Why are there so many pedophiles?

[Cainkane1]

You read about it every week. Someone somewhere has improperly touched a child or worse. It would seem to me like the consequences are so severe that doing something this cruel and selfish would be a RARITY. I live in Conyers Ga and we have 60,000 people living here. Not eight weeks go by without someone somewhere molesting a child. Young guys and old guys who should be old enough to know better get caught, tried and convicrted. Was it always like this or are the incidents being reported more often.???

 

[Skeptical Greg]

Was it always like this or are the incidents being reported more often.???

Yes.

 

[fuelair]

You read about it every week. Someone somewhere has improperly touched a child or worse. It would seem to me like the consequences are so severe that doing something this cruel and selfish would be a RARITY. I live in Conyers Ga and we have 60,000 people living here. Not eight weeks go by without someone somewhere molesting a child. Young guys and old guys who should be old enough to know better get caught, tried and convicrted. Was it always like this or are the incidents being reported more often.???

Within the limits of logic it was always like this and they are being reported more but at certain levels it was not always criminal in all places. The only technical change of major note is the sexualization of young females with certain advertising/contests and related.

 

[Sir Robin Goodfellow]

Sixty years ago, it just wasn't talked about. I doubt it was any less common.

 

[Soapy Sam]

If it were not a rarity, you would not read of it every week.

99.99% of people interact with kids normally every day. That's what "normal" means.

The reason you don't read about it is that it won't sell papers.

 

[MG1962]

It is similar with domestic violence and rape. Women have been enpowered through changes to the law and attitudes in society. So although the rates of offense seem to be rising, it is actually that cases are being reported with more confidence

 

[plumjam]

There were more pedophiles in the early and mid 1970s. In those days everyone dressed like a pedophile. Now only pedophiles do. And wrestling fans.

 

[Magyar]

You read about it every week. Someone somewhere has improperly touched a child or worse. It would seem to me like the consequences are so severe that doing something this cruel and selfish would be a RARITY. I live in Conyers Ga and we have 60,000 people living here. Not eight weeks go by without someone somewhere molesting a child. Young guys and old guys who should be old enough to know better get caught, tried and convicrted. Was it always like this or are the incidents being reported more often.???

First - the consequences are LAUGHABLE! DO you know what the average time a fist offender spends in jail ZERO

If you happen to be smart enough to breed your own victim - you molest your own child -
most stated don't even consider it a crime and the states FIRST, and sometimes seems ONLY, priority is to "reunite the family" YES you heard right, The state in its infinite wisdom believes that a a raped child is best served by returning him/her to the bosom of the person who raped him/her.


second Check out Protect.org

Where you will find that there are legislators who are ACTIVELY WORKING to REDUCE the penalties for incest and child molesters. But at the same time some of the same idiots are screeming bloody murder about throwing away the key for pot smokers.

Your religious right at work for you.

 

[Polaris]

First - the consequences are LAUGHABLE! DO you know what the average time a fist offender spends in jail ZERO

If you happen to be smart enough to breed your own victim - you molest your own child -
most stated don't even consider it a crime and the states FIRST, and sometimes seems ONLY, priority is to "reunite the family" YES you heard right, The state in its infinite wisdom believes that a a raped child is best served by returning him/her to the bosom of the person who raped him/her.


second Check out Protect.org

Where you will find that there are legislators who are ACTIVELY WORKING to REDUCE the penalties for incest and child molesters. But at the same time some of the same idiots are screeming bloody murder about throwing away the key for pot smokers.

Your religious right at work for you.

For a crime like that, just the way the victim walks should justify a harsh sentence.

 

[YeahDude]

First - the consequences are LAUGHABLE! DO you know what the average time a fist offender spends in jail ZERO

If you happen to be smart enough to breed your own victim - you molest your own child -
most stated don't even consider it a crime and the states FIRST, and sometimes seems ONLY, priority is to "reunite the family" YES you heard right, The state in its infinite wisdom believes that a a raped child is best served by returning him/her to the bosom of the person who raped him/her.


second Check out Protect.org

Where you will find that there are legislators who are ACTIVELY WORKING to REDUCE the penalties for incest and child molesters. But at the same time some of the same idiots are screeming bloody murder about throwing away the key for pot smokers.

