What's even more disgusting is that it's sex offenders in general who get hounded for the rest of their lives.
Yes, the system requires a good deal more adjusting before it's ready to be used so harshly. I know a guy who was convicted of statutory rape in a Red State: He was 18 and she was 17 but her daddy didn't like him so he had him busted. The guy will be a registered sex offender in that state forever. Since he couldn't get work he moved back to California to live with his mother. When he dutifully went to register, the lady behind the counter looked at his records, burst out laughing and said, "Son, you're just a normal guy here. Welcome to the Golden State."
Exhaustive studies have shown that they'll continue to be sexually attracted to little kids, so...... What do you do with them?
And that is the difference between pedophiles and murderers. The vast majority of murders are crimes of passion: finding your spouse in bed with somebody, for example. I am convinced that most people who have been convicted of murder are
less likely to do it a second time than the rest of us are to do it the
first time. They've been through the experience and know what it's like when the passion wears off and they're staring at the results of their horrible deed. There's no way any of us can know what that is going to feel like.
If you say imprison them for life-without-parole, then I'd agree ....except why should we keep paying for their food and housing? Why not just execute them? Why does any society need people like that?
You can say that about any "capital" crime. You and I respectfully disagree on this, but I say that capital "punishment" is not punishment at all because once a person is dead the impact is pretty well lost on him. It's just institutionalized revenge, and revenge is arguably the worst of all human emotions. It's certainly the one that's responsible for a lot of wars. The last thing the government should be doing is setting an example for the common folk that revenge is
ever acceptable.
But child molesters have a very strong sexual urge that can not be cured just by telling them: Be nice in the future. Unless we castrate them or put them on medication, that very hard to surpress sexual urge will exist and they still be dangerous.
There is some disagreement on this but many authorities insist that rape of any type is not about sex at all, but about control, or simply about violence. To support that thesis, some reports I've seen cited in the popular press indicate that castration does not stop the attacks but merely channels them into a different choice of weapon: violation with something too icky to think about. Not only do they not need a penis but they don't even need a libido. Rape is just a convenient way to commit a violent crime with a weapon that doesn't have a concealment problem.
I suspect the truth is somewhere in between. For some guys it's a sexual thing and for others it's not. If we could tell them apart we could castrate the former and lock up the latter (or in Max's case have a public stoning and sell popcorn) and feel fairly secure.