m o l e s t e d

[perv]

www.salon.com/feb97/molested970228.html

This is a very disturbing article about the child sexual abuse industry.

A good example of why I can't help but regard these people as on par with the Taliban, even though I'm sure there are a few decent individuals mixed up with it.

[antichrist]

We take everything to extremes in North America, don't we.

[dantesvirgil]

Er...for me the link goes to a mom's story about finding out her teenage son molested her other son, and the difficulties in dealing with both of them. It doesn't say anything about an industry.

[MaybeNever]

I believe perv means the field that has grown up around addressing situations such as the one written about, not an industry of trafficking in child sex slaves.

I admit that I don't know much about how to handle such a situation, but the group disclosures remind me of how the Chinese Communists dealt with their "political deviants". It is entirely possible to cross a line while opposing even things like this, but I honestly have no idea whether what this woman describes is necessary or just barbaric. Or, worse perhaps, both.

[D'Coke]

I think necessity is always the most important thing to consider. Self preservation and all. On both sides of the count, of course. That said, I'm no psychologist and so I can't speak to their methods. But it's whatever works, no matter how cruel it may seem.

[booley]

Apr 5, 2009 15:11:16 GMT -5 dantesvirgil said:

Er...for me the link goes to a mom's story about finding out her teenage son molested her other son, and the difficulties in dealing with both of them. It doesn't say anything about an industry.

Not specifically. But it does imply it. It talks about an entire group of "professionals" that benefit from charges of sex abuse.

From the politicians that get "tough on crime" (because who is going to go on record as for sex abuse?) to the DAs that know their careers are made by how many people they send to jail (danger to society or not) to therapists who see anything that doesn't fit their "box" as denial (and how do you prove you aren't in denial?)

Even those that don't benefit directly are affected. Like cops that know only one way to deal with a "criminal" to employers who don't want the controversy of hiring "one of those people"

That's one part of the problem. The other also implied in the article is how we view human beings in this country.. which is shitty.

First there's "morally superior outrage" that I have seen, even from self professed "compassionate" Liberals. Sex criminals are evil so nothing done to them is "too harsh" In other words, since they are evil so it's ok to do evil to them in return.

Second there's the hang up on sex that is bad and somehow unnatural. As if kids are unaware they even have genitals and when they do begin to wonder about sex, it needs to suppressed the way you would a cancer or genetic condition.

Which then brings us to something which would seem to contradict that but actually doesn't. Modern society more and more views people, especially children as monsters. Kids are to often seen as assholes who would beat you with a baseball bat and stick their dick in the remains if given a chance. So they need to be controlled and suppressed.

Unfortunately I have no idea how to this could be fixed. Certainly no fix would be easy or quick. Peopel just hear the words "molester" or sex offender" and their brains switch off and become paranoid.

And too many people benefit from that.

(end rant)

[perv]

Apr 5, 2009 15:51:02 GMT -5 MaybeNever said:

I believe perv means the field that has grown up around addressing situations such as the one written about, not an industry of trafficking in child sex slaves.

Correct. I called it that a little sarcastically, but then again, some of what they do would be considered sexual abuse if anyone else did it, so the term kinda works either way you read it.

The most disturbing part to me, is that as much as wish the boys in that story were an isolated case, the picture they paint makes that hard to believe. Apparently once the industry gets their hands on someone ("victim" or "abuser"), reality doesn't matter any more. The industry is always right by definition and anyone who disagrees is obviously sick, and/or evil.

[D'Coke]

Are you saying most psychologists vilify those who disagree wit them?

[stormwarden]

I wouldn't put it past them to say the least. Psychologists tend to be quite defensive about their diagnostics.

[ironbite]

So do religious types.

Ironbite-I guess being a fanatic doesn't just limit itself to religion.

[perv]

Apr 5, 2009 20:32:11 GMT -5 D'Coke said:

Are you saying most psychologists vilify those who disagree wit them?

Not in general, I'm specifically speaking of the people who make their living "treating" child sexual abuse offenders and victims.

And I'm not saying all of them do it either, no doubt there are also child sex abuse therapists who treat their patients in a conscientious, constructive, and non-judgmental way, somewhere.

[Lady Renae]

I just want to highlight a few things I think need highlighting...

He is in peer group therapy, where he learns a new vocabulary. He speaks off-handedly about "offending" people in a whole new way than that phrase is usually meant. He's learning about "ownership" and "restitution" and "errors of thought."

All the boys are from heterosexual families, all but our case involved heterosexual abuse, but one parent still insists the cause is "homosexuality."

[The younger son] believes now, somewhere deep, that his pleasure in being touched was itself bad, that because that touch was forbidden, he himself is bad, that the disruptions and upsets of the last year are somehow his fault, the fault of his finding pleasure. It doesn't matter how many times we or anyone tell him different. Now I'm afraid to caress him, afraid to go to the bathroom at night because he might waken and see me in a state of half-dress, afraid to tuck him in and kiss him when he's asleep, lest he have a dreamy memory of being touched in bed. He has been asked now, over and over, by many strangers, if his father or mother ever did a "bad touch." He wakes up on the weekend and runs into our room and jumps in bed to cuddle as he always has, and we recoil, afraid.

There are rules in this peculiar world. Givens. Paramount is that a victim always tells the truth, with one exception. When a victim tells the same story as the offender, then the victim is wrong -- because also paramount is the rule that an offender always lies. For many months we've been warned to expect more -- more confession, more disclosure, more details, more victims, to accept the fact that he must be holding something back. No confession is ever considered complete.

My every attempt to put what happened in a social context, a context of human sexuality and relationship, is averted. My every effort to discuss the preoccupying sexual nature of teenagers is met with discomfort and evasion. Real sex is never mentioned here. Sexual curiosity, sexual pleasure, is irrelevant.

I have words. They won't come out.

[Paradox]

I have a friend who has a friend whose son was put on Georgia's sex offender registry for mooning somebody from the back of a moving car. In Georgia, this means he cannot live anywhere within several thousand feet of places where children might be, such as schools, bus stop, even churches (I'm not sure how that is constitutional.) He mooned somebody, so now he essentially cannot live in the state of Georgia at all. We have a system that treats the drunk who took a piss behind a dumpster the same way it treats the guy who fucked a toddler. This system is broken.

[Lady Renae]

Apr 6, 2009 12:20:28 GMT -5 Paradox said:

This system is broken.

Grats on being my first "QFT!"