Your religious right at work for you.

Could you please post some links to back up the statements in the highlighted red. It is unwise to make such accusations without backing it up.

In the highlighted yellow, I find this statement hilarious. Most times I hear the religious right blame the LIBERALS for wanting to reduce penalties for child molesters. Yet I have never seen a legislator even propose such a thing. I will check out the site you link to.

Edit:

I brielfy looked over the site. I figure that if there were legislators actively trying to reduce penalties for child molestation then the site would have that persons name in BIG BOLD LETTERS. But alas, I didn't see any. Since you made the claim could you point to me where this could be found?

 

[BTMO]

As the other folks have said - it has always been around. You just hear more about it now.

There are societal reasons for this - it is easier to talk about today, and people are more willing to report abuse to the police, but the other side of this is... smut and sensationalism sells news papers.

It is in the medias interest to report these events in as much detail as they can get away with.

 

[Fnord]

Why are there so many pedophiles?

In my humble opinion, the question requires a slight modification...

Why are there so many pedophiles still alive after their convictions?

I'm just asking.

 

[Jeff Corey]

A fist offender? OK, I'm sorry I asked.
But this part,
"If you happen to be smart enough to breed your own victim - you molest your own child -
most stated don't even consider it a crime and the states FIRST, and sometimes seems ONLY, priority is to "reunite the family" YES you heard right, The state in its infinite wisdom believes that a a raped child is best served by returning him/her to the bosom of the person who raped him/her."
Is not true in NY and I'd be shocked if it were in other states.

 

[jasonpatterson]

With a nod to Magyar for entertaining levels of ridiculous, it's interesting (in a sad way) to note that there are a substantial number of female adults who abuse male or female children as well. The difference in response seems to be the largest reason why this type of abuse is so rarely reported.

When a 25 year old man has sex with a 15 year old girl, most everyone thinks he is slime, regardless of whether the girl consented. (I realize that her consent isn't worth anything legally, but it matters for the girl involved, to be sure.) I agree that it would be a rare sort of couple formed this way in which the man wasn't taking advantage of the girl and I totally support the prosecution of the man.

When a 25 year old woman has sex with a 15 year old boy, most people react by wondering what the woman was thinking and congratulating the boy. In rare cases, it is prosecuted, but not usually. Again, it would be a rare sort of couple where the relationship was sound and I support the prosecution of the woman.

A female is the perpetrator in 1/4 of reported sexual abuse cases, but it is almost always assumed that a pedophile is a man. There is also evidence that boys underreport abuse by females, so that number is likely higher. Here's a link to a 1997 US government statistics compilation showing the data for that year. The table is a bit messed up, but if you shift the first and second numerical columns left 1, it makes sense.

I've got no history in this, nor have I any particular inclinations of sympathy toward the perpetrators of either sex; I've just always wondered why it's so badly underreported... It seems like moms sexually abusing their kids would be so much more outrageous and "news worthy" than dads, but you just don't see it.

 

[bonavada]

The state in its infinite wisdom believes that a a raped child is best served by returning him/her to the bosom of the person who raped him/her."
Is not true in NY and I'd be shocked if it were in other states.

Not true in the UK also I think.
The penalties for paedophillia here have become significantly harsher over the last decade or so. But cases crop up (seemingly) all to often where the victims aren't protected enough. A recent case, local to me (SEE HERE) illustrated the failure of the system here. It's not mentioned in the report I've linked to (it was in a TV report about the case) but one of the victims, a young girl who was raped and physically abused, reported her abuse several times to authorities prior to her abusers arrest. She was effectively ignored. There is still a long way to go when it come to tackling this sort of crime.

I think it should be a "one strike and out" for paedophiles. Do it once and you're locked up for the rest of your natural.

End of story.

BV

 

[slingblade]

With a nod to Magyar for entertaining levels of ridiculous, it's interesting (in a sad way) to note that there are a substantial number of female adults who abuse male or female children as well. The difference in response seems to be the largest reason why this type of abuse is so rarely reported.

When a 25 year old man has sex with a 15 year old girl, most everyone thinks he is slime, regardless of whether the girl consented. (I realize that her consent isn't worth anything legally, but it matters for the girl involved, to be sure.) I agree that it would be a rare sort of couple formed this way in which the man wasn't taking advantage of the girl and I totally support the prosecution of the man.

