by Allie Martin and Bill Fancher
(AgapePress) – The nation's largest Catholic civil rights organization is calling for a boycott of a major cable network over a recent broadcast.
Seventy-five organizations are being asked to join a boycott of the Showtime cable network because of a movie aired last week which many said was anti-Catholic. The Catholic League is calling for the boycott because Showtime broadcast the movie Sister Mary Explains It All, which has been criticized for having a Catholic-bashing message. Viacom, which owns Showtime, reportedly refused to condemn the anti-Catholic tone of the movie.
Patrick Scully is director of communications for the Catholic League. He expects swift response to the call for a boycott.
“We are expecting a very good response because this is the same list of organizations that joined us in a similar protest against the play Corpus Christi when it was [presented] here in New York,” Scully says. “These are allied organizations much like the Catholic League. These are people of great faith who have great respect for any sort of religion and any sort of religious faith.”
Scully believes the boycott will send a powerful message to Showtime executives.
“The people in this country whether they be Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, Mormon, or Buddhist are not going to tolerate religious intolerance,” he says. “They will not tolerate religious bigotry, and that's exactly what this movie is.”
The Showtime original movie is based on a play which features a nun who is confronted by four of her former students, all of whom are allegedly dysfunctional as a result of their Catholic upbringing.
Comics and Porn
While the Catholic League sets its sights on a boycott of Showtime, one pro-family advocate is warning parents about the negative influences of another form of “entertainment” comic books. Robert Knight is with the Culture and Family Institute, an affiliate of Concerned Woman for America. Knight, who believes today's comic books are a “far cry from those of the past,” says they have become a vehicle to introduce kids to a side of life they have not seen.
“Most of the comics you see in comics stores are full of pornography, homosexuality, graphic violence, grotesque images, foul language, and attacks on religion, particularly Christianity,” Knight says.
Knight says the producers of today's comics say it is up to parents to monitor what their kids read. But the long-time defender of family values contends parents cannot be with their kids every minute and that it only takes a brief exposure to pornography to damage a child's mind. According to Knight, leaders in the comic book industry do not seem to care.
But Bob Neely cares about the effect of porn on kids. He is a clinical psychiatrist who works with sexually abused children. Neely says that over the years of his work, he has seen the link between pornography and abuse. “There is no happy ending for the children who have been so abused. They will never feel normal … never be free of the nightmares and memories that will haunt them … never be rid of the shame that will be with them always … and never spend a single day free of the emotional pain that will be their constant companion.”
Like many pro-family leaders and crusaders against pornography, Neely is urging the Bush-Ashcroft Justice Department to clamp down on pornography in order to protect potential child victims.
(This update courtesy of Agape Press.)