This conversation is closed. Start a new conversation
or join one »
Housing sex offenders
The latest "cause craze" is that the states are not doing enough to find housing for sex offenders.
There are areas that sex offenders cannot live and they cannot live within 1000 feet of a school. As they must register and file a address this presents a problem for those who cannot find a place to live. Some claim a intersection as their home of record and live the homeless life. Some groups are demanding that the states develop a system for housing convicted sex offenders.
Is this the responsibility of a state?
Showing single comment thread. View the full conversation.
Showing single comment thread. View the full conversation.
Allan Macdougall 30+
Males are naturally sexually attracted to females of child-bearing age - something that is down to biology, and not necessarily something that can be legislated against.
What has gone seriously wrong, is that these men's peceptions of a girl's child-bearing age has been lowered by the media they choose to be influenced by, to pre-pubescent levels.
Any state intervention should initially be directed towards a media, whose ethics have gone grotesquely out-of-control in this and many other ways.
peter lindsay 30+
John Smith 30+
Allan Macdougall 30+
There's no getting away from the fact that youth sells products. Add sex to that equation and its potency as a marketing strategy is enormous, for products like high fashion clothing, perfume and jewellery. These adverts are ubiquitous and there is no getting away from them.
'Subliminal messaging' is the lifeblood of advertising and that, along with the profit motive, is enough to have the effect of distorting moral standards, one's body image, causing eating disorders, depression... the list goes on. What price a young person's right to childhood?
Peter's point: "The old fashioned roles that the media try to put women into don't fit anymore.In the media you see children and then teens and then mothers, they seem to have missed the 18 to 30 age group..." is important. Growing up has speeded up to the point where crucial chunks of development get missed out.
My point is that the barely controlled urges of a sex offender is made worse by this sudden apparent jump from teen to adulthood in young girls, and I question the role of the media and advertising, seemingly creating such a distorted view of 'normality' in order to achieve commercial ends.
John Smith 30+
I live in the most liberal society in the world (Netherlands) and I have never seen that. Pre-pubescent models are always depicted as children, teenage fashion models are shown in fashion advertisements geared towards women, that are not attractive to men at all (fashion is a means for women to achieve social dominance over other women, not a means to seduce men), and lingerie models are always at least 18 years old. And again, I must stress advertisements of young girls could never explain why so many boys are abused, nor could they explain why widespread child abuse goes back a long way in history.
Allan Macdougall 30+
If they are the adults you say they are, then many are made to look a lot younger than their actual age. Surely you see that, don't you?
You say: "Pre-pubescent models are always depicted as children, teenage fashion models are shown in fashion advertisements geared towards women, that are not attractive to men at all (fashion is a means for women to achieve social dominance over other women, not a means to seduce men)".
You don't know what goes on in the mind of a sex offender any more than I do. Also, how do you know that teenage fashion models are not attractive to oversexed older men - those who might go on to offend?
I can only guess why boys are abused. Again it is probably the allure of youth in establishments that are predominantly male (such as boarding schools and prisons) and where gender likely becomes immaterial when overridden by raw urges.
There is no getting away from the fact that youthfulness is desirable. People endure extreme surgery or go on ridiculous diets to achieve it. If youth is such a powerful holy grail to strive for, for people who are past it, then it is not too outrageous a statement to say that this kind of dysfunction could manifest in other forms - such as pedophilia.
My disclaimer is that these are just thoughts based on observation, not necessarily verifiable through evidence. If you have evidence to refute, then I would like to see it.