Bill Donohue Psychotic Bully President of the Catholic League
Bill “Pig Face” Donohue, degenerate leader of the Catholic League
Bill Donohue, the psychotic bully president of the Catholic League. He loves to attack the survivors of priest rape and nun abuse or anyone standing up for us. He loves to insult and denigrate priest rape survivors by stating that “If a 15 to 17 year old is being messed with by a priest and he does not punch that priest, then he not only wanted what was happening, they are a homosexual.” Well Bill, I seriously doubt YOU would have punched your rapist priest in the mouth. I seriously believe you would have gotten down on your knees and sucked his dick with no problem.
Bill Donohue of the Catholic League shoves his foot down his throat over the movie Spotlight
Bill Donohue of the Catholic League shoves his foot down his pig throat over the movie Spotlight
Yuppers, got to hand it to Bill Donohue, President of the Catholic League and Defender of the Degnerates of the Unholy Roman Catholic Church of Pedophile Pimps, Priests, Nuns and the Parishioners who bow down and suck their dicks in unholy love.
1. First posting on Spotlight from Posting on the Catholic League blog, titled
“SPOTLIGHT” EXAMINES ABUSE SCANDAL which then contains a link to a pdf file written by Donohue at the following link: SHINING THE LIGHT ON “SPOTLIGHT” Bill Donohue. Now Bilbo Dildo makes the following statement:
“In the Catholic League‘s 2002 Annual Report, I even defended the media. “The Boston Globe, the Boston Herald, and the New York Times covered the story with professionalism,” I wrote”
2. But Bill attacks the Boston Globe in a new posting BOSTON GLOBE REEKS OF BIAS on his Catholic League blog as follows:
“On the front page of the Metro Section in today’s Boston Globe, there is a story about the movie “Spotlight” that smacks of bias and gullibility; the former is driving the latter.”
He goes on to spew his typical bullshit defense of the Unholy Roman Catholic Cult of Pedophiles, as usual:
“Lisa Wangsness relies on Terence McKiernan of Bishop Accountability for her data. She writes that he told her that “the bishops could have agreed to make lists of abusive priests available nationwide.” Referring to him again, she writes that “More than 2,400 abusive priests nationwide have never been named.”
First, McKiernan is known for making up figures on the fly. A few years ago, after he told a sympathetic audience he was going to “stick it” to New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan, he accused him of “keeping the lid on 55 priests.” That is a lie. Several times I have personally challenged him to name the names and every time he runs.
Second, the term “abusive priests” is meaningless. Were they simply accused or was there a credible accusation made against them? Were the accusations substantiated or unsubstantiated? Was there a finding of guilt? Wangsness never tells us because it obviously doesn’t matter to her.
Third, what institution, including the Boston Globe, publishes the names of employees who have had an accusation made against them?
Fourth, how does McKiernan know there are 2,400 priests who have never been named? Did she ask him for verification?
Fifth, the figures for the Boston Archdiocese undercut the point that she and McKiernan are making. Indeed, there are more unsubstantiated accusations than there are findings of guilt.
Then Bill spews even more well worn bullshit from his well worn defense of his cult of pedophiles by of course, being a hypocrite. From his Catholic League posting LOUSY JOURNALISM ON “SPOTLIGHT”
3. “Bill Donohue comments on the way journalists are handling “Spotlight”:
“Spotlight,” which opens today, is being heralded as an example of solid journalism, the kind of movie that should be shown in college journalism classes. Ironically, many journalists who are touting the movie are proving just how lousy they are at their craft.
Journalists for the following media outlets got their facts wrong:
New York Post; The Daily Commercial; Associated Press; Wall Street Journal; Boston Globe; National Catholic Reporter; Vanity Fair; Los Angeles Daily News; Christianity Today; RogerEbert.com; New Yorker; New York; Observer; Chicago Reader; timesofmalta.com; The Verge; baretnewswire.org; SLANT; Paste;avclub.com; filmcomment.
Whether through laziness or ignorance, all of these sources misrepresented the facts by saying the problem was pedophilia. As the John Jay College of Criminal Justice researchers pointed out, less than 5 percent of the molesting priests were pedophiles. They found that 81 percent of the victims were male and 78 percent of them were postpubescent. That means the abusers were homosexuals.
Not to admit this is an expression of journalistic malfeasance, the kind that ought to be discussed in the classroom.”
So here is Bill, trashing the Boston Globe and others, he formerly defended as these news organizations for their professionalism in their reporting on the story, and now here he is trashing them for the same damn thing.
Of course, he then spews his typical bullshit about this being a homosexual and not a pedophile problem, using the John Jay College of Criminal Justice research, but totally ignores what the researchers said to his sorry ass way back in 2010:
“Whether through laziness or ignorance, all of these sources misrepresented the facts by saying the problem was pedophilia. As the John Jay College of Criminal Justice researchers pointed out, less than 5 percent of the molesting priests were pedophiles. They found that 81 percent of the victims were male and 78 percent of them were postpubescent. That means the abusers were homosexuals.”
But in an interview with Media Matters, Margaret Smith — a John Jay College criminologist who worked on the 2004 study — said that while Donohue “quoted the study’s data correctly,” he “drew an unwarranted conclusion” in asserting that most of the abusers were gay.
Explaining that it is an oversimplification to assume to that priests who abuse male victims are gay, Smith said: “The majority of the abusive acts were homosexual in nature. That participation in homosexual acts is not the same as sexual identity as a gay man.”
As an example, Smith pointed to the case of Marcial Maciel Degollado, a prominent Mexican priest who allegedly abused male children and also allegedly carried on affairs with multiple women. Smith noted that while Maciel allegedly abused boys, most people would not think of him as a gay man.
“What we are suggesting is that the idea of sexual identity be separated from the problem of sexual abuse,” said Margaret Smith, a researcher from the John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York, which is conducting an independent study of sexual abuse in the priesthood from 1950 up to 2002. “At this point, we do not find a connection between homosexual identity and an increased likelihood of sexual abuse.”
Seems Bill Pig Face Donohue of the Catholic League will use the John Jay report to make his false assertions that this is a homosexual and not a pedophile problem, but ignore what the very researcher and other researchers on this problem of child rape, pedophiles and other sex crimes against children, said to him.
SHINING THE LIGHT ON “SPOTLIGHT” Bill Donohue
The movie “Spotlight” is bound to spark more conversation about the sexual abuse scandal in the Catholic Church. Unfortunately, much of what the American public knows about this issue is derived from the popular culture, something this film will only abet. Therefore, the time is ripe to revisit what the actual data on this subject reveal.
When the Boston Globe sent the nation reeling in 2002 with revelations of priestly sexual abuse, and the attendant cover-up, Catholics were outraged by the level of betrayal. This certainly included the Catholic League. The scandal cannot be denied. What is being denied, however, is the existence of another scandal—the relentless effort to keep the abuse crisis alive, and the deliberate refusal to come to grips with its origins. Both scandals deserve our attention.
Myth: The Scandal Never Ended
When interviewed about the scandal in 2002 by the New York Times, I said, “I am not the church’s water boy. I am not here to defend the indefensible.” In the Catholic League’s 2002 Annual Report, I even defended the media. “The Boston Globe, the Boston Herald, and the New York Times covered the story with professionalism,” I wrote.
A decade later things had changed. In the Catholic League’s 2011 Annual Report, I offered a critical assessment of the media. “In a nutshell,” I said, “what changed was this: in 2011, unlike what happened in 2002, virtually all the stories were about accusations against priests dating back decades, sometimes as long as a half-century ago. Keep in mind that not only were most of the priests old and infirm, many were dead; thus, only one side of the story could be told. Adding to our anger was the fact that no other institution, religious or secular, was being targeted for old allegations.”
It became clear that by 2011 we were dealing with two scandals, not one. Scandal I was internal—the church-driven scandal. This was the result of indefensible decisions by the clergy: predatory priests and their enabling bishops. Scandal II was external, the result of indefensible cherry-picking of old cases by rapacious lawyers and vindictive victims’ groups. They were aided and abetted by activists, the media, and Hollywood.
Regarding Scandal II, more than cultural elites were involved. “In 2011,” I wrote, “it seemed as if ‘repressed memories’ surfaced with alacrity, but only among those who claimed they were abused by a priest. That there was no similar explosion of ‘repressed memories’ on the part of those who were molested by ministers, rabbis, teachers, psychologists, athletic coaches, and others, made us wonder what was going on.”
