"It's got to be "enemy left!" and straight in - as quick as that. If you start thinking 'Well, they could have a machine gun here ... should I, shouldn't I, could I, couldn't I, you're dead."Mutatis mutandis, this applies to an ambush by the presenter on live TV. Joanna Bogle was ambushed by Jon Snow on Channel 4 the other day and came out fighting. She didn't equivocate, apologise, wonder whether it might be right to use a condom to save a life, or try to hide under cover of "possible theological opinions."
From the luxury of watching a rerun of the clip, we could all give advice on a phrase here, or a gesture there. But this was a sophisticated attack on the Catholic Church using the now customary tactic of having a nominal opponent while the presenter is the (much more experienced) real opponent. By aggressively getting in some points of truth and common sense, Joanna may have helped some viewers to see that there is in fact another side to this argument and that it is not just "blind dogma" or prejudice but a question of facts - what works and what does not work in saving the lives of thousands of people. Had she done anything else, she would have been publicly kebabed or simply betrayed the truth.
Have a look at the clip. And before you jump in to give advice, ask yourself whether you would have actually responded better in the heat of the moment to the outrageous assertion that Pope Benedict has "condemned many Africans to death."
H/T Patrick Madrid
39 comments:
, as Ann Furedi, chief executive of the abortion and advice service bpas has pointed out, as a form of contraception condoms are relatively unreliable, and promoting the use of condoms could possibly lead to a rise in unwanted pregnancies. ‘Historically, whenever there has been a shift away from hormonal contraception like the pill, towards barrier methods like condoms, rates of unplanned pregnancy have risen as a result’, says Furedi.
So condons are inefective against pregnancy but not AIDs. I'll believe Ann Furedi as she ought to now. the above quote was taken from spiked. I had reakd Anne's original article but can't find itnow. Hope I am not contriverning any copyright laws.
Ugh! "You're getting awfully fierce..." with the "see the silly Christian woman" little half-smile... Twisting her words at every turn. He should be very, very ashamed of himself. This is not journalism.
Thank you Joanna, you were brilliant, anyone listening would know that you were right. They tried to heckle you, but you went in there fighting. Please come into our Catholic Schools and tell them the truth about the Teachings of Our Mother the Church and sex. If there were more speakers like you our children would not be losing their faith.
God Bless you, you are in our prayers.
Well done Auntie Joanna! Fearless, as ever and ready to tell it as it is despite the barking dogs! Frankly Jon Snow and the lady Doctor were lightweights in comparison. The 'ambush' was about as effective as a half eaten cold plate of noodles.
Jon Snow simply showed himself up by a couple of patronising comments aimed at Joanna - highly unprofessional. It made him look tired and dated! The good lady Dr. on the other hand probably means well but was clearly utterly confused about the entire medical issue of AIDS/HIV and the efficacy of condoms!!! Even condom manufacturers agree that their products are not 100% efficient at preventing pregnancy let alone preventing the transmission of STD's. The sperm is thousands of times larger than the HIV viral particles! So what chance does that piece of flimsy rubber have at preventing the spread of AIDS - NONE WHATSOEVER!!. They reckon on about a 10% failure rate which is why abortion is the condoms favourite partner in crime. It's the safety net in case of condom failure. Bottom line is if an Airline for example said 'Come fly with us', but the small print said '10% of our planes fall out of the sky' - would you rush to buy a ticket???? The only 100% safe bet for not dying in a plane crash is 'DON'T FLY WITH THAT AIRLINE.' Similarly ABSTINENCE from sex with potentially HIV infected people is guaranteed 100% effective.
And latest LifeSite News has this to say:
Harvard AIDS Expert Says Pope is Correct on Condom Distribution Making AIDS Worse
By John-Henry Westen
March 19, 2009 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Edward C. Green, director of the AIDS Prevention Research Project at the Harvard Center for Population and Development Studies, has said that the evidence confirms that the Pope is correct in his assessment that condom distribution exacerbates the problem of AIDS.
