A prominent retired bishop in the Greek Orthodox church — known honorifically as the Metropolitan Chrysostomos of Dodoni — has caused a bit of a stir with some bizarre comments about rape.
In an interview with Skai TV, the ex-bishop mused about rape, declaring that there can’t be rape without consent. “A woman does not sit and get raped without wanting it,” he told the interviewers, who apparently tried to explain to him how exactly rape works.
The ex-bishop also declared that women can’t conceive as a result of rape, so there is no need to make abortion legal in the case of rape. Oh, and no one should use contraceptives, because the whole point of sex is to make babies.
The ex-bishop’s remarks were quickly condemned by politicians and Greek Orthodox church officials, with the Holy Synod, the church’s ruling body, saying that his comments on rape were “unacceptable for an Orthodox cleric and offensive for human beings and especially for women and victims of rape.”
I wonder what Roosh, who is some sort of Orthodox Christian and who once proposed that rape be made legal on private property — would think about all this.
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I was Greek Orthodox until a few months ago.
This is evil.
Kiwi Farms apparently just went down b/c CloudFlare hosting was getting tired of dealing with complaints about them.
Maybe an interesting follow up for David?
@Crip Dyke
Finally, bout time that the Kiwi Farms ilk got yeeted into the trash where they belong and are getting at least some cummupance for their cyber-criminal atrocities.
It wont ever erase they pain the caused people, the lives they runied and destroyed. And the people who died, sent into graves because of the ceaseless and malevolent torment those barrels of boiler sludge were responsible for…
But I can take solace of the fact that their Karma-Houdini warranty has finally run out and everyone finally decided to unite and rally to ensure these garbage people’s feet were held to the fire
It may not be enough in my opinion; but at least it’s a start
And now KF is using DDOSguard.
Roosh would probably say the hierarchy had been infiltrated by the wrong sort—maybe he’d blame it on the married priests’ being ‘whipped’.
Is there an Orthodox equivalent to sedevacantism?
Well now I’m upset
I wonder what his views are about male rape. If someone were to rape him, would he have to concede he wanted it?
@David:
“A bit of a stir”? That’s like saying the Hindenburg experienced some slight turbulence on its final approach to Lakehurst.
I’ve noted before that Roosh’s Armenian Orthodoxy is an entirely different branch of Christianity compared to eastern Orthodoxy. Besides, the Greek Orthodox Church is just one of the churches within the Eastern Orthodox community (which is currently badly splintered over the Russia-Ukraine conflict).
But ultimately, it boils down to this – that large religious communities are culturally (and usually also doctrinally) diverse. Even in nominally centralized churches, individual members often find it easy to dismiss their leadership view when convenient. Generally, in modern world, conservative cranks across Christendom seem to be putting aside their doctrinal disagreements to unite in a war against modernity.
The bishop himself doesn’t seem very internally consistent, arguing that a) rape is fundamentally like normal sex, with some degree of consent always involved b) rape is somehow different from normal intercourse, and thus cannot result in pregnancy.
Is it bad that when I hear such balls-to-the-wall statements like this my first thought is: “How many women has he raped?”
@Gerald Fnord
Roosh doesn’t like priests being whipped? Does flagellation count?
Can’t conceive as a result of rape? I wrongly assumed Todd Akin invented that myth on his own.
The can’t conceive as a result of rape myth is something that has been circulating around the Evangelical anti-abortion crowd long, or at least the male leaders of that community, before Todd Akin. The idea is that nothing bad ever happens to good women, so if something did happen, they deserved it. It’s very appealing, because it means you don’t need to take responsibility for your actions, and you don’t need to help people. Those women who are suffering deserve it. I’m sure they also think ectopic pregnancies are the result of promiscuity.
@sunnysombrera,
Based on the reaction from the Synod, it sounds like they might be wondering that exact same question, themselves.
The ‘can’t conceive through rape’ myth is from classical-era biology. The logic is that both partners need to orgasm to release the two ‘seeds’ that meet for conception. Bearing in mind that they couldn’t see what was going on inside, it was a reasonable guess. The upside of the theory is that husbands wanting children have an incentive to give their wives a good time. The many downsides are obvious. But anyway, we’ve known it doesn’t actually work like that for about 200 years now.
Re: Kiwifarms – while Keffals’s swatting and subsequent harassment storm was the one left-wing people were paying attention to, it may not be the straw which broke the camel’s back, resulting in CloudFlare dumping them. They were apparently also starting up a harassment campaign against Marjorie Taylor Greene.
@D.R: Glad you escaped.
@sonnysombrera: I think that’s most normal people’s reaction when they hear something like this. TBF, he might have limited his raping to males. I hope the Synod starts doing some serious detecting, if only for CYA.
@Snowberry: I thought their sort liked MTG?
@GSS ex-noob
MTG on Newsmax last Wednesday: “That website needs to be taken down. There should be no business or any kind of service where you can target your enemy. That’s absolutely absurd.”
@Snowberry; @GSS ex-noob:
Cool Girl status is as fragile as cotton candy in a roaring downpour.
@Chris Oakley
He’s being deliberately understated, it’s like the reverse of hyperbole. Why don’t you learn to read?
@snowberry: Gosh, she says one true and non-heartless thing and wham.
@FMO: Perfect analogy.
Wow this guy is disgusting. I hope people leave the church where he is preaching en mass.
@GSS ex-noob:
Perfect analogy.
And that cotton candy is catnip and zebra-flavored—guaranteed to be delicious to leopards.
@Critical Dragon 1177:
I hope people leave the church where he is preaching en mass.
http://instantrimshot.com/index.php?sound=rimshot&play=true
@Jumpin’
First, the opposite of hyperbole is called “litotes”. I agree with your perceptive notation of its existence in David’s writing.
Second, Chris Oakley did not fail to understand that David was using litotes, but rather was sufficiently struck by the actual events / quote upon which David was reporting that Chris Oakley felt inspired to express their own feelings, in this case through hyperbole, or perhaps hyperbole and a half.
We’re a long standing culture here at WHTM and with that comes a trust for others’ perceptions and values. I’ve no doubt where Chris Oakley is, though I can understand that for someone less well conversant in and / or less well fit to WHTM’s idiosyncratic expressions of culture, ethics, and values, it may be hard to decipher any individual’s intent.
On average, however, you’ll do fine to assume that the long timers “get it” and the noobs do not.