Two exposes pertaining to the continuing national battle over abortion have surfaced recently; both have been discussed on dotCommonweal. One is the exposure, through the efforts of LiveAction, of shocking behavior on the part ofindividuals who worked for Planned Parenthood. The other is the exposure of shocking behavior on the part of Fr. Thomas Euteneuer, who not only worked for Human Life International, but served as its president.In a sense, however, both events are structurally similar. In each case, people associated with a high-profile group engage in scandalous activity that is not itself approved by the group, but is carried out in the context of activities that are so approved. (Fr. Euteneuer's exorcism activities were deeply connected to his anti-abortion activism, as his HLI-promoted book Demonic Abortion, illustrates.)What's interesting to me is the way opponents and supporters of each organization made parallel moves in offense and defense with respect to these cases. 1. People who opposed PP (or HLI) said that the behavior of these individuals revealed something deeper about the character of the organization, and the people who were associated with it.2. People who supported PP(or HLI) said that the behavior of these rogue actors is not characteristic of those who belong to the organization as a whole, and that those who were publicizing the unfortunate incident were engaging in "schadenfreude."Looked at together, it raises some questions. 1. Is it schadenfreude to be happy about the exposure of PP but not about the exposure of HLI? Or vice versa? Is schadenfreude okay, then, in some cases but not others? Or is what is involved not schadenfreude?2. Is our adoption of option 1 or 2 above solely dependent upon our view of the organization and its cause? 3. When and how, then, does our view of the character of people involved in a cause start to affect our view of the cause?Are most people "messy virtue theorists"--at some point, does continuing scandalous behavior in an organization start to affect one's views of the organization? And how do we deal with the fact that what one group thinks is a "revelation" of a group's character, the opponents think is an "anomaly," or a a "misstep"? We see the same phenomenon with respect to the sexual abuse crisis in the Church: some people say it reveals what the true character of the Church is, while others say that it simply reveals the unfortunate reality of human sin.These battles, of course, are conducted mainly for the hearts and souls of the "undecided" group. The structure is, "Look how horrible my opponent's people are. . . . see, I' m right about them!" But how does an "undecided" person grapple with the contending positions, anyway?