MovieChat Forums > Doubt (2008) Discussion > Innocent until proven guilty

Innocent until proven guilty


He wasn't. He resigned based on the ambiguous threat couched as a lie. Nobody has an entirely clean past, including the nun. He could have had an episode of alcoholism or adultery or anything...and wouldn't have wanted it brought into the public eye.

Nothing was proven, nothing was confessed, and no evidence was supplied.

Innocent until proven guilty is the logic of justice.

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But this wasn; a court of law. Innocent until proven guilty doesn;t apply in the church, in your place of business or in your family kitchen.
Accusations can be enough to destroy lives. And on the flipside, accusations can be just as easily buried and ignored.



"De gustibus non disputandum est"
#3

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Sister Allowycious (sp?)decided to err on the side of future innocents -right or wrong. There is no win or justice if Father Flynn were innocent but had some other indiscreton his past. But he is an adult, has power in the institution he is a part of whereby he was granted another, better position (Lord help that parish if he truly is guilty) but the risk to children Sister A feels responsibile for if he is guilty - he could ruin a child's entire future with trauma, unhappy and unhealthy future relationships and possibly even be creating a future pedophile.

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SO is it a good thing to act and risk erring on the side of future innocents based solely on a gut instinct? a personal "certainty"? Or is it a bad thing? (or indifferent?)

It seems to me one can use prejudice or "certainty" in a variety of ways, all in the name of protecting the innocents. In the end, Sr. Aloysius could behave in any manner she chose and remain unaffected by her choices. If she's right, she carries on. If she's wrong, she carries on. She runs no risk to herself, losing nothing with the consequences of her actions while innocents get steamrolled by her fury- right OR wrong.




"De gustibus non disputandum est"
#3

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As someone who has been lied upon and had my reputation ruined by someone trying to cover up their own wrongdoing, I do not come to the determination that Sister A's actions are for the best,lightly - it is just not worth putting so many children at risk. Abused grow up to be abusers. Sending this man on his way hurts one adult as opposes to dozens of children growing up traumatized and then perpetrating it on to hundreds more children. The only thing I find a problem with the outcome is that Father Flynn was moved to another school as opposed to a position that didn't involve working with children. As we've seen in the news, it has been the practice of the Catholic Church to simply move problem pedophiles from parish to parish. I know the church practices forgiveness, but they should be moving them into positions with no contact with children.

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Nor do I take it lightly, having attended a catholic school where a pedophile priest was stationed after having committed wrongdoings elsewhere (Fr. Patrick O'Donnell, you piece of sh^t).

My main problem with all of this is that she didn;t have enough information to work with before setting out on her crusade against Fr. Flynn. She had suspicions and her certainty based on very little information. To the best of our knowledge she never talked to the boy(s) about any of it and ultimately used her gut instinct rather than even the slightest bit of evidence in order to set out to destroy a person;s life and reputation.

I'm all for protecting children. But I'm also a huge proponent of justice and justified accusations. I don;t think this film effectively conveyed Sr. Aloysius' justification for her actions.
And in the end, no good came from her actions.



"De gustibus non disputandum est"
#3

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While I agree that she did not have enough evidence, I disagree that "nothing good came of it". With both arguments, we just don't know if it did or not. Wouldn't the victims of your school's priest have been better off if someone had suspected that priest and, despite whatever doubts they may have had, erred on the side of children?

It's a hard call, but i stand by children's rights to be children first. I equate it to the people who did not believe Michael Jackson was a pedophile (I tend to believe that way myself) but 1)as a parent, i wouldn't risk leaving my child alone with him and 2) once he was accused, he should have made sure he was never alone with other people's kids instead of flaunting his "love" of children. It may be a witch hunt, but since it is, the accused should just back off. Father Flynn, thinking he held all the power in that good ol' boy system, underestimated Sister 'Wicuous.

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When I say "nothing good came of it" all it did was migrate the problem somewhere else. If he is guilty, keeping him under close supervision, intercepting his acts of evil and getting evidence to have him lawfully destroyed would have served the children far better. Now he's just swept under the rug. the same thing happened with our priest until he was finally brought down. How many kids were injured because of suspicions reported to those who would cover it up?

Of course, back then it's highly doubtful even the police would be much help. Who wants to risk going to hell for handcuffing a priest?

Thus is the power and the fear of the church.



"De gustibus non disputandum est"
#3

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@ShanerMD and apologies to Gabby, I thought. i posted my original reply to ShaderMD but must have clicked on Gabby.

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Hey, the more great minds brought into this, the better!



"De gustibus non disputandum est"
#3

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:)

and so very true about just shoving any known guilty priest along. People (and the Church) don't understand that forgiveness should not absolve consequences when it comes to criminal acts.

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Indeed. My forgiveness is not for the offender, but for my own sake and peace of mind.
Absolution on the other hand would be for the offender - and a lot more difficult to come by.



"De gustibus non disputandum est"
#3

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She had a belief that she held as fact and did what she thought was right.

He had to leave because, as stated in his sermon about gossip, his reputation there was going to be destroyed by her.

If someone suspects another if child abuse it is their duty to report it. However, his was a different time, and there are coverups and scandal in the Catholic Church.

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This wasn't a court of law but a school; so innocent till proven guilty doesn't apply. Flynn had more power in the Church, even if he had been caught red handed, than Sis A did with good standing. He only had to fear being found out for what he did to Donald and his previous history, of predation, being brought u p again.

There can only one.

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I agree with your remark about not wanting it brought into the public eye. Remember, he quotes in the film that he will not have her ruin his reputation (or something along those lines)

I reckon he resigned to avoid it being highlighted, even though he may well have been completely innocent of all accusations.

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How do you PROVE that someone is a child molester? Catch them in the act? How likely is that? Have the child make an accusation, which in this case would have been a troubled boy's word against a priest's?

Please explain - how do you prove someone is a child molester?



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^^^^ Just the way you said my friend. How else could you prove it?. There could potentially be physical evidence as well.

It is indeed very hard to prove, as are all sex crimes. Which is why it's hard to get convictions, and easy to make false accusations.

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>How do you PROVE that someone is a child molester?

Well, in court is one way. I have been an observer in many such cases.

But here's an anecdotal example. My brother was an altar boy. Sometime after he began doing that he mysteriously had a lot of extra spending money for model airplanes. My mother insisted on knowing where that came from. My brother was also acting strangely, emotionally. Turns out the money came from the priest. My mother took him out of the altar boy job because the priest had fiddled about with him.

Now, how owuld you prove that in court? Swear to tell the truth, the mother would explain about the money for the airplanes.

And the *beep* priest can burn in hell.

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