Can child molesters be rehabilitated?????

[southcitymom]

What's to say of the addicts and alcoholics who were sexually abused as children? If not for some depraved louse hurting a child would Sue still have picked up that pipe? Would John have become a heroin addict? I understand with addiction placing blame on a particular incident or a horrific past won't get ya clean, but there's no denying that a very large number of addicts were sexually abused as kids. Just a thought, but I am with Texas Vickie here. I'd like to ask the guy with the monitor bracelet on who went and took a child right out of her own school how it all works.

You are so right about that. That's why my life is filled with so many survivors of child sexual abuse - I am one of the very few women I know in recovery who was not molested as a child. That's one of the reasons I truly see it as a cycle of pain.

I guess - like anything else - it all comes down to personal desire to change (bearing in mind that I don't think pedophiles can ever truly change their orientation). And we can never truly gauge that desire from the outside.

But I do think child molesters, like addicts, like all of us - are individuals. While it is, of course, important to look at the broad similarities, the reasons people abuse children are probably as varied as the people themselves.

I don't have any universal answers - just lots of questions!

ETA: I think the guy with the bracelet who snatched the little girl probably thinks "it" works in much the same way that the drug addict in treatment who steals painkillers out of her friend's medicine cabinet thinks it does....which is to say, not very easily! In both cases, people are acting on a terrible compulsion.

 

[DeltaDawn]

Well my feelings are until we understand and know how to treat these people who are deviant in their sexual preference for children, and also many of these same people are deviant in many other ways also, we need to lock them in up in detention programs to keep the future of our society safe. Our future is in the hands of the youngest members of our society and until we realize that we are lost as a society. Yes I've worked with people with all kinds of mental illness, but the people we all admit we don't come close to understanding the workings of and the complete cure for are pedophiles. Enough said..when we have that cure we can treat them, until then it is a cost and a responsibilty our society must undertake to keep these people off the streets, in treatment centers and under lock and key being studied. If it was your child that would be approached next you would not think for one second the cost was to high to society.
The only cost that is too high to society is to allow these sexual deviants called pedophiles to roam the streets at their will and violate the young members of our society who are our future.

 

[philamena]

Absophukinlutlely NOT!

 

[believe09]

nope, not good to have child molesters roaming the streets-agreed. There is a broader question in all of this about "curing" what one generation might believe is deviance vs another generation who believes it is illness, vs another generation who may believe it is inherent like left-handedness.

I was raised in an atmosphere of incredible violence, pain and abuse, and addiction was the catalyst of some of the worst of it. But to me, when all of the layers were peeled back, what really happened was that we as children weren't valued. We could be beaten, saddened, ridiculed etc...because our parents owned us. They could do what they liked. We didn't have a say in what was being done to us simply because we were children. I think any crime involving a child has that same basic motivator...call it an easy target if you want to simplify it.

There are adults who prey on children because those adults feel that the children don't have the right to say no. And most times the children will love you anyway-regardless of whether you hurt them or hug them. I wonder if that part of being a child is what makes it so easy for the pedophiles to convince themselves that the children are willing partners?

OK, that is the end of my rant, lol...

 

[txsvicki]

You can't cure a serial killer, so why could a child molester be cured? They're both psychopaths with absolutely no empathy or feelings for others. Serial killers will begin thinking and doing weird stuff at an early age and so do child molesters. They keep on until old age, even that doesn't stop them. Look at BTK, Gary Hilton, the old men who are still molesting, etc.

 

[LionRun]

Though there may be similarities between addicts (be it alcohol, other drugs, or both) and child molesters, I think there is one key difference. I think that generally most addicts have a conscience. It may go on vacation or be a bit weak during active drinking/drug use. But, I think most addicts have consciences and have the capacity to feel for others.

On the other hand, I think that child molesters either lack a conscience or it is defective beyond repair. And, I think there is a critical period for the development of a conscience that is perhaps similar to the critical point in learning to speak a human language. Young adult child molesters or adult child molesters may be passed the critical point for developing a conscience.