The steeple-chasing lawyers and professional victims’ organizations had a vested economic interest in keeping the scandal alive; the former made hundreds of millions and they, in turn, lavishly greased the latter. But it wasn’t money that motivated the media and Hollywood elites to keep the story alive—it was ideology.
To be specific, the Catholic Church has long been the bastion of traditional morality in American society, and if there is anything that the big media outlets and the Hollywood studios loathe, it is being told that they need to put a brake on their libido. So when the scandal came to light, the urge to pounce proved irresistible. The goal was, and still is, to attenuate the moral authority of the Catholic Church. It certainly wasn’t outrage over the sexual abuse of minors that stirred their interest: if that were the case, then many other institutions would have been put under the microscope. But none were.
There is no conspiracy here. What unfolded is the logical outcome of the ideological leanings of our cultural elites. Unfortunately, “Spotlight” will only add to Scandal II. How so? Just read what those connected with the film are saying.
Tom McCarthy, who co-wrote the script with Josh Singer, said, “I would love for Pope Francis and the cardinals and bishops and priests to see this [film].” Would it make any difference? “I remain pessimistic,” he says. “To be honest,” he declares, “I expect no reaction at all.”
Mark Ruffalo plays a reporter, and, like McCarthy, he says, “I hope the Vatican will use this movie to begin to right those wrongs.” (My italic.) He is not sanguine about the prospects. Indeed, he has given up on the Church.
The view that the Catholic Church has not even begun to “right those wrongs” is widely shared. Indeed, the impression given to the American people, by both the media and Hollywood—it is repeated nightly by TV talk-show hosts—is that the sexual abuse scandal in the Church never ended. Impressions count: In December 2012, a CBS News survey found that 55 percent of Catholics, and 73 percent of Americans overall, believe that priestly sexual abuse of minors remains a problem. Only 14 percent of Americans believe it is not a problem today.
Commentary by those associated with “Spotlight,” as well as movie reviewers and pundits, are feeding this impression. But the data show that the conventional wisdom is wrong. The fact of the matter is that the sexual abuse of minors by priests has long ceased to be an institutional problem. All of these parties—Catholics, the American public, the media, and Hollywood—entertain a view that is not supported by the evidence. “Spotlight” will only add to the propaganda.
In 2002, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) commissioned researchers from the John Jay College of Criminal Justice to conduct a major study of priestly sexual abuse; it covered the years 1950 to 2002. It found that accusations of the sexual molestation of minors were made against 4,392 priests.
This figure represents 4 percent of all Catholic priests. What was not widely touted is that 43 percent of these allegations (1881) were 4 unsubstantiated. To qualify as “unsubstantiated” the bar was set high: the allegation had to be “proven to be untruthful and fabricated” as a result of a criminal investigation.
In other words, roughly 2 percent of priests were likely guilty of molesting minors. Accusations proven to be false should carry no weight in assessing wrongdoing, yet the fabrications are treated by the media as if they were true. It must also be said that this rate of false accusations is much higher than found in studies of this problem in the general population.
More than half of the accused priests had only one allegation brought against them. Moreover, 3.5 percent accounted for 26 percent of all the victims. As computed by professor Philip Jenkins, an expert on this subject, the John Jay data reveal that “Out of 100,000 priests active in the U.S. in this half-century, a cadre of just 149 individuals—one priest out of every 750—accounted for a quarter of all allegations of clergy abuse.”
These data give the lie to the accusation that during this period the sexual molestation of minors by priests was rampant. It manifestly was not. Even more absurd is the accusation that the problem is still ongoing.
In the last ten years, from 2005 to 2014, an average 8.4 credible accusations were made against priests for molestation that occurred in any one of those years. The data are available online at the USCCB website (see the reports issued for these years). Considering that roughly 40,000 priests could have had a credible accusation made against them, this means that almost 100 percent of priests had no such accusation made against them!
Sadly, I cannot name a single media outlet, including Catholic ones, that even mentioned this, much less emphasized it. The Catholic News Service, paid for by the bishops, should have touted this, but it didn’t. This delinquency is what helps to feed the misperception that the Church has not even begun to deal with this problem.
In 2011, researchers from John Jay issued another report, “The Causes and Context of Sexual Abuse of Minors by Catholic Priests in the United States, 1950-2010.” While the document was often critical, it commended the Church for its forthrightness in dealing with this problem. “No other institution has undertaken a public study of sexual abuse,” the report said, “and as a result, there are no comparable data to those collected by the Catholic Church.” Looking at the most recent data, the report found that the “incidence of child sexual abuse has declined in both the Catholic Church and in society in general, though the rate of decline is greater in the Catholic Church in the same time period.”
So much for the myth that the Church has not yet “begun” to address this issue. Every study by the John Jay researchers shows that most of the abuse took place between 1965-1985. This is not hard to figure out: the sexual revolution began in the 1960s and fizzled out by the mid-1980s. Libertinism drove the sexual revolution, and it hit the seminaries as well, especially in the 1970s. Matters slowed once AIDS was uncovered in 1981. It took fear—the fear of death—to bring about a much needed reality check.
Myth: Celibacy is the Root Cause
On October 28, 2015, a columnist for the Boston Globe wrote an article about “Spotlight” titled, “Based on a True Story.” Similarly, script writer Tom McCarthy said, “We made a commitment to let the facts play.”
No one disputes the fact that predatory priests were allowed to run wild in the Boston Archdiocese; the problem was not confined to Boston, but it was the epicenter. That molesting priests were moved around like chess pieces to unsuspecting parishes is also true. Ditto for the cover-up orchestrated by some bishops. This is the very stuff of Scandal I. Where the factual claims dissolve, however, is when the script claims to know what triggered the scandal.
“Spotlight” made its premiere on September 3 at the Venice Film Festival. A review published by the international French news agency, AFP, noted that “in Spotlight’s nuanced script, few in the Catholic hierarchy have shown any inclination to address whether the enforced celibacy of priests might be one of the root causes of the problem.”
The celibacy myth was debunked by the John Jay 2011 report. “Celibacy has been constant in the Catholic Church since the eleventh century and could not account for the rise and subsequent decline in abuse cases from the 1960s through the 1980s.” But if celibacy did not drive the scandal, what did? The John Jay researchers cite the prevalence of sexually immature men who were allowed to enter the seminaries, as well as the effects of the sexual revolution.
There is much truth to this observation, but it is incomplete. Who were these sexually immature men? The popular view, one that is promoted by the movie as well, suggests they were pedophiles. The data, however, prove this to be wrong.
When the word got out that “Spotlight” was going to hit the big screen, Mike Fleming, Jr. got an Exclusive for Deadline Hollywood; his piece appeared on August 8, 2014. The headline boasted that it was a “Boston Priest Pedophile Pic.” In his first sentence, he described the film as “a drama that Tom McCarthy will direct about the Boston Globe investigation into pedophile priests.” This narrative is well entrenched in the media, and in the culture at large. Whenever this issue is discussed, it is pitched as a “pedophile” scandal. We can now add “Spotlight’s” contribution to this myth.
One of the most prominent journalists on the Boston Globe “Spotlight” team was Kevin Cullen. On February 28, 2004, he wrote a story assessing a report issued by the National Review Board, appointed by the USCCB, on what exactly happened. He quoted the head of the Board’s research committee, well-respected attorney Robert S. Bennett, as saying it was not pedophilia that drove the scandal. “There are no doubt many 7 outstanding priests of a homosexual orientation who live chaste, celibate lives,” he said, “but any evaluation of the causes and context of the current crisis must be cognizant of the fact that more than 80 percent of the abuse at issue was of a homosexual nature.”
Bennett was correct, and Cullen knew it to be true as well. “Of the 10,667 reported victims [in the time period between 1950 and 2002],” Cullen wrote, “81 percent were male, the report said, and more than three quarters [the exact figure is 78 percent] were postpubescent, meaning the abuse did not meet the clinical definition of pedophilia.” One of Bennett’s colleagues, Dr. Paul McHugh, former psychiatrist-in-chief at Johns Hopkins University, was more explicit. “This behavior was homosexual predation on American Catholic youth,” he said, “yet it is not being discussed.” It never is.
