Amen.
I am not going to allow a pedophile to use this message board to justify what he/she does. I am not going to allow this message board to be used by pedophiles as a “showcase”. If he were in treatment, and wanted to discuss what might or might not have gone wrong, I could tolerate it. But this person wanted to start the thread with the assumption that all he had was a diferent sexual orientation, and that he wasn’t a rapist if children “consented”.
IF you want to start a thread on the pros and cons of murder, go right ahead. If, on the other hand, you start a thread stating that you are an uncaught murderer and that you saw nothing wrong with it, you can go get your jollies somewhere else.
Not having seen the thread in question it’s hard for me to judge the appropriateness of the moderators’ actions, but I’m inclinded to give them the benefit of the doubt. And even if I wasn’t, it is, after all, their board. Having said that, one line from this thread caught my attention, so in the interests of Fighting Ignorance (the purpose, as we all know, of this site)…
Cite, please?
What’s to say? What’s to know?
The point being that it was NOT an abstract discussion, far from it; your buddy was getting his jollies by publicly airing his evil for all the world to see.
You okay with that? You want to read pleas for understanding from someone that would rape a child? What’s to understand, to condone?
I’m not okay with it and never will be and I’m horrified that you would encourage such sickness.
You wanna know more, I suggest you drop him an email; I’m sure he’d be all too happy to oblige you.
BTW, we also have no desire to see threads such as “Ask the Arsonist” or “Ask the Serial Killer.” For the same reasons.
your humble TubaDiva
Administrator
I would also point out, in the mildest way, that saying “But they let us talk about drugs! They let us talk about deviant sex!” in attacking this decision is IMO a great way to convince them not to let us talk about those things.
Does anybody really want hard-ass mods who never ever ever let us discuss anything remotely or possibly illegal or immoral? I don’t. But if you point out that they do, occasionally, allow such discussions, in order to bolster the argument that they therefore must allow all such discussions, then you are making it an “all or nothing” proposition – in which can you can’t then be surprised that their choice, in the interest of prudence and legality, is “nothing.”
As has been said before, it would be “fighting ignorance” to allow people to post the best way to create a fertilizer bomb; how to lure a five-year-old into a car; or great tips on committing a date rape and getting away with it, because lots of people are ignorant about those subjects, too. It would be “fighting ignorance,” but it wouldn’t be very smart. Mods have to exercise their own good judgment in closing threads. IMO, the fact that people would complain about the closing of a thread started as an apologia by an actual bona fide pedophile strikes me as evidence that some people would complain about any closing whatsoever, no matter how richly deserved, nor how obviously foolish it would be to allow the thread to continue.
I worked as a psych tech in psych hospitals that treated both molestors and thier victims(on differant units, of course). The shrinks and counselers I talked to all said that it was pretty much useless(treating the molestors), because there was no known way of rehabilitating them. If they had done it once, they would do it again. This has been about 9 years or so, and maybe someone has come up with something, but I’m not holding my breath.
Unless the thread went somewhere brand new after the last time I saw it, it was precisely this sort of misunderstanding that he was trying to address. He claimed, and we have ZERO reason to not believe him, that he has * never * acted out his desires. So for to call him a child molester is completely inaccurate, and totally unfair. He repeatedly stated that he has never, would never act out, he also repeatedly stated that he undestands that in this society it would be harmful. So he was copping to his feelings, and for this he gets shut down?
I agree with the OP, (again, assuming that something completely different didn’t happen after my last look at the thread). I think it was a good opportunity for people to understand something better, instead of just having a kneejerk dismissal of it.
I’m disappointed in the Dope, and I think it has contributed to ignorance in this instance.
stoid
bdgr, it very well may be that there is no known effective way of rehabilitating pedophiles. And it may be that once a person begins to sexual desire pre-pubescent children they’ll never stop desiring them. I don’t know if either of those things are true, but your anecdotal evidence is appreciated. But surely the recidivism rate of child molesters who are released from places like the hospital you worked at is not one hundred percent? And if it isn’t, then it would be inaccurate to say that child molesters never change, even if the only change that some experience is a change in their actions and not a change in their desires.
At the time I was told it was, in fact, 100%.
