law (and rational assessment) must be weakened (or, as they like to say, ‘reformed’).
All of which Victimist elements were in place when the Anderson Strategies were formulated precisely to take advantage of them.
But then LDB tries to plaster-over the gaping abyss that his/her immediately previous bits have opened: LDB is “not saying throw people in jail for suspicion of such crime”. But what does LDB expect is going to happen if his/her immediately previous assertions are fulfilled? You can’t fine-tune substantive derangements so as to have only the good consequences you want but not noxious consequences you’d rather not admit to having caused.
Thus we then get a menu of suggestions as to how one might address an instance of suspected sex-abuse without getting tangled up in the legal forum: “try to improve the situation by addressing it”. This can be done, LDB suggests, by ‘removing’ “that person” (i.e. the suspected abuser) … “depending on the situation”. Nice – for an individual situation, although not so useful for formulating national or wide-based social policy. And there still remains the danger of ‘witch-hunts’ developing, even on this relatively informal level.
The safety-catch of being “credibly-accused” seems helpful, until (the devil is always in the details) one tries to formulate guidelines as to what constitutes such ‘credible accusation’. And once this sort of thing gets going, what are the chances that persons in authority are not going to dare to say No to an allegator and will stretch that “credibly” to include whatever-it-takes to say Yes? All of these possibilities and problems lie close to the surface in this sort of thing, as we have even seen in the Stampede and even in the Church where the present parameters of “credibly accused” are elastic indeed.
There is a hint of ‘emergency-ism’ in the assertion that “it is more important to protect young people than to … “. This type of ‘emergency’ thinking has historically proven to be the lead-in to all sorts of lethal mischief in societies that have embraced it or onto which it has been imposed.
So LDB’s comment gives an opportunity to get an overview of the genuinely profound complexities involved in this problem of dealing with a phenomenon for which a) there is general conceptual awareness and acknowledgement of its existence but for which b) there is most often no evidence to prove individual instances and c) a great potential that loosening fundamental principles will open the door to even further profound dangers (false allegations, loose and elastic deployment of even informal ‘solutions’, derangement of basic societal and structural principles).
These were the issues that decades-ago should have received careful and thorough individual, public, and official consideration before the Victimist ‘solution’ was so widely embraced, and before the Anderson Strategies then so shrewdly provided a vehicle for capitalizing on the complexity and the confusion.
This is a complicated issue with serious dangers on all sides and it always has been. I don’t pretend to have an answer, but I have been working on this site to demonstrate that the Stampede and all of its underlying foundational elements are not and never have been the way to proceed. There has to be a better way.
All studies note from my knowledge that sex abuse in childhood can make the victims extremely promiscuous. That's if you see promiscuity as a bad thing per se. I was very promiscuous through out my life after my abuse.
It was what it was. If I knew better I could have been better. I wanted love didn't get it. So I filled up on appetizers. Maybe if I'd had therapy at the time things would have been different. I'll never know. But I shouldn't have had to deal with this from the get go. Who created that situation. The people in the pews, who knew nothing or the prelates who knew everything?
Nobody is blaming the victims here.
Who said you were, Pat?
Let's hope there are no "Jaime's" lurking about in any of the antiCatholic bigots backgrounds given LDBs premise that we need to presume all these victims are truth-tellers, thereby setting aside the rule of law. Unfortunately, the debacle that defines the Catholic Church abuse matter made it much harder for real victims to be believed. Oh, what a tangled web we weave-
The first line of offense for children (teenagers know well enough to how to fight back, if that is what they desire) against these sick predators is their parents (what did they know, or ignore?), then, the victim's extended family and community.
On the 24th at 129AM JR asserts – as best I can tell from the grammatical problems – that all the studies he knows-of indicate “that sex abuse in childhood can make the victims extremely promiscuous”.
First, he gives us not even a single ‘study’ from his apparently sizable compendium of studies. Does it not occur to Abuseniks to offer supportive corroboration or are they somehow predisposed (for whatever reasons) against providing supportive corroboration?
Second, (presuming the existence and integrity of this or that ‘study’) there is that hugely important subjunctive mood of the verb: “can” cause. Which scientifically does little to guarantee or definitively establish causality (as the authors of the Dutch Abuse Report realized and stated, and as I have discussed more than once in prior comments).
As to JR’s self-report of promiscuity, let the readership consider as it may.
How “I wanted love but didn’t get it” can be connected to alleged abuse (especially as JR has related the incident) is anybody’s guess. He notes he didn’t get “therapy” although he has also said on many occasions here that there is nothing the Church can do for ‘victims’.
And it remains for readers to consider as a general question: is it probable that one or two instances (including no classically-defined penetrative rape, we recall) could create such utterly life-derailing consequences? The Victimist psychological mantra to deal with this type of question is to claim that any type of ‘sexual abuse’ (anywhere on the spectrum from touching to classically-defined penetrative rape) can (or perhaps the more excitable Victimists will claim ‘does’ or even ‘must’) cause profound, permanent or semi-permanent, wide-ranging and pervasive life-wrecking derangements.
Which already-dubious claim is then adopted by persons looking to explain their life-issues along this track: a) I was sexually abused; b) that predictably and automatically caused all the problems that I have had in my since the moment it happened; c) before which I was doing pretty well or even better.
And then, of course, in the Stampede, under the aegis of the Anderson Strategies, we would have to add: d) I can’t prove it but e) I should get ‘compensated’. And at this point somewhere between 11 and 12 thousand allegants have taken in 3 or so billion dollars (yes, minus tortie fees and expenses).
Thus JR’s characteristic concluding ‘victimization’ plaint remains unsupported and open to question on numerous levels. And the indictment of the “people in the pews” and “the prelates who knew everything” ditto. (Although there’s an uncharacteristically graceful stylistic and rhetorical balance and symmetry in that concluding sentence.)
I'm a f#@%ing artist baby, And you know what? when one tells the truth, at least for me anyway, the universe echoes. That's the stage we are on presenting ourselves and our feelings to the universe letting it know we're here. Now that's beautiful to me.