So it is indisputable that the Boston Globe “Spotlight” team knew that it was homosexuality, not pedophilia, that drove the scandal. Yet that is not what is being reported today. Indeed, as recently as November 1, 2015, a staff reporter for the Boston Globe said the movie was about “the pedophile priest crisis.” This flies in the face of the evidence. In fact, the John Jay 2011 report found that less than 5 percent of the abusive priests fit the diagnosis of pedophilia, thus concluding that “it is inaccurate to refer to abusers as ‘pedophile priests.'”
The evidence, however, doesn’t count. Politics counts. The mere suggestion that homosexual priests accounted for the lion’s share of the problem was met with cries of homophobia. This is at the heart of Scandal II. Even the John Jay researchers went on the defensive. Most outrageous was the voice of dissident, so-called progressive, Catholics: It was they who pushed for a relaxation of sexual mores in the seminaries, thus helping to create Scandal I. Then they helped to create Scandal II by refusing to take ownership of the problem they foisted; they blamed “sexual repression” for causing the crisis.
So how did the deniers get around the obvious? Cullen said that “most [of the molested] fell victim to ephebophiles, men who are sexually attracted to adolescent or postpubescent children.” But clinically speaking, ephebophilia is a waste-basket term of no scientific value.
Philip Jenkins once bought into this idea but eventually realized that the word “communicates nothing to most well-informed readers. These days I tend rather to speak of these acts as ‘homosexuality.'” Jenkins attributes his change of mind to Mary Eberstadt, one of the most courageous students of this issue. “When was the last time you heard the phrase ‘ephebophile’ applied to a heterosexual man?” In truth, ephebophilia is shorthand for homosexuals who prey on adolescents.
Even those who know better, such as the hierarchy of the Church, are reluctant to mention the devastating role that homosexual priests have played in molesting minors. In April 2002, the cardinals of the United States, along with the leadership of the USCCB and the heads of several offices of the Holy See, issued a Communiqué from the Vatican on this issue. “Attention was drawn to the fact that almost all the cases involved adolescents and therefore were not cases of true pedophilia” they said. So what were they? They were careful not to drop the dreaded “H” word.
Further proof that the problem is confined mostly to gay priests is provided by Father Michael Peterson, co-founder of St. Luke’s Institute, the premier treatment center in the nation for troubled priests. He frankly admits, “We don’t see heterosexual pedophiles at all.” This suggests that virtually all the priests who abused prepubescent children had a homosexual orientation.
The spin game is intellectually dishonest. When adult men have sex with postpubescent females, the predatory behavior is seen as heterosexual in nature. But when adult men have sex with postpubsecent males, the predatory behavior is not seen as homosexual in nature. This isn’t science at work—it’s politics, pure and simple.
I have said it many times before, and I will say it again: most gay priests are not molesters but most molesting priests have been gay. It gets tiresome, however, to trot this verity out every time I address this issue. That’s because it means nothing to elites in the dominant culture. Just whispering about the role gay priests have played in the sexual abuse scandal triggers howls of protest.
There is plenty of evidence that Hollywood has long been a haven for sexual predators, both straight and gay. The same is true of many religious and secular institutions throughout society. But there is little interest in the media and in Tinsel Town to profile them. They have identified the enemy and are quite content to keep pounding away.
There is no doubt that the Boston Globe “Spotlight” team deserved a Pulitzer Prize for exposing Scandal I. Regrettably, there will be no Pulitzer for exposing Scandal II.
Techniques used by the Catholic League to suppress criticism of the Catholic Church
By Stephen D Mumford | 10 October 2012
N4CM
From the link: http://churchandstate.org.uk/2012/10/techniques-used-by-the-catholic-league/
Editor’s note: The following has been adapted from Chapter 15 of N4CM Chairman Dr Stephen D Mumford’s seminal book, The Life and Death of NSSM 200: How the Destruction of Political Will Doomed a U.S. Population Policy (1996).
The Catholic League was founded in 1973 by Jesuit priest Virgil Blum. William Donohue assumed leadership in July 1993. Since then, the membership has grown from 27,000 to 200,000. According to Donohue, the League has “won the support of all of the U.S. Cardinals and many of the Bishops as well…We are here to defend the Church from the scurrilous assaults that have been mounted against it, and we definitely need the support of the hierarchy if we are to get the job done.” Thus it can be considered an arm of the Church. It supplements or replaces priest-controlled organizations of the past described by Paul Blanshard and George Seldes. The League apparently has a single mission: suppression of all mainstream criticism of the Roman Catholic Church.
According to Donohue, it is fortunate that, “the Catholic Church is there to provide a heady antidote to today’s mindless ideas of freedom.” He is a strong advocate of the Church’s positions on restriction of the freedoms guaranteed by the American Constitution and condemned by popes for nearly two centuries, especially those regarding the press and speech. He informs us that: “the Catholic League is there to defend the Church against its adversaries.”
There are many recognizable principles governing the behavior of the League. One is revealed in a vicious 1994 attack against the New London newspaper, The Day, for an editorial critical of the Catholic Church: “What is truly ‘beyond understanding’ is not the Catholic Church’s position, it is the fact that a secular newspaper has the audacity to stick it’s nose in where it doesn’t belong. It is nobody’s business what the Catholic Church does.”
A second basic premise is the League’s commitment to canon 1369 of the Code of Canon Law: “A person is to be punished with a just penalty, who, at a public event or assembly, or in a published writing, or by otherwise using the means of social communication, utters blasphemy, or gravely harms public morals, or rails at or excites hatred of or contempt for religion or the Church.” Canon law is the law of the Catholic Church. All criticism of the pope or the Church is in violation of this law in one way or another. This chapter will make clear that the League follows this canon to the letter and demands that all others conform—or pay the price for their violation.
Another principle is aggressive action. Says Donohue, “I defy anyone to name a single organization that has more rabid members than the Catholic League. Our members are generous, loyal and extremely active. When we ask them to sign petitions, write to offending parties and the like, they respond with a vigor that is unparalleled…We aim to win. Obviously, we don’t win them all, but our record of victories is impressive.” To justify this stance, he identifies with Patrick Buchanan’s resistance to the “Culture War” against the Catholic Church: “We didn’t start this culture war against the Catholic Church, we simply want to stop it.”
Donohue also justifies the League’s aggressive behavior by claiming that it is culturally unacceptable for nonCatholics to criticize the Catholic Church. “Perhaps the most cogent remark of the day,” he asserts, “came from the former Mayor of New York, Ed Koch, who politely remarked that his mother always advised him not to speak ill of other religions. It is a lesson that apparently few have learned….Non-Catholics would do well to follow the advice of Ed Koch’s mom and just give it a rest. Their crankiness is wearing thin.” This cultural norm is widely accepted in America, to the enormous benefit of the Vatican. What role, one wonders, did the Catholic Church play in its adoption? Certainly, in the case of population growth control, its consequence has been catastrophic.
The Catholic League strongly discourages criticism of the Church, especially attacks by the press. Says Donohue, “It does no good complaining about Catholic bashing if all we do is wait until the other side strikes.” Prevention of such publications is of the essence. Yet Donohue is convinced that this is not censorship: “The press and the radio talk shows asked me if the Catholic League was engaging in censorship by responding the way we did. As always, I informed them that only the government has the power to censor anything.” This is patently untrue.
Another tenet enunciated by Donohue:
“I think it is a gross mistake to give elevation to fringe groups. Our basic rule of thumb is this: the more mainstream the source of anti-Catholicism, the more likely it is that the Catholic League will respond….The mainstream media, after all, have the credibility and influence that the fringe lacks, and they are therefore much more likely to do real damage.”
“When major universities, TV networks and government officials engage in Catholic-baiting, it is a far more dangerous situation than the venom that emanates from certifiably fringe organizations.”
“When an establishment newspaper such as the Sun-Sentinel [Fort Lauderdale] offends, it cannot be ignored.”
Donohue goes on to explain the Sun-Sentinel example. On February 9, 1995, it ran an ad, paid for by a Seventh Day Adventist group, which claimed that the Catholic Church is seeking to create a New World Order to take command of the world and that the Pope and the Catholic Church were in a league with Satan.
