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| Richard Dawkins: I will arrest Pope Benedict XVI |
| 2010-04-12 |
| To paraphrase Uncle Joe, "How many divisions has Richard Dawkins got?" It's also sad to see Hitchins getting involved in this juvenile, undergraduate street theatre stunt. RICHARD DAWKINS, the atheist campaigner, is planning a legal ambush to have the Pope arrested during his state visit to Britain “for crimes against humanity'. Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens, the atheist author, have asked human rights lawyers to produce a case for charging Pope Benedict XVI over his alleged cover-up of sexual abuse in the Catholic church. The pair believe they can exploit the same legal principle used to arrest Augusto Pinochet, the late Chilean dictator, when he visited Britain in 1998. The Pope was embroiled in new controversy this weekend over a letter he signed arguing that the “good of the universal church' should be considered against the defrocking of an American priest who committed sex offences against two boys. It was dated 1985, when he was in charge of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which deals with sex abuse cases. Benedict will be in Britain between September 16 and 19, visiting London, Glasgow and Coventry, where he will beatify Cardinal John Henry Newman, the 19th-century theologian. Dawkins and Hitchens believe the Pope would be unable to claim diplomatic immunity from arrest because, although his tour is categorised as a state visit, he is not the head of a state recognised by the United Nations. They have commissioned the barrister Geoffrey Robertson and Mark Stephens, a solicitor, to present a justification for legal action. The lawyers believe they can ask the Crown Prosecution Service to initiate criminal proceedings against the Pope, launch their own civil action against him or refer his case to the International Criminal Court. Dawkins, author of The God Delusion, said: “This is a man whose first instinct when his priests are caught with their pants down is to cover up the scandal and damn the young victims to silence.' Hitchens, author of God Is Not Great, said: “This man is not above or outside the law. The institutionalised concealment of child rape is a crime under any law and demands not private ceremonies of repentance or church-funded payoffs, but justice and punishment. |
| Posted by:tipper |
| #25 Hitchens defacing Syrian Nazi posters in Lebanon and getting a beating for it, so I'm guessing Hitchens A tad more realistic. |
| Posted by: Pappy 2010-04-12 22:34 |
| #24 I'm deeply impressed by the analysis of Old Spook There's a reason they used to let OldSpook do what he did. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2010-04-12 21:20 |
| #23 And it's not a theory The Replicator theory elegantly explains what was previously a puzzle - where did the most primitive organisms as we know them today come from? The previous explanation that they somehow randomly arose in the primeival soup was deeply unsatisfactory, but was the generally accepted explanation when I was taught genetics. Otherwise, few ideas in science are genuinely original to one person. |
| Posted by: phil_b 2010-04-12 21:14 |
| #22 I respect anyone who wants to be an atheist or agnostic. I'm a hard-shell agnostic, and I have nothing but contempt for anyone who *wants* to be an atheist or agnostic. It's a religious-philosophical position built upon the wreckage of hope and the failure of faith. Anyone who desires the negation of faith as a goal is someone not to be trusted with so much as a pocket-knife, because dollars will get you donuts they're half-way to sociopathy. Agnosticism and atheism honestly arrived at is the failure to discover any truth in religion. That's sad, and socially disastrous. Don't come over here, folks, it sucks on this side of the fence. |
| Posted by: Mitch H. 2010-04-12 18:30 |
| #21 I'm deeply impressed by the analysis of Old Spook (I'm a practising Catholic, too). I respect anyone who wants to be an atheist or agnostic. But Dawkins and Hitchens aren't doing them a favor. And of course, the "not recognized by the UN state" is nonsense. Switzerland has only been a UN member since 2002. Before it had an observer status like the Vatican. And of course their heads of state had diplomatic immunity. Pope Benedict is an absolutely honest, deeply moral person with the highest integrity. Yes, the Church has bad apples like any organization has. And of course an organization that works a lot with young people will have its share of pedophiles. But the house cleaning is under way. |
| Posted by: European Conservative 2010-04-12 17:08 |
| #20 I went to that link. Debunked? Jumpin Jiminy! When the Old Spook digs in, he does not stop does he? |
| Posted by: Beldar Threreling9726 2010-04-12 16:12 |
| #19 I don't think Selten---who's a very high level game theory, ahem, theoretician---has been popularized, TW. |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2010-04-12 15:31 |
| #18 Thank you, g(r)omgoru. I'm going to have to find a popularization of Selton's work. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2010-04-12 14:47 |
| #17 Dawkins Replicator theory is IMO the most important theoretical contribution to the theory of evolution since Darwin himself. (a) It's not Dawkins', see George C. Williams Adaptation and Natural Selection Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1966. (b) And it's not a theory but a metaphor---immensely popular with laymen, but otherwise ... |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2010-04-12 14:00 |
