Cardinal: Paedophiles aren't criminals

[dirtychinchilla]

It isn't really something we can disagree with without qualification, and I am not a psychiatrist, least of all one renowned enough to stand up and dispute a medical diagnosis as specific as this one, and no it isn't a cultural definition, it is a classified and quantified medical definition. Paedophilia is a medical diagnosis, Child Molestation is a criminal offence. There is a distinct demarcation between the two.

I disagree with them, but you're right, I have no qualification to back up my opinion. I think they have, in part, succumbed to social pressure. Don't get me wrong, as I said before, I think that many paedophiles have a mental disorder, but not all. Have no doubts that I agree that child molestation is a criminal offence.

I'm glad to see the chap has apologised.

 

[Derek W]

I've not gone back into this post since the other day but one thing thats been playing on my mind is the quote that Lowrider posted

Look at this post for example,

"Help me - I AM a Pedophile

Well this is one hell of a way to introduce myself, aswell as a first post. Here goes then.

Before you read on I want you to understand this is not something I enjoy having. It is destroying me. I have never committed an act of sexual harassment or molestation of any form. It began when I was 14. I had just started masturbating and at this stage it was all out of curiosity. At school I noticed I was attracted to a boy in class. One night I experimented masturbating with him in mind. I enjoyed it and this continued. After another year I was no longer attracted to this boy; he was growing. I soon found other boys in the years below for me to fantasize over. Another year later and I was masturbating over little boys every night. After realising the addiction was only craving more and more I decided to limit my masturbation to only once a week before it becomes too out of hand. I have stuck to that up until today, although the urges are starting to get to me. I would literally cut off my fingers if what I want most were to become completely legal and consensual.

Even though I only feed my urges once a week I still fantasize every spare moment of the day. I know where this road leads and I do not want to go down it. ATM I am 17, straight towards girls of my age, although on the pedophilia side only to little boys who look between the ages of 10-14, with some exceptions of around 7-8. The worst thing i've done thus far is stolen a boys P.E. clothes.

What I am trying to ask is what should I do to control my urges? My self discipline/defense mechanism of only once per-week is not going to hold out much longer and while I doubt I would ever rape a child, at this rate a few years down the track could be a different story."

It's not hard to find posts like these, last time this topic was brought up I found a couple of guys that had never acted on their urges talking about being scared to seek help due to the stigmatization they would most likely endure, and reading this thread I'm not surprised, people have been conditioned by the media to believe that Pedophiles are automatically criminals.

What and why on earth were you looking for this sort of thing and more importantly what sort of websites allow these sorts of posts where someone openly admits their a paedophile?

 

[elmarko]

The Cardinal has both clarified and apologised for any offence he caused:



http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/rel...g-paedophilia-was-an-illness-not-a-crime.html


Another report that appears to have more information on what he said:



http://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...condition-apologises-for-offence-8539345.html

To be honest, that's how I interpreted what he said.

 

[Castiel]

I would say that the statement "Do the Church & society not have to consider the damage he suffered when deciding what to do?" a little problematic, especially when the guidance to bishops still doesn't obligate them to contact the authorities. Regardless of the circumstances, the Church shouldn't be deciding what to do, the Church should be contacting the authorities.

He said the Church and Society, not one or the other. It is entirely the Churches decision on what they do with a member who is guilty of child abuse and has suffered abuse themselves within the context of their membership and any treatment or rehabilitation they can or will offer, that they should also be reporting criminal offences to the relevant authorities is entirely right, one doesn't exclude the other.

Also while the Italian Bishops (not the Vatican) guidance to Italian Bishops is as thus ...“Under Italian law, the bishop, given that he holds no public office nor is he a public servant, is not obliged to report illicit facts of the type covered by this document to the relevant state judicial authorities.”

it continues later to say:

“In cases regarding this type of crime where an investigation is ongoing or where a penal proceeding [trial] has been opened according to Italian state law, the co-operation of the bishop with the civil authorities will prove very important, within the ambit of respective areas of competence and with respect for both state norms and those established by the concordat.”

Again pretty vague stuff, but again it is the Bishops themselves that retain the authority to determine their own policies, this is guidance not policy.

However it doesn't say that they shouldn't, only that they are not legally required to and it also doesn't take into consideration that in other archdioceses the Bishop or Cardinal has the authority to determine the position of his diocese, and that each Bishop Conference has the autonomy to issue its own guidance, they are not beholden to Rome.