On the 24th at 129AM JR asserts – as best I can tell from the grammatical problems – that all the studies he knows-of indicate “that sex abuse in childhood can make the victims extremely promiscuous”.
First, he gives us not even a single ‘study’ from his apparently sizable compendium of studies. Does it not occur to Abuseniks to offer supportive corroboration or are they somehow predisposed (for whatever reasons) against providing supportive corroboration?
Second, (presuming the existence and integrity of this or that ‘study’) there is that hugely important subjunctive mood of the verb: “can” cause. Which scientifically does little to guarantee or definitively establish causality (as the authors of the Dutch Abuse Report realized and stated, and as I have discussed more than once in prior comments).
As to JR’s self-report of promiscuity, let the readership consider as it may.
How “I wanted love but didn’t get it” can be connected to alleged abuse (especially as JR has related the incident) is anybody’s guess. He notes he didn’t get “therapy” although he has also said on many occasions here that there is nothing the Church can do for ‘victims’.
And it remains for readers to consider as a general question: is it probable that one or two instances (including no classically-defined penetrative rape, we recall) could create such utterly life-derailing consequences? The Victimist psychological mantra to deal with this type of question is to claim that any type of ‘sexual abuse’ (anywhere on the spectrum from touching to classically-defined penetrative rape) can (or perhaps the more excitable Victimists will claim ‘does’ or even ‘must’) cause profound, permanent or semi-permanent, wide-ranging and pervasive life-wrecking derangements.
Which already-dubious claim is then adopted by persons looking to explain their life-issues along this track: a) I was sexually abused; b) that predictably and automatically caused all the problems that I have had in my since the moment it happened; c) before which I was doing pretty well or even better.
And then, of course, in the Stampede, under the aegis of the Anderson Strategies, we would have to add: d) I can’t prove it but e) I should get ‘compensated’. And at this point somewhere between 11 and 12 thousand allegants have taken in 3 or so billion dollars (yes, minus tortie fees and expenses).
Thus JR’s characteristic concluding ‘victimization’ plaint remains unsupported and open to question on numerous levels. And the indictment of the “people in the pews” and “the prelates who knew everything” ditto. (Although there’s an uncharacteristically graceful stylistic and rhetorical balance and symmetry in that concluding sentence.)
No es me jobo. I aint the one paid to be here. I'm here for truth's sake and maybe for a little justice for the injured. Easy things to do. If you wanted to.
To be in a commited relationship trust is required when I was harmed my ability to trust was destroyed and along with it relationships for me.
It's called hyper vigilence always on alert never relaxed. Not exactly a place of respite, a safe harbor for another person.
Publion January 23, 2014 at 11:03 pm,
You said it yourself near the beginning of your post. ". . . in considering the ‘story’ we move from the legal forum to the personal and public forums."
In that post, I moved on from the legal forum, certainly the criminal legal forum. In the criminal court the evidentiary standards are rightly high (relative, of course, to the seriousness of the crime). Evidence, statute of limitations, state/commonwealth willing to prosecute, alleged victim willing to testify – many things need to come together in order to pursue criminal actions. With respect to catholic clergy sex abuse, criminal actions have been rare.
Civil actions have different and lower evidentiary requirements from/than the criminal. Jeff Anderson innovated in this area by suing dioceses/bishops in tort for fraud. That is one way to get to the personnel documents. The employer of the priest, in assigning or reassigning the priest to a parish, represents to the parish/parishioners that the priest is fit and safe and celibate. When the pastor and/or the bishop knows that the priest is not any one of the three, that is a misrepresentation. That is fraud. The personnel files often times prove the fraud by proving the knowledge. Liability and money are at stake in the civil case, not freedom from jail, and thus evidentiary standards, among other things, are different .
Different still, are the rules of evidence of those of us in our ordinary personal and public forums. We, the public, can watch the video that Jaime made and choose not to care about the privacy violation. We just take the information for what it is worth. Courts cannot do that. Employers, generally, can also, for example, view the video and make employment decisions based upon the information therein. In the same way, an employer can choose to believe an accuser over an accused just based on their stories alone. The employer can then take action.
This concept is obvious in the church context where a bishop/archbishop/cardinal, just say bishop, is told by a pastor of a parish that a priest has been accused by a parent of sexually molesting her minor son. The pastor tells the bishop that while the accusation could be true, there is no proof that it is true. The accused priest admits to knowing the boy and spending time in various activities alone with the boy but denies the accusation. The bishop removes the accused priest from the parish and then informs the accuser's family in order to defuse the situation. The boy and his family do not want anyone to know about this matter because they are embarrassed and the church and the priest do not want to compromise the church's or the priest's reputation unfairly. The priest is reassigned to another parish. The same scenario plays out a second time without any meaningful variation. Now, what do you do as the bishop or the pastor?
These circumstances are what cumulatively create the obligation for the bishop or pastor to act in the interest of the parishioners by removing the priest from the job and by informing the next employer and/or parishioners about the reason for reassignment or dismissal. This information cannot be kept secret and the priest presented in the course of his employment as OK – fit for the job, safe, and celibate. Circumstances come about and reach a point quickly where one cannot reasonably continue to reassign or employ this person without acknowledging and acting upon the cumulative effect the accusations.
And, in the case of the possible sexual abuse of a minor, do people need to act like it is an 'emergency'? Yes. Just like you would act if your house MIGHT be on fire. The situation is serious for everybody and the consequences of doing nothing could be devastating.
"The Media Report" supports this young lady. Who is a victi. As they should. If she had been raped by a Catholic priest, "The Media Report" would be attacking her.
That is a blatantly false statement. If you are, in fact, a "True Catholic", you should know better. Why are you always attacking the Catholic Church? This site is about media bias against the Church and ALL of its clergy/faithful. It is very well presented here. There are many examples where this continues to occur. Your comments in the past under "True Catholic" are always the same no matter what has occurred. It is safe to say that you don't read the news pieces and just spout the same venom in different ways.
I would change your name. The sign you use is very misleading.