When a 25 year old woman has sex with a 15 year old boy, most people react by wondering what the woman was thinking and congratulating the boy. In rare cases, it is prosecuted, but not usually. Again, it would be a rare sort of couple where the relationship was sound and I support the prosecution of the woman.

A female is the perpetrator in 1/4 of reported sexual abuse cases, but it is almost always assumed that a pedophile is a man. There is also evidence that boys underreport abuse by females, so that number is likely higher. Here's a link to a 1997 US government statistics compilation showing the data for that year. The table is a bit messed up, but if you shift the first and second numerical columns left 1, it makes sense.

I've got no history in this, nor have I any particular inclinations of sympathy toward the perpetrators of either sex; I've just always wondered why it's so badly underreported... It seems like moms sexually abusing their kids would be so much more outrageous and "news worthy" than dads, but you just don't see it.

Problem is, that's not pedophilia. Pedophilia is adult sexual attraction to pre-pubescent children.

A 15-year-old of either gender having sex with an adult is not pedophilia. The 15-year-old has likely developed an adult body, and is too old in any case to be attractive to a pedophile.

 

[Euromutt]

I think it should be a "one strike and out" for paedophiles. Do it once and you're locked up for the rest of your natural.

End of story.

That's not such a great idea. Various countries' statistics indicate that pedophiles have a very low re-offense rate.

British Home Office figures indicate that of persons convicted of sex crimes involving children and released in 2002, 17% had been reconvicted within 2 years; if that sounds like a lot, the average for all released convicts was 60%, and the offense was not specified (i.e. the second conviction was not necessarily for a sex offense, let alone involving a child).

A USDoJ BJS report on reoffense among sex offenders found:

Of the almost 9,700 sex offenders released in 1994, nearly 4,300 were identified as child molesters. An estimated 3.3 percent of the 4,300 released child molesters were rearrested for another sex crime against a child within 3 years.

And that's in the American system, which is not known for rehabilitating offenders.

The thing is that a lot of child molesters think that they're not doing anything socially unacceptable, and the fact that they're convicted, combined with the subsequent need to be protected from other inmates, serves to effectively disabuse them of that notion. Treatment programs also seem to be highly effective. In 1993, Peterhead prison (in Aberdeenshire, Scotland) was converted to house only sex offenders serving sentences of 4 years or more, and a treatment program was instituted. By 2002, 156 prisoners had been released, of whom six had reoffended.

On the whole, it looks like child molesters can be successfully reformed, and we shouldn't be wasting government resources and wrecking the convicts' lives when they cease to pose a threat. That said, there is a hard core of offenders who are the Ian Huntleys and Richard Allen Davises of this world, and where they are concerned, you do have a point. But the best way to identify those types from the bulk of sex offenders is that the hard cases reoffend, whereas the others generally do not.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

While I don't think it's that common relatively speaking, it does garner attention making it seem common.

Biologically, (whether it is nature or nurture aside) my guess is since we are programed to find babies attractive, something gets confused between that attraction and sexual attraction in the pedophile brain.

 

[Soapy Sam]

Most men (at least in my experience) DO NOT find babies especially cute, unless they think it's their baby. I find them annoying when they cry and of no interest at all otherwise. (I'm apt to go gogoo over puppies though. Could be a wiring fault).
Can't speak for women, but I've watched men and women on trains when someone comes on with a baby. The women- even pre-pubescent girls- tend to smile at the baby. Most men don't.

Dunno how typical this is. Anyone?

 

[BTMO]

Most men (at least in my experience) DO NOT find babies especially cute, unless they think it's their baby. I find them annoying when they cry and of no interest at all otherwise. (I'm apt to go gogoo over puppies though. Could be a wiring fault).
Can't speak for women, but I've watched men and women on trains when someone comes on with a baby. The women- even pre-pubescent girls- tend to smile at the baby. Most men don't.

Dunno how typical this is. Anyone?

I smile and make faces at babies. I always have. I like it when they smile back.

I also play with puppies and kittens.

And for the record, I am a 46 year old heterosexual male ...