I must point out the latest headline case for those of you who haven’t heard: Mark Hulett in Vermont sexually assaulted a girl for four years. Judge Edward Cashman sentenced him to 60 days after he pled guilty. He said that he no longer believes that punishment works. Apparently this judge has been off kilter for a while, several years ago he told a rape victim that she had just seen one of the harsh realities of life and should get over it.

This is what I’m talking about when I talk about people killing a baby to save a puppy. It’s a reversal of morality: The poor pedophile can’t do anything to help himself. He’s driven by obsessions that he can’t fulfill. He conflicts with himself until finally, driven by complete mental breakdown he becomes a molester. I’m trying to avoid harsh language here because I don’t want to upset people, but there aren’t enough bad words to describe someone who lets their problems become a child’s problems. I should qualify that statement; there is a difference between the normal mistakes adults make with kids, like not teaching them good coping skills, and straight out abusing them. I need to explain my earlier statement about the baby and the puppy: when you sympathize with the molester you can’t reconcile that with sympathizing for the child. You no longer want “justice” for the child, your thoughts start drifting along the lines of, “Well, I can’t change what’s already happened. The best thing to do is help this person not do this anymore.” Problem there is I’m pretty sure there is no way to treat a pedophile, save chemical castration. I’d appreciate a shrink’s perspective/knowledge on the issue here. So when you start trying to reconcile the two, the harsh fact is that the best way to deal with the issue is probably just to lock up the pedophile forever to protect further children. The prisoner sympathetic mentality doesn’t allow for that, hence the myth of a “cured” pedophile with the help of state mandated counseling and some jail time. Bullshit. If you wanted something better than prison, just put all pedophiles on an island somewhere or in a work camp. I know it sounds crazy but at least it allows them to live a semi-normal life. On the one hand it sucks that their brain is wired that way. On the other hand, you can’t let them hurt kids. What choice do you make? The mistake lots of people are making is to let pedophiles be in a position to hurt kids out of respect for the humanity of the pedophile. You can’t do that. On some level, you have to deny the humanity of the pedophile to save kids. But we don’t benefit from those kinds of choices. Our political leaders and judges, especially this one, are usually too weak to make those decisions.

You people are obviously too STUPID to comment on things which you clearly know NOTHING about.

I do feel sorry for anyone who has those urges, but as soon as they act upon the urges, they need to be (a) incarcerated and (b) treated. Here come the problems.

1: While in prison, many learn tricks to better commit crimes (”You used the babysitting ploy? That’s so 1980s. Try this one….” “Hey, thanks. I like to pick up boys at….”)

2: Treatment options for pedophiles are limited and not terribly ineffective — first you have to get it through to them that their desires are wrong, which may take years if it happens at all. Once you convince them of that, they have to be taught to focus desire on adults. It’s a long process and you can bet the state isn’t paying for enough counselors to make it happen.

In many prisons, counseling for sex offenders is optional… we just lock them up, untreated, and release them eventually, still untreated. Yep — it must suck to have internal struggle. As long as the disease remains, pedophiles and other sex offenders need treatment. They also need to be punished for their crimes.