Victims, reports say boards to review church abuse flawed

[trotsky]

https://apnews.com/66ffb032675b4e599eb77c0875718dd4

Facing thousands of cases of clergy sex abuse, U.S. Catholic leaders addressed their greatest crisis in the modern era with a promised reform: Mandatory review boards.

These independent panels with lay people in each diocese would review allegations fairly and kindly. And they would help bishops ensure that no abusive priests stayed in ministry.

But almost two decades later, an Associated Press investigation of review boards across the country shows they have broadly failed to uphold these commitments. Instead, review boards appointed by bishops and operating in secrecy have routinely undermined sex abuse claims from victims, shielded accused priests and helped the church avoid payouts.

...“It’s a fraud. It’s a sham. It’s a cover-up,” said David Lasher, 56, the owner of a furniture design company who told the review board in St. Petersburg, Florida, in April about his sexual abuse by a priest. “There’s no one on the board that cares for the victim...it’s all about protecting the church.”

What a shocker. And yet there are still those who try to defend this rotten, corrupt organization.

[MineralMan]

1. "review boards appointed by bishops "

There's your problem right there. Putting a fox entry flap in your henhouse isn't wise. If the Bishops are at the heart of the problem, who does anyone suppose they'll appoint to such a review board? Ridiculous.

[trotsky]

2. Again it comes down to the church viewing itself as the ultimate authority.

It cannot submit to anything else, by definition. That is what makes the abuse worse. But whataboutists don't like to talk about that, so they whatabout.

[MineralMan]

3. Yes, exactly.

Sadly, we tend to let major religious organizations do that. We should not.

[Major Nikon]

7. Yes but whatabout when child rape happens outside the church?

That “proves” it’s just ‘human nature’ and in no way means organized religion is in any way responsible.

All the evidence the RCC had significant influence over police and the justice system, influenced parents to keep quiet, moved child rapists to other poorer counties to avoid prosecution, and allowed networks of child raping priests to share victims, well that could have happened anywhere. I mean after all, there’s all sorts of secular organizations that enjoy absolute trust over all of these people, indoctrinated into them from birth, right?

[trotsky]

8. My favorite: "fAMiLiEs dOn'T HAvE aNY SecUlAR oVeRSiGht EItHer!!"

Which is patently untrue, there are many mandated reporters who intersect with most families' lives - teachers, doctors, etc.

[Major Nikon]

9. But not priests because they are specifically exempted

At least in most states. And we know this is a recipe for insuring the child rapes and cover ups will benefit from this exemption because experts like prosecutors and child welfare advocacy organizations are telling us this. But some are still "unsure" and instead want to parrot out the RCC's own position on why that's a bad idea, because after all nobody really knows as much about child rape as the RCC. And the reason nobody knows as much about it is because the RCC won't release all their records going back decades with thousands of cases of members of their organization raping children and institutionalized cover ups and shielding rapists from prosecution in dozens of different ways. It's really more accurate to say nobody knows more about covering up child rape than the RCC because they simply have far more experience doing it.

The reason the RCC spends millions of dollars lobbying against secular accountability is pretty clear to anyone north of a room temperature IQ. But some are still "unsure" about it because of the exact same talking points the RCC is using as if everyone is just too stupid not to see through the child rape apologia.

[trotsky]

10. Right. Another special exception just for religion.

And now throw in the entire RCC hierarchy being exempted from mandatory reporting laws. Gee, what's the worst that could go wrong? How about... hmmm... what's actually happened?

Some people have no shame when it comes to protecting privilege for their religion.

But hey, we can always blame the victims for not coming forward sooner, right? /s

[Major Nikon]

11. They are exempted because they do such a great job of policing themselves

And we know they are doing such a great job because we are fortunate to have a RCC water boy parroting our the RCC’s own explanation of how they are doing such a great job.

[temporary311]

4. Letting criminals investigate themselves turned out poorly?

Surprising.

[trotsky]

5. Yeah, who knew? n/t

[Major Nikon]

6. What we really need right now is a child rape apologist to give us the RCC's position

I’m sure there’s some priest out there who has written an article on how secular regulation of the RCC’s culture of child rape has no hope of working and how the RCC is doing such a great job of addressing this problem themselves.