The Media Report does not attack victims
Josie you don't know that True Catholic isn't one, a true catholic. Josie are you just another frog in the chorus? Nobody is attacking you. And certainly not your church, or your religion.
What punishment would normal nonreligious abusers get compared to what priests and bishops have received as punishment. On the whole they haven't paid at all on any level you choose.
Jesus Josie, try not to go into hysteric fits over things that haven't happened. It makes you sound like a clack leader.
.JR-I normally try to ignore you, especially when you unnecessarily bud in, trying to defend a dopey comment. No hysterics here.. "True Catholic" posts one liners every once in awhile here, She really doesn't read the material (actually, you miss some as well) and resembles posters elsewhere that claim that they are "true", "disillusioned", "lapsed", "reformed" whatever flavor of the week catholic they can sign on as. It is really pointless for her/him to chime in just for the sake of being here. And yet, you are just as dopey with your 'go girl' cheer. What's the point of her making the blatantly untrue remarks about media report?
I remember her prior one liners. Look them up. Ridiculous.
First, apologies for the double-posting of my comment of the 24th at 1024AM – I think that’s my fault and not the site or ISP.
‘True Catholic’ posts on the 24th at 209PM. We see once again the standard Playbook bit: to question is to attack.
LDB posts on the 24th at 139PM.
LDB apparently was not referring to the legal forum, but to the personal and public forums. OK, although I noted in my comment of the 23rd at 1103PM that the forums are – in practice – dynamically interrelated: to influence the personal and the public forums may well create a dynamic pressure on the legal forum. In actuality they are not completely isolated from each other, although for conceptual purposes they can in that limited way be discussed separately.
LDB is correct to point out that the evidentiary standards are lower for civil cases (i.e. lawsuits). However, in the Catholic Abuse Matter a) there have been far more settlements out-of-court than there have been civil trials, and b) we are blocked here by the secrecy protocols so often required by the torties on behalf of their Plaintiffs. This does nothing to enhance the credibility of those settled-claims and the allegations involved, and indeed raises the probability that they may not have been credible even by civil-lawsuit evidentiary standards. But it was the legal genius of the Anderson Strategies that ‘bundled lawsuits’ would still preclude actual trials (as I have discussed several times recently).
There have not been, to my knowledge (which is not complete), any successful trials for fraud in this Matter. And the ‘bundled lawsuit’ strategy – again – would also remain a key and active factor in preventing such trials and, instead, obtaining the out-of-court settlement either at the insistence of the Insurers or defense counsel or both.
But I will say that it would be a very good thing indeed if Ordinaries were more aware of their implied responsibility to guarantee the competence of the clergy whom they assign (and ordain). Which seems now to be the case, if the number of non-historical and ‘fresh’ or ‘recent’ allegations is any indicator.
LDB is correct that individual citizens and the ‘public’ (in the forum of public opinion) are not bound by legal-level evidentiary parameters. But a) if individuals or the public generally get into the habit of making judgments without exercising some amount of what the universities call ‘critical thinking’ then things can degrade rather quickly. Which would b) become even more acute a problem if the media also indulged themselves in such non-critical assessment and thinking. As we have seen in the Anderson Strategies and in the Stampede.
Employers may have more leeway, but one needs to recall that without substantial evidence an employer acting on a ‘hunch’ can him/herself become the target of legal action taken in response by the terminated employee. Of course, if there is something as clear as a video ‘confession’ then that would change matters, but aside from the present video ‘evidence’ that is the topic of this TMR article, I don’t recall many such outright instances of sufficient ‘evidence’ to justify acting-on that hunch.
A Bishop nowadays so informed by a pastor (in the example LDB proffers in the paragraph beginning “This concept is obvious in the church context … “) would probably – if I understand the current Church protocols – be bound to relieve the priest of duties pending further investigation and also bound to notify the civil law enforcement authorities (which, one would hope, the parent(s) would also have done). I am not sure that – in the allegation of a crime being committed – any adult (even a parent) would be justified in claiming that ‘embarrassment’ prevents their own reporting to the civil authorities. I am not certain if parents are not also ‘mandated reporters’ in all of the various applicable State laws nowadays; were they not, then that would indicate a gap in the law that should be addressed by legislators (unless they had considered that and for whatever reason(s) decided to exempt parents from that legal responsibility).
Ditto the following paragraph beginning “These circumstances …” – all of this material describes, if I am rightly informed, the principle now erected into official Church protocols in such instances.
I also agree with the use of the term “employment” here in referring to the priest: as I said in prior comments, I am pleased to see the Church conceive of its responsibility in a manner more akin to other professional practitioner guilds such as doctors and lawyers.
LDB then furthers the thought on my use of the ‘emergency’ image. I would respond as follows. First, my concern is with the passage of laws and the inflaming of public opinion on the pretext of an ‘emergency’ that would putatively override fundamental legal principles and basic principles of justice in regard to the accused. Second, I would not say that the analogy of a house on fire is sufficient to cover the actualities in this type of situation: would one refrain from calling the authorities (the Fire Department, in the analogy of the burning house) simply because one might feel ‘embarrassed’ that one has had one’s house catch fire?
Rather, this would be a report of a suspected crime. If one’s child came home and said that the parish priest had just strong-armed him/her and taken his/her laptop, would the parent not immediately call the police rather than the Bishop?
In this sense, there is an ‘emergency’, but one that can indeed be handled quickly through proper official channels (911, in this case).
My concern is that the dynamic of ‘emergency-ism’ has been deployed in the Stampede for the purpose of overriding usual formal procedures (calling the authorities). This, as I have said, is not a dynamic that originated with the Anderson Strategies; it is a dynamic that was introduced earlier by Victimist pressure to create the acute public sense of a crisis that demanded both a) action against individuals and b) the weakening of established societal procedures for ascertaining guilt or innocence and simply presuming guilt. And before that, it was a dynamic that wad deployed – on various pretexts – to override all legal safeguards, by manipulating the public into accepting such derangement of law and fundamental legal principles because of an ‘emergency’ (one of the Third Reich’s laws was actually dubbed ‘the Emergency Law’, i.e that there is an ‘emergency’ so great that all good Germans will indubitably accept the necessity of the government (and the public) acting without regard for due-process and fundamental legal principles). The dynamic remains the same.
