Is a Child Safer in the Catholic Church or Burley Public Schools?

Two interesting stories come out of KIDK and the little town of Burley, Idaho. First, is this:

BURLEY, ID – A Burley Junior High School teacher is arrested for reportedly trying to entice a child over the Internet.

Then we have this story:

BURLEY, ID – A former Burley High School teacher is sentenced up to 12 years in prison for having a sexual relationship with a student.

Chad Burnett pleaded guilty in June to two counts of sexual battery against a minor and violating a no-contact order.

 Now, mind you, Burley is a tiny town, by most standards with less than 10,000 people, so it doesn’t have a ton of school teachers. I think it’s safe to say that these two public school teachers represent a higher percentage of high school and junior high teachers in the Burley Public school system than pedophile priests represent of the Catholic Church. Nor is Burley the only one to have teachers involved in sexual misconduct. There have been stories throughout the Treasure Valley and throughout the country in recent years of teachers having relations with students with varying degress of punishment. Yet, it has not generated the amount of media coverage or the same type. Sexually abusive teachers are treated as an isolated incident, however, the abusive priests are linked in a chain as if they were co-conspirators.  

The question is why the difference in media coverage. The answer is the pervasive role of bias in the press. In the eyes of the mainstream press, the Catholic Church is an institution that deserves undermining and exposing as full of hypocrisy. Public confidence in public schools should not be undermined even though there are sickening number of people being paid by taxpayers who view public schools as a place to pick up dates. If the media treated sexual abuse in public schools as a systemic problem, they’d be a boon to homeschooling as many skittish parents would withdraw their children afraid of their children falling victim to the next Chris Burnett.

Looking at the large number of sexual abuse cases within the walls of public schools in recent years, you find how silly some of the commentary on the Catholic abuse scandal. In particular, the fanciful notion that this could all be solved if we only allowed priests to marry. Unless, there’s some rule requiring celibacy among Burley Public School teachers that I don’t know about, that solutions seems totally ineffective, unless your aim is to undermine Catholic Church tradition, which is the mainstream media’s goal.

What really is behind the rise in sexual abuse in recent years?  I don’t think it can be tied to a single profession as it cuts across all lines and professional barries.  Certainly, Catholic Priests and School teachers are good folks in general, who want to help children, not hurt them, despite the bad actors in the profession.

Part of it may be better reporting. The news and entertainment media has done a good job educating children that they should report these crimes, although far too many go unreported.

I think much of this goes back to the sexual revolution and the idea of eliminating all inhibitions. It’s kind of like opening a pandora’s box. If one suggests casting aside all outdated inhibitions,  for most of society, that may mean going further in non-marital relationships and sleeping around a little. For a smaller portion, this may mean committing adultery after you’re married. For a yet smaller group, it may mean same sex sexual experiments. And for a small minority, it may mean sex with children and young people who should be able to trust them.

Of course, most advocates of the sexual revolution will point out that they don’t advocate for things like adultery or child abuse. But it’s awful hard to make a headline, “Disregard Outdated Sexual Inhibitions” and expect people to read all the way to the bottom for the fine print.