"The pope is correct," Green told National Review Online Wednesday, "or put it a better way, the best evidence we have supports the pope's comments."
"There is," Green added, "a consistent association shown by our best studies, including the U.S.-funded 'Demographic Health Surveys,' between greater availability and use of condoms and higher (not lower) HIV-infection rates."
Thanks John Henry Weston - a very timely article in defence of our Holy Father. For more go to LifeSiteNews.com - and send them a donation they do fantastic work to spread the Truth and expose 'lies and agendas' at all levels.
Papa Benedict we love you and God Bless you abundantly Joanna Bogle!
Wonderful, wonderful, show, Joanna Bogle!
Thank God we have the likes of her to tear into the unprincipled b*****d who ambushed her. She gave as good as she got, in fact she bettered them both. Snow declared that he had never had such a passioned "interview" before. He clearly felt the heat and did not expect what was served up to him. His final joke was to claim that "the grim reaper" had called time!
Ho, ho, ho!
JARay
Joanna did very well, I would not have been so restrained with her co-interviewee from Christian Aid. It's a shame she didn't get to challenge Jon Snow's assertion head on. That the majority of AIDS sufferers are dutifully heeding church teaching and not using a condom whilst simultaneously disregarding the church's teaching on chastity is a proposition I find entirely implausible.
It seems that Joanna Bogle is not much better than Jesus at managing her message. Jesus was unable to stop the crowds from calling for His Blood. Jesus was not able to get the leaders of the day--Jewish or Roman--to receive the truth of what He was saying.
Meanwhile, I'm with the level-headed man of deep faith, John Allen. He understands that this whole furore is because of the Vatican's colossal incompetence. If the Vatican could just learn from the politicians, know when to obfuscate, know when to lie, and above all know that the best defence is an outrageous attack on one's opponent, then the Church would not be getting all this flak.
Finally, the Pope and Joanna Bogle are in danger of making this whole issue about saving lives of vulnerable people in Africa. Unthinkable.
Well done, Joanna. Good to see someone so passionate about the Catholic faith.
As for the presenter, well it is the BBC, isn't it? Beelzebub Baal Communications, I believe.
God bless our Pope and give him good health and a long life!
Actually, Terry, this one was Channel 4 but the BBC has the same bias.
Good on you Joanna! Let them see this is something to hold firms views about. The other cold creature, squirming with self-righteousness, managed to discuss life and death with all the engagement she might exhibit were she discussing a new cataloguing system for the public library.
Joanna really shone. And through her light one saw the truth, quite clearly. I thought she was remarkably calm in the circumstances. Jon Snow is a real ****.
Well done Joanna.
Jon Snow showed himself up as a patronising, smug, uncouth bully. He was determined not to let Joanna finish her points before cutting across her. Further, he showed disdain and disrespect towards the Christian Faith in his throwaway, 'God and Christ and all that stuff..
This inaccurately amed 'interview' was not only a terrible example of secular media bias. I'm sure JS counts himself a member of a Profession. He disgraced it. We should set Mother Angelica onto him.
Our own Catholic media Office is a disgrace as well.
At the very least,Joanna Bogle deserves the 'Bene Merenti'.
May God bless our Pope, grant him endurance, and protect him from all his enemies. Ad multos annos!
Ftaher I teach inmates in the Prison here. We have inmates here who have aids, I close my Bloodborne Pathogen Class by asking this, "If you are about to have sex with a girl, and she is ready, then says I have aids but here is a condom, what would you do?"
A condom does not preclude pregnancy (sperm being a cell is huge compared to a virus), what makes these people think it will prevent aids?
Richard
"If the Vatican could just learn from the politicians." Not quite sure of the nature of the point it is you are making James M???
Does the Vatican need to lie to get a message 'across'??? Are you suggesting that Jesus our Lord and our God should have lied in order to 'get out of' having to go through His Passion, or to get His 'point' across to the Jews or to Pilate???