If this is true then I don't think any amount of rehabilitation can give them the help needed to assure that the chances for re-offending will be low. These are just my thoughts and opinions, and I don't think I have ever read anything that backs up my theory.

Lion

 

[dee10134]

There's NEVER been any evidence that they can be.

Has there been any evidence that they cannot be?

Honestly, I think that pedophilia is a sexual orientation and that is why they cannot be rehabilitated.

 

[DeltaDawn]

Has there been any evidence that they cannot be?

Honestly, I think that pedophilia is a sexual orientation and that is why they cannot be rehabilitated.

There is tons of evidence that they cannot be ..the rate for repeat pedophile offenders in this category is extremely high.

I am not so sure this is so much sexual orientation as in something genetic, but more a sexual orientation because of social things that have happened in their past. I don't think they are born with a certain gentic marker that leads them to these acts.

Many pedophiles were victims of sexual abuse themselves and the cycle seems to continue. If it means we have to keep them away from society to protect our children and study them to find a "cure", then as a society that is what we should do.

Placing them back into the community after treatment has not worked well. It is left up to them to register as sex offenders when they move..and guess what many, many do not...and many choose to live in ares saturated by children..ie near schools, playgrounds, parks.

Again just MHO

 

[SewingDeb]

Amen Bobbi and Delta Dawn!

When you look at the sheer numbers of abusers who go on to abuse, as the population expands we are going to see even more of this! The cycle has to be broken somewhere and I believe in locking them up for life so they do not offend again to produce more abusers.

I know that not all abuse victims go on to abuse. I know that personally, but some do. We have to prevent future abusers by stopping the ones we know of in their tracks.

They can have all the therapy and understanding in the world, behind bars.

 

[southcitymom]

Has there been any evidence that they cannot be?

Honestly, I think that pedophilia is a sexual orientation and that is why they cannot be rehabilitated.

It's true that some of them can be, but the recidvism rate as we know it is extremely high.

I think it's easy to say all child molesters lack a conscience or are sociopaths but that's just not been my experience. Maybe most of them are like this - I just don't know.

I sponsored a woman once - a 35 year-old lesbian who has been in a long term relationship with another woman. When she was younger, but old enough to know better, she touched a young boy inappropriately. By all accounts, she molested the child.

Far from being unconcerned about this piece of her past, she was mortified and devastated by it and has done a lot of work on the issue both in and out of therapy. I know this woman very well and she did an awful thing, but - while she has psychological diagnoses and is a recovering drug addict - she's not a sociopath and she certainly has a conscience. And I would be dumbfounded if she ever molested a child again.

Now - would I have this woman babysit my kids? No, I wouldn't - but the reasons are complex and not solely related to that incident in her past. Still, I love this woman and she sees my kids on a regular basis and I do not feel like they are in jeopardy.

 

[southcitymom]

...They can have all the therapy and understanding in the world, behind bars.

Do they get therapy behind bars? I always wonder about that. I would think that prison life as I envision it just teaches them more about violence and rape and power, though I have heard that some amazing transformations can take place in prison. I guess it depends where the offender winds up.

 

[Filly]

Do they get therapy behind bars? I always wonder about that. I would think that prison life as I envision it just teaches them more about violence and rape and power, though I have heard that some amazing transformations can take place in prison. I guess it depends where the offender winds up.

One state requires them to go to a facility and the convicted sex offenders pitch a biotch about it, SCM. I'm thinking it's California. I have to look it up. I doubt any amazing transformation happens to these sex offenders period though. Often they get to meet new contacts and their sick circle just grows and grows. Example that creep in New Jersey who murdered little Megan Kanka. Three of them perverts lived in one house. Seems like they have clubs almost.

 

[Filly]

Though there may be similarities between addicts (be it alcohol, other drugs, or both) and child molesters, I think there is one key difference. I think that generally most addicts have a conscience. It may go on vacation or be a bit weak during active drinking/drug use. But, I think most addicts have consciences and have the capacity to feel for others.

On the other hand, I think that child molesters either lack a conscience or it is defective beyond repair. And, I think there is a critical period for the development of a conscience that is perhaps similar to the critical point in learning to speak a human language. Young adult child molesters or adult child molesters may be passed the critical point for developing a conscience.

