‘The slick fella, too handsome for his own good, whose shifty eyes furtively appraised the family silver,’ or, ‘the well-dressed, good-looking young man whose frank curiosity about the family heirlooms showed an appreciation for life’s finer things.’

Why?

Word choice makes all the difference. Some words are so emotionally laden with either positive or negative connotations that just using them automatically produces the corresponding emotion in the reader or hearer. Producers of media know this and often choose emotionally loaded language to sway the readers to their way of thinking. This is fine for editorials and opinion pieces, but the purveyors of news pieces bear the responsibility of using neutral language, of presenting the facts, the “plain, unvarnished truth,” and allowing readers to form their own conclusions.

These are the facts about the term pedophilia. It is a medical term, not a legal one. There are no laws or statutes criminalizing pedophilia. Depression might cause a person to shoplift, but the criminal act is shoplifting, not having depression. Not everyone who shoplifts has depression, and not all with depression shoplift.

The same is true with pedophilia. Not everyone who molests a child has pedophilia – in fact, research suggests the percentage is low – and not everyone with pedophilia has engaged in any criminal conduct, including molesting a child. And certainly, not all registrants are pedophiles. Sexual convictions run the gamut from public exposure to violent rape.

Recently a series of news stories were published in Joliet, Illinois, by Joliet’s local Patch homepage.  The situation is one where the mayor is doing his best – or worst — to close down an apartment building designed as reentry housing for men with sexual crime convictions. After losing round one by way of a federal ruling, Mayor Bob O’Dekirk launched round two: the city bought a lot with a vacant house a block away from NewDay Apartments, the home of the registrants and for full disclosure, one of NARSOL’s many partners in implementing fact-driven policies that advance meaningful criminal justice reform.

The mayor’s plan, unanimously approved by city council without a grandfather clause, is to demolish the home and create a park/playground there. Projected to be functional by June 2023, the park would place the residents of the apartment building out of compliance with state law and effectually, the mayor hopes, put the apartments out of business. Called a “pocket park,” Joliet is not the first city to resort to this strategy in order to make areas uninhabitable for registered individuals.

Joliet Patch, the local news homepage for the town on Patch.com has published four articles about the situation in Joliet, three since city hall got involved. Those three all scream, in huge headers, about the “Pedophile Palace” that the mayor has sworn to shut down.

Of all words in our language designed to evoke a strong, visceral, negative reaction, that one ranks right at the top. Seldom fully understood, almost always misused, and often misspelled, pedophilia requires a qualified physician’s diagnosis before one can accurately be labeled a pedophile.

Patch is not the only media outlet to choose and misuse that word to steer readers and listeners toward a specific reaction. Some weeks prior to the most recent article in Joliet, in a recent broadcast of Tucker Carlson, Fox News, in bold headlines, announced, “TUCKER CARLSON: No healthy society can tolerate pedophilia,” with a sub-heading of “Tucker speaks out against child sexual abuse.” The connection is made: Pedophilia and child sexual abuse are interchangeable terms.

In another video, Carlson bemoans the fact that California is “Putting thousands of pedophiles back on the street.” He is speaking of individuals who have been convicted of a sexual crime, have completed the court-ordered incarceration period, and are released under community supervision for the remainder of the sentence.

Once again, the connection between the word and the crime is inescapable, and now not only is child sexual abuse the same as pedophilia, but also everyone on the registry for any sexual crime is a pedophile.

But it is a false connection.

Carlson and Fox News ignore the facts and do everything possible to cement the false connection and establish a belief in the viewers’ minds that precludes any reasonable and factual discussion about sexual offending.

Throughout the Joliet pieces, other pejorative language is used. The apartment dwellers are “sexual predators” at every possible occasion, not “men,” not “tenants,” but “sexual predators.”

Tucker continues to use “pedophile/pedophilia” as often as possible, but at least his rhetoric is labeled “opinion.”