Jesus got so much flak that it got Him crucified. He told the Apostles (and us in turn) to expect the same if we followed in His footsteps. The Church has been and will continue to be attacked always - for proclaiming the Truth, whatever the cost. Pope Benedict knows exactly what and when to say.
Maybe I'm just thick and not quite getting the gist of what you are saying James M - I hope. You mention John Allen - now is that the Irish Comedian or is it John Allen Jr the columnist for the dubious National Catholic Reporter which hosts other noted 'catholic' writers such as 'Sr.' Joan Chichister???
Thank you, Father. I live in Japan and didn't catch which channel it was on, but Channel 4 isn't much better, is it?
As for James M's comment: "If the Vatican could just learn from the politicians, know when to obfuscate, know when to lie".
If the Vatican were to start lying, then the church just becomes hypocritical, doesn't it? The Catholic Church is about the truth, no matter how painful it is to hear it sometimes.
Sjees, she doesn't even get the chance to speak, and if she does, she has to respond to some nasty twist the presenter made of the words she said.
Think she's done a great job defending the Catholic point :)
I find this article and the comments even more dispiriting than the original item (which I saw live - C4 is my normal news channel).
With friends like these who needs enemies.
Jon Snow was right, anyone who gets that over-excited simply loses, irrespective of merit.
To answer you question, almost anyone who remained calm would have done a better job of defending the Humanae Vitae.
John Scholes
trustyservant.com
The good lady Dr. on the other hand probably means well but was clearly utterly confused about the entire medical issue of AIDS/HIV and the efficacy of condoms!!!
She was merely pumping out the usual platitudes from the progressive's vending machine.
There is one thing we need to watch out for: the HIV-is-smaller-than-sperm argument. We are in danger of blowing ourselves up with it. HIV is transmitted through semen. If the semen doesn't get through (which it can through breakage, leakage, etc.) the virus doesn't either no matter how much smaller it is than sperm. I agree entirely of course that telling people to use a condom is like telling people to wear body armor when robbing banks, but let's pick our sticks carefully so we don't pick up a boomerang.
I watched an episode of Battlefield Britain by Jon and Dan Snow, it was about the Siege of Londonderry etc - I think, I didn't watch to the end, they had an obvious bias against the Catholic side, intimating that the British people were all Protestant and fiercely resisted the idea of the monarch being Catholic. I have better things to do with my time than watch a couple of self-satisfied moral relativists sneering at the church and the faith.
Hurrah to Auntie Joanna for making her stand.
I was debating this issue with a blogger recently, and both there and - very clearly - in the Channel 4 piece, it is abundant modern man doesn't like the Catholic message, because it's the only message that tells the truth: sex is not for fun only. Sex has consequences, etc.
*sighs* Someone tried to argue that the Pope's instructions would kill everyone. Except it's not true: if everyone did what the Pope and the Church said, i.e. abstinence, sex for children not just fun, etc., then no-one would die of being infected (wittingly) with HIV!
it's important to correct Jon Snow
here's his email address:
jon.snow@itn.co.uk
my email started with
Dear Mr Snow
You obviously hadn't done a very good job on your research into the consequences of using condoms as a means of combatting Aids / HIV. If you had, you might have behaved in a more mature manner while conducting your interview with Joanna Boogle, instead of acting like an arrogant schoolboy trying to intimidate a woman with the wisdom of more years, and concern for human dignity.
Renowned experts have conducted studies which prove that far from reducing pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases, condoms just lead to abortion as a contraceptive or further disease and death. The only people who benefit are the manufacturers whose coffers are being filled.
It appears you haven’t much concern for the coffins being filled in Africa due to misleading, expensive Western advertising being shoved at its people instead of funds being directly made available so they decide for themselves how best to be used.
Then again, I have to remind myself that far from being an agent of bringing information to the masses, you’re just another who self-polices to make sure you don’t upset the power structure who decides whether or not you have a job.