If this is true then I don't think any amount of rehabilitation can give them the help needed to assure that the chances for re-offending will be low. These are just my thoughts and opinions, and I don't think I have ever read anything that backs up my theory.

Lion

Lion that's an excellent post. Thank you for that. Personally I have trouble even comparing drug and alcohol addiction to pedophilia. As, SCM had said that a relapse in drug addiction could be like a recovering addict stealing her friends pain pills. Nobody is going to get hurt there except the addict. Well, maybe her poor friend who is trully in pain and short medicine. A pedophile reoffending? There's no way even to tally the devastation that causes. Not to mention to how many people.

 

[ttrachel04]

I remember watching Dan Abrams interview a convicted child molester. He made the argument that all folks like him should be locked up and the key should be thrown away. He flat out said that his own sentence was not long enough, but that's all he was sentenced to. He said that it's a disease, and it can't be rehabilitated, at least not as of yet. The man even got himself physically castrated.

 

[SeekingJana]

I'm very lucky in that I've never been molested, and I don't know anyone personally who has been.. at least they haven't told it if they were.
I've also never known a convicted child molester, but I bet I've known some who just haven't been caught yet. WS has taught me that much already.

If I could wave a magic wand and have the power to 1) Identify offenders or budding offenders and 2) Impose action to stop any further child abuse ever, then what I would do to them would be to:

a) Have each man surgically castrated.
b) Have each man receive mandatory monthly injections of female hormones to further reduce the male aggressive tendencies.
c) Selective frontal lobotomies on those who were repeat offenders or especially aggressive. Let them sit and stare at blank walls.

They wouldn't be animalistic after I meted out my forms of physical " rehabilitation". Forget mental rehabilitation- it isn't possible, not now, not ever. I believe this with all my heart.

Let's face it- this is a male dominated crime, and until we take the physiological impulses for sexual aggression away from the dangerous segment of the population, we will always have rapists and child molesters. It goes without saying that many go on to mutilate and murder.

Did I mention that this entire topic makes me MAD???:furious: :furious:

 

[Filly]

SJ, you say you don't know any convicted child molesters but may have known some that weren't caught yet. That's my rule of thumb as well. Also, the ones who haven't offended YET. Got to start sometime so pity the poor child that happens to. Or the ones caught who never get convicted and go on to offend again. Can't find them by punching a zipcode in the registry. Sad way to live, but it's reality.

 

[SeekingJana]

SJ, you say you don't know any convicted child molesters but may have known some that weren't caught yet. That's my rule of thumb as well. Also, the ones who haven't offended YET. Got to start sometime so pity the poor child that happens to. Or the ones caught who never get convicted and go on to offend again. Can't find them by punching a zipcode in the registry. Sad way to live, but it's reality.

If a male has even fantasized about hurting a child, in my perfect world, he would get the treatment outlined in my post above yours.

I agree, prevention is crucial, but these men cannot be prevented without serious alterations to their sick sex drives, their aggressiveness, and their physical desire to touch, look at, or otherwise hurt any child, ever.

BTW, I would do the same thing to men who hurt women- if I was 'Queen Of The World' and had the power to do so .

 

[southcitymom]

...... Seems like they have clubs almost.

Like does attract like.

 

[txsvicki]

Is NAMBLA pushing for pedophilia to be considered normal, just a sexual orientation much as homosexuality or opposite sex attraction? Of course wanting to rape is never considered an orientation and no child wants to have sex with some ugly perverted creep.

 

[southcitymom]

One thing I have wondered about castration of pedophiles who molest or other child sexual offenders - would they then harm in another way? If we accept that rape is a crime of violence and if that is completely true, then wouldn't the person just offend with some other object if his sexual organs and the drive behind them were gone? (ie - maybe he would strike with his fists instead of strike sexually).

I don't know - just thinking out loud.

It seems to me that castration would remove a person's sex drive for whatever they desired - men, women, children. I'm not convinced that all pedophiles are violent - though, of course, if they act on their desires they will always cause violence.