Wednesday, March 02, 2016

Madhouse driven madder

Always full of mad, and frequently offensive, right wing vitriol*, I see that the participants* of Catallaxy** are being driven especially berserk over the clearly poor impression George Pell is leaving in his evidence to the Royal Commission into child abuse.  Not only that, but Andrew Bolt's surprisingly harsh assessment is causing further outrage.  (Don't worry, Bolt will probably recant - he's too much of a cultural warrior to not come back to support for Pell.)

Mind you, I'm still not particularly interested in the matter.  I remain distinctly uncomfortable with the publicity the survivor group is getting.   As truly shocking and terrible (parts of) the Catholic Church have been in this matter, I still cannot get over the feeling that some victims are unhealthfully not moving on, ever; and intense media attention promotes that.

To be fair to some indirect victims, however, such as those with suicide in their family very likely attributable to abuse, it is hard to see how you would ever stop thinking about it.


* average physical age is now up to 70, by my estimate; but mental age:  a cranky 86. 

**  Other recent Catallaxy highlights:  people there cancelling their subscription to The Australian because it's become too left wing [hahahahahahahahahahahahahaha];  the endorsement of Trump by "I'm right and the rest of the world is wrong" economist Kates;  the continuing eccentric obsession with tobacco plain packaging by Prof Davidson; and of course (I'm contractually obliged to mention this at least every 6 months) the continuing failure of the latter's stagflation warning of 2011 - stagflation being the natural consequence of following Keynesian policy, of course.   Now that the global temperature alleged "pause" is well and truly over, I wonder when he'll start talking about policy responses to climate change, too.

Update:  and the predicted Bolt-ian retreat is in.

10 comments:

Not Trampis said...

well count this evangelical defending a catholic twerp who patently doesn't understand the bible. ( What Catholic does?).

I thought him highly impressive on his first day in evidence.

If you are gon g to have a go at this RC then you must have a go at the other one as I did. A lot of similarities.

Steve said...

Have you noticed how I don't engage with you on matters of religion, Homer?

But as for Pell being "highly impressive": I think his imperious inflection in the way he speaks does him a disservice. Probably hard to break that habit, though.

Not Trampis said...

Do what you want.
I was talking about what he said not how he said it!

Steve said...

Well, even there I see that CL (of all people) at Catallaxy initially was noting that Pell worded his "wasn't interested in" comment very clumsily. (He probably meant to say he wasn't interested in gossip about parish priests.)

Not Trampis said...

I should have also said I was simply airing my views not looking for a debate.

Anonymous said...

Catallaxy have turned from a human rights council into a humanist rights council for the underpriviliged!

Look what happened in the areas of vilification, they support terrorist and people in league with agenda 21, the coming new world order, other groups like Islamic Jihadist - ISIS before the support the people that they were designed to support, the Marginalized, the down trodden and those without much support.

They are not human rights but "Monarchist Alienist" rights

I have linked a site of a person taking me on and one of the main reasons why i BACK those who want to rid NSW of the Anti vilification cases as this is supporting subversion rather than they groups we were told that they were to support.

This is the sort of clown that if they do not stop they need to be locked away in an internment camp as they are a danger to Australia

I give this a five star rating towards agenda 21 ***** the highest of all ratings as this is what agenda 21 is - looking for world control on the pretence of Monarchy and Royals and Freedom Of Speech as lonmg as you dont say anything about who's entitled to be a voter or indeed a PM!

John said...

I think his imperious inflection in the way he speaks does him a disservice. Probably hard to break that habit, though.

I think people are being unfair in that matter. I once read that intellectually inclined men as they become older they tend to deal with life much more in the abstract, keeping their emotions at bay. I'm inclined to the view that Pell is one such individual and castigating him for that style is what I call psychological fascism.

As for the rest I think all the attention on Pell is very misguided and scapegoating. Pell is a tiny part of a much bigger problem: the Catholic Church harboured the worst of criminals. I haven't followed the debate that closely and statute of limitations probably prevents this but those who knew of pedophile priests and didn't report them to the police are guilty of harbouring criminals.

Steve said...

Well, I hope you realise I wasn't exactly castigating him for it; rather just observing that he probably doesn't even realise how his manner of speaking works against him in the (often unfair)court of public perceptions.

John said...

True Steve, yours was a balanced observation on that matter. I had in mind various media commentators having a go at Pell about his demeanour. In the media it is a recurring statement and betrays a demonise any which way we can attitude.

Not Trampis said...

Pell was a reforming Archbishop in these matters. It would be strange to go from a person hiding the truth to being a person who brings it out in the open aZnd attempting to ameliorate the problem.