Arrest the Pope

Richard Dawkins wants to arrest the Pope:

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.

That last part (emphasis mine) is interesting.

Wiki tells me that the Vatican is "a recognised national territory under international law, but it is the Holy See that conducts diplomatic relations on its behalf, in addition to the Holy See's own diplomacy, entering into international agreements in its regard." The Vatican itself is not recognized by the UN.  It is the Holy See (the ancient episcopal jurisdiction of the Catholic Church in Rome) that wears the pants in terms of foreign relations.

Wiki:

In addition to the member states [of the United Nations], there is currently one non-member permanent observer state: the Holy See (which holds sovereignty over the state of Vatican City and maintains diplomatic relations with other states). It has been an observer state since 6 April 1964,^[37] and gained all the rights of full membership except voting on 1 July 2004.^[38] 

Wiki again:

The Holy See has been recognized, both in state practice and in the writing of modern legal scholars, as a subject of public international law, with rights and duties analogous to those of States. Although the Holy See, as distinct from the Vatican City State, does not fulfil the long-established criteria in international law of statehood; having a permanent population, a defined territory, a stable government and the capacity to enter into relations with other states,^[4] its possession of full legal personality in international law is proved by the fact that it maintains diplomatic relations with 177 states, that it is a member-state in various intergovernmental international organizations, and that it is: "respected by the international community of sovereign States and treated as a subject of international law having the capacity to engage in diplomatic relations and to enter into binding agreements with one, several, or many states under international law that are largely geared to establish and preserving peace in the world."^[5]

In that light, calling the Pope's trip to England a "state visit" sounds a bit pretentious (if not out of character). The Pope is a "head of state", but as far as I can tell he's not actually the head of any full-fledged state. Vatican City is a toy country, and the Holy See is "analogous" to a State. I don't know that either of those grant him diplomatic immunity.

Of course, he has immunity of a different kind. He's the kindly daddy (from Latin: papa; from Greek: πάππας (pappas), an affectionate word for father) of the  most self-consciously grandiose institution on the planet. He's the shining, beatific face of the patriarchy. He's the ultimate earthly arbiter of right and wrong.

You can't just clap him in irons for systematically sheltering and relocating the holy men who raped the children entrusted to their care.

Can you?

Mammals in the House

Congress has scheduled a hearing on marine mammal captivity, the Orlando Sentinel reports. The House Subcommittee on Insular Affairs, Oceans and Wildlife will meet on April 27th to hear testimony. Animal welfare advocates hope the meeting will lead to tighter regulations on the industry, which has had some of its not-so-shiny areas brought to light by the recent death of a SeaWorld trainer by a killer whale in Orlando and the Oscar-winning documentary "The Cove," about dolphin captures in Japan.

From the article:

The Sun Sentinel explored the world behind marine parks in a 2004 investigative series. It found that over the previous three decades, about 1,500 sea lions, seals, dolphins and whales in marine parks had died at a young age, some from human hazards such as capture shock and ingestion of coins and foreign objects.

The industry took root in Florida when the first marine park, Marineland of Florida, opened in 1938, and fostered an international trade with killer whales now worth up to $5 million each.

Until the 1980s, many of the marine stars came from the wild, with Florida waters supplying bottlenose dolphins that ended up at parks in Europe, Israel and Canada. U.S. attractions stopped capturing marine mammals more than 15 years ago and now rely on breeding.

Today, of the 1,243 marine mammals in the nation's parks, zoos and aquariums, only 15 percent were caught in the wild, a Sun Sentinel analysis of federal data shows. Another 14 percent were found stranded on beaches, and the rest were born in captivity.

Sarah over at WaterNotes, a conservation blog, has some further thoughts on the hearing:

This is a huge development for many reasons and – I feel – a golden opportunity for zoos and aquariums to give a voice to their husbandry practices, reveal their missions, and inform the public about the size and scale of their education and conservation programs.  It’s a chance to separate the institutions who get it right (and most likely carry AZA credentials) and those that have a long way to go.  It is also a chance to discuss what the role of zoos and aquariums can be and what more they can do, towards fulfilling the obligations of the MMPA [Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972, info here and here] to use contact with and observation of marine mammals to inspire our next generation of ocean advocates and stewards.

Google vs. China

Google just cold turkey stopped censoring in China. Who knows what happens next. I'm behind Google all the way, but sooner or later they're going to get kicked out. If the Party really decides to get its crackdown on, massive government cyberattacks are going to be the least of their problems.