He was looking for JUSTIFICATION for his feelings . . . which he believed were appropriate, just misunderstood by society. This is not “understanding,” it’s pandering to what is truly deviant.
Surely you can see the difference between consensual activity between adults and preying on young girls.
This is contemptible, and to try to fly under the banner of “eradicating ignorance” about something so beyond the pale is despicable.
your humble TubaDiva
Administrator
I’ve only been working with victims, and I’m not in clinical work any longer, but during my education the issue of treatment of child molestors was often debated, and one of my best friends is doing her Ph D in forensic psychiatry, specialising in child molestors. Even so, I’ve only heard about two even partly successful rehab programs, one is the US and one in Denmark. The US program was a research project that included an intense combination of aversion therapy, group therapy and individual therapy for a long time. The follow up 1 or 2 years later showed very few recurrencies. (I don’t know if any later follow ups were made.) The project did not continue because it was waaay to expensive.
The Danish project might still be in use, I’m not sure, but they had partial success with a combination of chemical castration and behavioural therapy. I don’t have any Medline or Psychlit references handy, but I could check if anyone is interested.
However, I did not see the thread that was removed, but from what I read here, it sounds like the absolutely right thing to do. There is no way you can “enlighten” a pedophil out of his/her disorder.
Thanks for the info Wiwaxia, I would be interested to know how things worked out long term(past 2 years).
Tuba:
I didn’t really get this sense at all. I saw the thread as Stoid did. Do you have quotes that back up your interpretation?
Your tax dollars at work: a few facts courtesy of the U. S. Justice Department Bureau of Justice Statistics:
(excerpts)
Presents findings from the National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) regarding sexual assault, especially of young children. The data are based on reports from law enforcement agencies of 12 States and covers the years 1991 through 1996.
Highlights include the following:
Sixty-seven percent of all victims of sexual assault reported to law enforcement agencies were juveniles (under the age of 18); 34% of all victims were under age 12.
One of every seven victims of sexual assault reported to law enforcement agencies were under age 6.
Forty percent of the offenders who victimized children under age 6 were juveniles (under the age of 18) [NOTE: That means 60 PERCENT of offenders were adults.]
Sex offenders
The median age of the victims of imprisoned sexual assaulters was less than 13 years old; the median age of rape victims was about 22 years.
An estimated 24% of those serving time for rape and 19% of those serving time for sexual assault had been on probation or parole at the time of the offense for which they were in State prison in 1991.
Child victimizers
Offenders who had victimized a child were on average 5 years older than the violent offenders who had committed their crimes against adults. Nearly 25% of child victimizers were age 40 or older, but about 10% of the inmates with adult victims fell in that age range.
Recidivism of Prisoners Released in 1983
An analysis of the criminal records of more than 16,000 men and women, representing the almost 109,000 offenders who were released from prisons in 11 States during 1983. The study links correctional data with Federal and State criminal history records to provide a complete portrait of criminal careers for more than a half of the State prisoners released during 1983. About 47% of the former prisoners were convicted of a new crime and 41 percent were sent back to prison or jail. 4/89 NCJ 116261
“Released rapists were 10.5 times more likely than nonrapists to be rearrested for rape. . .”
Sorry the stats are so old, but that’s what I found on the 'net.
I’m convinced. But you go read and see for yourself.
your humble TubaDiva
Administrator
Of course I can, TubaDiva.
Can you see the difference between thoughts and deeds?
- One more time, * ** he does not prey on young girls and has no plans to. ** You can shut down anyone you want anytime you want, but I object to you doing so by accusing anyone of something they have not done and mischaracterizing what is going on. And so far as he says and we know, he hasn’t and wouldn’t touched a hair on a child’s head. And you keep talking about him as though he has hurt someone. He ** has not hurt anyone and has no intention of doing so. **
stoid
I have my doubts here, the thread is gone so we didn’t debate it, but IMO his wording suggested he had carefully redefined several terms to suit his purposes. From his post, I understood that he doesn’t agree with non-consensual sex, but doesn’t believe there is an age of consent. He calls child rapists bastards, but hints that ‘rape’ is only defined as the act of using physical violence. He started one of his posts ‘Since I have admitted to myself…’ but doesn’t relate what he did prior to this time. Once again, just my opinion since it is no longer there.