I would be happy to insist that everyone – parents as well as administrators, be they in a clerical or lay organization, should take all allegations seriously and act accordingly. I think that term – and one can add some adverbial oomph to it such as ‘very seriously’ if one prefers – accurately conveys the sense of urgency necessary in this type of allegation or suspicion without heading into the danger-laden territory conveyed by the term ‘emergency’.
As for trawling back for a period of decades in order to apply today’s new standards of concern to a prior era, I have some serious reservations. Evidence degrades (such as it may have been), memories are susceptible to degrading (and susceptible to unwitting or even deliberate manipulation), and attitudes and approaches and priorities and awareness change in all of the forums – individual, public, and legal. Retrogressive and historical campaigns are subject to all manner or evidentiary difficulties, and those difficulties carry with them noxious consequences that may be overlooked in the excitement and frisson of such campaigns.
And – as I have said here – it gets individuals and the public used to some very bad habits of uncritical thinking and of acting upon insufficient justification and upon insufficient grounds.
There are those who would immediately say that the damage caused by such possible assaults in the past is more than sufficient justification, but I would strongly disagree. First, there are far too many difficulties and toxic consequences for any such widespread approach to work without creating serious derangement in all three forums. Second, there is no way of determining – especially long after the fact – what damage was caused by the alleged assault and what was not caused by it but rather was ascribable to other factors.
So the ‘present’ can indeed be handled, and even handled better than the ‘past’ handled it. But there is no general way to go back and – with demonstrable justification – try to address a ‘past’ that saw and did things differently (and perhaps less efficaciously than the present).
NotTrueCatholic's comment is silly in comparing the Carillo case to the typical 'case' against a Catholic priest.
1. Carillo isn't suing anybody- no motive by this victim other than to protect other minors at risk today, and hopefully she secured some sense of justice for herself.
2. Carillo procured and documented a confession from her perp.
3. Carillo isnt using government or media resources to vilify an entire occupation/vocation or class of people (eg. Catholic priests) – she targeted her perp with no political agenda, and then went and nailed her.
No Comparison, and, the public school system is still totally unaccountable, as opposed to the Church.
Are there any 'victim activist/watchdog groups' being interviewed by the msm for these public sector minor abuse cases? No, I dont think so.
Did you see the msm break this story? No, I dont think so.
Go True Catholic!
Josie, i never said. "Go girl" to or about True Catholic.
Don't you see how your prejudices color your arguments?
I said "Go True Catholic." "Girl" was never used by me nor did I ever indicate gender. I neither know nor care what True Catholic's gender may be. What ever gender she/he is she/he is neither nuts nor hysterically shouting "Catholic haters" at people who aren't interested enough in your religion to bother to hate it. IMHO.
P.S. Gurl was a middle ages term (that became the word girl) which was used to describe both teenaged males and females. FYI
Shawn on Jan 24 said, "The Media Report does not attack victims."
Really? It's created a forum where victims are attacked regularly usually starting with the line. "You have no proof you are victims". And the answer is "You have no proof we are not."
I and other victims did not invent our abuse. We tell you the truth of what happened to us. There maybe fraudulent accusors but they aren't posting here.
We, victims, were presumed liars; fraudsters; scam artists; felonious criminals by P.;D. and Josie from the jump.
I wouldn't exactly equate their behavior to a welcome wagon. Would you?
And you can question anyone about our accusations. We answer. But to presume we are lying with out knowing us or what happened to us is wrong.
Why don't you ask your hierarchs to explain our abuse. They know the whole story from all angles. Demand they release all the info. They have it all..
And ask them when they propose to compensate their real victims?
http://www.bishop-accountability.org/news2007/07_08/2007_07_11_Foley_CourtAbuse.htm
WI fraud cases start in 2007. For fraud, the SoL starts to run only when the fraud is discovered and then goes for six years.
You have it backwards on confidentiality agreements. The church, the diocese more precisely, asked for confidentiality not the tort lawyers or victims.
Legally mandated reporters are people in professional positions of particular authority and responsibility, not parents generically.
In apparent response to my point (the 24th, 1024AM) that although he has portentously referred to all of the studies which he has read, he hasn’t thought to provide any references to even one such study, JR responds (the 24th at 722PM).
He claims it is not his job (“no es me jobo” – apparently hoping to deflect the negative impact of his assertion here by some sort of mock or pidgin Hispanic imitation that is apropos of nothing; perhaps he even imagines himself being humorous).
He then claims that he isn’t “the one paid to be here” – thereby implying that people who do provide references are “paid to be here” (and, apparently, therefore don’t deserve any corroborative evidence, thus absolving himself further from his omission). We recall a variation of this trope when he deployed it earlier on the site: that while he and “Dennis” have only their “wits” on which to rely, yet these two heroic paragons are up against the highest-paid PR resources on the planet.
Then – marvelously – that he is “here for truth’s sake and maybe for a little justice for the injured”. Although corroboration of claims apparently don’t qualify as working in the service of “truth”, or at least not any “truth” JR wants to play with. Which doesn’t do anything to burnish the impression that he is strongly-grounded in any sort of “truth” at all (unless the word is defined out of any substance whatsoever).
Then – with an obvious ambiguity – we are told that they are “easy things to do”, which might refer to looking up studies along the lines JR claims or which – distractingly – might refer to that “justice for the injured” bit (which reveals the retreat to the Wiggy high-ground that he apparently expects will absolve him of any responsibility to back up his already-shaky assertion about all of the studies he claims he has read or will at least distract readers from his original omission and subsequent defense of it).
And does he then wonder why he and his material don’t seem to be well-received or even believed here, except by other Abuseniks?
Of course, since he responded to both instances of that accidentally double-posted comment of mine, we are also welcome to further sample his wares in his comment of a few minutes earlier (the 24th at 716PM).
