‘Crisis communications’: emails show how NFL’s Saints and NBA’s Pelicans helped New Orleans church spin abuse scandal (258 Viewers)

[Covington Saint]

Great retort - very insightful.

I know. But when you just completely make up ideas and posts them off as a credible opinion, i'm not sure what else you want. I'm trying to keep my retort civil. You posted completely wrong thoughts.

 

[donato]

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If it went against the court order, that evidence no matter how damniing, becomes dismissable in theory

Dismissible by who? It's already out there now.

 

[Mr. Sparkle]

Is that what happened?

Depends on whether you believe the contemporaneous email record or the after-the-fact denials of what the email traffic shows.

....Bensel – the teams’ vice-president for communications – wrote an email to Lauscha on 1 November 2018, the day before the clergy-abuse list was released. Using common abbreviations for “conference call” and “with”, Bensel wrote: “Had a cc w [New Orleans’ then district attorney] Leon Cannizzaro last night that allowed us to take certain people off the list.”

The Saints and Cannizzaro deny that any such conversation took place. To me, it shows that either Bensel was lying in that email or they are all lying now. Either way, it's not good.

 

[Doug B]

If it went against the court order, that evidence no matter how damniing, becomes dismissable in theory

Bensel nor anyone else with the Saints is facing criminal charges. I don't anticipate anyone even facing a civil trial for any of this. Dismissible evidence won't ever come into play here.

 

[BayouSAINTJoe]

No bueno

 

[rail]

This…..

For everyone saying it’s a non story it’s irrelevant what you think or the rest of us think. It’s what the NFL thinks. At the end of the day I’m pretty sure that most of you here can take your little Saints fan glasses off for a second and realize that even if Tesla’s PR rep did what Bensel did that it would be newsworthy and cause some business issues for Elon. Mrs Gayle and the Saints are not immune or exempt from criticism by the media/AP/NFL executives or Goodell on this matter.

TBH with the state of both franchises Mrs Gayle would probably be better off selling both teams anyways folks. As a Saints and Pelicans fan myself I just hope that the NFL will abide by her plan to keep the Saints in New Orleans and allow Dennis Lausca to facilitate the sale to an owner or ownership group committed to keeping the franchise in New Orleans as originally agreed upon by the NFL back in 2021. As for the Pelicans well that’s an another question because the NBA was less committal.

Going through this mental exercise of taking out the emotional ties we have, as 'fans', to this organization and really looking at this situation is totally on-point. Picture Elon/Tesla, Bill Gates/MS, or whatever major corporation out there doing this. At the very least this billion-dollar company is using its resources to advise/put a PR spin on a religious organization weathering (yet another) storm of children being raped. Even to the point of suggesting certain accused names being taken off of a list to avoid public embarrassment.

This is beyond reprehensible. I don't care how close you are to a church/religious organization. This is something you don't even consider touching, let alone offer your company's resources to.

My initial gut, admittedly emotional, reaction has me questioning my continued fandom. I wouldn't blame Moore, or anyone, in the least if they decided not to work for a company that engages in this.

You can spin it as "oh, how coincidental this piece coming out right now", "old news", conspiracy theories to make the team be sold/moved, or even what appears to be some victim blaming, as much as you want. This is awful horrible, horrendous behavior by an organization that should not be dismissed or just brushed off as a 'nothing burger '.

 

[JackDiesel]

Really great that this resurfaces right as our potential future head coach is in New Orleans.

 

[Mr. Sparkle]

By the way, Bensel's entire job is to prevent something like this from happening to the Saints.

 

[St. Widge]

The Guardian article linked in the OP, muckraking as it it, is actually worth the read. Just to know what's being accused. At its heart:

"Yet what remained hidden until now are more than 300 emails, amounting to more than 700 pages, many emblazoned with the NFL and NBA logos, showing that the teams’ officials were more involved with some of the church’s operations than they ever admitted. They expose how extensively the sports teams’ leaders intervened in their local church’s most unyielding scandal.​

​

"In the most blatant example of that, Bensel – the teams’ vice-president for communications – wrote an email to Lauscha on 1 November 2018, the day before the clergy-abuse list was released. Using common abbreviations for “conference call” and “with”, Bensel wrote: “Had a cc w [New Orleans’ then district attorney] Leon Cannizzaro last night that allowed us to take certain people off the list.”​

If Bensel did lobby to have names taken off the list, it's disgusting and he should be fired. But, the quote you have above from the email referenced in the article isn't clear to me. The quote is:

“Had a cc w [New Orleans’ then district attorney] Leon Cannizzaro last night that allowed us to take certain people off the list.”