I’m now wondering if the best course of action wouldn’t have been pressing him for info, then turning his IP over to the authorities with a transcript. I didn’t think of it immediately, so I can’t fault the moderators for not thinking of it either.
People who would take at face value the word of a person with admitted pedophilic tendencies that he has not acted on his proclivities and does not intend to do so, strike me as almost touchingly naive – especially when we realize we’re talking about an individual none of us knows, whose credibility we cannot possibly assess.
Again, I’m at a loss to see how anyone could not realize that discretion is the better part of valor when dealing with such a sensitive topic and frankly, TUBA, this strikes me as such a no-brainer that I don’t know why you’re bothering to even defend it.
I find it a really tough subject to confront at the best of times, to have to decide whether it should be discussed on a message board is not something I’d wish on anyone. FWIW, I have no doubt Czarcasm made the best decision he could.
Jodi - FWIW, I feel hampered in grasping any kind of comprehension about the inaccessible paedophilic (to me) mind-set because of the emotionally charged, perhaps hysterical, tone of information I receive through conventional media. Therefore, I would have welcomed the opportunity to hear what this self-proclaimed ‘non-practitioner’ had to say. But I also understand others are deeply offended at the notion that people like this be given ‘air time’.
I am also aware that some people can be tenaciously devious in how they lure in innocents – was he putting out to gain something ? – seems unlikely but…
My view: I don’t want to fight selective, censored ignorance and I want to try to comprehend better how these people think.
Information about bomb making it ain’t, insight ‘from the horses mouth’ into a deeply disturbing human condition it might have been.
Exactly so.
The more I think on it, the more I concur with locking the damn thing; given how hot tempers (justifiably; f’r’instance, moggy, I think the chances of you being flamed for your stance are about zero; I hope you’ve come to as much peace as you can over what was done to you, and I can’t imagine how difficult doing so must be) run over the subject, the only thing keeping it from a total Pit meltdown would have been incessant mod-interventions and warnings. If I had a Moderator hat (and I swear, if you ever come NEAR me with the intention of putting one on my head, I’ll kill you), I would have done the same.
But deleting it was a bad move. It leaves no non-mod-accessible record of the source of a conflict over which emotions run high–here we have Tuba calling the reasons of people who disagree with it “despicable.” (I’d use “overly idealistic” myself. Having seen the thread in its locked entirety, I do think “fighting ignorance” is a bit of hyperbole; there was nothing new or surprising in it, merely tedious rationalizations that have all appeared before in abstract-level debates on it.) Basis for it being despicable? For anyone who didn’t see the thread in its locked entirety, hearsay and hearsay only; a matter of one word versus another. Was he lying when he repeatedly said he never acted on his pathology? Was he about to be caught in that lie? Moot questions now.
And of course it’s their board. That doesn’t absolve them from criticisms of some few of the choices made in the running of the whole creaking host. When all’s said and done, this isn’t that big of a deal. Sure, first they came for the pedophiles and I did nothing because I was not one. Then they came for the left-handed hunchback double-amputees with TWIN DORRANCE #5X STAINLESS STEEL HOOK PROSTHESES, and I did nothing, and so on. But I figure, I can pretty much do nothing as they go for the pedophiles, and do something afterwards. Really, I figure I can just start to limber up as they’re going after the hook prostheses folks, so I’ll be good and spry and ready for a fight once they go after the gypsies.
Stoid, it might be differant if he said he realizes that it would be wrong to act on his feelings, but he said that he didnt feel it was wrong, and only harmfull because of the bagage society places on it. He refuses to get proffesional help for it because hes afraid he will feel guilty. What he is trying to do is build up justification in his mind so that he can equate pediphelia with homosexualality. Once he reaches this point, say, by getting less than confrontational responses from a message board, he will eventually convince himself that it is ok, as long as the child doesnt object. What he tried on this message board, if he wasnt a troll, was just the first step, and our morbid curiosity is not nearly as important as showing that tolerance does not extend to people who have sex with children. By indulging him in this little play, we are contributing to the problem.