I reached out to Joliet Patch and to Tucker Carlson’s team while working on this piece, but have not heard back.

Words shape our beliefs, opinions, and actions. They also shape the beliefs, opinions and actions of our lawmakers, and inaccurate words and words whose meanings have been twisted will lead to laws and policies that are inaccurate and twisted. Laws that are based on falsehoods and incorrect beliefs do not advance public safety.

Legislation grounded in empirical evidence and arrived at in the cold, impassionate light of accurate and connotation-free verbiage has the very best chance of providing society with laws that are fair, just, and work as they should.

Source: thecrimereport.org

Sandy, a NARSOL board member, is communications director for NARSOL, editor-in-chief of the Digest, and a writer for the Digest and the NARSOL website. Additionally, she participates in updating and managing the website and assisting with a variety of organizational tasks.

Let’s be crystal clear that sex offender laws are created with fear-based rhetoric and political trepidation from both sides of the political spectrum. The recent opinion column, Damaging justice to make a point about rape highlights the potential failures of judicial independence and underlying rationale. Dr. Klein strikes a perpetual chord that sex offender registries AND people that support such registries are equally villainous and culpable.

Sex offender registries were initially created with the intention of notifying the general public about potential violent sexual offenders being released from incarceration. Today’s registries display a hodgepodge protuberance from public urination to sexually motivated murderers. Registries no longer serve the purpose to separate based upon tier status. Instead, registries serve only a purpose of humiliation and opprobrium patterned behaviors.  Public defenders, law enforcement, politicians, and the general public insist on labeling convicted sexual offenders as predators, aggravated, pedophiles, or recidivists. Citizens rush to judgment by inaccurately identifying all on the registry as predators and/or pedophiles. To add insult to injury, many registrants are listed for life allowing community leaders to exclaim or assert a need to do more to segregate registered offenders from public view.

There are a sprinkling of message boards on the internet that advocates positively for sex offender reform. But the question remains, “why is advocacy for registries shunned or free from the civil discussion?” The answer may possibly be that fascism and martial styled government tactics are the reason. It may sound like harsh words, but aren’t the same tactics used to loosely describe sex offenders in general? Creating a new level of indentured servants with annual registration fees on a registry free to the general public poses another issue of conformity. Not allowing registered offenders to live near or access to schools, daycare, public parks, bus stops, shopping malls, churches, and sometimes jobs are another form of authoritarianism in a nation built upon freedoms and human rights. When there cannot be a rational discussion or an alternative viewpoint, then there is no real privilege or opportunity to exercise free speech or equitable and fair dialogue.

Candidly speaking I personally find law enforcement leaders that reach far and beyond what the law allows to be labeled as predators. They seek to groom the general public about false safeties, securities, and protections no differently than a seasoned pedophile. Sometimes the general public can be labeled as social-recidivists because they may share inaccurate and anti-social styled patterns. These social-recidivists use offender registries not to educate self or others. Instead, they use registries to instill disengagement and separation as a weapon. I would argue that those that support registries are somewhat equal to predators, pedophiles, recidivists, and fascists. An individual doesn’t have to be convicted to be guilty. That individual can show all the signs and symptoms of criminal behavior but hasn’t been caught.

Martin Niemöller was a prominent Protestant pastor who emerged as an outspoken public foe of Adolf Hitler and spent the last seven years of Nazi rule in concentration camps. He wrote the following:

First, they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Socialist.

Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.

Dr. Klein is right to assert the time for sex offender bullying and overlegislation must end. It can be very difficult for any registered offender to find the strength to advocate for themselves and perhaps others that share his/her similar situation. However, “when will you speak for yourselves or other registered offenders?” There are a few advocates to start the campaign to end unjust laws and a horribly constructed sex offender registry. When will YOU begin to notice the real offenders of reform and fairness under the law are those in power acting in a role similar to predators, pedophiles, and recidivists?  I encourage you to share your stories about how laws and the registry have done more harm than good. Your voice is powerful and will be heard.