In the United States for example the current practice is to disclose all criminal offences to the relevant authorities not least of all because the law in the United States requires it, so I suppose it is dependant on the context within the entire advice to Bishops and exactly what policies are in place.

Clearly because of the actions of the Church in the past (see Vatican advice to Irish Catholics to not inform the Police in the past when the Irish Bishops were doing so as a matter of course) they should be far more robust in how they express such things and make it clear that what the law might say is irrelevant, the default position should be to investigate and report any cases of Child abuse to the relevant authorities in any country, regardless of whether they have a legal obligation or not.

 

[Castiel]

I disagree with them, but you're right, I have no qualification to back up my opinion. I think they have, in part, succumbed to social pressure. Don't get me wrong, as I said before, I think that many paedophiles have a mental disorder, but not all. Have no doubts that I agree that child molestation is a criminal offence.

I'm glad to see the chap has apologised.

You are getting it a bit twisted about....Paedophilia is a recognised and verifiable medical disorder....not all paedophiles molest children and not all child molesters are paedophiles. It isn't that not all paedophiles have a psychiatric disorder, if they have no psychiatric disorder then they are not paedophiles, they are just child molesters. It is like not all murderers are psychopaths. The psychopath is the psychiatirc disorder, the Murder is the criminal offence, while they can be related they are not necessarily so.

 

[dirtychinchilla]

Well that second paragraph clears it up a lot, man. So what if you are attracted to children, have no psychological disorder, and have not committed any crime?

 

[dowie]

I think he is quite brave to bring it up, given the points you raised such as he is a Catholic Bishop, the Catholic Church is in the middle of a huge child abuse scandal and it is obvious that he would be criticised for it.

I'm not sure I'd describe it as brave... He wasn't just talking about paedophiles but paedophiles who have abused children. While paedophilia itself is a psychiatric disorder succumbing to those urges and sexually assaulting/raping someone is still a criminal offence and deserving of punishment. To argue that it doesn't warrant punishment is a reflection of the damaging policy the church has had over many years of attempting to deal with any cases internally and move the perpetrator on rather than alerting the authorities.

 

[RDM]

He said the Church and Society, not one or the other. It is entirely the Churches decision on what they do with a member who is guilty of child abuse and has suffered abuse themselves within the context of their membership and any treatment or rehabilitation they can or will offer, that they should also be reporting criminal offences to the relevant authorities is entirely right, one doesn't exclude the other.

Also while the Italian Bishops (not the Vatican) guidance to Italian Bishops is as thus ...“Under Italian law, the bishop, given that he holds no public office nor is he a public servant, is not obliged to report illicit facts of the type covered by this document to the relevant state judicial authorities.”

it continues later to say:

“In cases regarding this type of crime where an investigation is ongoing or where a penal proceeding [trial] has been opened according to Italian state law, the co-operation of the bishop with the civil authorities will prove very important, within the ambit of respective areas of competence and with respect for both state norms and those established by the concordat.”

Again pretty vague stuff, but again it is the Bishops themselves that retain the authority to determine their own policies, this is guidance not policy.

However it doesn't say that they shouldn't, only that they are not legally required to and it also doesn't take into consideration that in other archdioceses the Bishop or Cardinal has the authority to determine the position of his diocese, and that each Bishop Conference has the autonomy to issue its own guidance, they are not beholden to Rome.

In the United States for example the current practice is to disclose all criminal offences to the relevant authorities not least of all because the law in the United States requires it, so I suppose it is dependant on the context within the entire advice to Bishops and exactly what policies are in place.

Clearly because of the actions of the Church in the past (see Vatican advice to Irish Catholics to not inform the Police in the past when the Irish Bishops were doing so as a matter of course) they should be far more robust in how they express such things and make it clear that what the law might say is irrelevant, the default position should be to investigate and report any cases of Child abuse to the relevant authorities in any country, regardless of whether they have a legal obligation or not.

That is the problem though, the vagueness. You would have thought that after all of the issues they have had they would be somewhat more clear in what they mean and what Bishops should do.

The fact that they once again tried to cover up impropriety from a Cardinal and tried to swear victims to secrecy with the O'Brien case makes me think that the Church is still more concerned about its reputation than anything else.

When placed against that sort of background I would say that this Cardinal's remarks were ill-advised and his subsequent clarifications seem weak. I don't think he has been brave at all but rather somewhat stupid.

