Contrasting Penn State’s Approach With the Catholic Church’s Approach to Its Own Sex Abuse Scandal

[LAGC]

How does one explain the stark difference between how Penn State has handled its child sex abuse cover-up scandal, and how the Catholic bishops handled theirs? I am going to take a page out of the book of the Framers of our Constitution, and suggest that the difference is all about organizational structure.

The Similarities Between the Catholic Church and Penn State Scandals

First, let me reiterate what has been said repeatedly by now: The Penn State cover-up scenario is similar to the Boston Archdiocese’s cover-up scenario, which we learned about ten years ago. In both cases, it was revealed that revered and powerful men knew about child sexual abuse that had been perpetrated by a colleague, yet failed to protect the children at issue.

In both scenarios, the perpetrator(s) were permitted to persist in their sexual assaults on children because their superiors failed to blow the whistle. They were all guilty of the same callous disregard for the wellbeing of the defenseless children who were being brutally subjugated and violated by one of their own.

But then the stories dramatically diverge.
..
..
In contrast, what was Penn State’s response to the publicity about its cover-up? In a matter of days, the Board of Trustees fired the powerful men who had failed children: Coach Joe Paterno and President Graham Spanier. These men were not wrapped in the protections of power. Rather, they were held publicly and painfully accountable. Their vaunted positions afforded them no comfort for their failures. Quite the contrary.
..
..
(more)

http://www.snapnetwork.org/the_penn_state_scandal

Read the whole article, it really is pretty damning.

For all their crimes at Penn State, Sandusky will likely spend the rest of his life behind bars. Paterno's career is over. The college president got sacked.

Yet there are still many abusive priests who have never -- and will never -- see so much as a day behind bars, and they are STILL being protected, in positions of power within the church, just exiled off elsewhere! And the high clergy (bishops on up) who enabled them? THEY ARE AS ENTRENCHED AND POWERFUL AS EVER!

Maybe it is really just an "organizational" thing, but organized religion brings out some of the worst traits of mankind -- corruption with a Godly stamp of approval on it. You can't get any bigger license to abuse without consequences than that!

[MarkCharles]

1. Recommended !

[Ikonoklast]

2. How many Catholics are on the Supreme Court?

Opus Dei Catholics, for that matter.


There is your answer.

[Hepburn]

6. Too many...

...in fact, more than one RW Christian (any faith) is one too many.

[DURHAM D]

3. Why the different reaction by Penn State.

Simple - Women were in the room. It changes everything. Its unfortunate they weren't present in the 90s.

[NMMNG]

4. ...

[JohnnyLib2]

5. Truly, that is a classic.

[Hepburn]

7. +1,000...n/t

[MarkCharles]

10. Pretty much sums it up n/t

[cleanhippie]

8. I would love to hear from some of our DU catholics on why they continue to support that institution.

Why they choose to continue to fill the pews and the coffers, implicitly condoning the behaviors of both the child-raping priests and the vile institution that hides and protects them.

[MarkCharles]

9. You are not alone in wanting to hear from them, but I doubt

there are any that will reply on this forum, somehow.

[Celebration]

12. Definitely NOT a Catholic here

But they have made a lot of changes as an institution due to the scandals. I am no apologist for the church and actually cringe at certain things about it.

But I honestly think that the fact that the Catholic Church went through all that it did had an influence on the Penn State Board of Trustees. They have been schooled as how to best deal with something like this. Had it not been for the Catholic Church crisis, I think they would have floundered. That is just my best guess, however.

[MarkCharles]

13. Penn State is one school of a few tens of thousands in one state. Perhaps

you are aware that the Roman Catholic church is a worldwide church and that currently, in so man other nations, the truths are still coming out, the reluctance to allow laws of democracies to prosecute preists is repeatedly denied. The list goes on and on.


Examples to prove my point:


Germany
Main article: Catholic sexual abuse scandal in Europe#Germany
In February 2010 Der Spiegel reported that more than 94 clerics and laymen have been suspected of sexual abuse since 1995, but only 30 of those suspects had actually been prosecuted because of legal time constraints on pursuing cases.


Malta
84 allegations had been made as of April 2010 and Lawrence Grech, one of many alleged victims complains that he was abused in an orphanage. Mr Grech complained in 2010 that the Church had been investigating cases for seven years without doing enough that is effective. The pope spoke to Mr Grech and approved his courage in coming forward. <31> <32> <33>-A Maltese court found that Fr Charles Pulis and Fr Godwin Scerri sexually abused children and sentenced the two men to six years and five years in prison respectively. The church regretted delays before there were proper investigations into the abuse and promised to defrock Fr Pulis


The Catholic sexual abuse scandal in Ireland is a major chapter in the worldwide Catholic sexual abuse scandal. Unlike the Catholic sexual abuse scandal in the United States, the scandal in Ireland included cases of high-profile Catholic clerics involved in illicit heterosexual relations as well as widespread physical abuse of children in the Catholic-run childcare network.
Starting in the 1990s, a series of criminal cases and Irish government enquiries established that hundreds of priests had abused thousands of children in previous decades. In many cases, the abusing priests were moved to other parishes to avoid embarrassment or a scandal, assisted by senior clergy. By 2010 a number of in-depth judicial reports had been published, but with relatively few prosecutions.
In March 2010, Pope Benedict XVI wrote a pastoral letter of apology to address all of the abuse that was carried out by Catholic clergy
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_Catholic_sex_abuse_cases_by_country

This cover-up and moving of holy men around isn't over.

[Celebration]

14. I meant the Catholics in the USA

are dealing with this pretty well now. The others worldwide, NO!

Of course, they were FORCED to deal with it. But, they do have lots of prevention systems in place now. Maybe they were dragged along kicking and screaming, but the Catholic Church today in the USA is probably safer than other churches, which often have their own covered up scandals.

Penn State wanted to get out in front of all this, and they did. They realized that they did NOT want to be dragged kicking and screaming. It would be more harmful to the institution.

[struggle4progress]

11. For various reasons, one should expect different profiles for sexual misconduct and sexual crimes

at large state universities and at large US catholic parishes

Neither the demographics, nor the standard social interactions, are immediately comparable. The opportunities for personal contact and exploitation differ significantly, as do the pressures that can be applied to force victim compliance in cases of harassment. Since the demographic profiles and social contexts differ, one should also expect victim profiles to differ, and one should expect the reasons victims do, or do not, come forward to differ also, with differing reasons as well that victimization allegations are, or are not, believed

Reliable data may be difficult to obtain, but a 2007 study indicated about 20% of the female undergraduates surveyed at two large universities said they experienced a sexual assault attempt since entering college, and about 5% they experienced a sexual assault since entering college; see The Campus Sexual Assault Study (pdf)

Other related issues on campuses include sexual pressure on students from faculty or sexual pressure on lower-level employees from higher-level employees. Again, good data is difficult to obtain

So I don't see how to do a meaningful comparison of "Penn State" and "the Catholic Church"

[trotsky]

15. Should those "different profiles" mean that in one institution, the perps remain free...

and often are given access to a fresh pool of new victims?

[struggle4progress]

16. The Penn State case seems to involve, in part, an incident nine years ago, and the university seems

to have been aware of it nine years ago but seems to have done rather little until very recently

That's all over the news, as far as I can tell

But the victim in that case is rather outside the usual at-risk demographic in a university setting

So the recent Penn State story might be good cause to think in somewhat broader terms and to wonder also whether there's a fuller story for the usual at-risk demographic in that setting

[darkstar3]

17. Oh look, another parry.

[trotsky]

18. Could you please answer my question?

Thanks!