Commuting the Sentence of Medical Pedophiles

[CitizenCain]

Do you commute/reduce his potential sentence for soliciting child prostitution and possessing child pornography?

Are we allowed to acquit based on the theory that since he's harmed no one (but himself), he hasn't actually done anything wrong, yet?

And, on a related note, when you say "child" prostitution and "child" pornography, do you mean it in the legal sense of the word that makes late teens who "sext" naked pictures of themselves to their lovers guilty of federal felonies for creating and distributing child porn? (It certainly seems that way, based on the text of the book you posted... unless he solicited one of those 5 year old kids that are always working at massage parlors.)

I don't think so. While his sexual preferences aren't his fault, what he does with them is. Presumably, all pedophiles want kiddies because of some combination of genetic factors and environmental stimuli, so I can't really see the difference between the generic case and this one.

How is this fundamentally different from throwing a Texan in jail for possession of "obscene" material and "lewd and lascivious solicitation"

...

because he happens to be a gay man (possessing gay porn and soliciting gay sex) in a bible-thumping small town?

Neither one is "responsible" for his condition, nor has either one actually done any harm to anyone else, though both probably will at some point in the future (the gay man by inviting the terrible wrath of Jeebus down on all the neighbors who don't stone him to death, of course).

For me it's not about being "his fault" in the legal situation, it's about is he a danger to society, as in will he reasonably re-commit these crimes.

If that's the case, why don't we simply execute (or imprison for life) anyone who tests as medically psychotic or sociopathic? Empirical evidence suggests a near certainty that both conditions will result in a significant portion of life spent in criminal activity.

No, but under most.

Being attracted to children and acting on those impulses are two different things. He did the crime.

Sounds to me like he didn't. He wanted to act on those impulses... but from the sounds of the set up, he didn't get a chance to actually have any sexual contact with a "child" (which in this case sounds to me like it really means fully developed "teenager").

Not buying it. If I was on the jury I'd have no problem convicting.

Who cares? You've also said you'd execute someone for misdemeanor property trespass. No one's surprised that you'd jump on any opportunity to unleash your bloodlust on any poor SOB the law gives you the slightest pretense to.

Being attracted to children but never acting on that impulse is not actually illegal. We don't have thoughtcrimes. Any criminal activity is an activity they chose to do.

Sure we do, and I know we've had this discussion before. The guy doing ten years in a federal penn for Japanese "magnas" (drawings), or the multiple people in the rest of the Anglo-world convicted of possessing child pornography for possessing cartoons and other drawings... for that matter, I'll go so far as to say that criminalizing the possession of [any] pornography blurs the lines sufficiently to be classified as thoughtcrime. Australia's made recent headlines for their particularly absurd regulations on what pornography is illegal, but we all have similar legislation. Images of [x] should be illegal because [insert weak justification here], but the real reason they're banned is because we find the underlying attraction perverse and sick. It doesn't matter if it harms no one, or even if it's completely consensual for all parties involved, or even if there are any actual people involved at all... it's still outlawed, and that's because we find the thought disgusting. The only reason those actual thoughts aren't against the law is because we've yet to invent a way to record someone else's thoughts.

And I suppose it might be helpful to point out that there are two types of "pedophilia." One is a condition where an adult is attracted to a pre-pubescent child, and the other is a condition where the legal system defines everyone as a child until the moment they are 17 years, 365 days old, ignoring basic biology, psychology and even the most primitive notion of cognition. It seems that the two terms are being used interchangeably in this thread, much as they are in the real world, despite how completely counter-productive that is.

That's not to say some people shouldn't spend the rest of their lives in institutions for the "criminally insane" or are "un-rehabilitable".

Such as, for example, bloodthirsty, self-professed Christians who are itching for any flimsy excuse to blow someone's head off?

That's what I'm talking about here. It's idiotic to measure someone up to normal people's rules and laws when he is subject to a completely different set of rules due to his brain chemistry.

Unfortunately, this exact same "the brain is drastically different" defense is even more valid for sociopaths than it is for pedophiles. Sociopaths are unable to process emotion, and as such can't empathize with other people. When they're not violent, they're con-men and fraudsters who steal from and destroy countless lives before they're put in jail. When they are violent, they generally like to cut women into little pieces, and it's not a coincidence that most serial killers (and certainly the more prolific and famous ones) are sociopaths, and have brain scans revealing that the frontal cortex of their brain has very little blood-flow, and is essentially unused.

So... what of that? That it's a physical defect beyond his control or that we shouldn't apply normal rules to a decidedly abnormal biology seem to pale in comparison to the fact that the condition is untreatable, and if left unincarcerated, this person will continue destroying people's lives, just as surely as everyone else will continue to satisfy their basic biological and psychological needs.