“Accordingly, the Catholic League contacted the radio and television stations in the area, the opposition newspaper, and the nation’s major media outlets registering its outrage and its demands. We demanded nothing less than ‘an apology to Catholics and a pledge that no such ads will ever be accepted again.’ We added that ‘If this is not forthcoming, the Catholic League will launch a public ad campaign on its own, one that will directly target the Sun-Sentinel.’”
“What exactly did we have in mind? We were prepared to take out ads in the opposition newspaper, registering our charge of anti-Catholic bigotry. We were prepared to pay for radio spots making our charge. We were prepared to buy billboard space along the majority arteries surrounding the Fort Lauderdale community. Why not? After all, …we are in a position to make such threats….This is the way it works: if the source of bigotry wants to deal with lousy publicity, it can elect to do so. Or it can come to its senses and knock it off. In the event the anti-Catholic bigots want to bite the bullet and stay the course, we’ll do everything we can within the law to make sure that they pay a very high price for doing so.” It goes without saying that anyone critical of the Vatican, or the hierarchy, or the Roman Catholic Church is, by definition, an anti-Catholic bigot—including Catholics themselves.
One final element makes clear the objective of the Catholic League—protection of the papacy against all criticism. Writes Donohue, “It is the conviction of the Catholic League that an attack on the Church is an attack on Catholics.” He offers no rationale to support this theory. Obviously, millions of liberal American Catholics would disagree outright, for it is they who have been attacking the Church.
Donohue continues,
“Throughout American history, the job of combating anti-Catholicism fell to the clergy, and especially to the Archbishops. But times have changed….The type of anti-Catholicism that exists in American society today is fundamentally different from the genre that marked this country’s history from the outset. From colonial times to the election of John F. Kennedy as President of the United States, anti-Catholicism was vented against both individual Catholics and against the Catholic Church itself. But over the past 30 years, it has become evident that most of the Catholic-bashing centers on the institution of the Church…”
The hierarchy cannot be effective against criticism of the institution because they are the institution. Thus, the hierarchy has had to call on the laity to protect the institution in this way. In 1971, the League’s founder pointed out, “If a group is to be politically effective, issues rather than institutions must be at stake.” In other words, the laity, if left to their own devices, will not defend the institution but they will defend their interests as individuals. Hence, the League has adopted this principle and has convinced its members that “an attack on the Church is an attack on Catholics.” In this way, the institution is successfully using individual lay Catholics to shield it from all criticism.
The Church and Its Image
The Catholic Church in America has good reason to be intensely concerned about its image and any criticism. Donohue cites a 1995 study, “Taking America’s Pulse,” undertaken by the National Conference (formerly known as the National Conference of Christians and Jews). Despite the almost complete suppression of all criticism of the Catholic Church in America, a majority of non-Catholic Americans (55%) believe that Catholics “want to impose their own ideas of morality on the larger society.” The survey also found that 38% of non-Catholics believe that Catholics are “narrow-minded because they are too much controlled by their Church.” Obviously, there is a highly receptive audience in this country for any justified criticisms of the Catholic Church. If the floodgates ever opened, it is unlikely that the Church would be able to close them again. Only too well understood by the hierarchy, and the Catholic League, this perhaps explains their unmitigated intolerance for criticism.
Methods of the League
Donohue has cited many of the methods used by the League, including some we have already mentioned. “We specialize in public embarrassment of public figures who have earned our wrath and that is why we are able to win so many battles: no person or organization wants to be publicly embarrassed, and that is why we specialize in doing exactly that…” Elsewhere he writes, “The threat of a lawsuit is the only language that some people understand. The specter of public humiliation is another weapon that must be used. Petitions and boycotts are helpful. The use of the bully pulpit—via the airwaves—is a most effective strategy. Press conferences can be used to enlighten or, alternatively, to embarrass.” “Ads taken out in prominent national newspapers are quite effective.”
But probably the most effective means of suppressing criticism of the Catholic Church through the press is a constant “in your face” attack of local newspapers. In a 1995 report on the Massachusetts Chapter of the Catholic League, it is noted that the president and the executive director had been on the attack, “appearing in the media more than 600 times” in the previous five years. In a single state, 600 times in five years! It is no wonder that newspapers in Massachusetts are very reluctant to print any criticism of the Catholic Church, no matter how justified, given this constant barrage of punishment.
Intimidation of the media leadership and of our government by the League is achieved through the wide distribution of frequent news releases, its monthly newsletter and an annual report. Individual attacks are often announced through widely distributed press releases which are bound to capture the attention of members of the press.
Success of the League
The Catholic League has been remarkably successful in achieving its goals. Donohue rightfully gloats: “One of the major reasons why people are giving [donations] is the success the Catholic League has had.” As noted earlier, membership grew from 27,000 to 200,000 in the first two years after Donohue took control. He continues, “We have had a string of victories and we have also had an unprecedented degree of media coverage. We don’t win every fight but our overall record is quite good. Our presence on radio and TV, combined with coverage in newspapers and magazines—both religious and secular—is excellent.” “We’ve been featured on the television program ‘Entertainment Tonight’ and received front page coverage from national newspapers including the Wall Street Journal and The New York Times.” The number of apologies and promises it extracts from the nation’s newspapers, TV networks and stations and programs, radio stations, activist organizations, commercial establishments, educational institutions and governments is most impressive.
The suppression of all criticism of the Catholic Church and its hierarchy is the goal of the Catholic League. The visit of the pope to the U.S. in October 1995 was a major media event. Given all the gravely serious problems faced by the Church and the enormous amount of dissent by American Catholics, as well as the growing hostility from non-Catholics as a result of the Church’s interference in American policy making, one would expect wide coverage of these realities in the media during his visit. Instead, it was treated as a triumphant return.
The Catholic League believes that it played a major role in this great public relations success—and with good reason. In August 1994, it launched a campaign to intimidate the press in an astounding advance warning to media professionals preparing for the pope’s visit to New York in late October. A letter signed by Donohue announced a press conference to be held just prior to the pope’s visit that will present “10′s of thousands of petitions from active Catholics” that have been collected over the past year. What else but intimidation of the press is the intent of this campaign?
The November 1995 issue of the League’s journal, Catalyst, is headlined, “Media Treat Pope Fairly; Protesters Fail to Score.” Donohue writes, “By all accounts, the visit of Pope John Paul II to the United States was a smashing success. Media treatment of the papal visit was, with few exceptions, very fair. Protesters were few in number and without impact. From beginning to end, this papal visit proved to be the most triumphant of them all.” A month later he writes, “The relatively few cheap shots that were taken at the Pope by the media in October is testimony to a change in the culture.” And of course the desired “change in the culture” is the elimination of criticism of the pope and his hierarchy. The Catholic League is succeeding on a grand scale far beyond what all but a handful of Americans realize.
Intimidation Prevents Criticism
It is clear from Donohue’s own words that prevention of any criticism is the goal of the League and that intimidation is its means of achieving this end. In a fund-raising letter mailed in December of 1995, Donohue appeals for funds to hire more staff: “We could have done more….We could have tackled other issues, thereby adding to the number of people who will think twice before crossing Catholics again.” From the League’s 1995 Annual Report: “It is hoped that by …[attacking critics], potential offenders will think twice before launching their assaults on Roman Catholicism.” This statement also makes it clear that it is the protection of the institution that is the goal, not protection of individual Catholics.
It appears that the most aggressive and extensive attack in League history was one directed at Disney for its release of the movie, “Priest.” In an editorial, Donohue forthrightly says that the purpose of the intensive attack on Disney is the prevention of the production of such critical movies in the future: “Our sights were set on what might be coming down the road, not on what had already happened.”
The advice given by Ed Koch’s mother—do not speak ill of other religions—has been a national ethic for nearly all of this century. This ethic, inherent in our culture, has served to suppress nearly all criticism of the Catholic Church. As a result, until its political activities were unveiled with the implementation of the bishops’ Pastoral Plan for Pro-life Activities in 1975, the Church had been relatively immune from mainstream criticism. Because this ethic has served the Catholic Church so well, the Church may very well have played a major role in its inculcation into our culture. With its political activity becoming increasingly evident, critics are more than ever convinced of the need for public criticism of the Catholic Church.
