I would submit that this massively screwed up country and world is primarily the work product of religious people with a strong sense of Christian privilege and entitlement. They act as if secular reasoning is the very definition of evil. However, for the most part, secular reasoning tends to be vastly more moral as it seeks what benefits people, rather than trying to channel magical thinking derived from a magic book into creating social norms. No theocracy was ever a bastion of human rights and intellectual freedom. Finding this preacher is a pedophile is more of an expectation than shocking.
The xtian right seems to be able to absorb and ignore a nearly infinite amount of hypocrisy as long as the perpetrator is a devoted follower of Jeebus. I am expecting even more now that the supremes have cart blanche to start eliminating more and more rights. Gilead here we come.
I fear you are right. Once people convince themselves they're operating under divine sanction, they're capable of any horror. That said, I don't think trying to force religion on people would have the happy ending they're hoping for.
Really disturbing. He's a sex offender looking at child pornography and somehow he was allowed to coach his daughters la- crosse team? He's disturbing just as trump is disturbing, and is getting away with all of it. Btw-- not every American voted for trump. I didn't.
I have come to believe that the reason so many god-men* support Trump is that he lives out their innermost fantasies of rape and assault sans consequence.
* gets old having to type out "evangelical" or "religious" or "khrishchin" every damn time.
"trying to figure out " Try all the Christians that have been pushing their agenda for years. Super stars Jerry Falwell, Billy Graham, Oral Roberts, Kenneth Copeland, Paul Crouch, Kathryn Kuhlman, Jim Baker, Benny Hinn, Pat Robertson, etc. all very influential to this day, and tax free.
Robert Reich — "All day today, people I’ve worked with over the years have been contacting me — some in tears, some in abject panic, most deeply worried. It has been a hard day for so many.
Since 2015, I’ve been saying that America is better than Trump. I’m no longer so sure."
Was he a juvenile at the time of the previous offense? Because I thought juveniles were the only records that could be expunged and even that wasn't easy to do.
I don't know if it's because I'm reading more atheist content (thank you Hemant) or what, but it seems that lately there is a large amount of pedophile church men that are being caught with their pants down.
I think the problem lies in the church leaders being too anxious to forgive and forget and ignore the victims.
I saw a meme once that said:
When a woman says "This man raped me a long time ago", we say, well that was in the past, he can't change the past!
When a girl says "This boy raped me last night", we say, "But his future, we can't wreck his future!"
And there she stands, suspended between his past and his future.
People in the evangelical world [along with the catholic church] lost the moral high ground, or any moral ground at all for that matter, when they failed to address the sexual abuse of children within their own ranks while pretending to be holier than thou. The fact that they've elevated and supported an adjudicated rapist, serial adulterer, liar and convicted felon puts the lie to fact that they give a damn about morals, or character or ethics. They're the quasi-religious arm of the MAGA party.
People who can no longer tell right from wrong, or don't give shit, are in no position to point fingers at anyone else. Once again, it's not a drag queen preying on our precious children and corrupting them. It's not LGBT folks passing out rainbow pins, either. It's the predators hiding behind 'the cross of Jesus™️' who are the real danger. To our children and to our country.
And yet another day that ends in "Y." This isn't just a tendency or a pattern anymore. It's a RUT, and growing deeper by the day. Men like Yates are showing up all over the religious spectrum with a regularity which is frankly ... well, calling it "disturbing" would be indulging in understatement.
And all at once, I find myself going back to the movie Spotlight and that one statement by the researcher: "Six percent is 90." That is to say, 6% of Catholic priests act out against kids. Granted, that's the RCC.
My question is: is there a similar fraction applicable to other churches and religious organizations? To me, that is a question deserving of a proper answer.
I don't know what the statistic is, but the clergy has been hiding behind their magic books and clerical collars to abuse women and children for centuries.
Even more worrisome than the actual number of sexual predators in religious ranks is the number of people who suspect or know of wrongdoing and say nothing. Or worse, cover it up. That fraction is enormous - as we know just from the sexual abuse cases in the RCC.
I remember this time* a woman came with her husband on a church stage to talk about her aggressor and the crowd cheered him up for repenting of his sin. Sickening.
Goes to show that talk is cheap, doesn't it? As are cheap theatrics. But people sitting in those pews WANT to believe that their sky fairy can cure people of deviancy on the spot. I'm willing to bet her aggressor hasn't mended his ways - on the basis that god has already forgiven him for it. Any takers?
That sickening event is also shown on video as it happened in the documentary, "For Our Daughters" on You Tube. The descent of organized religion into the abyss of true perversion, cover-up, and whitewashing of its always male perpetrators by requiring only a perfunctory apology and repentance shows the dysfunctional rot in the hearts of not only of the patriarchical leadership but of their brainwashed followers. They have all long abandoned the central moral principles of the writings they attribute to their professed deity. It was surprisingly easy to leave.
