Do we condemn a person for life for an alleged action that we cannot be 100% sure ever happened? In the whole education/prevention process, which is weak at best, we need to be educating victims to speak out sooner rather than later. Additionally, research is showing that approximately 7% of allegations made are false. The sooner the victim speaks out, the more likely there will be enough evidence to charge the perpetrator.
If he did truly rape this woman years ago, as a law-abiding citizen now, does he deserve a second chance? I have always thought that this is what the United States of America was all about.
Victims speak out and prosecutors decline their cases and police throw their rape kits in a landfill. They go to court and judges ask if they tried closing their legs. They warn friends about someone on social media and are branded a liar. The problem is how society responds, including you who I'm sure doesn't worry about rates of false reports for non-sexual acts like robbery or aggravated assault.
Thank you for your response, Jenna. Because comments cannot be lengthy, we usually only have room to focus on one particular topic, often leaving out other pertinent information. Those who are victims need to be heard and helped, and fortunately you have taken the time to comment on that aspect.
As for the rate of false reports in non-sexual acts, that I have never read any research results on, so I do not know what the rates would be. Even if I did know them, though, we are told to stay on topic in our comments, and they would not have applied to my discussion.
Make amends how? Don't think just words or apology would do anything. What if they way to make amends was removing one's self from a position of power? Should uncomfy consequences for the harmdoer be off the table?
I'm not entirely sure. I think a lot of that is probably up to the person who was harmed, and the result of an honest and earnest attempt to make those amends. But the broader point is just that I don't think we, culturally, really even have a language to begin discussing what that process might look like.
And, personally, I don't think that uncomfortable consequences should be off the table, and certainly not if that's what the person who was harmed is seeking -- but ours is a habit of making those consequences so uncomfortable so as to discourage any participation in the amends-making process in the first place.
Being willing to make amends but only if it comes at no detriment to yourself as the "harm doer" seems very inadequate to me. Relinquishing power should be the floor.
No detriment -- how about years of prison and sex offender probation and then the numerous laws that go with the sex offense registry? In most areas of this country, registrants who are one-time-only offenders will find it difficult to find a place to live or work, their families will be punished in the whole process -- particularly the children, they will have a target put on their back for vigilantes to come after, and the list goes on and on. Unfortunately, most people think everyone on the registry has raped a child. That is actually a very rare occurrence. Some are on the registry for public urination, being 21 and having consensual sex with their 16-year-old girlfriend whom they marry after prison, being a juvenile and sending an inappropriate picture of yourself through a text to another juvenile, and the list goes on and on.
Patty Wetteringly, the mother who help to jumpstart Congress into forming the sex offense registry in the 90's, has said that the registry has been hijacked. She only intended it to be for people like the man who abducted, raped, and killed her son. She said that too many people are now being put on the registry for whom she never intended.
Yes, the murders-rapists-kidnappers and violent re-offenders do not deserve any mercy. But the majority of people on the registry are one-time offenders who are working hard at reintegrating back into society as law-abiding citizens. Research shows that approximately 90% of FUTURE sex crimes will be committed by people NOT on the registry.
If you really want to prevent as many future victims as possible, then you will want our society to use research-based best policies. What we are doing now is not working. All research supports that statement.
Do we condemn a person for life for an alleged action that we cannot be 100% sure ever happened? In the whole education/prevention process, which is weak at best, we need to be educating victims to speak out sooner rather than later. Additionally, research is showing that approximately 7% of allegations made are false. The sooner the victim speaks out, the more likely there will be enough evidence to charge the perpetrator.
If he did truly rape this woman years ago, as a law-abiding citizen now, does he deserve a second chance? I have always thought that this is what the United States of America was all about.
Victims speak out and prosecutors decline their cases and police throw their rape kits in a landfill. They go to court and judges ask if they tried closing their legs. They warn friends about someone on social media and are branded a liar. The problem is how society responds, including you who I'm sure doesn't worry about rates of false reports for non-sexual acts like robbery or aggravated assault.
Thank you for your response, Jenna. Because comments cannot be lengthy, we usually only have room to focus on one particular topic, often leaving out other pertinent information. Those who are victims need to be heard and helped, and fortunately you have taken the time to comment on that aspect.
As for the rate of false reports in non-sexual acts, that I have never read any research results on, so I do not know what the rates would be. Even if I did know them, though, we are told to stay on topic in our comments, and they would not have applied to my discussion.
Make amends how? Don't think just words or apology would do anything. What if they way to make amends was removing one's self from a position of power? Should uncomfy consequences for the harmdoer be off the table?
I'm not entirely sure. I think a lot of that is probably up to the person who was harmed, and the result of an honest and earnest attempt to make those amends. But the broader point is just that I don't think we, culturally, really even have a language to begin discussing what that process might look like.
And, personally, I don't think that uncomfortable consequences should be off the table, and certainly not if that's what the person who was harmed is seeking -- but ours is a habit of making those consequences so uncomfortable so as to discourage any participation in the amends-making process in the first place.
Being willing to make amends but only if it comes at no detriment to yourself as the "harm doer" seems very inadequate to me. Relinquishing power should be the floor.
No detriment -- how about years of prison and sex offender probation and then the numerous laws that go with the sex offense registry? In most areas of this country, registrants who are one-time-only offenders will find it difficult to find a place to live or work, their families will be punished in the whole process -- particularly the children, they will have a target put on their back for vigilantes to come after, and the list goes on and on. Unfortunately, most people think everyone on the registry has raped a child. That is actually a very rare occurrence. Some are on the registry for public urination, being 21 and having consensual sex with their 16-year-old girlfriend whom they marry after prison, being a juvenile and sending an inappropriate picture of yourself through a text to another juvenile, and the list goes on and on.
Patty Wetteringly, the mother who help to jumpstart Congress into forming the sex offense registry in the 90's, has said that the registry has been hijacked. She only intended it to be for people like the man who abducted, raped, and killed her son. She said that too many people are now being put on the registry for whom she never intended.
Yes, the murders-rapists-kidnappers and violent re-offenders do not deserve any mercy. But the majority of people on the registry are one-time offenders who are working hard at reintegrating back into society as law-abiding citizens. Research shows that approximately 90% of FUTURE sex crimes will be committed by people NOT on the registry.
If you really want to prevent as many future victims as possible, then you will want our society to use research-based best policies. What we are doing now is not working. All research supports that statement.