However, this ethic does not protect the Church from dissent within its confines which has been growing since Vatican Council II in the 1960s, and most remarkably in recent years. The American media, to avoid flying in the face of American culture by ignoring this dearly held belief, have occasionally provided a forum for this protest. The dissenters have been a significant source of criticism. The Catholic League has not overlooked this problem—indeed, it takes it very seriously. All criticism is targeted from whatever source, including members of the Church.
For example, on January 22, 1995, CBS’s “60 Minutes” broadcast a segment by Mike Wallace on the Catholic dissident group Call to Action. The Catholic hierarchy did agree to appear but dictated terms that were unacceptable to CBS. Then, according to Donohue, the Catholic League sent two letters to executive producer Barry Lando and issued the following press release on January 25:
“The entire Call to Action segment was, from beginning to end, an exercise in intellectual dishonesty and journalistic malpractice. The decision to give high profile to the Catholic Church’s radical fringe was pure politics, and nothing short of outrageous….Allowing extremists an uncontested opportunity to rail against the Catholic Church distorts the sentiments of most Catholics and provides succor for bigots. There is a difference between reporting dissent, and promoting it….‘60 Minutes’ made clear its preference, extending to the disaffected a platform that they have never earned within the Catholic community….This is propaganda at work, not journalism.”
This press release, of course, was received across America as a powerful warning to others to steer clear of Catholic dissidents. The Catholic League then launched a national postcard mailing campaign directed at Lando personally: “…we are angered over the way you continue to present the Catholic Church….We are tired of having our Church viewed from the perspective of the disaffected.”
In another example, the League attacked the October 5, 1995 edition of “NBC Nightly News” with Tom Brokaw for providing a platform for Catholics for a Free Choice and Dignity. The League’s press release included the following:
“The media do a great disservice to Catholics and non-Catholics alike when Catholics for a Free Choice and Dignity are presented as though they were genuine voices in the Catholic community. The effect of such misrepresentation is to promote dissent rather than to record it. As such, it is irresponsible for the media to allow itself to become willing accomplices to public deception.”
The continuous intimidation is bound to have its desired effect. The April 22, 1996 issue of the New Republic magazine criticizes the League’s annual report as indicative of the League’s “paranoia.” The New Republic completely misses the point. One need only look at the language used in the League’s attacks. It is not defense. It is intimidating language. The report is an offensive weapon used to silence critics of the Catholic Church.
The Catholic League focuses it attention on five types of institutions: media, activist organizations, commercial establishments, educational institutions and governments. Donohue attributes the League’s success, in part, to its ability to stay focused. The League’s 1994 and 1995 annual reports alone offer 350 examples of League attacks.
As one surveys its material, it becomes evident that all criticism of the Church or anything that places the Church in a negative light is deemed anti-Catholic, despicable and impermissible. The Church is simply above all criticism. The Catholic League obviously rejects America because it rejects what America stands for, including the freedoms of speech, expression and the press. This stand taken by the Catholic League is consistent with nearly two centuries of Catholic teaching on these matters and we should expect nothing different.
Intimidation by Catholic institutions over the past hundred years, has resulted in a populace woefully ignorant of the threat to American democracy and security posed by the Church. This intimidation has made it possible for the Church to go unchallenged.
Bill “Pig Face” Donohue, degenerate leader of the Catholic League
End Of The Catholic League?: Conservative Host Interviews, Decimates Bill Donohue
Conservative talk radio host Hugh Hewitt interviewed Bill Donohue yesterday, and destroyed him on-air. Is this the beginning of the end of the Catholic League?
From the link: http://www.thenewcivilrightsmovement.com/davidbadash/the_end_of_the_catholic_league_conservative_host_interviews_decimates_bill_donohue
A decade ago, comedian and “Daily Show” host Jon Stewart appeared on CNN’s “Crossfire.” It was one of the most contentious, memorable, and truth-filled interviews ever. The full interview is here, and here’s a short clip of some of the best moments:
That was October 2004. By January, 2005, “Crossfire” was fired. Canceled. Kaput. Gone. Dead. In large part because of Stewart.
This week, Catholic League president Bill Donohue penned a disgusting statement in response to the terrorists who slaughtered 12 people in Paris, mostly members of the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo. In his commentary, Donohue blamed the editor-in-chief, for his own death.
NCRM attacked Donohue for the gross and ugly attack, as did several others.
Yesterday, Donohue was interviewed by longtime conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt. For those unfamiliar with him, he is a law professor at the same school as the Chairman of the National Organization For Marriage, and has frequently had NOM Chair John Eastman on his show. Hewitt is a very conservative Roman Catholic, and has a strong social media following.
Donohue no doubt assumed he was walking into friendly territory.
He was not.
“Bill, I’ve often agreed with you over the years, because like you, I’m an orthodox Catholic, went to confession on Saturday, Mass on Saturday night,” Hewitt, about a minute into the interview, told Donohue. “I don’t believe, except maybe perhaps vis-à-vis Dennis Prager, I’ve committed any mortal sins in the interim, so I think I’m in good standing with the Church right now. And I have to say I’m appalled, and I’m embarrassed, and I’m urging you to rethink this.”
And then it really went south.
“You blamed the victim before their bodies were cold,” Hewitt accused. “Everyone listening to this show believes that you are blaming the victim before their bodies were cold. It’s deeply embarrassing to me as a Catholic.”
Hewitt also accused Donohue of being a “bully,” of “lying,” of being an “embarrassment” to Catholics. He said Donohue’s comments on the attack on Charlie Hebdo are a “scandal on the church.”
The entire 23-minute audio is below. You may think you won’t listen to it all, but you will. It’s like a train wreck, a car wreck – you can’t help but listen because it’s just so bad, for Donohue.
Is this the end of the Catholic League? No. But it’s likely the beginning of the end.
Just as when a better journalist, Jon Stewart, destroyed “Crossfire,” the better Catholic, Hewitt, has destroyed the Catholic League. He has exposed it as very un-Catholic, un-Christian, and nothing more than a money-making charade. And it’s about time.
Listen:
And now Bill wants to insure they have no right to privacy and that he has the right to investigate their allegations.
Audio: Hugh Hewitt versus Bill “Those Charlie Hebdo attackers were right to be angry” Donohue
posted at 8:01 pm on January 8, 2015 by Allahpundit
From the link: http://hotair.com/archives/2015/01/08/audio-hugh-hewitt-versus-bill-those-charlie-hebdo-attackers-were-right-to-be-angry-donohue/
A long clip but a fun one and you won’t lose much if you listen to only the first half. Things start to get hot at around 4:30 and then hotter still at 9:30.
Noah already blogged Donohue’s statement yesterday arguing that, although murder is to be deplored, the Charlie Hebdo staff provoked it by being so gleefully sacrilegious. Hewitt is appalled by that blame-the-victim reasoning, as is pretty much everyone whose name isn’t “Bill Donohue.” Today Donohue posted a new statement on the Catholic League website to “clarify” his earlier remarks. Spot the egregious lie:
My position is this: the murderers are fully responsible for what they did and should be treated with the full force of the law. Nothing justifies the killing of these people. But this is not the whole of this issue.
The cartoonists, and all those associated with Charlie Hebdo, are no champions of freedom. Quite the opposite: their obscene portrayal of religious figures—so shocking that not a single TV station or mainstream newspaper would show them—represents an abuse of freedom.
Freedom of speech is not an end—it is a means to an end. For Americans, the end is nicely spelled out in the Preamble to the U.S. Constitution: the goal is to “form a more perfect Union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity.”…
Let’s forget about legalities. As I have said countless times, everyone has a legal right to insult my religion (or the religion of others), but no one has a moral right to do so. Can we please have this conversation, along with what to do about Muslim barbarians who kill because they are offended?
CNN’s not blacking out Charlie Hebdo covers because they’re shocked at obscene images of religious figures. They’re blacking them out because they’re terrified jihadis will try to copycat the Paris terrorists by shooting up CNN HQ if they don’t. And it’s frankly amazing that Donohue, who owes his public notoriety to his willingness to scream about anti-Catholic bigotry on camera, would give them a pass on that. The media usually has no qualms about passing along images like “Piss Christ” denigrating Christian icons, a point Donohue has himself made endlessly in the past. The reason he’s giving them a pass today by presuming good faith “sensitivity” to religion as a motive rather than cowardice is because he wants to encourage their anti-blasphemy ethic towards Muslims. If he plays their game by pretending that censorship is about respect for faith instead of fear, he gives them a reason to add Catholicism to their growing list of Institutions That Must Not Be Offended. He’s quite explicit about this with Hewitt too. What’s wrong with self-censorship in the name of sensitivity, he asks? Why can’t we have a social norm against blasphemy?