He is “an artist baby” [expletive symbols omitted]. Which I would say nicely reveals a great deal about how the Abusenik Playbook works: it’s ‘art’, and so whatever is in the mind of the artist is that artist’s ‘personal truth’ and once the artist has created that ‘personal truth’ then the rest of the world need only admire it. (Art critics, I imagine, are not invited to the gallery for the showing and the party.) I could certainly go along with ‘artful’, and I would say this term even more accurately captures what’s going on.
Then in the next riff we are transported dizzily to the empyrean: “when one tells the truth … the universe echoes”. Charming, but we actually had been looking for some corroboration for that bit of earth-bound truth he claimed he had read so much about, as he originally claimed.
And the rest of the comment follows on that riff, reminding me of nothing so much as the vapid verbalizations at a Sixties midnight bong session.
And that’s all we get.
"No es me jobo" still holds sunshine. You want to play college professor you go right ahead. Not interested here.
[edited by moderator]
In regard to LDB's comment of the 24th at 903PM:
First, the link to B-A gives us an article reporting that a court decided that persons may sue for fraud within certain parameters. As I had mentioned, I am not familar with any actual lawsuits based (at least in some part) on an alleged fraud.
Second, as we have seen in prior comments here, federal judge Schiltz has revealed the extent to which secrecy agreements are demanded by the Plaintiffs/torties and not by the Church. Having completed his/her review of the worldwide abuse documents in the released caches, LDB may want to catch up on record of comments and information contained on this site.
And in regard to the exclusion of parents from the legally-mandated reporting requirement, I would say again that such an exclusion – in whatever State's laws it occurs – is odd, when you consider it. Surely parents should be the most 'mandated' of all, since they are in so close a position to any alleged victim. Why would legislators exclude them? This is an area of the overall Abuse Matter (not just the Catholic variant) that needs further analysis and exploration.
And, of course, the silence of parents in the eidesis or imagined-scenario of the Catholic Abuse Matter as envisioned by the Abuseniks is stunning. The Abuseniks claim on the one hand that a crime is a crime in any era, yet if that is so then shouldn't the parents have called the police on their own? Or, if they called the Bishop and saw no satisfactory results after a reasonable amount of time, then called the police? Or at least a lawyer?
Is 'embarrassment' a sufficient excuse? Did they not sense that the story they were told was an 'emergency'? And if not, why not?
There are various possible answers to each of these questions, to be sure. But at the end of the day, the silence of the parents remains a gravid area of analysis.
I may be reaching here; but P, have you no ability to empathize?
Shame is huge in victims.
Why did he pick me to rape? What did I do that let this bastard think he could do this to me? If I tell my parents. Will they believe me or their religious leader? Will anyone believe me? After all, he's a grown up and I'm a kid.
Am i gay ? Does he think I'm gay? Will i become gay?
Parents, if told and who believe their child, wonder should they report this to the police? Will this destroy my child? Will he/she be harmed by having to testify? How can i make this all go away? Let's just pretend it never happened? And on and on
There goes some more of that misogyny directed at Josie for some ungodly reason. She's 'hysterical, in fits and a clack leader', all bigoted remarks directed at her gender, not her words or concepts. After all, bigotry aways serves to simply reduce you to that element of your entirety that is being singled out and identifed as the subject for your hatred.
This only matters here because bigots usually harbor a guild of hatreds - they're seldom single-issue bigots. We seem to be experiencing a couple here whose 'hate guild' includes hatreds for Catholics, women, and capitalists/conservatives/libertarians – to name just a few 'hate-targets' so far identified. I am sure more hates will be revealed as they get emboldened, and continue to slip up.
On another topic, the majority of the male gay community must have been abused by priests when they were teenagers because they en masse appear to be practicing 'hypervigilance' in their infamously and notoriously anonymous and highly sexualized lives. Because, as we all know, 'stranger sex' in the park is far 'safer' than the loving [complimentary] intimacy experienced within a loving, committed monogamous relationship/authenthic marriage.
Other dialogue here seems to be surrounding certain 'artists' declarations. My observation is that this is where Publion's 'plop' application is strongest since this particular 'artist' excels at emitting or contributing the type of 'plop' singular to the male ungulates. While on the 'plop' topic, it doesn't require hitting water to make the 'plopping' sound, as was claimed in a prior comment – anyone familiar with many ungulates and all equines knows that the 'plop' sound occurs when the manure pile hits the ground every time (not to get bogged down in more BS than that which we have to contend here on a daily basis).
Hysteria, contrary to the Angriest Catholic in the World's own sexist view point, is not limited to any particular gender. He is hysterical in everything he posts and he says he's a man.
I will take a shot in the dark and believe that "True Catholic" of 1/24 at 2:09 is one who believes in the Roman Catholic faith and can see the wrong doings of the catholic church and its clergy members.
However, we once again we read the two cents of Josie if we wish to choose to respect what she has to say.
So lets put aside Lynn, Avery, Engelhardt and Shero, and look at the two most recent cases from Pennsylvania, one of a priest who has admitted guilt to groping an individual and second another priest who has plead guilty to a felony charge when he was found with a child in his car with no pants on.
JOSIE, who are the True Catholics ?
Can you even imagine what could have happened to that first priest if he groped the wrong person like a sexual abuse survivor ? Could he possibly came back with a bloody stump ?
Who would you scream was wrong Josie ?
I would say the person inflicting the violence was most wrong, Dennis. IMHO. Violence solves nothing. (And it allows for a tangential argument to ensue that bloodies ( almost literally) the debate.
I don't wish to get into a debate on imagined violence. It's not the issue. I want to continue to ask the faithful catholics here, When will you compensate all your corporate church's victims?
Regarding the majority of the lewd and lascivious and sometimes criminal behavior being perpetrated by priests, the sooner the ranks of the Catholic clergy are purged of its offending homosexuals, the better for both the Church and society. We already know that the Church is undertaking due diligence on this issue, but what about all the other non-Catholic institutions, both public and private?