| #16 Why Reinhard Selten, g(r)omgoru? Because he once torn Dawkins & Maynard Smith a new one NOTE ON EVOLUTIONARILY STABLE STRATEGIES IN ASYMMETRIC ANIMAL CONFLICTS SELTEN R JOURNAL OF THEORETICAL BIOLOGY Volume: 84 Issue: 1 Pages: 93-101 Published: 1980 |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2010-04-12 13:51 |
| #15 I don't know about Dawkins, but one of the war correspondents (Michael Totten?) had a story about Hitchens defacing Syrian Nazi posters in Lebanon and getting a beating for it, so I'm guessing Hitchens has a little spunk. Dawkin's The Selfish Gene is a fascinating read, but he has gone a little nutty with the whole atheism shtick. Whatever they do, I hope they have giant puppets. I love giant puppets. |
| Posted by: SteveS 2010-04-12 13:32 |
| #14 I liked Richard Dawkins' ideas way back when, but currently I think it doesn't account sufficiently for material culture's effects in making humans more stupid. |
| Posted by: Thing From Snowy Mountain 2010-04-12 13:18 |
| #13 #12 Ah, just have a couple of Swiss Guards slap Dawkins around and steal his lunch money. Posted by: mojo 2010-04-12 10:30 My thoughts exactly, mojo. I can't see Dawkins or Hitchens having the stones to go up against anyone; especially the Swiss Guards. |
| Posted by: WolfDog 2010-04-12 11:42 |
| #12 Ah, just have a couple of Swiss Guards slap Dawkins around and steal his lunch money. |
| Posted by: mojo 2010-04-12 10:30 |
| #11 Dawkins is already denouncing this, and says he said no such thing, blaming it on the Murdoch owned Times. |
| Posted by: Anonymoose 2010-04-12 09:03 |
| #10 To Gaz My examples make much sense for one side because they highlight this guy's hipocrisy and for the other side because except for the xample about islamic pedophilia they higlight the above averagee rates of pedophilia between agressively atheistic types (cf Spain's socialists and East Germany's orphanages) |
| Posted by: JFM 2010-04-12 08:32 |
| #9 Dawkins doesn't have any work on the theory of evolution---just popularization of the work of others. Dawkins Replicator theory is IMO the most important theoretical contribution to the theory of evolution since Darwin himself. |
| Posted by: phil_b 2010-04-12 08:19 |
| #8 Why Reinhard Selten, g(r)omgoru? See OldSpook's masterful summary of the flaws in the case against the pope. Mr Dawkins is more than a bit of a crank, I quite agree, one of those who think that achievement in one area guarantees the ability to succeed in all. On the other hand, if g(r)omgoru doesn't think much of his output within his field, that may explain Mr Dawkins' insistence on being acknowledged wherever his interest turns. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2010-04-12 08:15 |
| #7 |
| Posted by: Throper Forkbeard7372 2010-04-12 07:23 |
| #6 Look above for an incomplete list of people who should be prosecuted in case the Pope is Your examples makes no sense. All (?) athesists should be prosecuted for the crime (?) of not comdemning things in other countries that have little or nothing to do with atheism (Ahmedinajad? Roman Polanski?) |
| Posted by: Gaz 2010-04-12 07:20 |
| #5 Having said that, he may have a point. The Pope should be no more immune to prosecution for covering up crimes, than say the CEO of a large corporation like Enron. Look above for an incomplete list of people who should be prosecuted in case the Pope is. |
| Posted by: JFM 2010-04-12 04:43 |
| #4 Dawkins is a brilliant man whose work on the theory of evolution I admire. Dawkins doesn't have any work on the theory of evolution---just popularization of the work of others. His own, few, professional papers are way below par. |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2010-04-12 03:33 |
| #3 Dawkins is a brilliant man whose work on the theory of evolution I admire. Unfortunately, he he subscribes to cranky left wing causes. Having said that, he may have a point. The Pope should be no more immune to prosecution for covering up crimes, than say the CEO of a large corporation like Enron. But 'crimes against humanity' is just the usual UN sponsored BS. BTW, the Pope is the head of state of the Vatican, nominally a sovereign state and would generally be immune from prosecution in other countries. 'Crimes against humanity' is probably framed to allowed prosecution of heads of state, such as Charles Taylor. Overall I'd say, more leftwing abuse/exploitation of vague UN sponsored 'sounds good' laws. |
| Posted by: phil_b 2010-04-12 03:28 |
| #2 Just sneak up to Dawkins and whisper in his ear "Renhard Selten". |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2010-04-12 03:27 |
| #1 Nice idea. ut I prpose to extend this to all people who raised in arms to defend Polanski. I propose to extend this to all atheists who said nothing to the gfact that proportion of children raped is sevaral times higher in secular (aka atheist) institutions than in catholic ones. I popose to extend this to all atheists who said and say nothing about the nearly systematic abuse of children in Esast Germany's orphanages. I propose to extnd this to all atheists who don't try to have Ahmedinajad and other leaders of countries who have eagal rape of nine year old girls. I ropose arresting all atheists wh say nothing about socialists in Spain who have lowered age of consent to tewleve years so their pedophilic athesistic partisans can fulfill their lust. |
| Posted by: JFM 2010-04-12 02:19 |