Here's the link to the article so you can read it first.
<a href="http://www.foxnews.com/wires/2006Oct12/0,4670,SexOffenders,00.html">SCHR Challenges Georgia's Sex Offender Law</a>
Couple of questions to consider:
When has a person served their time?
How much is too much monitoring?
Should we be allowed to tell people where to live or kick them from their homes?
Is the problem (of sex offenders) really that big or has the media over portrayed the issue because of its use of fear tactics?
Does the media even employ fear tactics?
My answers; hopefully this will spark some debate we could all possibly learn from.
A person has served their time once they have left jail; the additional punitive measures such as ankle bracelets, restrictions on jobs and housing, and registration on a list only perverts our sense of justice. How can we expect people to re-assimilate and play a positive role in society when they are restricted from living? Because criminals are blocked from doing anything useful we are only setting them up to fail and thus probably repeat their previous crimes.
We shouldn't be allowed to tell people where to live. This goes back to eminent domain. Forcefully removing someone from property they have purchased with their own money is wrong.
The media always portrays children as the victims. However it's often the opposite; a student comes onto a teacher and the teacher is the one punished for example. Another example is the case of Mark Foley. If anyone has read the IM's he sent it is quite obvious that these were consentual messages. Both parties took part in the "sex" talk. It seems that, more often than not, the younger party goes out looking for something that the older party then provides. However wrong this seems it is not emotionally damaging for either party and yet our society tells us it is.
So yes, the media does employ fear tactics by telling us there are millions of people out there just waiting to pounce on our kids when in fact it is often the opposite. There are millions of kids out there looking for people to play around with. Basic logic: Victims would close down their IM windows or block people; this doesn't happen so common sense dictates that maybe we should re-evaluate our former opinions.
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Comments: 7
If anyone thinks that the responsibility of unacceptable sexual behavior should be shared with the child - then I feel they are still the child and possibly one that was abused.
After these offenders have been convicted and they have done there time in jail for which they were convicted, they know in advance what is to follow...they should have thought of that before they became involved in sexual misconduct with underage person.
To expect consideration for spoiling the life of someone, that they should be given a free pass back into a healthy society is unacceptable....
I feel very strongly that they knew in advance, they had a problem, sickness - what ever you want to call it and there is plenty of medical assistance out there now to redirect that kind of behavior and thinking process.
Again, my argument of disagreement with you is they should have addressed their problem BEFORE they did the damage.
I agree with most of the provisions in these laws. However i also know that due process is often not given to the offenders. Because of the distasteful nature of these crimes. One case i know of. A 19 year old man moved to town and met a girl. Her mother met the young man and she dropped her daughter off at his house a number of times. She also said her daughter was 17. After dating for several months someone filed a complaint that the girl was only 13. The young man was arrested and plead out to statutory rape. He is on the preditor list. In this case there was no preditory behavior it was consentual and encouraged by the mother. This was abuse of the laws.
There are far more dangerous preditors than most people want to hear about these people should never get out of prison.
i hadn't heard a defense of foley.
house pages are supposed to serve in their junior or senior year. that's junior or senior year of high school. foley should have known that most of his pigeons were underage.
what foley did might not have been illegal. it was immoral.
i am aware that some people get convicted of a crime and must register and they might have been fooled by someone's age or might not have committed something morally reprehensible.
if a pedophile lives next to an elementary school, commits a crime with a child, goes to prison and gets out, should the court mandate that he move? i think they could. it's easier for him to move than to establish a school elsewhere.
I can't believe I read this. There is NEVER a situation where it is ok for an adult to have any level of sexual contact with a minor. A teacher especially because he/she is in a position of trust with vulnerable children. It is never the child's fault. However, if the child did make advances, then he/she has most likely been molested previously. I've never heard anything so chilling as a pedophile on TV from prison saying "take me to a playground and I can point out to you the molested kids."
Every state law should be tiered so that the lesser offenses labeled sexual do not have to register. Statuatory rape with teens both consenting and 3-5 years difference in their ages is different from a 20-80 year old man molesting a child 25 or younger.
The latter I am in favor of locking up until their victim is declared totally healed and normal by a court appointed psychiatrist. That's only fair. Most would be serving a life sentence just as their victim is.