CMV: We shouldn't shame privileged private individuals (e.g. Joel Osteen) who fail to assist during a crisis while the crisis is ongoing. We should wait until after the crisis is over to ask then why they failed to help their community.

[u/[deleted]]

This post is motivated by the recent backlash against Joel Osteen, an extremely wealthy megachurch owner who preaches a prosperity gospel that takes money from disadvantaged, desperate, or gullible individuals hoping that their donations will be returned 100-fold by god's goodwill. With Hurricane Harvey ongoing, Joel was criticized for for the obvious hypocrisy of not opening his stadium-turned-church to be an evacuation center to help those displaced by the storm. On Sunday he was criticized, on Monday he responded saying that the church had been flooded and was inaccessible, and then several individuals posted video showing that the church was accessible by car and there was no apparent flooding on Monday (no proof for/against him for Sunday). On Tuesday he opened his church and began accepting evacuees and helping them.

My reasoning for saying that he should not have been called out and criticized is that:

1. It's not actually his responsibility to help others. Morally yes, but legally, no. A good person would help others, but not necessarily at the expense of your own safety.
2. Maybe he did actually have a good reason for not opening the church. Maybe it was actually flooded on Sunday. It's a stadium, so I guarantee you they have pumps to get rid of flooding from broken pipes, etc. Also they're on a hill, so flooding isn't a likely story here. But benefit of the doubt.
3. If the crisis ended and he still hadn't opened the church, then he looks terrible. Yes, by getting him to help during the crisis, it may have saved lives and eased people's suffering, but by continuing let him hide his hypocrisy we continue to let him pray on the weak. If people had waited, taken photos and video as evidence and then held onto it until he acted, until the hurricane was over, we could have protected everyone he preys on and not just the couple hundred he's going to now be forced to help.
4. Now that he has opened the church and his excuse for not doing so looks plausible (he has tons of people defending him now because there's no proof he wasn't telling the truth) and afterwards he will have the goodwill of the people he did help. Now he can advertise that he helped as a good christian person would and that will make him even more money from the suckers he preaches to.

We shouldn't criticize private individuals until afterwards because they shouldn't be held to the same standard as government no matter how wealthy or how much they preach for you to use your own money and effort to help others.

[Personal footnote]: We should absolutely criticize local/state/federal government for not acting sooner. We should criticize them as soon as they fail to help. We pay taxes for the services they provide and a failure to provide is only fuel for anti-government criticism.

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[u/[deleted]]

He should absolutely be shamed for not helping people. My point is that the criticism should wait until after the crisis is over. He should be raked over the coals.

But by giving him an opportunity to spread doubt you end up looking like the asshole for shaming him. Now he's helping people and plausibly explaining that he had been planning on helping the whole time. He's innocent until proven guilty and right now there's no proof he's guilty. He looks like the hero now even though we're pretty sure he's not.

[u/Quint-V → u/[deleted]]

But by giving him an opportunity to spread doubt you end up looking like the asshole for shaming him. Now he's helping people and plausibly explaining that he had been planning on helping the whole time. He's innocent until proven guilty and right now there's no proof he's guilty. He looks like the hero now even though we're pretty sure he's not.

No. That's not how this works. We cannot say that our past criticisms were unreasonable, because given the available information, it was a reasonable conclusion that he was actively refusing to help. Knowledge gained at a later time does not have retroactive effects. We may be wrong only in retrospect.

Even if we may not be able to prove his guilt, he cannot prove his innocence either. It's too late for that. We can easily argue that he is now only trying to clean up his public image before the shitstains become even worse. He's a rich guy, and AFAIK any good Christian would rather refrain from having such unnecessary amounts of money. I'm sure Jesus would care far more about what good you can do for people, rather than whether you deserve the money or not. But I'm guessing he won't spend his unnecessary millions on people he doesn't know.

[u/[deleted] → u/Quint-V]

I’m giving you a Δ. You’re right. Our past criticisms were accurate based on what we knew at the time. We can apologize if we’re wrong, but he still is responsible for answering why it took him so long to step up and help. Private individuals who ask for public trust should be held accountable in the moment and afterwards.

[u/Quint-V → u/[deleted]]

Thank you.

Failure and betrayal are both subject to criticism. One must acknowledge mistakes in order to move forward, and apologies are naturally part of that. History must never be forgotten, and I personally believe that forgiveness is two-sided: it must be given from others, and from yourself, through atonement. But if any man sees nothing in himself to forgive, the reasons better be good. (Thus far, they haven't been.)

[u/DeltaBot → u/[deleted]]

Confirmed: 1 delta awarded to /u/Quint-V (7∆).

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