Hewitt asks the correct question in response: What do you do when people defy that norm? How far are you willing to go to enforce it? Donohue’s against criminalizing the practice, he claims, but is that because he genuinely opposes penalties or because he suspects people won’t hear him out if he takes too harsh of an approach to blasphemy at this point in the public debate? His logic is conspicuously similar to the collectivist logic used by fans of “hate speech” laws, including his creepy reference to “abuse of freedom”: We should protect free speech up to the point that it’s not hurting society, at which point it’s time to start carving out exceptions. It’s the “heckler’s veto” as social ideal. Provocative speech, which is hurtful to some slice of the public almost by definition, would have a tough time surviving in that moral ecosystem. In fact, years before jihadis decided to escalate the sanction, Charlie Hebdo was sued in French courts on grounds of “racism” for publishing the Danish Mohammed cartoons. They did survive, but as the entire world now knows, Charlie Hebdo was unusually dogged in its willingness to take risks for satire. Hewitt’s rightly suspicious here that Donohue’s system of “moral” sanction for blasphemy would calcify into a system of legal sanction. And you know what? Given the polling, he’s right to be.
Note what Donohue says, by the way, about major figures in the Church allegedly dialing him up and telling him privately that they agree with him. I sure hope that’s not true. The media’s anti-blasphemy drift has enough momentum as it is, without a hard shove from religious figures who actually matter.
There isn’t a pedophile problem in the Roman Catholic Church spews Bill Donohue, the Defender of the Pedophiles of the Roman Catholic Church.
Bill Donohue of the Catholic League states the following: Crimes of a sexual nature need not be reported to the police, just the legal department
Bill Donohue of the Catholic League states the following: Crimes of a sexual nature need not be reported to the police, just the legal department
Bill Donohue is at it again, defending the indefensible and claiming that crimes of a sexual nature need not be reported to the police, just the legal department. This proves beyond a shadow of a doubt, that Bill Donohue will willing violate FEDERAL AND STATE LAWS that say YOU MUST report these crimes to the police. In his latest diatribe in defense of Lafayette Bishop Michael Jarrell for not publishing the names of priests accused of a sexual offense in The Advertiser on August 23, 2014. This is the article:
From the link: http://www.theadvertiser.com/story/opinion/2014/08/23/bishop-deserves-praise-protecting-priets-identities/14500535/
Kudos to Lafayette Bishop Michael Jarrell for not publishing the names of priests accused of a sexual offense. His decision is identical to the one that the leaders of every other institution, public and private, have long come to: It is unethical to do so. Why should the Catholic Church be any different?
A reporter came to my office a few years ago asking me about this issue. Specifically, she asked how I could defend a bishop for not posting the names of accused priests on his diocesan website. I immediately asked for her boss’ name and phone number. She wanted to know why. “Because I am going to report you for sexually harassing me, and then I want to see if your name is going to be posted on the website of your cable news employer.”
She got the point.
I am the CEO of the Catholic League. If someone called me making an accusation against one of my staff members, I can assure you I would not call the cops. No employer would. I would do the same as everyone else: I would conduct my own internal investigation, and would only go to the authorities if I thought the charge was authentic.
There is a profound difference among an accusation, a credible accusation, a substantiated accusation and a finding of guilt. The assumption behind all three levels of accusations is that the accused is innocent, yet this seems not to matter much anymore, especially when the accused is a priest.
The leader of a professional victims’ group maintains that we need to know the names of the credibly accused priests in Lafayette so that parents can protect their children. Nonsense.
Of the 15 priests, seven are dead, five have moved away, and three are retired. None is in ministry. Moreover, all the accusations stem from alleged offenses dating back prior to 1984. In short, it is more than hype to suggest that kids are in danger — it is expressly demagogic, designed to whip up public sentiment against priests.
What is really sickening about this issue is that so many decent and innocent priests have had their reputations ruined by vicious accusers who remain anonymous. No one demands that we make public the names of the accusers, but somehow we are all supposed to know the identity of the accused.
Correction: Only when it comes to priests are demands made to publish the names of the accused.
The New York Times has a business ethics policy that reads, “Any employee who becomes aware of any conduct that he or she believes to be prohibited by this Policy or a violation of the law … is expected to promptly report the facts forming the basis of that belief or knowledge to any supervisor of the legal department.”
In other words, crimes of a sexual nature need not be reported to the police, just the legal department. If this policy is good for reporters, why isn’t it good for bishops? The best part of the Times’ policy says that those who make false accusations are subject “to discipline up to and including termination.” The bishops should adopt this policy immediately.
I am so proud of Bishop Jarrell for acting fairly and courageously.
— Bill Donohue is the president of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights.
And now Bill wants to insure they have no right to privacy and that he has the right to investigate their allegations.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: PEDOPHILE DEFENDER OF THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH, BILL DONOHUE, PRESIDENT OF THE CATHOLIC LEAGUE FOR THE DEFENSE AND PROTECTION OF THE PEDOPHILE PIMPS, PRIESTS AND PARISHIONERS OF THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH…CALLS HIS HOLY FATHER, POPE FRANCIS A LIAR!!!
Bill Donohue states again and again, that there is not a pedophile problem in the Roman Catholic Church, that this is a homosexual problem.
So in essence, with Bill Donohue stating this…he is calling Pope Francis, his Holy Father…A LIAR!!!!
Pope Francis: ‘One in 50’ Catholic priests, bishops and cardinals are paedophiles
So Bill…you pig faced scumbag defender of the Pedophiles of the Roman Catholic Church…you are calling your Pope a liar…and you should now shut the fuck up.
No Bill, instead get down on your knees, remove Cardinal Timothy Dolans shriveled little penis from your cock suckers mouth, and say 1 MILLION Our Fathers and 1 MILLION Hail Mary’s….then do you good deed…suck off Dolan and swallow his sacred sacrament…you disgusting, scumbag degenerate defender.
Enjoy your eternity in hell Bill and Dolan…you both deserve it.
There isn’t a pedophile problem in the Roman Catholic Church spews Bill Donohue, the Defender of the Pedophiles of the Roman Catholic Church.
First off because Bill Donohue says that if a priest rape victim did not punch his offending priest in the face while he was raping them, then that means not only did they want to be raped, they enjoyed being raped and are homosexuals for it. So this is the scenario I play in my head if one of Bill Donohue’s daughters got raped and did not defend herself against her rapist attacker:
Would YOU also tell them to turn the other cheek? Would you tell them that they should not prosecute their rapist because that would be so anti-Catholic and anti-Christian? Or would you feel deep down inside your soul….if you have one…to want to go out and blow the brains out of the rapist? Would you demand the prosecution of the rapists of your daughters…or would you just tell them to shut their mouths, forgive them and turn the other cheek like you do to priest and nun abuse victims? Is it ONLY priest and nun abuse victims whom should forgive their rapists and abusers? I mean you demand that teachers whom rape the..according to your bogus estimates…400,000 children…deserve to be prosecuted and put into prison, so please explain to us Bill Donohue, defender of this evil…why should NOT the Popes, Cardinals, Bishops and Archbishops whom covered up these crimes, or the priests and nuns whom committed these crimes against us…be exempt from the same demands you place on others?
So like you use bully tactics against us survivors of priest rape and nun abuse saying your attacks are protected under the First Amendment Free Speech right, I have every right to do the same to you, you disgusting, sorry excuse for a human being.
So be ready Bill. On this one page I am going to expose you for whom and what you are. A psychotic, punked assed bully.
Bill even encourages having a “roadie” before leaving…which means he advocates himself and his employees to drink and drive.
I mean hey…you even admit it Bill in one of your own postings on the Catholic League website:
“We don’t have that problem—being a boozer is a condition of employment.” said Bill Donohue about the Catholic League. Helen Sorrentino of The Alternative Press advises employers to limit office parties to “a few hours.” I manifestly disagree—ours is open-ended and could go on all night. She says to “end the service of alcohol 30 minutes prior to the end the party.” No way—this is not a baseball game where you can’t get a beer after the seventh inning. Indeed, most of us grab a roadie before leaving.