When I first heard about this story the other day, I asked why he wasn't already sitting in prison for his first conviction for the very same crime. If this had been anyone else, they certainly would have been.
Of course, it doesn't take a genius to see the reason why. Being a man of the cloth enabled him to not only duck the consequences of his actions the first time, it emboldened him to repeat those actions. He learned absolutely nothing. Is he of the belief that his religion will spare him a residency in prison yet again?
Where are all the lesbian child abusers? The gay male child abusers? The bis? The transgenders? They don't appear to exist. If there are any, they're ninjas who have mastered the art of invisibility.
Nope, It's always the cis-genedered religious types. The ones screaming about deviants. That these projectors always seem to support Trump (who fondled his own daughter) comes as no surprise, either.
Didn't you hear? The trans people are just looking to infiltrate the toilets of America & play sports to confuse everybody. *eye roll* Guess trying to find ways to go potty is occupying their time.
It must be such a confused & tangled mess in whatever these people use & call brains.
People, I already had the bejesus scared out of me simply by READING "Project 2025". Now that we're facing the hard reality that it's about to be implemented, I ain't got me any more bejesus to be scared out of. I just cling to the motto from my years in the labor movement: “Don’t mourn, organize.” —Joe Hill (1879-1915) American labor activist and songwriter, final message before being executed on trumped-up murder charges
To such abhorrent white men --- and yes, that is almost always the case in such abuses --- as this, "prey" and "pray" are used interchangeably... one to describe their deeds or victims and the other to describe the process of excusing their actions. Christianity isn't the only society-approved superstition that practices and condones sexual abuse, but the fact that such a large number of its members participate in it under the guise of "helping" children (or women) makes it almost an unofficial sacrament. All in favor of castration with a rusty dull butter knife, please raise your hands...
Kids have always liked rainbows, all the pretty colors! That’s not an agenda, it’s what kids find appealing. Yet pastor-pedophiles warn against this because it’s a way to hide their true identity and point the finger at someone else to deflect from their crimes.
And if I may add, I don't think it was even the LGBTQ community that first used the rainbow as a logo, but I could have missed something. In the 80's, Jesse Jackson and his Rainbow Coalition (a symbol of diverse people working together) were tireless critics of the Reagan Regime.
Not sure if the LGBTQ community adopted the rainbow symbolism or were simultaneously using rainbow imagery all along.
And I don't doubt that when hair furor starts rounding up people to deport that the young ones will be giving into to the 'loving care' of xtian organizations.
He did it before. What happened on the border, caging children intentionally separated from their families, then adopting them out through Christian adoption agencies without even trying to find their real families was nothing other than human trafficking. And I am certain there was sexual abuse happening at every point in the operation.
Well, under the new administration, christian nationalists will be forgiven and all will be well once again. That's the power of forgiveness, it wipes the slate clean.
Most of us are still reeling, I guess. I feel all my usual snark and rage is muffled by this overwhelming disbelief. There are times when I can't even believe Nov 5 happened. I suppose when this passes I'll start punching walls and breaking things again.
I would submit that this massively screwed up country and world is primarily the work product of religious people with a strong sense of Christian privilege and entitlement. They act as if secular reasoning is the very definition of evil. However, for the most part, secular reasoning tends to be vastly more moral as it seeks what benefits people, rather than trying to channel magical thinking derived from a magic book into creating social norms. No theocracy was ever a bastion of human rights and intellectual freedom. Finding this preacher is a pedophile is more of an expectation than shocking.
The xtian right seems to be able to absorb and ignore a nearly infinite amount of hypocrisy as long as the perpetrator is a devoted follower of Jeebus. I am expecting even more now that the supremes have cart blanche to start eliminating more and more rights. Gilead here we come.
What was it Voltaire said, "Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities."
Jane, I agree with that quote look at tRump….
I fear you are right. Once people convince themselves they're operating under divine sanction, they're capable of any horror. That said, I don't think trying to force religion on people would have the happy ending they're hoping for.
"Christian privilege and entitlement" Tax the churches! Frank Zappa -1980
At St Alphonzo's pancake breakfast, where he stole the margarine.
Pass the breakfast syrup and bacon.
https://youtu.be/zXdckI9ZtMs?si=jA0nqFS7Q9CsJajp
Enjoy!
Still no signs of librarians or drag queens. Curious.
Don't be silly! Librarians don't lead organizations urging Christians to vote for sexual predators!
Don't worry Trump is going to release the Epstein list.
Really disturbing. He's a sex offender looking at child pornography and somehow he was allowed to coach his daughters la- crosse team? He's disturbing just as trump is disturbing, and is getting away with all of it. Btw-- not every American voted for trump. I didn't.
