"Scapegoats and Shunning - Sexual Fascism in Progressive America"

[OneBlueSky]

By "PARIAH"
CounterPunch
March 4-5, 2006

This is an important article worth both your time and your thoughtful consideration. Please read it in it's entirety before commenting.

"The writer remains anonymous because he writes and is politically active in several completely unrelated social justice movements. He fears that the shunning and marginalization he describes for those who write about this topic could compromise (unfairly) his other work."

http://www.counterpunch.org/pariah03042006.html

(snip)

There is a class of people in America today, numbering two million or more, who have been utterly scapegoated, ostracized, demonized and shunned. There is no longer any defense available for these people. Almost no-one on the left or the right, civil libertarians or ordinary citizens, will defend their rights. They are regularly vilified with the most vicious and hate-filled language--language previously reserved for classes now protected: Jews, Blacks, homosexuals. They are fair game as targets of abuse and vandalism. They are subject to utter public scorn. About 600,000 of them have been rounded up and forced to register--many soon to be monitored for life with electronic bracelets and global positioning devices. Nearly 4000 have been locked up for life, not on criminal charges, but by civil commitment, and those numbers are growing by the day. The remainder are mostly in hiding, desperately afraid of sudden exposure and witch hunts by neighbors, fellow-workers and friends, whom they fear will suddenly see them as monsters beyond redemption. They are a class defined not by specific crimes (though they are accused of many offenses) but by their very being, their desires, their constitution, as allegedly broken human beings. Presidents and Governors call them "despicable," "disgusting," "incapable of rehabilitation or reform," "beyond help." They are loudly reviled as examples to be shunned by fundamentalist and bigoted preachers, but also by left-wing media, progressive community leaders and feminists.

Who are these scum? Arab terrorists? Muslim fanatics? No--those evil-doers appear almost benign when compared to this heinous mob. These are the most awful people in the world: SEX OFFENDERS! Worse, many are PEDOPHILES! In fact, these two terms become mingled. Jeb Bush recently alluded to all the sex offenders in Florida as child molesters, though fewer than 1/3 of those incarcerated in that state for "sex crimes" involved people under 18. Bush went on, "These are a group of people who are the sickest of the sick. They are truly perverts and it's not curable. Instead of civil detention, we ought to make sure...these pedophiles...are locked up forever."

(snip)

The worst deprivation of rights comes in the form of life-time civil commitment of sex offenders after incarceration. Seventeen states have some version of this measure, and 21 more states are considering it. As of December, 2004, according to researchers at the Washington think-tank that has followed this since Washington passed the first such law in 1990, 3,493 persons were in locked mental facilities or special prisons under civil commitment. As of that date, only 427 of persons ever locked up under these laws had been released. Usually called "Sexually Violent Predator Laws," these almost always include non-violent offenses against persons under the age of consent in that state. In some states, persons accused of various crimes including child pornography, prostitution and even indecent exposure are included as "sexually violent predators." As Mark McHarry wrote in his thorough summary in Z Magazine, November, 2001, civil commitment procedures deprive citizens of virtually all their Constitutional rights: the right to remain silent, to have a lawyer at interrogations, bail, provisions against double jeopardy and ex post facto laws--and many more. The New York Bar Association, challenging Governor Pataki's administrative order in 2005 to move all sex offenders to locked mental facilities upon release, commented, "It cannot be overstated how readily sex civil commitment may be abused."

(snip)

One day--perhaps fifty or a hundred years from now--it will appear ludicrous that our society was so consumed with anger at this class of scapegoats that it obliterated its fine traditions of liberty and justice in favor of retribution and vengeance. It will seem odd, that American society was obsessed with concern about sexual acts with teenagers even as it pursued a pointless war that killed thousands of teenagers and others on both sides of that war. People will hopefully someday recoil when told that a person convicted in Federal court of making a photograph of a 17 year old masturbating would receive a mandatory sentence of life in prison, yet a person convicted of the (non sexual) murder of that teen would face far less. It will seem incredible that the focus was on sexual deviance rather than on the astronomical rate of murder and other real violence, or the growing gap between rich and poor, and the indelible mark of real poverty on so many children. Until such a day of greater sanity, this scapegoating and shunning of all sex offenders and "pedophiles" will inevitably lead to less freedom and more insecurity for all who might engender the wrath of puritan preachers or stoke the greed of media outlets and pandering politicians. For now, it seems unlikely that even those who traditionally guard our civil liberties or those who traditionally challenge state repression from the left, will dare speak out, lest they, too, be marginalized and shunned.