See not ONLY is Bill a self-admitted BOOZER…a condition of employment at the Catholic League is you be a boozer like himself. You also get good and drunk and then grab a roadie before leaving, getting behind the wheel of a car, DRUNK and driving home. I mean he did NOT say that he provided any kind of driving service for his drunk ass or his drunk assed employees did he in any part of his message on Office Parties Rules to Ignore posting on the Catholic League website?
These are all links to videos where in Bill Donohue does in fact defend the Roman Catholic Church, it’s priest pedophiles, hebephiles and ephebophiles, the leaders like Cardinal Timothy Dolan, Donald Wuerl, Roger Mahony, et al and of course Pope Emeritus Benedict, whom covered up for these disgusting, perverted, degenerate, predatory scumbag pedophiles…….moving them around, not warning anyone, protecting them, and by their actions caused the rapes and abuses to continue and are therefor just as much responsible for the crimes as the priests and nuns whom raped and abused us.
Bill loves to play with semantics too. Bill absolutely hates it when we call his disgusting priests and leaders whom he defends PEDOPHILES. Nope, he would rather place the blame for the problem on homosexuals, referring to the John Jay report to back himself up with his false claims and assertions. Why even One of the researchers responsible for a landmark statistical study of sexual abuse in the Catholic Church says that Catholic League president William Donohue “drew an unwarranted conclusion” from her work when he claimed that “most” of the clergy who committed the abuse have been “gay.”
In an interview with Media Matters, Margaret Smith — a John Jay College criminologist who worked on the 2004 study — said that while Donohue “quoted the study’s data correctly,” he “drew an unwarranted conclusion” in asserting that most of the abusers were gay.
Explaining that it is an oversimplification to assume to that priests who abuse male victims are gay, Smith said: “The majority of the abusive acts were homosexual in nature. That participation in homosexual acts is not the same as sexual identity as a gay man.”
As an example, Smith pointed to the case of Marcial Maciel Degollado, a prominent Mexican priest who alledgedly abused male children and also allegedly carried on affairs with multiple women. Smith noted that while Maciel allegedly abused boys, most people would not think of him as a gay man.
Here is a link to this story: http://mediamatters.org/blog/2010/04/02/expert-donohues-claim-that-most-abusive-priests/162640
Below you will find a full posting of the story.
So here are videos, of Bill Donohue, spewing his evil against priest rape victims, slamming homosexuals for it and all kinds of other falsehoods that he spewed from his well used outhouse pie-hole.
The Infamous Bill Pig Face Donohue, President of the Catholic League and Defender of the Degenerates of the Unholy Roman Catholic Church of Child Rapists
Expert: Donohue’s claim that most abusive priests are gay is “unwarranted”
Blog ››› April 2, 2010 11:23 AM EDT ››› JEREMY SCHULMAN
One of the researchers responsible for a landmark statistical study of sexual abuse in the Catholic Church saysthat Catholic League president William Donohue “drew an unwarranted conclusion” from her work when he claimed that “most” of the clergy who committed the abuse have been “gay.”
In a March 30 ad published in The New York Times, Donohue described the sex abuse scandal as a “homosexual crisis.” Donohue added: “Eighty percent of the victims of priestly sexual abuse are male and most of them are post-pubescent. While homosexuality does not cause predatory behavior, and most gay priests are not molesters, most of the molesters have been gay.”
During a March 31 appearance on CNN, Donohue elaborated on his claim, specifically citing a 2004 study produced by researchers at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, which found that 81 percent of the alleged victims of sexual abuse by priests were male. During the CNN segment, Donohue repeated his assertion that “most of the molesters have been gay.”
But in an interview with Media Matters, Margaret Smith — a John Jay College criminologist who worked on the 2004 study — said that while Donohue “quoted the study’s data correctly,” he “drew an unwarranted conclusion” in asserting that most of the abusers were gay.
Explaining that it is an oversimplification to assume to that priests who abuse male victims are gay, Smith said: “The majority of the abusive acts were homosexual in nature. That participation in homosexual acts is not the same as sexual identity as a gay man.”
As an example, Smith pointed to the case of Marcial Maciel Degollado, a prominent Mexican priest who allegedly abused male children and also allegedly carried on affairs with multiple women. Smith noted that while Maciel allegedly abused boys, most people would not think of him as a gay man.
In a November 18, 2009, Politics Daily column about Smith’s research, David Gibson reported:
“What we are suggesting is that the idea of sexual identity be separated from the problem of sexual abuse,” said Margaret Smith, a researcher from the John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York, which is conducting an independent study of sexual abuse in the priesthood from 1950 up to 2002. “At this point, we do not find a connection between homosexual identity and an increased likelihood of sexual abuse.”
A second researcher, Karen Terry, also cautioned the bishops against making a correlation between homosexuality in the priesthood and the high incidence of abuse by priests against boys rather than girls — a ratio found to be about 80-20.
“It’s important to separate the sexual identity and the behavior,” Terry said. “Someone can commit sexual acts that might be of a homosexual nature but not have a homosexual identity.” Terry said factors such as greater access to boys is one reason for the skewed ratio. Smith also raised the analogy of prison populations where homosexual behavior is common even though the prisoners are not necessarily homosexuals, or cultures where men are rigidly segregated from women until adulthood, and homosexual activity is accepted and then ceases after marriage.
Such conclusions, moreover, are not unique to analyses of sexual abuse in the Catholic Church. As Think Progress noted, Gregory Herek, a psychology professor at the University of California-Davis, analyzed a number of studies and concluded: “The empirical research does not show that gay or bisexual men are any more likely than heterosexual men to molest children. This is not to argue that homosexual and bisexual men never molest children. But there is no scientific basis for asserting that they are more likely than heterosexual men to do so.”
being sued for defamation against a priest abuse survivor
INDEPENDENCE, MISSOURI (USA) — The Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights defamed a man who says he is a victim of priestly sex abuse as a drug-abusing murderer and a Catholic-hating bigot, the man claims in court.
Jon David Couzens Jr. sued The Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, its President William Donohue, the KC Catholic League, KC Catholic League President Joe McLiney and KC Catholic League Capacity Secretary James O’Laughlin, in Jackson County Circuit Court.
Couzens claims Donohue defamed him in statements responding to the Kansas City Star’s three-part series on priestly abuse, written by Judy Thomas in December 2011.
The series centered around Couzens’ claims – and subsequent lawsuit against the KC Diocese, Msgr. Thomas O’Brien and Fr. Isaac True – that he and three other altar boys, one of whom committed suicide, were sexually abused in the early 1980s.
“Thomas’ entire soap-opera yarn concerns the allegations of Jon David Couzens,” Donohue said in a statement posted on the Catholic League’s website.
“He says that a priest molested him and three other altar boys back in the early 1980s. But why should we believe a man who only now is coming forward with his tale – he never told a single soul – especially given the fact that he has been implicated in a murder? Thomas never told readers that on the night Mark Trader was murdered about a dozen years ago, Couzens got into a fight with him over a botched drug deal, and although another man was convicted, on appeal it was alleged that Couzens and two other men had ‘motive to commit the murder and the opportunity to do so.’ This is public record, so why the cover up?”
Couzens’ attorney, Rebecca Randles, told Courthouse News she has no idea where Donohue came up with the drug and murder implications. Randles said in an interview that that to her knowledge Couzens has never been subject to any drug or murder-related charges.
In the lawsuit, Couzens claims that he reported Trader’s murder in April 1992 to police, after the killer confessed to him. He claims in the lawsuit that he received a commendation from now-Sen. Claire McCaskill for his good citizenship in the murder investigation and trial.
Donohue ramped up his criticism in another statement on Dec. 8, 2011, speculating on the timing of Couzens’ abuse lawsuit with the emergence of a lawsuit filed earlier that year against the K.C.
Diocese and priest Shawn Ratigan. That lawsuit claimed the Diocese waited nearly 6 months before reporting child pornography found on Ratigan’s computer.
“Couzens may be a hero to the Star, but his character is indeed questionable: he was implicated in a murder,” Donohue said in the statement. “Why hasn’t the Star revealed this to its readers? Does it want to ‘silence’ its critics? Why did Couzens wait 30 years before he told his ‘wrenching’ tale? Because the time was ripe to cash in after Fr. Ratigan’s name hit the papers?”