 

[Castiel]

I'm not sure I'd describe it as brave... He wasn't just talking about paedophiles but paedophiles who have abused children. While paedophilia itself is a psychiatric disorder succumbing to those urges and sexually assaulting/raping someone is still a criminal offence and deserving of punishment. To argue that it doesn't warrant punishment is a reflection of the damaging policy the church has had over many years of attempting to deal with any cases internally and move the perpetrator on rather than alerting the authorities.

He wasn't arguing that the abuse of children relating to the paedophilia was not to be punished or that it isn't a criminal offence. He has since clarified his position, which to be honest is what I took his words to mean anyway.

 

[Castiel]

That is the problem though, the vagueness. You would have thought that after all of the issues they have had they would be somewhat more clear in what they mean and what Bishops should do.

The fact that they once again tried to cover up impropriety from a Cardinal and tried to swear victims to secrecy with the O'Brien case makes me think that the Church is still more concerned about its reputation than anything else.

When placed against that sort of background I would say that this Cardinal's remarks were ill-advised and his subsequent clarifications seem weak. I don't think he has been brave at all but rather somewhat stupid.

I agree with the former, I disagree that the Cardinal should have simply kept quiet, that is the problem with the Church already, not addressing the problem, he is at least speaking about and looking to solutions that benefit both abuser and abused....and it is something that medical professionals have been advocating for some time.

 

[semi-pro waster]

Indeed, however we are relying on the report second-hand so it is difficult to get the context in which it was made to the interviewer...however the point is being made that Paedophilia is not the same as Child abuse and it is a common misconception that they are one and the same, (being a Paedophiliac can lead that individual to abuse Children, but not all paedophiliacs abuse Children and not all Child abusers are paedophiliacs.) This hampers people getting treatment and being treated as the stigma creates barriers that shouldn't exist.

I wouldn't be totally surprised if we weren't getting the full context from the interview. It's one thing to try and address the common conflation of the two but it's something that you'd have to be extremely clear on to avoid misunderstandings and with the best will in the World he doesn't seem to have been. In fact in the clarification he seems to be saying that paedophilia is a crime - it is not as you've been at pains to point out, child sexual abuse is a crime but a seemingly contradictory clarification isn't really helping his cause.

I think he is quite brave to bring it up, given the points you raised such as he is a Catholic Bishop, the Catholic Church is in the middle of a huge child abuse scandal and it is obvious that he would be criticised for it.

It could be bravery or it could a certain level of arrogance in believing that the Church should have absolute freedom in how it deals with such matters. I'll be charitable and assume it's bravey but I'm not convinced it's not misguided unless he's absolutely clear about the message he is trying to put across.

I think the sooner we realise that if we treated Paedophilia as a psychiatric disorder and differentiated that from the criminal acts that can be perpetrated in part because of that disorder, we might just get to a position whereby people will go to their GP or Health centre and ask for help rather than struggling on their own and eventually succumbing to their condition and save Children from being abused and worse in the meantime.

I can agree that treatment prior to abuse is certainly a better option than dealing with the effects and punishing after the crime. It's not always easy for people to distinguish between the two but that's not a reason not to try for a more effective method of dealing with this problem.

 

[dowie]

He wasn't arguing that the abuse of children relating to the paedophilia was not to be punished or that it isn't a criminal offence. He has since clarified his position, which to be honest is what I took his words to mean anyway.

He's since backtracked following a PR disaster... paedophilia isn't a criminal offence - most countries don't prosecute thought crimes... he was referring to people being criminally responsible, specifically two priests he knew who had abused children:

"Now don't tell me that those people are criminally responsible like somebody who chooses to do something like that. I don't think you can really take the position and say that person deserves to be punished. He was himself damaged."

He still questions how we deal with the abuser. It was an incredibly thoughtless statement given his position. In fact the start of the interview was him trying to defend/excuse the actions taken by the church in the past when dealing with these cases.

 

[RDM]

I agree with the former, I disagree that the Cardinal should have simply kept quiet, that is the problem with the Church already, not addressing the problem, he is at least speaking about and looking to solutions that benefit both abuser and abused....and it is something that medical professionals have been advocating for some time.

I didn't say he should have kept quiet though, he just should have thought a bit more about what he said and how he said it. Though if he is unable to articulate what he means properly then he should perhaps keep quiet as otherwise he is likely to make things worse.

What ever message he was trying to get across has been lost in the rather weak language he has used.

 

[dowie]

While he might be correct it's something that can all too easily be misinterpreted so it's somewhat of an unwise thing to say unless you can be absolutely certain that all context will be included to qualify the statement as necessary.