I can see how someone could interpret that as Bensel suggesting names be taken off of the list, but IIRC, it was the Archdiocese that released the list so to me it sounds like Bensel got info from Cannizzaro that indicates that some of the list had not committed crimes and he suggested that those names be taken off of the list. I don't think Bensel should be involved in this in his professional capacity with the Saints, but as disgusting as I find it, he can do it as a private citizen. Moreover, it's not the same as lobbying the DA to no prosecute some abusers.

All of the articles appears to be giant articles with little new information that were timed for release to get the most attention possible when the vast majority of what is in the articles was know year ago and the little new information is really subject to interpretation and isn't the smoking gun it is portrayed to be.

 

[St. Widge]

By the way, Bensel's entire job is to prevent something like this from happening to the Saints.

Saints PR has been terrible for many years. Winning a lot of games covered that up but they have never been good at it.

 

[Sun Wukong]

Going through this mental exercise of taking out the emotional ties we have, as 'fans', to this organization and really looking at this situation is totally on-point. Picture Elon/Tesla, Bill Gates/MS, or whatever major corporation out there doing this. At the very least this billion-dollar company is using its resources to advise/put a PR spin on a religious organization weathering (yet another) storm of children being raped. Even to the point of suggesting certain accused names being taken off of a list to avoid public embarrassment.

This is beyond reprehensible. I don't care how close you are to a church/religious organization. This is something you don't even consider touching, let alone offer your company's resources to.

My initial gut, admittedly emotional, reaction has me questioning my continued fandom. I wouldn't blame Moore, or anyone, in the least if they decided not to work for a company that engages in this.

You can spin it as "oh, how coincidental this piece coming out right now", "old news", conspiracy theories to make the team be sold/moved, or even what appears to be some victim blaming, as much as you want. This is awful horrible, horrendous behavior by an organization that should not be dismissed or just brushed off as a 'nothing burger '.

Correct.

The number of people in this thread trying to handwave this away because their favorite team did something reprehensible is wild, but not shocking. Fandom is often cultish.

But make no mistake. This is disgusting.

 

[UptownSaintsFan]

it did but leave it to a left winged british news paper to take advantage of the super bowl being in new orleans to spit out a regurgitated news story with slight more intel like its the biggest hit piece in the world for clicks. All of a sudden, a left winged newspaper is going to take the cover up of pedophilia seriously after the past decade plus we've witnessed all sorts of different facets of our lives.

They are citing quotes from emails. Grow up.

 

[St. Widge]

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Yep, someone or someone's trying to stir the pot. If it went against the court order, that evidence no matter how damniing, becomes dismissable in theory

It would likely be inadmissible in Court, but not in the Court of public opinion.

 

[UptownSaintsFan]

It has been, but it seems national news outlets want to blow it up to make it a crisis. One thing I've learned is that when they pick up stories in this fashion (things well known for a long time) there is usually a motive behind it unrelated to journalism.

One of the many reasons I typically stay away from MSM. Manipulation on malleable people has replaced Journalism in that profession.

There is no manipulation here. the story blew up again because someone released more emails and these emails implicate the saints even more than the prior ones did. The media did not do this, the saints did.

 

[Sun Wukong]

There is no manipulation here. the story blew up again because someone release more emails and these emails implicate the saints even more than the prior ones did. The media did not do this, the saints did.

Right? What part of this do these people not get? It's not made up or a witch hunt. The Saints organization did something gross, it was reported years ago, now more tangible evidence of it has come to light and is being reported on.

You want to be mad at somebody, be mad at Benson and Bensel for getting involved with this contemplate bullshirt in the first place.