The image of Shel and the reverse cowboy pretty much quashed it for me.

A bloody minute?

From the Washington Post of 18 April 2010:

Maybe because some of the dissatisfied have left the church.

Beebe Medical Center heard allegations about Dr. Earl Bradley 14 years ago
Facing 18 lawsuits in case, hospital could go into bankruptcy
Link

Link
from the video link:
At what cost? Was this part of the decision that was made not to report this A-hole?

When a nurse complains about a Doctor, she better have a good case with corroborating witnesses or evidence. If not, they'll clear the Doctor, because they have no way of knowing her motivation. Not the least of which is Doctors (caution, broad brush) tend to be self-centered/condescending when it comes to the help.

You know, I was thinking... the righteous indignation about children I see today, either didn't exist or was at least much less apparent years ago. I mean on a community/national level. These days you can't look at a kid sideways without a lynch mob forming. Whereas years ago, if the kid wasn't physically injured, people not immediately involved would be more like, tsk tsk, that's a shame, what's for supper? The emotional well being of other peoples kids, and sometimes their own, was not a big concern. Maybe that's why the Catholic Church was so successful at covering up these incidents.

Not to mention that there used to be a default position within society of disbelieving children when they spoke up about abuse of this kind.

"Righteous indignation" and "lynch mob" both sound very negative, while "these incidents" not so much.
That jumps right out at me.

They has a plan, or maybe it's a how-to manual:

I can't think of a better way to describe public reaction to any reports, even alleged. I've seen it right here on this board, calls for lynching, torture, sexual mutilation, etc.

Just when you thought the thread was done.

Catholic League: Not All Gay Sex is Abusive

The entire post:

Would you say it's abuse for a 52 year old to have "consensual" sex with a 17 year old? Never mind gay sex, never mind priest sex. The Catholic League is twisting like a pretzel here, trying to make everything OK. It's so much crap, it's practically entertaining.

Not to mention the Catholic church thinks sex outside of marriage or for anything other than procreation is wrong. So yeah, they can leave out the genders and the ages and whatever else they want, they're waffling on their face! (which is probably a lot like pancakes on your face.)

well, that's what the SNAP people have wanted all along. Maybe they'll shut up now.

I don't think Bruce is supportive of that view, and I do think it's an accurate description of values previously held.

I personally knew two girls abused as children. One was called back in her late teens or twenties to give evidence about a school caretaker (janitor) who exposed himself to her and was on trial for more serious abuses with other young girls. She reported the incident in the '70s and the reaction was very much, "There, there, no harm done." The report was filed, which is why she was tracked down later.

The second was physically abused and again, she reported it. Not to the police in her case - she was in care and reported it to the people higher up in the facility. No-one believed her. It was only a family member who heard gossip years later that made any of her family take it seriously. She was simply seen as being "disturbed" because of her background and the reasons she was in care in the first place. She had nothing like a criminal trial or conviction to give her closure, but at least in the end her family accepted what had happened. This was in the late '60s.