I wish there were more bloodied stumps emerging from these assaults perpetrated by offending homosexuals, starting with those deserved wounds being delivered first by intended victims capable of fighting back, to their parents and other family members (where are their fathers, brothers, uncles, etc.?), to their community support groups and organizations (teachers, police, scout leaders, neighbors, coaches, etc.).
There was a time when an attack on a child or minor would have a elicited a 'street justice' response, at which time, it would have been in the perps own best interest to either voluntarily (and quickly) turn himself over to the authorities for protection, or flee the neighborhood rather than face his summary justice punishment.
It is a fact that these disgusting sex crimes against children and women (actually currently promoted by the prevailing entertainment industry and other artists) were rare in certain neighborhoods where the men (who were still present and relevent in both the family and community) simply did not tolerate such activity, and were not prone to look to others to solve their family's or community's temporary 'blight'. Replacing men in the family and community with the state is in large part responsible for the prevalence of these crimes against minors.
Of course, I am no advocate of vigilantism (repeat that for those here who wrestle with words, context, sentences, concepts) when there is a working (legal, honest, effective) alternative being offered by the justice system. But, if you are being advised to act as though a minor at risk (no longer true in the Church, but, true everywhere else) is an "emergency" akin to a fire, perhaps a case could be made that a few 'examples' being made of these disgusting predators would serve the larger social/cultural problem, for which this particular matter seems to be at epidemic levels.
The progressive reactionaries, though, will most undoubtedly scream foul when the recipients of these community-based 'street justice' solutions (anywhere on the spectrum of removing them from their postions without due process to 'bloodied stumps') are found to be members of the government sanctioned 'protected classes'. The first time the injured perp cries 'bias' (i.e. "I am only being attacked because I am "whatever"), the conundrum of whether to support their 'protected class' member or their children will surface, as will the legal and activist vultures looking to 'compensate victims'. Let's never forget that there was a time when false claims against 'protected class' members was practiced, that which resulted in vigilantism – the history books are littered with these horrendous accounts.
And, this is why the progressives must insist that this child abuse matter is one about Catholic priests (as if there is something inherent in Catholic theology, morality, ethics, law or culture that promotes or protects such despicable actions) and not one about offending homosexuals. The PC crowd morphed their self-imposed conundrum of protecting children/minors vs. protecting homosexuals into their own form of vigilantism ('summary justice', 'street justice') against the Catholic Church.
Of course, it didn't hurt to have the usual merry band of antiCatholics (political and religious opposition in the public square, government and media) gleefully jump on the bandwagon for their own bigoted reasons to help 'the cause' along.
I hope the victims being created today, outside of the Church, are generous in their historical assessment of the whole miserable debacle. The backlash a few years down the road could be ugly.
"Lewd and lacivious" are words that seem to excite the Angriest catholic. Where as child rape doesn't seem to bother him/it at all.
So now angriest catholic blames the victims family and the abuser for the crimes committed against us. everyone but it's self and the hierarchy, Is guilty.
Let's cut to the truth. It's the money you care about not the injured people. If it wasn't that and the protection of an illusory facade that has never really been true. Is all you give a hoot about human beings who were harmed are the last and least on your list of issues here.
Here's an idea; how about having the Church cease doling out free money to 'God only knows who' (30B, and counting?) and let's give all the other organizations/institutions where minors are have been and are being abused today, starting with that den of wolves in the entertainment industry and art world and moving out into the public sector, where each and every one of these entities will be required to dole out their 30B each, you know, to make it fair/equitable- kind of like our very own version of addressing 'income inequality'? Why, we could put the UN in charge of dispensing those funds, once their done fixing our football team names.
Is there anybody or anything the angriest catholic in the world likes?
When will you compensate the people you've harmed? Any over all plan to do that or does reparation have to be pried from your greedy hands?
Now ACW (angriest catholic in the world) is coming up with a 30 billion dollar figure?. When did 3 billion become 30 billion? Talk about transubstanciation! If $30 billion is what you owe your victims then $30 billion should be paid to your victims. god knows you have it.
Correction: Two errors in one posting of mine: $3B instead of $30B, and it should have been "they're" instead of "their".
Other than that, I am enjoying the ranting and rolling that will eventually knock the resident self-proclaimed Communist/Atheist loon off the left side of the planet.
Am I mistaken or wasn't I recently 'excommunicated' by this commenter?
A 'big' question was raised, though, that deserves further exploration; "There may be fraudulent accusors but they aren't posting here".
How can we tell the difference between the fraud victims and the real victims if nothing more than one's 'word' is required?
Just wondering how that works in China, North Korea, Cuba and the rest of Shangri-La?
And when do you plan to compensate your catholic victims? Before or after you "knock me off the planet"?
ACW should keep her/ his violence to themselves. No one need be harmed.
The ranting never stops. No peace. No calm. No respect. No one who is uncompensated compensated. And no demand to compensate.
And why exactly am I supposed to believe you know "the way the truth and the light"?
Sure don't see any behavior here that would recomend your faith as a step up. Particularly from 3 people.
That's only 3 out of millions of catholics but why are they posting here with their hate filled rants? How do they emulate Jesus?
How does that behavior end your problems?
I'm an American ACW. Maybe you've heard of America? You know home of the free and the brave?
You may consider me one of the free and the brave.
Free enough to hold my Marxist views and brave enough in this capitalist wet dream, that's drowning you, to tell you that I hold them.
So ACW can rant away doing it's imitation of Joe McCarthy and or Billie Donahue. The big question is, when will you compensate your noncompensated catholic victims? You know all those real victims, when? Any idea?
We are informed by JR (the 26th, 1117AM) that his little fake-Spanish phrase ‘no es me jobo’ “still holds sunshine” – whatever that may mean; but the vagueness is, I will say, a giveaway to the visceral awareness that somehow the phrase actually doesn’t do that at all.
Then – marvelously – while JR then goes on to set up the show such that I am ‘playing’ at being “college professor” (apparently because I think or question; and does not-thinking result in some sort of ‘worker-bee honesty and forthrightness’, like in the old Stalinist social schematics?) – he has just given us a few minutes before (the the 26th, 1104AM) a very obscure and archaic medieval linguistic usage (“gurl”).
