things we should have learned in elementary school

So let me just get this straight.
In a conference speech, the Pope chooses to quote a Byzantine emperor, specifically a quote saying Islam brought nothing into the world that was not "evil and inhuman" and implies strongly that it was only spread by, and is inherently characterized by, violence.
Then some people get upset. Those crazy Muslims, always being upset over hurt feelings for nothing!
So the Pope is pushed to apologize. What does he say? He's sorry people reacted so badly to what he said; he's sad that his remarks were misinterpreted; while he chose to quote that passage in a major speech in front of an audience, including the "evil and inhuman" part, it was just a quotation, it doesn't necessarily reflect his personal views; and he meant no offense, so he hopes Muslims worldwide can just be calm and reasonable and not crazy at him, since he has respect for their "ador[ing] the only God."

I hate that sort of "apology," profoundly. "I'm sorry you took offense at my actions" or "I'm sorry you reacted badly" or "I'm sorry you feel hurt by what I did" is not, repeat not, the same as "I'm sorry for what I did" or "I apologize for what I said." "I'm sorry you were offended," passive voice, no subject, is different from "I'm sorry I offended you." It admits no wrongness and no fault; it takes no responsibility; and, more importantly, it's disqualified from being an actual apology because there is no implied promise to change anything. It's fundamentally not an apology. It's going through the motions of an apology so you can say, "Look, I don't know why this guy is so unreasonable. I said 'sorry.' Technically. I'm sorry, world, that you have to deal with this person's craziness."

The Pope is an educated man who is very aware of his huge influence. He knew exactly what he was saying, he chose the extremely offensive mediaeval quotation out of many thousands of others, and he did so with full knowledge of the repercussions, knowing full well how far those words would go, who would hear them, the ways in which he officially speaks, in large sections of the public mind, for Christendom. He knew what the implications were. Still, Benedict didn't apologize for anything other than the bad reactions of other people to his perfectly innocent use of the terms "evil and inhuman" in a widely-disseminated public speech, with a sort of wide-eyed, "Golly, guys, I don't know why my quoting some guy in a little ol' chat would bug anyone, but if anyone were bothered by neutral words on the nature of reason and religious violence, well, I'm sorry to hear about that, and I hope those people won't get all nasty about it, which I would never imply is their basic nature. I was just quoting someone who said it was. Never expected anyone to hear about it." And yet, funny enough, the news coverage is all about how oversensitive those Muslims are, again, for being bothered by this. He claims he was just trying to start a reasonable conversation about violence. If that's so, why did he start the conversation without Muslims present, and start it by claiming no violence on his own tradition's part, provoking them with grave insults, and claiming it's their special sin?
It's like walking up to a guy and saying to the person next to him, "Hello. I hear that Joe kills kittens and his mother is a whore. Why do you think that is?" And if Joe gets angry, the excuse is, "Well, look, I just wanted to start a conversation, based on mutual respect. And I said I heard your mother is a whore. I was citing someone else. I said hello. Why are you--hey, look, bystanders, I'm sorry Joe's upset by what I said. I just wanted to talk to him about kitten-killing."

(I shouldn't have to say that I don't condone any of the more violent protests that have occurred this week. That goes without saying, as it ought to go without saying in regard to the other more-than-a-billion Muslims who aren't doing anything of the sort.)

What the Hell is the man trying to accomplish, here, anyway?


Edit: http://www.feministe.us/blog/archives/2006/09/18/unapologies/ I'll clean up the link in a bit, but it looks like I'm not alone in thinking this isn't actually an apology at all. too bad the comments thread is turning into an argument over whether or not the "evil and inhuman" thing is actually true.