- more . . .

http://www.counterpunch.org/pariah03042006.html

[RDU Socialist]

1. those poor poor child molestors

:nopity:

[JackDragna]

3. This article is spot-on.

I have little sympathy for true child molestors, but the end result of the massive paranoia over these people is to put the scarlet letter on people who sure as hell don't deserve to be villified for the rest of their lives (ie, 20 year olds who have sex with 17 year olds, etc).

[Erika]

2. A good attorney friend of mine was a public defender

He had a defendant who was a carnival worker, charged with statutory rape of a 17 year old girl. She didn't complain but her folks did after finding her underwear. He went to jail and must register as a sex offender.

I also think these sex charges about teachers with teenagers are totally stupid. Biologically, teenagers are adults with the normal sexual urges of an adult. Their hormones lead them towards sex.

One hundred years ago, there was nothing wrong with marriage between a young teen and an adult. All of sudden it's a sin? Yes, historians will look back at us as a reincarnation of the 1700's puritan movement. Totally unenlightened.

[madrchsod]

6. dam that happened here--the judge let the guys go

the judge thought she looked 18 or 19 years old. and yes it was the girls parents that complained..of course that was over ten years ago...

[madrchsod]

8. teachers and teenagers

that are in the same school is wrong. it falls under the "they should know better" rule. but- my friend was propositioned in his class room for a better grade..he thought it was funny because he was gay and she didn`t know it.

[madrchsod]

4. as usual in this society

all sexual offenders get lumped together. there are important differences that i won`t go into. i will say that anyone convicted of child molesting should never ever be released into the general population unless they are monitored everyday for the rest of their lives and even then they would move heaven and earth to molest the nearest child that crossed their path.. there is nothing anyone can do to alter their obsession in ruining children's lives to satisfy their obsession. i`ve known people who everyone thought were fine up standing people and later found to be molesters all their lives.. the last one in our town was released on bail and molested a child the following day..another was released from prison and sent back several weeks later-he was 85 years old. i have no sympathy for these people and they can rot in hell for all i care

[Erika]

7. It's the definition of a child that is in question

When a girl starts menstruating, or a boy can get a sexual hard-on, they are no longer biologically children. Their hormones play a huge role. Procreation is at the heart of the hormones for survival of humanity.

Again, 100 years ago, it was common for teens to marry. Now it's a sinful taboo? And a party who is 18 or older is now considered a sexual predator? I don't think so.

[Extend a Hand]

5. Sexual abuse is a pervasive problem in our society

http://www.womenofsubstance.org/sexabuse.htm

* 38% of girls are sexually abused before the age of 18.
* 16% of boys are sexually abused before the age of 18.
* In 1994 345,000 sexual abuse incidents were reported to Child Protective Services in the U.S.
* 90 – 95% of all sexual abuse cases go unreported to the police.
* In most cases, the child knew the sex offender. With girls, 29% were relatives and 60% were

Acquaintances.

* With boys 16% were relatives and 44% were acquaintances.
* Fabricated sexual abuse reports constitute 1 to 4 % of cases reported.
* Physical force was not used in 2/3 of incestuous abuse.
* Children who grow in a family where there is D.V. are 8 times more likely to be sexually molested within that family.
* 68% of incest survivors were adult victims of rape or attempted rape by a non-relative at some point in their lives.
* Women who reported childhood rape were three times more likely to become pregnant before age 18.
* 70 to 80 % of sexual abuse survivors report excessive use of drugs and alcohol.
* 70% of child sex offenders had between 1 & 9 victims, 23% had 10 to 40 victims.
* Approximately 1/3 of all juvenile victims of sexual abuse are children younger than 6 yrs. of age.
* In 1995 126,000 children who were victims of either substantiated or indicated sexual abuse; of these, 75% were girls. Nearly 30% of child victims were between the ages of 4 & 7

[mrcheerful]

9. As you can see by their posts no one bothered to actually read the link

just like their good friends the fundies, they ignored facts and posted their beliefs. They talk about how they cant understand or relate to fundie christens, yet here is one topic that they are showing they buy into the propaganda just as fast a Right Wingers. Why is it that they refuse to research things instead of taking government statistics as fact? Theres one county I know of that brags it has a 100% conviction rate on CSC cases, why or how can that be? That means every case that comes before a judge, the person is convicted, even murder doesn't have that kind of conviction rate.

[OneBlueSky]

10. a few seem to have read it . . . most, however, seem to have ignored . . .

my plea for "thoughtful consideration" in favor of knee-jerk reactions . . . which is precisely the point the author was trying to make (and why he didn't put his/her name on the article) . . .

[rpannier]

11. It's a very thought provoking article.

The authors makes many valid points.