Absent a priestly predator is paedophilia a religion news story?
In comments posted in response to my 24 April 2013 story "Paedophilia and the Radical Left of '68", Ira Rifkin questioned whether politics and paedophilia were properly within the ambit of GetReligion.
Was I pushing too hard? Confusing the moral and ethical issues in the story I cited in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ) -- protests over public honors to a prominent politician who 30 years ago as one of the stars of the radical left wrote of his sexual encounters with children, which he now claims are fiction --with religion news?
Whatever his crimes and immoralities, Cohn-Bendit's actions are in no way comparable to those of the Roman Catholic Church. The 60s are long over; history has moved on. The media's faults, blind spots and assorted deficiencies are not always at their root worthy of GR's attention. Agreed: ain't no ghost here worth the commentary.
... The Cohn-Bendit story contains little if any grist for GR. As for Cohn-Bendit and the RC Church, it seems clear that the magnitude of the crimes Church leaders committed are far greater quantitatively, as well as qualitatively because of the Church's unique position as a global religious/moral authority. Cohn-Bendit has far less reach. Whatever his personal responsibility, it cannot be compared to that of the Church. Bash the 60s if you like, even it's values. But molestation - real or imagined - was not one of its identifiable hallmarks.
Some took issue with Mr. Rifkin's comments, seeing religious ghosts in the story exhumed by GetReligion. Others noted that Daniel Cohn-Bendit is a prominent politician – – a public figure whose stock in trade has been lecturing Europe on how it should adopt his moral worldview on the environment, economics, immigration, foreign affairs, and social issues such as gay marriage. My observations focused on the different treatment accorded Mr. Cohn-Bendit and the Catholic Church by the media on the issue of paedophilia. I argued:
The opprobrium held by right thinking people against paedophilia in Europe does not apply, however to revolutionaries and left wing politicians. A report in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ) on the fracas over the award of a prize to Daniel Cohn-Bendit suggests a double standard is being applied to paedophiles in Europe. Those who molest children out of lust are criminals and beyond the pale — those who molest children out of revolutionary fervor to bring down the capitalist regime really aren’t so bad.
The paedophilia and the left story has now moved back into the public eye in Europe with articles in Stern, Deutsche Wella, Der Tagesspiegel and othernews outlets on protestations by Green Party leaders that their movement had not provided political respectability for pedophile activists.
Der Spiegelreported:
He is a boy, roughly 10 years old, with a pretty face, full lips, a straight nose and shoulder-length hair. The wings of an angel protrude from his narrow back, and a penis is drawn with thin lines on the front of his body. The 1986 image was printed in the newsletter of the Green Party's national working group on "Gays, Pederasts and Transsexuals," abbreviated as "BAG SchwuP." It wasn't just sent to a few scattered party members, but was addressed to Green Party members of the German parliament, as well as the party's headquarters in Bonn.
Documents like this have become a problem for the Greens today. Some 33 years after the party was founded, it is now being haunted by a chapter in its history that many would have preferred to forget. No political group in Germany promoted the interests of men with pedophile tendencies as staunchly as the environmental party. For a period of time in the mid-1980s, it practically served as the parliamentary arm of the pedophile movement. A look at its archives reveals numerous traces of the pedophiles' flirtation with the Green Party. They appear in motions, party resolutions, memos and even reports by the party treasurer. That is because at times the party not only supported its now forgotten fellow campaigners politically, but also more tangibly, in the form of financial support.
The protests over Cohn-Bendit have led to an internal party investigation. the Guardian reported:
Germany's Green party is to launch an investigation into its active promotion in the 80s of paedophile groups who lobbied for the legalisation of sex with children. The party's leadership has said it will commission an independent researcher to investigate "for how long and to what extent" such groups had an influence. The party's chief whip, Jürgen Trittin, said the initiative aimed to take a close look at the "totally unacceptable demand" in the 80s that sex with children should be made legal. He admitted that the party had made wrong decisions about paedophilia.
In an interview with Der Spiegel, the Guardian wrote Mr. Cohn-Bendit conceded his confessions were lies, prompted by a desire to shock.
"It was a type of manifesto against the bourgeois society," he said. ... He said he had written the descriptions of his time in the kindergarten in an attempt to "appear to be more dangerous than I was", and admitted they had been "irresponsible".
Germany's tabloids and conservative political parties are not likely to let this story die. But is Ira Rifkin correct in saying this is the a political story, not a religion story?
Like Lord Copper, he is right up to a point. All social interaction, all life is based upon choices. Making a choice implies using moral judgment. It could be argued that the political pedophile scandal is a story about the moral failings of Daniel Cohn-Bendit and the Green party.
Here I agree with Mr. Rifkin. This is a political story that has moral and ethical overtones. But what makes this a Get Religion story is a comparison to the reporting by the Guardian, Der Spiegel and other European newspapers on the Catholic clergy abuse scandal. The perspective these newspapers have brought to the Catholic scandal is that the institution is tarnished by the actions of pedophiles within the clergy ranks. The perspective in these articles is that the institution is to be applauded for examining its historical support for pedophiles within the party's ranks.
What makes this a Get Religion story is the context of the European press environment. I am not defending or excusing the Catholic Church. I am however pointing out inconsistencies and double standards in media coverage.