False Sense Of Security

The puritanical notion of sex in this country is not just obnoxious, it's also a threat to our own safety.

http://www.findingdulcinea.com/news/Americas/2008/December/Sex-Offender-Laws-Lead-to-Rise-in-Homelessness.html

The laws against sex offenders are really cutting off the nose to spite the face.  First of all, what constitutes a "sex crime" is incredibly vague and broad.  Getting drunk and taking a piss on public property can be considered a sex crime via the "public exposure" route.  So a guy who got a little too shitfaced one night, while undoubtedly stupid, is now forced to register his address and have on his public record for the rest of his life that he is a "sex offender".

Then there's that horrific case of the teenager who was over 18 getting a consensual blow-job from a 16-year old girl at a party, who had the misfortune to have it caught on video tape and published on the internet.  This kid was a college student with good grades and a promising future.  The girl (and the girl's parents, I think) admitted it was consensual and I'm pretty sure refused to press charges.  But, according to the law, the kid was sentenced to something stupid like a decade in jail and a permanent label of SEX OFFENDER, with a minor, no less, on his permanent record.  This will pretty much destroy his life.  Which is another beef I have with the legal system ... setting up a chart of X crime = Y punishment with no allowance for the judge to use his own judgement.  What the fuck are we paying them for if all they do is let a guilty verdict come in, then look at a chart and give an automatic sentence with no thought to the individual circumstances of the case?  Fuck, *I* can do that!  Where's my robe and gavel?

The people in this society are so terrified of sex, they're willing to destroy people's lives over it.  Now, don't get me wrong, I'm all for punishing someone for rape as a violent crime and for child molestation.  Predators should be locked up.  But we get so carried away that a little poor judgement is now grounds for taking away a man's life.

Now several states have upped the restrictions on where a convicted sex offender can live.  Mostly it has to do with how close to schools and parks they are.  Think about that.  We're talking all sex offenders here, including rapists of adults, men who were just barely in their majority at the time with barely-underage partners, and simply undecent exposure-ists.  I can totally understand being uncomfortable with having a convicted child-molester living across the street from the local elementary school.  But how many of these guys actually have committed crimes against minors?  And what age of the minor?  And what age were they at the time of the offense?  And what was their psych evaluation prior to being released from prison?  Never mind the fact that they are legally released from incarceration, supposedly having paid their debt to society and deemed safe for re-entry.  How many residential neighborhoods do you know that do NOT have a park or a school nearby? 

What all this means is that all the child-molesters, all the rapists, and all the guys who got drunk at a party and exposed themselves irresponsibly cannot find a place to live.  Which means that they are now homelss.

HOMELESS.

These guys, the men everyone is so afraid of to the point of denying them their basic ability to survive AFTER they have completed their mandatory sentencing, are now out on the streets.  Does the term, desperation mean anything to you?  If you have nothing to lose, what's to stop you from doing anything illegal again?  It may or may not be another sex crime.  It may be theft or violence.  But the odds of lawlessness increases when a person becomes homeless.  If someone has paid their debts and is given another chance, and now has a home and a job to lose, doesn't it seem likely that a percentage of them will be more afraid of losing their second chance at a future than in indulging their poor judgement again?

But no, paranoid parents are shoving their children out the door to school in the morning, content and smug in their belief that they have eradicated, or at least reduced the chances, of a big, bad, predator crouching in the shadows, just waiting for a chance to pounce on their innocent babies.

Except now they've created more of them ... 800% more of them - 800% more homelss guys on the streets of America.  A homeless guy with a permanent criminal record that prevents him from ever having a place to live or a job, is probably crouching in those shadows right now because, well, where else is he going to go?  Great job keeping the streets safe from drunken frat boys, now we have 800% more grown men with a prison record and nothing to lose and no way for their probation officers and other monitors to track them as a consequence.