Hey, Kids: Wanna Work For a Pro-Censorship Organization?

JESUSLAND—In what can only be described as an amazing coincidence, just two days after Republicans, many of them of the Tea Party variety, gained even more seats in the U.S. House of Representatives as well as a majority in the U.S. Senate, Morality in Media (MiM) has sent out a solicitation, not just to hire more employees (and interns, who "don't have to be in DC" where MiM's headquarters are located), but also to find a "branding/marketing firm" to help them "re-brand some aspects of our organization." (We're guessing, to help them avoid stupid public outbursts like this one, this one and even this one.) Specifically, in terms of branding/marketing, they're looking for "someone talented in graphic design and marketing," 'cause if MiM's learned one thing from the 2014 Republican political campaign, it's that no one cares about substance; it's all about image and how many visual and verbal lies about your opponent you can squeeze into 30 seconds of air-time or on a billboard. Regarding hirees for MiM itself, the search is on for a Graphic Designer & Multimedia Specialist, an Administrative Assistant and a Communications/Press Coordinator—and we're guessing they expect that last job to take quite a bit of time as Republicans, having nothing better to do for the next couple of years, decide to ramp up new hearings on the "threat of pornography" to the American Way of Life®. Incidentally, anyone reading this who's interested in applying for any of those positions can just, "Email a thoughtful cover letter and your resume to Dawn at mim@moralityinmedia.org." Funny thing, we were just reading about some clergy and former clergy who might be ripe for changing tracks and fighting porn wherever and whenever it rears its ugly head. Seems that impending retiree Cardinal Francis George of the Archdiocese of Chicago has just released roughly fifteen thousand (15,000) pages of documents relating to 36 pedophile priests who've populated the Chicago Diocese over the past 65 years or so—and that's in addition to the 27 other priests previously identified, for a total of 63 priests "who church officials found abused 352 children since 1950," according to a story in today's Chicago Tribune. Those church documents make interesting reading. For example, there's the (extensively redacted) file on Fr. Robert L. "Bob" Kealy, which runs to 958 pages, and it's chock full of glowing evaluations by his fellow clergy of Kealy's work since 1972 in various parishes—but it isn't until page 189 of the file that there's any hint of sexual impropriety. In a letter from Rev. Lawrence P. McBrady to Bishop Raymond E. Goedert dated September 25, 2000, it is noted that "a young adult male... claimed that Bob had made a sexual advance while he was at a party attended by Bob." The "sexual advance" turned out to have been Kealy grabbing the kid's crotch at the party where the kids and Kealy were drinking and smoking pot—a charge which the parish review board dismissed, saying "there was not reasonable cause to suspect sexual misconduct with a minor," though they did call the smoking and drinking "inappropriate." But when the kid threatened to go to the press, Kealy was asked to resign, which he did—two years later. The bulk of the file is chock full of official statements about how the church was going to change its method of investigations of pedophilia, letters of commendation of Kealy from other clergy—and newspaper clippings of stories about pedo-priests. The point is, a look through Kealy's file, not to mention those of several other defrocked priests, reveals glowing praise for Kealy's ability to motivate his various parishes and how well he interacted with the parishioners—probably just what MiM needs going forward. Plus, it never hurts for a pro-censorship group to have a couple of clergy on its employee roster. The full list of the recently revealed pedo-priests is here, and the documents related to it can be found here. Finally, the MiM solicitation is looking for public input for their 2015 "Dirty Dozen" list of companies and public figures that are "porn friendly": "We want to know who YOU think should be on the 2015 Dirty Dozen List," the email reads. "Many people come to us with stories about specific companies, products and individuals that use sexual exploitation to make a profit. "Members of this list might create a product that specifically caters to pornography, their policy regarding obscene material may be lacking or otherwise profit from involvement with pornography and sexually exploitive materials. "Who do you want to fight in 2015? Email us at mim@moralityinmedia.org with your ideas." Believe us, Dawn: You don't want to know what our ideas are—but our readers may send you a few anyway.