See, if Abuseniks toss-in obscure and archaic medieval linguistic usages that just means they are actually very smart and not merely ranting whackjobs and therefore can be confidently believed no matter what they claim; whereas if ‘non-believers’ think clearly and use language properly and point out valid conceptual or historical elements, that just proves they are effete bourgeois non-worker poseurs, who, come the revolution, will be sent to re-education camps, no doubt. (But we weren’t supposed to have noticed all this clanky machinery behind the thought.)
On the 27th at 1220PM he asks (neat bit: he blushes demurely that he “may be reaching here”) if I “have … no ability to empathize?”. This is not “reaching” – this is throwing up the same old stuff that I have answered before; so the state-of-the-question has long ago moved-on in regard to this particular bit. Specifically, I have said that a) if ‘empathy’ means not-questioning, then his question is already off-base and cannot be answered because (in the English language) ‘empathy’ and ‘not-questioning’ are not synonymous. But we see here again the linguistic and conceptual shell-game so vital to the Abusenik and Stampede Game: love me, love my story, and if not, not.
And b) – and again – I am not going to deploy ‘empathy’ in a situation where i) it is not established that ‘empathy’ (especially if it is supposed to include ‘not-questioning’) is appropriate and where ii) there are a number of other possible explanations or explanatory factors involved. (About which, more below.)
He then tosses-up (and, but of course, without further conceptual explication or explanation) the Victimist and Abusenik mantra that “shame is huge in victims”. But as I have said before, if one has had a crime committed against one, does one not-call the authorities? Does one not-report being robbed or assaulted because one is ‘ashamed’ or “embarrassed”? Does one not-call the Fire Department because one is ‘ashamed’ or “embarrassed” that one’s house has caught on fire?
But this particular gambit was vitally necessary to the Victimist and Abusenik game-plan (especially when incorporated into the Anderson Strategies) in order to provide some sort of ‘scientific’ fig-leaf and ‘explanation’ for the fact that so many allegations were being made so many decades after the alleged crime was committed and were seriously lacking in evidence; in order to absolve the allegants of having to respond-to the very un-congenial line of questioning: why did you wait so very long to report this? (And, of course, one possible alternative – if un-congenial – explanation to that is: back then, society generally did not take so strong a position on ‘sexual abuse’, or did not define ‘rape’ to include just about any sexual-encounter (real or claimed), and that ‘society’ included police, media, and even parents – presuming that one even told them.)
And because, of course, one other alternative explanation to “shame” being the reason for the delay is that it wasn’t until much later that the Anderson Strategies had provided a legal vehicle whereby one could rather easily sign-on for a big payout without a) having to provide much in the way of proof, b) having a living (or at least mentally-compos) defendant to refute one’s story, or c) running much risk of being prosecuted oneself if one were discovered to have sworn-to a false claim and perhaps having collected monies on that basis.
And then this “shame” also works to neutralize any substantive questioning at all, at any point in the present or future, because to do so will merely re-victimize (by re-shaming) the allegant all over again.
Thus we get the situation where a person publicly claims X and legally demands to be ‘compensated’ for X through the deployment of the Sovereign Coercive Authority of the state, but doesn’t want-to (or perhaps even putatively ‘cannot’) really talk about the story of X that putatively ‘justifies’ the claim.
And the solution for that problem – as Anderson saw and as we have seen deployed even here in recent Abusenik comments – is to enlist the (drama-hungry and secularist) media to so sway and manipulate public opinion that the public will presume that any such story is true … and thus neatly any ‘un-empathic’ necessity for examining the stories and claims and allegations is (in this theory) eliminated.
How have we learned so much about airliner safety in the past decades? By carefully and painstakingly examining every crash to find out what went wrong and what didn’t work right and what needed to be fixed. Was that ‘re-victimzing’ the airlines by making them go back and examine the incident in minute detail?
Of course, it can be asserted that one cannot re-victimize an airline in that way. One can only victimize or re-victimize persons. But will the persons themselves not want the causes of the incident to be addressed? Would allegants not want their stories highly-publicized and examined in order to contribute substantively to the correction of the claimed problem?
And the answer to that question is that Yes they want their stories and claims and allegations to be highly-publicized but No they don’t want their stories and claims and allegations to be actually examined.
And that’s one of the key disconnects in the Stampede, and one that has enabled the Thing to roll along for as long as it has.
Thus the numerous questions JR poses about his own claimed experience serve simply to remind us that they have numerous alternative possible explanations (which we have, to his great irritation, looked at before, especially last summer when the personnel files of his ‘perp’ were released).
But he then also proffers some reasons why parents might choose not to report any story they were told to the police (this proffer must also share conceptual space with the possibility that the allegant did not even tell his/her parents in the way-back in the first place). Well, parents who were told and chose not to report to the authorities then created a problem for the justicial procedures, i.e. there was no report on the basis of which to deploy established legal procedures and praxis. That was an inevitable consequence of their decision to not-report.
But – decades later, in so very many of these Catholic abuse cases – it became more congenial to make all these claims and allegations and tell all these stories publicly, and even to create actionable ‘space’ in the legal forum (the Anderson Strategies were at work here). But how to make hay off decades-old non-reported incidents?
To do that, established legal principles and procedures had to be profoundly weakened in order to a) create practical civil and criminal legal ‘space’ for these almost evidence-less claims and in order to b) create the performative illusion that if this and that and another claim were settled, then probably any other similar claims were true and accurate and deserved to be believed too. And thus the Stampede as we know it.
Thus the public and personal forums were induced into a presumption-of-guilt which then migrated into the legal/judicial forum where those established legal principles and procedures actually then were profoundly weakened – creating a symphony (or cacophony) of mutually reinforcing presumptions and – as well – billions in pay-out monies to the story-tellers, which also then served as an alluring beacon to more persons.
To borrow from Gilbert and Sullivan: “It was managed by a job – and a good job too!”