From Wiki:

The apparatus of the PRC's Internet repression is considered more extensive and more advanced than in any other country in the world. The regime not only blocks website content but also monitors the internet access of individuals. Amnesty International notes that China “has the largest recorded number of imprisoned journalists and cyber-dissidents in the world.” The offences of which they are accused include communicating with groups abroad, opposing the persecution of the Falun Gong, signing online petitions, and calling for reform and an end to corruption.^[4]

Some pretty egregious offenses there. It certainly would be unacceptable to have anyone suggesting reform, pointing out corruption, communicating with "groups" (what groups?) abroad, or opposing persecution. That would be shameful. Or something.

I'm just waiting for the international fiasco when a Google employee gets thrown in jail on some similarly ridiculous charge.

From the article:

Thousands of police officers are employed to monitor web activity and many automated systems watch blogs, chat rooms and other sites to ensure that banned subjects, such as Tiananmen Square, are not discussed.

What must it be like to work as a censor? To possess illicit knowledge when your job is to obliterate it? Are there really thousands of people across China who know what their country's been up to and choose to smother the horror stories anyway? That's real patriotism. Or true denial.

Maybe they told them it was all a pack of Western lies, evidence be damned. Maybe it's a cultural thing and I'm being insensitive. Then again, maybe the toxic waste in the air and water has affected their heads.

China scares me on several levels. Intensely corrupt, wildly irresponsible, and childishly vindictive, it looms like an enormous dumptruck on the horizon. They'll be more powerful than the States one day. We're far from perfect, but at the very least, we've got a mostly democratic government and a fetishistic attachment to free speech. What does China have?

Oh so sweet

Sweet vindication:

• The Cove won Best Documentary at the Oscars!
• Homophobic state senator comes out as gay, surprising only the very naive. 
  
  
  

  Last year, Mr Ashburn opposed a bill to establish a day of recognition to honour murdered gay rights activist Harvey Milk. He has also voted in the statehouse against efforts to expand anti-discrimination laws and recognise out-of-state gay marriages. Mr Ashburn, who represents California's 18th district, said he does not plan to run for any public office after his term ends later this year.

  No, I don't imagine he does. See also:

  
  
  
  • Ted Haggard 
  • This wonderful study from 1996 in Journal of Abnormal Psychology:

The authors investigated the role of homosexual arousal in exclusively heterosexual men who admitted negative affect toward homosexual individuals. Participants consisted of a group of homophobic men (n = 35) and a group of nonhomophobic men (n = 29); they were assigned to groups on the basis of their scores on the Index of Homophobia (W. W. Hudson & W. A. Ricketts, 1980). The men were exposed to sexually explicit erotic stimuli consisting of heterosexual, male homosexual, and lesbian videotapes, and changes in penile circumference were monitored. They also completed an Aggression Questionnaire (A. H. Buss & M. Perry, 1992). Both groups exhibited increases in penile circumference to the heterosexual and female homosexual videos. Only the homophobic men showed an increase in penile erection to male homosexual stimuli. The groups did not differ in aggression. Homophobia is apparently associated with homosexual arousal that the homophobic individual is either unaware of or denies.

Is homophobia associated with homosexual arousal?

By Adams, Henry E.; Wright, Lester W.; Lohr, Bethany A.

Journal of Abnormal Psychology. Vol 105(3), Aug 1996, 440-445.

Healthcare!

I've been doing very little these past few days except sleep and paint. Finished a few paintings, actually: some are presents, and will remain mysterious until the recipients-to-be finally come up and visit me, but there will be picspam of the others soon.

Internet goodies have been few and far between, but this one stood out. Stewart and Oliver take on the Great Sinister Healthcare Trap of 2010. John Boehner is hilariously apprehensive (Stewart; "It's a public dialog about important legislation, not Little Bighorn!"), and there's someone you may recognize in the sequence beginning around 0:25.

Republicans are also holding a conference in Hawaii, the apparent purpose of which is to convey to Hawaiians that their outstanding, exemplary health care system (of which Rush Limbaugh recently partook) is doomed to failure. After 40 years of... well, not failing. The conference seems to consist entirely of people who are not aware of this. John Oliver is there with the story.

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
The Apparent Trap
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Vancouverage 2010