In which I take an unpopular view...
May. 26th, 2005 05:47 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
conulyIn a community I'm in, somebody asked if you'd move if you knew you lived near a registered sex offender. And one of the replies was "No, I'd make them move".
*sighs*
Now, I in no way think highly of those who would harm children. We'll assume, for the purpose of this discussion, that the only people who are on those lists have either molested children or raped people - no Matthew Limons, no "Well, she told me she was 19!", nothing like that.
So, you do whatever it was, and you go to prison, and you get out... and you have to live somewhere, right? Where do you live? Where, that there are no children around, at all?
As far as I know, there are no lists of convicted burglars, or convicted murderers - or even convicted rapists, unless they raped a minor. So, it can't just be about protecting ourselves, it's got to be about punishing others...
And let's say it is all about protecting our kids. That's fair, nobody wants kids getting hurt. I can see keeping people from getting jobs as teachers, pediatricians, and so on.
The vast majority of children who are molested, it's by somebody in the family, or a family friend. The rest of them, it seems, are mostly victims of authority figures - priests, doctors, teachers, that sort of thing. While some kids certainly are taking candy from the nice man down the block, and others certainly are being snatched from the streets by men in ski masks, that doesn't seem to be very common.
And here's something else. If you're any good at your criminal activities, whatever they are, you don't get caught.
So you want to protect your kids? You won't do that by shutting off your neighborhood. In fact, the false sense of security this gives you may be more dangerous, I think, than not doing that. Best way to protect your kids is to educate them. That's the only way to protect them, not by trying to remove oh-so-dangerous elements from your world.
Besides. Harassment is a crime. You want to be a vigilante? Go put on a mask, and douse yourself with dangerous chemicals like everybody else.
*sighs*
Now, I in no way think highly of those who would harm children. We'll assume, for the purpose of this discussion, that the only people who are on those lists have either molested children or raped people - no Matthew Limons, no "Well, she told me she was 19!", nothing like that.
So, you do whatever it was, and you go to prison, and you get out... and you have to live somewhere, right? Where do you live? Where, that there are no children around, at all?
As far as I know, there are no lists of convicted burglars, or convicted murderers - or even convicted rapists, unless they raped a minor. So, it can't just be about protecting ourselves, it's got to be about punishing others...
And let's say it is all about protecting our kids. That's fair, nobody wants kids getting hurt. I can see keeping people from getting jobs as teachers, pediatricians, and so on.
The vast majority of children who are molested, it's by somebody in the family, or a family friend. The rest of them, it seems, are mostly victims of authority figures - priests, doctors, teachers, that sort of thing. While some kids certainly are taking candy from the nice man down the block, and others certainly are being snatched from the streets by men in ski masks, that doesn't seem to be very common.
And here's something else. If you're any good at your criminal activities, whatever they are, you don't get caught.
So you want to protect your kids? You won't do that by shutting off your neighborhood. In fact, the false sense of security this gives you may be more dangerous, I think, than not doing that. Best way to protect your kids is to educate them. That's the only way to protect them, not by trying to remove oh-so-dangerous elements from your world.
Besides. Harassment is a crime. You want to be a vigilante? Go put on a mask, and douse yourself with dangerous chemicals like everybody else.
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no subject
Date: 2005-05-26 09:33 pm (UTC)1) Before his conviction, he was pleading with his family and the parents of the girls he was babysitting to not be put in the position of being alone with them again. They blew him off.
2) After his conviction, prison time, and release, he was receiving therapy. He was given "aversion therapy" and was told to provide his own, ah, photographic material. (I'm of the opinion that shrink needs a 32 caliber stroke.)
3) It was discovered, in the long run, that he actually suffered a hormonal imbalance - testosterone induced psychosis. DepoProvera syrup treated the condition when he could afford to maintain it.
4) He could not find a single urologist in the state he was in who would perform a bilateral orchiectomy - which would have made him completely 100% harmless - without a court order. And he couldn't find a judge who would order it. I think he got that finally done 2 years ago.
What really cheeses me off is that when he was 17 or so and discovered he had a problem, every adult he went to blew him off. Yes, my friend is a really nice guy. He's one of those rare people who is honest to his own self-detriment - being up front about his history has resulted in him getting his ass kicked from time to time. In the years he was around my children (NEVER unsupervised - not even for a few seconds!) there was only one time he got up and left abruptly, and called to apologize for seeming rude later. I watched him struggle to maintain his medication, I watched him plead for a castration. His life was completely fucked, ultimately because his parents didn't take him seriously.
Of course, most pedophiles don't have such simple causality. Most of them are people who refuse to or cannot comprehend that what they are doing is wrong or harmful to children.
However, it seems to me to be ... perhaps just a little inappropriate to handle the perhaps 1% of people with a fixable hormonal problem the same as truly dangerous predators.
Well, it's late, and I'm starting to ramble, so I'll wrap this up. Mostly it's just food for thought, I guess, and I suppose I'm hoping that making people aware that there actually are a few people with a legitimate medical condition might help those few from being tarred with the same brush, and actually get effective treatment.