Randles said her client is not a gold-digger, and that the 30-year delay that Donohue finds suspicious is actually quite normal.
“If the memories are repressed or suppressed, there is no way to bring forth the accusations earlier,” Randles said in the interview. “Also, the average age of (priest) abuse is 12. The average age to report is 42. So 30 years is a common time frame.”
Couzens claims that Donohue’s statements falsely portray him as a drug-abusing killer and a Catholic hating bigot. Donohue’s statements were intended to incite and inflame people to confront Couzens, the lawsuit states.
As a result, Couzens says, he has been physically assaulted, cursed at on the streets, suffered emotional distress and loss of enjoyment of life.
Couzens said in a statement that he did not come forward just for himself.
“In the big picture it is a very sad thing that William Donohue and the Catholic League are attacking those who the Priesthood has already abused,” Couzens said in the statement. “I am not doing this just for me. I now understand why other victims don’t come forward. The things said about me are so cruel and offensive they cut to the core of my being. Others who don’t have my support would cower under these attacks.”
Randles said that statements such as Donohue’s are a common tactic by the Catholic League against those who claim to be abused by priests. She said the Catholic League attempts to bully and harass victims to deter them from moving forward.
Catholic League officials did not respond to a request for comment.
Couzens seeks actual and punitive damages for defamation, invasion of privacy, and negligent and intentional infliction of emotional distress.
“Mr. Donohue has been an outspoken and pugnacious defender of the church,” Randles said. “It’s our hope that he will align himself with things that are factually true.”
Randles said Couzen’s abuse lawsuit filed in 2011 against the KC Diocese and O’Brien is set for trial in April. The suit against True has been settled.
Bill Donohue @HolyBillDonohue
6. The KKK was A-OK. KKK has had several people elected to congress over the years. Way more than ACLU. #Republican #DavidDuke @jbooten
WHY YES BILL DONOHUE BELIEVES THAT THE KKK WERE A-OK.
Bill Donohue @HolyBillDonohue
#ImAnExtremist b/c I remember Jesus said to turn the other cheeck. Even during an event as horrible as rape.
FIRST BILL TELLS US IF WE ARE BEING RAPED BY A PRIEST WE SHOULD PUNCH THEM OUT. NOW HE SAYS IF WE ARE BEING RAPED, WE SHOULD TURN THE OTHER CHEEK. WELL BILL MAKE UP OUR MINDS….SHOULD BE BEAT THE LIVING TAR OUT OF OUR PRIEST RAPIST OR LET HIM RAPE US?
Now Bill is saying we should not give condoms to kids because that is perverted…
Bill Donohue @HolyBillDonohue 8 Aug 2012
@sonodoc99 @imao_ Don’t be handing those condoms to children, now – That would be perverted. Kids who want them badly enough will buy them
BUT STANDING UP AND DEFENDING THE RAPIST PRIESTS AND THE PEDOPHILE PIMPS LIKE CARDINAL TIMOTHY DOLAN IS NOT PERVERTED? BLAMING THE PRIEST RAPE VICTIMS FOR THEIR RAPES IS NOT PERVERTED? CALLING PRIEST RAPE VICTIMS HOMOSEXUALS IS NOT PERVERTED?
Here is a story posted by Catholics United…a group that Bill loves to defame…slamming him.
RELEASE: It’s Time for Bill Donohue to Hang it Up
The permanently irascible, offensive pundit is a relic of a bygone era
WASHINGTON – Bill Donohue, president of the The Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, has been president of the group for 20 years. The stated purpose of this organization is to defend the rights of Catholics in public life, yet when right-wing media commentators call the Pope a “Marxist,” or espousing anti-religious redistributionist views, Donohue is silent.
Beyond this stunning omission, his nearly incessant string of embarrassing statements in the media, wherein he defames and degrades whole swaths of people, represents a thankfully dying era in Catholicism. He claims his organization’s purpose is to “defend the Catholic Church,” but his behavior has only hurt it.
Right wing commentator Rush Limbaugh attacked Pope Francis last week, accusing him of “Marxism.” Instead of defending the Holy Father, Donohue chose to remain silent against these attacks (http://mediamatters.org/blog/2013/12/16/catholic-league-fine-with-rush-limbaughs-attack/197288). He said nothing when fellow right winger Sean Hannity piled on the Pope with Limbaugh (http://mediamatters.org/video/2013/12/17/foxs-sean-hannity-the-pope-sounds-like-he-is-ag/197303). Donohue has a history of selective, conservative outrage when defending the Catholic Church.
Donohue earns a salary of more than $400,000 per year, which he earns for his all-capitalized press releases and frequent interview bookings on CNN and FOX News Channel. When these statements and remarks are analyzed, one wonders why he’s taken seriously. One recent wide release statement focused on his office’s behavior at its Christmas parties (http://www.catholicleague.org/office-party-rules-to-ignore/). In another, he attacked a Catholic group for defending the Pope (http://www.catholicleague.org/bogus-catholic-entity-rips-rush/). A large portion of Donohue’s job of late has been to attack sex abuse victims in order to cover for those who perpetrated child sex abuse and those who protected them. Indeed, Donohue is currently being sued for defamation by a victim (http://www.kansascity.com/2013/12/09/4681920/former-altar-boy-sues-national.html). So, why is he taken seriously as a Catholic spokesman by the media?
This past weekend, he attacked civil marriage equality efforts, which Catholics nationwide overwhelmingly support (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/08/catholics-gay-marriage-support_n_2835847.html), calling them a “bizarre notion” (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1C5ol-D1i2I). Of course, Pope Francis faulted the “obsession” with things like gay marriage on the part of Catholic right wing pundits as something that is hurting the Church. Who is Donohue representing?
When asked about the sex abuse crisis, he immediately pivots his attacks to gay people (http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2010/04/01/89653/donohue-homosexuality-abuse/), insisting “homosexuality” was to blame for the crimes against children, not pedophilia. Further, he insists victims advocacy groups, made up mostly of Catholic lay people, are a “menace” (http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/03/13/catholic-leagues-donohue-vows-to-fight-rape-victims-one-by-one/). This is wrong, it’s defamatory and it’s embarrassing. Again, why is he taken seriously by the media?
Pope Francis has inspired Catholics by promoting what he calls the “full fragrance of the Gospel,” and inspiring the culture by calling on the world to embrace the poor, immigrants, victims of war and the forgotten. Where are Donohue’s statements echoing the Holy Father’s call to arms for Catholics? Why continue the right wing crusade? Again, why is he taken seriously by the media?
When people like Donohue are depicted on TV as a representative of the Catholic faith, it’s an embarrassment. Young people are leaving the Church in droves because of the divisive politics of so-called Catholic leaders like him. To elevate this man as someone to respect as a Catholic spokesperson shows how far degraded the role of religion in America has become, and is symptomatic of the problem.
The fact is, Donohue represents a fading set of identity-politics Catholicism that values division, victimhood and animus over unity and care for the least among us. Catholics in America know Pope Francis is the leader they’ve needed, and they deserve a better representative than Bill Donohue.
Founded in 2004, Catholics United, and its educational arm, Catholics United Education Fund, are non-profit, non-partisan organizations dedicated to promoting the message of justice and the common good found at the heart of the Catholic Social Tradition.
And now Bill wants to insure they have no right to privacy and that he has the right to investigate their allegations.
I made a promise to myself that I would refrain from making any more comments on Bill Donohue, president/well paid CEO/self styled mouth piece for Cardinal Dolan/ head of the right wing Catholic League. However, after his latest press release I gave myself permission to break that promise. Here is the pertinent part of the press release having to do with the abuse allegation against Minneapolis’ embattled Archbishop Neinstedt:
Last Friday, PFAW Foundation president Michael Keegan invited Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn to a public debate on arts censorship and religious liberty in light of the controversy over a new exhibit at the Brooklyn Museum. The invitation still stands, and we look forward to a productive and substantive conversation with Bishop DiMarzio.
– See more at: http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/catholic-league%E2%80%99s-bill-donohue-cries-out-attention#sthash.iUbRKOMe.dpuf
rapevictimsofthecatholicchurch 
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