What is disturbing is that his first conviction was expunged. Those who did it should be held accountable too.
There's nothing about Trump that ISN'T disturbing.
Nobody is above the law. Trump is a nobody who thinks he is. Still trying to figure out how he won.
With the number of white men who end with barely a slap on the wrist after a rape or assault conviction there are reasons to doubt.
I have come to believe that the reason so many god-men* support Trump is that he lives out their innermost fantasies of rape and assault sans consequence.
* gets old having to type out "evangelical" or "religious" or "khrishchin" every damn time.
There :
Fucking
Rethugs
Evilgelical
Asses
Kristains
Stupidum
"trying to figure out " Try all the Christians that have been pushing their agenda for years. Super stars Jerry Falwell, Billy Graham, Oral Roberts, Kenneth Copeland, Paul Crouch, Kathryn Kuhlman, Jim Baker, Benny Hinn, Pat Robertson, etc. all very influential to this day, and tax free.
Robert Reich — "All day today, people I’ve worked with over the years have been contacting me — some in tears, some in abject panic, most deeply worried. It has been a hard day for so many.
Since 2015, I’ve been saying that America is better than Trump. I’m no longer so sure."
𝐖𝐡𝐨 𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐰𝐞?
https://robertreich.substack.com/p/who-are-we-anyway
YES. I'd like to know the story behind that one.
But he wasn't held to account before and he likely won't this time because reasons.
Was he a juvenile at the time of the previous offense? Because I thought juveniles were the only records that could be expunged and even that wasn't easy to do.
I don't know if it's because I'm reading more atheist content (thank you Hemant) or what, but it seems that lately there is a large amount of pedophile church men that are being caught with their pants down.
I think the problem lies in the church leaders being too anxious to forgive and forget and ignore the victims.
I saw a meme once that said:
When a woman says "This man raped me a long time ago", we say, well that was in the past, he can't change the past!
When a girl says "This boy raped me last night", we say, "But his future, we can't wreck his future!"
And there she stands, suspended between his past and his future.
It's always the ones you most expect, ain't it?
People in the evangelical world [along with the catholic church] lost the moral high ground, or any moral ground at all for that matter, when they failed to address the sexual abuse of children within their own ranks while pretending to be holier than thou. The fact that they've elevated and supported an adjudicated rapist, serial adulterer, liar and convicted felon puts the lie to fact that they give a damn about morals, or character or ethics. They're the quasi-religious arm of the MAGA party.
People who can no longer tell right from wrong, or don't give shit, are in no position to point fingers at anyone else. Once again, it's not a drag queen preying on our precious children and corrupting them. It's not LGBT folks passing out rainbow pins, either. It's the predators hiding behind 'the cross of Jesus™️' who are the real danger. To our children and to our country.
They never have had the moral high ground.
Always has been.
𝐿𝑒𝑎𝑑𝑒𝑟 𝑜𝑓 𝐶ℎ𝑟𝑖𝑠𝑡𝑖𝑎𝑛 𝑣𝑜𝑡𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑔𝑟𝑜𝑢𝑝 𝑐ℎ𝑎𝑟𝑔𝑒𝑑 𝑤𝑖𝑡ℎ 𝑣𝑖𝑙𝑒 𝑐𝑟𝑖𝑚𝑒𝑠 𝑖𝑛𝑣𝑜𝑙𝑣𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑘𝑖𝑑𝑠 (𝑎𝑔𝑎𝑖𝑛!)
And yet another day that ends in "Y." This isn't just a tendency or a pattern anymore. It's a RUT, and growing deeper by the day. Men like Yates are showing up all over the religious spectrum with a regularity which is frankly ... well, calling it "disturbing" would be indulging in understatement.
And all at once, I find myself going back to the movie Spotlight and that one statement by the researcher: "Six percent is 90." That is to say, 6% of Catholic priests act out against kids. Granted, that's the RCC.
My question is: is there a similar fraction applicable to other churches and religious organizations? To me, that is a question deserving of a proper answer.
I don't know what the statistic is, but the clergy has been hiding behind their magic books and clerical collars to abuse women and children for centuries.
Millennia.
Even more worrisome than the actual number of sexual predators in religious ranks is the number of people who suspect or know of wrongdoing and say nothing. Or worse, cover it up. That fraction is enormous - as we know just from the sexual abuse cases in the RCC.
I remember this time* a woman came with her husband on a church stage to talk about her aggressor and the crowd cheered him up for repenting of his sin. Sickening.
* Mentoned here, in a post or a comment.
Goes to show that talk is cheap, doesn't it? As are cheap theatrics. But people sitting in those pews WANT to believe that their sky fairy can cure people of deviancy on the spot. I'm willing to bet her aggressor hasn't mended his ways - on the basis that god has already forgiven him for it. Any takers?