And thus, as JR accidentally reveals, this Thing could go on “and on and on” – because there was no longer any reality-principle that could limit the’ creativity’ and ‘artistry’ of the claims and allegations and the tactical artistry of the torties who realized what a bonanza Anderson had opened-up for them. There was, as there was in the many recent collapses of financial Bubbles, a “collapse of public fact” and as a substitution for that collapsed-fact – the introduction and amplification of stories and claims and (for the financial types) bubbly optimistic assertions and predictions.
On the 27th at 1155AM JR opines on the comment by ‘Shawn’ that “The Media Report does not attack victims”.
JR characterizes things thusly: TMR has “created a forum where victims are attacked regularly …” (the rest seems incoherent in light of the rest of that paragraph). We see here again that raising questions is – in the Abusenik dictionary – synonymous with ‘attacking’. This hyperbole, as I have said before, is a vitally necessary element in the Playbook: by its exaggeration it serves to distract from the actual substance of the issue (i.e. that questions are simply being raised about the credibility and probability of this or that assertion, story, allegation, or claim).
And once again JR raises the bit that if victims have “no proof” that they are victims then his answer to that is that nobody has proof that they are not victims. (Note also that JR casts the statement in the 2nd person, personalizing what is essentially a conceptual matter – but that too is essential to the Playbook: a story-teller has to ‘keep it personal’ precisely to a) avoid the conceptual and b) keep open the path to the usual high-ground about being ‘personally’ victimized (and/or re-victimized) by the (conceptual) questions. )
But as I have said many times: it is a not matter of ‘proof’ so much as it is a matter of credibility and probability. And if the stories and claims and allegations suffer from the outset by the fact that there is no proof or evidence to support them, then they suffer even more vividly and demonstrably from the various contortions and gambits that Abuseniks deploy to try to avoid that problem – all of which do nothing to enhance the now-vitally necessary elements of the credibility of the story-teller and the probability of the story.
Thus the yet-again asserted double-claim that “I and other victims did not invent our abuse” has to be taken for what it is: an unsupported assertion by an interested Party.
Ditto the assertion that “there maybe [sic] fraudulent abusers but they aren’t posting here”: how can JR possibly and credibly make that assertion? How does he have proof of the veracity and credibility of any other Abuseniks who post here? Or has he merely presumed it as a matter of personal choice and now expects that personal choice to somehow create a demand on the rest of the readership as well?
Nor has anybody been “presumed” to be “liars; fraudsters; scam artists; felonious criminals” – in my own comments I have simply pointed out disconnects and discrepancies and assorted other aspects that have to be dealt-with convincingly in order for any credibility to be legitimately established. And the Abuseniks have done none of that, and instead have deployed the wide array of Playbook gambits that they have demonstrated so often here.
He bleats that this is not evidence of a “welcome wagon” on this site. Well, what did he expect? This is a site dedicated to the examination of the Catholic Abuse Matter; it’s not a support-chat-room for persons who have all mutually agreed to believe each other with no questions asked and instead proffer each other sympathetic and empathetic clucks and awwwwws. I imagine that there are plenty of such sites on the Web; and if JR chose to comment here – at an examination site and not a support-site – then that’s his decision. But he can’t then claim he gets no ‘support’ and ‘empathy’ as if he were being denied something he might legitimately have expected. Readers here, on that score, might legitimately have expected commenting that embraced rationality, coherence, and credibility. So who, really, is being ‘victimized’ here?
As for the assertion that we “can question anyone [among the Abuseniks, presumably] about our accusations” and “we answer” – the record here is replete with examples of non-responsive ‘answers’.
I did not being commenting on this site with any ‘presumptions’ as to the credibility of anyone. I have serious reservations for quite some time, but only after reading hefty doses of Playbook gambits submitted in Abusenik comments on this site almost immediately. But therefore it is not accurate at all to claim that a) doubts engendered by doubt-creating comments equate with b) presumptions that were somehow supposed to have existed before the encounter with the myriad of doubt-creating comments. By this point now today, any reader who hadn’t commented may have reviewed the record of commenting on this site and formulated his/her own doubts on the basis of reading that material, but that doesn’t at all equate to the reader having come to the site from the get-go with any presumptions and fore-drawn conclusions.
Then the effort to distract from those formidable issues and suggest that readers “ask your hierarchs to explain our abuse” (which “abuse”, of course, hasn’t been demonstrably shown to exist in any of the specific cases we have seen, and perhaps in all probability doesn’t exist in some or even many other stories as well).
And the wrap is – again with no demonstration of JR’s presumed ‘facts’ – to rhetorically inquire as to “when [the hierarchs] propose to compensate their real victims”. And we’re back to square-one all over again. As usual.
You are so delussional . You don't see your ad hominums as attacks?
When will your hierarchs compensate their victims? Surely there are enough proven cases against the church to require your own commitee be set up to help victims. Every government around the world that's set up hearings in regards to your victims has found your hierarchy responsibile for these crimes. Every government including the vatican. So…..?
popes Francis and Benedict didn't apologize to us victims for nothing, you know.
You know I hardly read anything you write P. Maybe if you respected your readership including your oppisition, i would. You don't. I was raped. you don't believe it? Too f'ing bad.
"opposition", apologies.
News Flash: "P" probably isn't writing anything for the resident magpies edification – s/he's analyzing their tripe ('plop') for the rest of TMR – you know, those of us without an axe to grind against the Church and all Catholics. That is the segment of the TMR readership that has earned respect.
When did TMR agree to serve as any one indivduals personal soapbox- who cares about one's personal claim of 'rape' or whether or not it is believed here? Go away with your self-absorbed self, already, Mr. Wonderful. Bring something besides your-sorry-old-selves and tattered old grievances to the party.
Publion's analytical musings are excellent resources for the right-minded. We're not surprised that you don't get it.
I'm not a human being? I'm a magpie.
According to wikipedia a magpie is the only bird who can recognize itself in a mirror.
Can you recognize yourself in a mirror? Do you see what we see about you?
Whose edification is he writing for then? Howling they have no proof. Edifies who precisely? The fact that you got caught with our pants down is edifying to who exactly?