A couple of links to get the record straight may help you get a glimpse of the truth, even if you’re not prepared to share it with your audience:
From
harvard link
some quotes
plus a couple of other links
It is obvious that the "non-catholic" approach is based on the idea that it is everyone's right to have sexual intercourse. So they don't (can't) understand the idea of abstinence. It is all too common to hear arguments like: "If someone has HIV/AIDS, they can have as much sex as they want with as many people as they want. As long as they use a condom, Aids won't spread". What nonsense!!!
Surly if you don't have sex you can't pass on a sexually transmitted infection.
It all sounds like so many things these days where the morals have been inverted, and the Church is made out to be "out of touch". Well I’d rather be "out of touch" than pick an immoral choice
That smarmy Snow guy was lucky she didn't deck him, because she would have won. He'd have deserved it to, for being a [blank inserted here due to this being a priest's blog.]
epsilon:
A more measured tone might do us a better service. There's no need to call him a schoolboy, even if he is wrong.
Sorry, Fr Tim. Agree she was ambushed (quelle surprise).
Disagree she came out fighting. It was awful. Such a straightforward topic, too.
I wish that Joanna had said something like this:
"Encouraging condom use disguises the risk of transmitting HIV, because condoms are not fail safe. It is simply a lie that condoms offer complete protection. Condom distribution propagates this lie, and by that fact encourages greater sexual activity among people who would otherwise abstain. It therefore increases HIV transmission."
I realize that it's difficult to make a clear, logical argument in such a forum.
Personally I think Auntie Joanna will be set up a constant Aunt Sally on these broadcasts. The nature of the ambush was clearly based on the fore-knowledge of the producers that Joanna would lose her cool and make the other two sound like the voice of sweet reason. We need another quiet sneerer like the other lady to carry our point in future.
Excellent, that is what is needed passion, passion appeals to more people than the calm arrogant manner that the intelligentsia thinks makes them sound superior.
The last thing the Church needs to do is start aping politicians and start obfuscating and outright lying( a sin by the way!!!), no one respects that kind of behaviour, most people hate politicians it needs to be remembered.
Oh so easy to criticise Joanna Bogle. All these comments that go on about 'she should have said this, done that, been less fiesty, I would have done it like this, no she was wrong blah blah blah' are just a load of hot air.
Fact is that she got herself over to Channel 4 studios and in front of the cameras had the courage to stand up for the Catholic Faith and for the Holy Father. Easy to say on teh one hand that 'I would do it like this', but in the heat of the moment would you hold your nerve and fight back with facts as she did.
Joanna was hardly given space to breathe let alone give a calm argument as everytime she tried to put a point across John Snow cut across her bows. So she came out fighting and made a host of valid points. That these points fell on deaf ears is another matter but then C4's agenda had been set to show the Holy Father and the Catholic Faith as the 'big bogey man' condemning millions of Africans and others to a terrible death from AIDS/HIV because we choose to look to a deeper rooted cause for the problem and a permanent solution (fidelity to one marriage partner and abstinence from promiscuous sex) rather than the false idea of it's OK to carry on with having sex at any cost with the quick 'makeover' of using and placing all ones hopes in a flimsy bit of latex rubber.
What is deafening is the silence from our Bishops in E & W on these matters! Had their press office been 'up to speed' and working effectively over the last thirty or so years we wouldn't have such an outcry in the UK over the Pope's statements as the public and the media would have been more educated about the Catholic position on these issues over this period of time.
Perhaps dare I say, many lives could have been saved had the message of marital fidelity, chastity, renouncement of hedonism and moral relativism, been provided in pastoral letters to the faithful and solid catechesis.
So again, well done Joanna Bogle and God Bless.
Sorry, George, but you could not be more wrong.
Getting yourself over to a studio is really the least of it. Maps, taxi drivers and Sat Navs help with that one, I find.
