In a sadly less-than-shocking tale Caleb Hesse, a California elementary school teacher and 'family-values' proponent, has confessed to decades of abusing young boys. "According to KTLA, the incidents occurred mostly during Hesse’s overnight volunteer trips with the church. Hesse allegedly met many of his underage victims during these outings. Authorities believe the most recent crimes occurred as early as last week." (via Opposing Views)

  • http://www.youtube.com/user/Freethinkersanon Christopher

    It’s because of stories like this that whenever I hear some homophobe conflating homosexuality and pedophilia my first instinct is to wonder if they’re projecting.

    • Nick Harvey

      Has anyone proposed that anti-gay activists be banned from situations where they have power over young children (e.g. scout leader, teacher, etc) ? It seems the correlation between this sort of political position and a tendency toward pedophilia is stronger than the (non-existant) correlation between homosexuality and the same tendency.

      • Chuck

        You’re obviously leading a liberal conspiracy to smear those with traditional conservative values by having them all investigated for crimes against children.  (And how long before I find someone who believes in that conspiracy theory for real?)

    • dnebdal

      Indeed. It’s a dead giveaway if they start preaching about “resisting urges”, of course.

  • info

    And the news would be…?

  • CSBD

    methinks the 52 year old (who has sleepovers with kids) doth protest too much

  • benher

    Ah, see now. They always lead a cabal against it so they don’t have to share. Dirty pool!

  • wizardru

    Schadenfreude or no, children were harmed.  I can take no joy from such news, especially as a father.

    • http://twitter.com/unclejel jerry clark

      People who comment on such horrid stories must be covering their own arses.  Apart from me.

  • http://www.facebook.com/postelwait Cameron Postelwait

    i wish a ‘family values’ proponent would explain why they’d be against gays having families and being loyal to each other.

    • foobar

      Because Jebus.

      • http://twitter.com/beep54orama B E Pratt

         Just to be clear, Jesus never said anything about the subject. Leviticus or perhaps Paul, but not Jesus. On the other hand, ‘Jebus’ IS pretty good for referring to the wingnut types…….

        • http://insight.pinkonbrown.org/ Dr P Fenderson

          You’re correct – although not “perhaps Paul”. Most certainly Paul. Romans 1:26-27

          “Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones. In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed shameful acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their error.”

          Bigotry is still bigotry though.

          • Antinous / Moderator

            Sigh. I can’t even remember the last time that I committed any shameful acts with other men.

        • foobar

          Jebus, his poor cousin from the strip did, but it was mostly  just rich uncle Republican Jesus using it as a wedge issue to make sure Caesar got his.

    • llazy8

      Just for the record, having families and being loyal to each other aren’t always hand-in-glove.   There are people out there who want marriage rights without kowtowing to the default option of monogamy. 

      • http://twitter.com/spookiewon Pjay (Patti) Pender

        And…? First of all, there ARE such people, and they occur in about the same proportions in straight and gay people. I fail to see why it would be a marriage equality issue. And secondly, so the eff what?

    • http://twitter.com/spookiewon Pjay (Patti) Pender

      Well, when I ask they always say because it’s “unnatural” because gays can’t reproduce. Which, of course, explains nothing. About the same number of gays and straights are infertile, and, quite frankly, what does the world need with more people anyway? If it’s survival of the species, we’ll survive as a species longer if we reduce, not increase, our numbers.

  • SFDex

    The lady doth protest too much, methinks.

    (Of course, someone else beat me to the Shakespeare reference.)

    And I agree, there’s no joy to be had from this news, unless it helps open people’s eyes to the hypocrisy of many who fight so stridently against the rights of others.

  • http://nefariousnewt.blogspot.com NefariousNewt

    So, because he could not deal rationally with the pain his homosexuality was causing him, he inflicted that pain on the innocent.

    Is it perhaps time for the rhetoric of ‘homosexuality as abomination’ to stop? Because far from warding away the desire, it only seems to be used to inflict more harm.

    • Preston Sturges

      Most pedophiles have easier access to children of the same sex.  

      When a guy like a softball coach has access to young girls, he molests girls.  He does not drive across town looking for boys to molest instead. 

      • RedShirt77

         I would still bet there is some correlation between Shame and repression with pedophilia.  All types of people have it, it just seems that hating your own natural urges might be part of the formula for this type of abuse.

  • ToMajorTom

    In reply to NefariousNewt:  I agree it’s time for the rhetoric to stop, but I don’t agree that there’s a direct correlation between being gay and being a pedophile (which you seem to be saying here).  There are plenty of “straight” pedophiles (for lack of a better term), and I don’t think there has ever been rhetoric against straight folks to drive them to such activity.

    • HerkyDerky

      I think NefariousNewt is saying that there is a correlation between pain and abuse, not homosexuality and pedophilia.

  • http://thisisonlya.blogspot.com robcat2075

    I always wonder about people who are fixated on “working with children” because I typically find children tedious and annoying.

    • chenille

      It does nothing to help children to expect that all adults should want nothing to do with them. Enough has been written here about the unfair results of your suspicions on people like parents. They go far beyond cases like this, where “family values” is a better warning than “teacher”.

      Because speaking as someone who remembers being a child, I’m glad not everyone has such a snobby attitude to them. Not everything is about how you find other people, you know.

    • http://twitter.com/spookiewon Pjay (Patti) Pender

      I find them tedious and annoying as well.

  • oldtaku

    It’s great that people have finally stopped calling this sort of thing ironic.

  • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1362865524 Jaye Whitmire

    Folks, you’re not surprised when fat people work around food? A pedophiles goal is to be close to children. They engineer situations where they are trusted and close to children. Why is anyone surprised about this kind of revelation? Shouldn’t be. Not sure how you prevent it other than empowering children to tell someone.

    Children are trusting and make poor decisions, but they need to know they have power over their own body and no one, no one is allowed to violate them. 

    • http://twitter.com/spookiewon Pjay (Patti) Pender

      I don’t think comparing being fat people to pedophiles is really a fair comparison. I also don’t think most fat people work around, or even would like to work around, food.

      • http://www.geekgirlsonline.com Athena Hollow

         Very much right. In fact, most of the people I know who work around food aren’t overweight at all (maybe 1 in a staff of 10-20). This is because when you’re working around food, you’re on your feet and/or running around like a chicken with your head cut off – appeasing customers, taking/delivering orders, etc.

        • Antinous / Moderator

          Also because working around food can put you off your feed.

  • Teto85

    What’s shocking is that the perp is not a catholic priest, bishop, cardinal or other rank.

  • http://twitter.com/yatima Yatima

    It’s getting increasingly difficult for me to believe that the church has any purpose other than protecting child abusers.