I haven't heard the interview in full or read all the transcript but if he's suggesting that there should be no punishment for paedophilia then he's likely to find himself out on a particularly slim bough. I'd agree that treatment should be available and that a damaged childhood increases the risk of someone being an abuser later in life but to say that it means there can/should be no punishment alongside that is a rather dubious premise.

you can listen to the full interview here

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/...pedophilia-not-a-crime-illness_n_2900941.html

at 10 minutes in he mentions the two priests who were abused themselves and then went onto abuse children... its in reference to them that he makes the comment quoted above. Hes since backtracked and made conflicting statements where he's stated that sexual abuse must be punished... then later expressed concern about the abused abusers etc...

 

[Castiel]

I wouldn't be totally surprised if we weren't getting the full context from the interview. It's one thing to try and address the common conflation of the two but it's something that you'd have to be extremely clear on to avoid misunderstandings and with the best will in the World he doesn't seem to have been. In fact in the clarification he seems to be saying that paedophilia is a crime - it is not as you've been at pains to point out, child sexual abuse is a crime but a seemingly contradictory clarification isn't really helping his cause.

I don't see that he is saying paedophilia is a crime, he is stating that the sexual abuse of children is a crime. He is saying that paedophilia should be treated and the crime of sexual abuse of children be punished. It's about rehabilitating the paedophile with appropriate treatment as well as making sure he is punished appropriately for any crime he committed to which his/her psychiatric condition contributed.

It is pretty clear given recidivism rate of convicted paedophiles that simply locking them up rarely addressed their underlying reasons for committing the offences in the first place.

It could be bravery or it could a certain level of arrogance in believing that the Church should have absolute freedom in how it deals with such matters. I'll be charitable and assume it's bravey but I'm not convinced it's not misguided unless he's absolutely clear about the message he is trying to put across.

I think he probably miscalculated how to address this and chose the wrong medium in which to do so. An article where he was the author and had editorial control in order to make his position and evidence it may have been a more appropriate initial stage rather than in a radio interview where he lacks such control.

I can agree that treatment prior to abuse is certainly a better option than dealing with the effects and punishing after the crime. It's not always easy for people to distinguish between the two but that's not a reason not to try for a more effective method of dealing with this problem.

Agreed, although I would also add that treatment for a condition can also be a part of the rehabilitation and concurrent to any given punishment for a crime committed in relation to that condition. We may be able to address reoffending if we had a better approach to rehabilitation as well as simply punishing people.

 

[Castiel]

I didn't say he should have kept quiet though, he just should have thought a bit more about what he said and how he said it. Though if he is unable to articulate what he means properly then he should perhaps keep quiet as otherwise he is likely to make things worse.

What ever message he was trying to get across has been lost in the rather weak language he has used.

I don't disagree, as I said to SPW, perhaps a radio interview was not the best considered medium in which to broach the subject, initially at least.

 

[Castiel]

He's since backtracked following a PR disaster... paedophilia isn't a criminal offence - most countries don't prosecute thought crimes... he was referring to people being criminally responsible, specifically two priests he knew who had abused children:

"Now don't tell me that those people are criminally responsible like somebody who chooses to do something like that. I don't think you can really take the position and say that person deserves to be punished. He was himself damaged."

He still questions how we deal with the abuser. It was an incredibly thoughtless statement given his position. In fact the start of the interview was him trying to defend/excuse the actions taken by the church in the past when dealing with these cases.

While it is poorly worded, he makes a good point, often people with psychiatric disorders, whether inherent or relating to abuse they themselves suffered are found not to be criminally responsible, this includes sexual abuse of children...rehabilitation should be a primary consideration in such cases rather than simply punishing them...this doesn't mean not removing them from society, it means treating their condition so that they are no longer a risk to society at the same time as ensuring justice is served both for the abused and the abused abuser, as the Cardinal refers to them.

I don't see anything innately wrong with this.

 

[dowie]

I don't see anything innately wrong with the general idea that we should be treating these individuals or with your views expressed in here in general. I agree that they are ill and we should be looking at treating them. The cardinal has since come out with a more measured stance... the interview itself was slightly concerning though (and depending on your pov rather illuminating) - given the history of abuse in the church he sought to almost make excuses for past policy and made that complete clanger of a statement regarding the two priests he knew who were abused themselves and went onto abuse. I realise you seem to be taking the view that he didn't quite mean what he said in the interview and has since expressed himself better. Plenty of other people might take the alternative view that he was expressing his true thoughts during the interview and as a result of the bad press it recieved he's had to backtrack and give more measured statements/views...