No, this is about warfare. Some are up to it, some ain't.
This was a disaster, however supportive the Catholic Community remains of JB - and I support her, too. She is great. But please, keep her away from the Mainstream Media.
She was set up, precisely because the MSM know what a caricature she is. Wind her up and watch her go.
Entertaining, I agree.. but is this really how we want to come across ?
I would respctfully suggest that we protect Auntie J from future ambushes. This is not an effective tactic.
We are commanded to be as wily as serpents and as beguiling as doves.
Come on... please get real. You don't put your Army kitchen co-ordinator in front of the nuclear button.
George and Terry, perhaps I should clarify:
In the comment above I was being very tongue in cheek...
I was trying to show how mad, daft and nasty are those who are attacking the Pope and/or Joanna on this issue--especially the ones who count themselves Catholic.
Joanna did a great job. She spoke the truth loud and clear. For that you get crucified. That's how the world works...and despite superficial appearences, it truly redeems the world! Good on her.
The debate of JB's performance reminds me of the fights pro-lifers sometimes have over the use of graphic pictures of abortion. Someone gets the vapors and says "is this how we want to come across?" We are so afraid of being labled fringe by the msm that we end up being lickspittles pleading, "O please Media Masters. I assure you that in spite of these few hotheads that we are most reasonable in asserting our views. Please don't revoke our Good Public Relations seal." Faugh.
Bernadette - sorry but you're way off the mark. If as you put it (in a rather derogatory manner) Joanna Bogle is the equivalent of the 'Army kitchen co-ordinator', then by heck let her push the 'nuclear button' if she is the only one with enough guts to do it in defence of our Faith and the Holy father.
You seem to me to have itchy feet for getting yourself into a TV/Radio studio. Believe me, I really do hope you get the opportunity to defend the Faith in the public forum and may the Holy Spirit help you with whatever it is that you need to say.
In my books Joanna outshone both Jon Snow and the Christian Aid doctor - and despite all the heckling and patronising, snide comments from so called 'professionals', she got many good, solid and valid points across.
James M - I suspected that you had your 'cynical hat' firmly tucked over your head while reading your comment. But couldn't be sure, so thanks for coming clean! Great relief that there are more hardy troops out there.
In the famous words of Blessed Miguel Pro "Viva Christo Rei"!
I was just wondering if this clip could be posted on youtube so many people can access it...
If only all of our candles shone so bright and vigorous.
For a moment I wish she could be one of our bishops... oh well...
I can, however, wish that some bishops were like her...
This kind of "journalism" is despicable but we have to endure it. Most of those are still living in 1968. May be they should get 1968 salaries... that would force them to go looking for a real job.
I agree with veniteadoremus. What a slimy thing that was going on in that interview. Practically demonic.
Notice how "the journalist" literally could not see ANY alternative view without condoms other than: "So your advice to that prostitute would be to demand for moral grounds that the man does not use a condom."
And these people are the ones who charge us with being dogmatic?
They are also hypocrites. I prefer that they would simply show how much they despise abstinence rather than saying, "It is definitely part of the whole solution", or some other rubbish.
How can they not see that introducing condoms to a people who have been largely practising abstinence does not help further, but brings the whole house down? Are their brains really that unable to make connections?
Are people merely objects for their AIDs prevention?
God bless Joanna Bogle. We need people with that purity, to not really care about getting testy and fierce (though to my vantage she was rather calm), if it means getting out the truth.
...Interesting how soft-spoken the opposition can afford to be, when she in effect represents the highly lucrative condom industry in Africa. Is anyone interested in following the money?
... and how ironic that a 100% condom policy in effect endorses the very behavior of promiscuous, casual sexual activity which so desperately needs to change in the (formerly conservative) developing world.
Television is theatre. One can be absolutely right, and defend the truth passionately, yet not win the crowd over. Television people understand this very well, and choose their spokespeople adroitly in order to reinforce their position. This has nothing to do with rational argument, alas!
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