That sickening event is also shown on video as it happened in the documentary, "For Our Daughters" on You Tube. The descent of organized religion into the abyss of true perversion, cover-up, and whitewashing of its always male perpetrators by requiring only a perfunctory apology and repentance shows the dysfunctional rot in the hearts of not only of the patriarchical leadership but of their brainwashed followers. They have all long abandoned the central moral principles of the writings they attribute to their professed deity. It was surprisingly easy to leave.
"Christian" - the Other "C" word.
OK. Totally stealing that one.
Me too. Let's ALL put that on a t-shirt.
When I first heard about this story the other day, I asked why he wasn't already sitting in prison for his first conviction for the very same crime. If this had been anyone else, they certainly would have been.
Of course, it doesn't take a genius to see the reason why. Being a man of the cloth enabled him to not only duck the consequences of his actions the first time, it emboldened him to repeat those actions. He learned absolutely nothing. Is he of the belief that his religion will spare him a residency in prison yet again?
It works for a right wing felon rapist seditionist president-elect!
If he was black he’d be lynched and burned by the end of the lunch period.
Where are all the lesbian child abusers? The gay male child abusers? The bis? The transgenders? They don't appear to exist. If there are any, they're ninjas who have mastered the art of invisibility.
Nope, It's always the cis-genedered religious types. The ones screaming about deviants. That these projectors always seem to support Trump (who fondled his own daughter) comes as no surprise, either.
Didn't you hear? The trans people are just looking to infiltrate the toilets of America & play sports to confuse everybody. *eye roll* Guess trying to find ways to go potty is occupying their time.
It must be such a confused & tangled mess in whatever these people use & call brains.
EVERY accusation is an admission of guilt from kkkristers.
Goebbels is their idol, after all.
People, I already had the bejesus scared out of me simply by READING "Project 2025". Now that we're facing the hard reality that it's about to be implemented, I ain't got me any more bejesus to be scared out of. I just cling to the motto from my years in the labor movement: “Don’t mourn, organize.” —Joe Hill (1879-1915) American labor activist and songwriter, final message before being executed on trumped-up murder charges
To such abhorrent white men --- and yes, that is almost always the case in such abuses --- as this, "prey" and "pray" are used interchangeably... one to describe their deeds or victims and the other to describe the process of excusing their actions. Christianity isn't the only society-approved superstition that practices and condones sexual abuse, but the fact that such a large number of its members participate in it under the guise of "helping" children (or women) makes it almost an unofficial sacrament. All in favor of castration with a rusty dull butter knife, please raise your hands...
Waving hands furiously!
They give a whole new meaning to the phrase “aliens vs predators”.
Kids have always liked rainbows, all the pretty colors! That’s not an agenda, it’s what kids find appealing. Yet pastor-pedophiles warn against this because it’s a way to hide their true identity and point the finger at someone else to deflect from their crimes.
And if I may add, I don't think it was even the LGBTQ community that first used the rainbow as a logo, but I could have missed something. In the 80's, Jesse Jackson and his Rainbow Coalition (a symbol of diverse people working together) were tireless critics of the Reagan Regime.
Not sure if the LGBTQ community adopted the rainbow symbolism or were simultaneously using rainbow imagery all along.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pride_flag#Rainbow
And I don't doubt that when hair furor starts rounding up people to deport that the young ones will be giving into to the 'loving care' of xtian organizations.
He did it before. What happened on the border, caging children intentionally separated from their families, then adopting them out through Christian adoption agencies without even trying to find their real families was nothing other than human trafficking. And I am certain there was sexual abuse happening at every point in the operation.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=9TyqtWUTj6M
With a rusty chainsaw.
OT: It's 4 pm here and the sun has gone to sleep. Dark ages are coming.
Well, under the new administration, christian nationalists will be forgiven and all will be well once again. That's the power of forgiveness, it wipes the slate clean.
So they can come after us with a clear conscience.
That's how relative moral objectivism works.
Nice to know whoever puts me in that re-education center will be able to sleep at night.
They never have trouble doing that. As long as they don't have to euthanise you themselves. Apparently that takes lots and lots of alcohol.
They just have the State do it on their behalf. You know, like when the Jews had the Romans execute jesus.
Their hands are clean.
NEVER trust anyone who can use an imaginary f(r)iend to clear his conscience.
Fuck this guy. That's all I've got. Just can't seem to find the snark today.
Snarky style or stylish snark is always appreciated as an artform. But you got the message across, even if it wasn't your best presentation. :-)
Most of us are still reeling, I guess. I feel all my usual snark and rage is muffled by this overwhelming disbelief. There are times when I can't even believe Nov 5 happened. I suppose when this passes I'll start punching walls and breaking things again.
Another day, then. Your snark and that of other masters in this commentariat is a joy worth waiting for.