The sex offender: the 21st century witch

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At the end of May, the Republican-controlled House of Representatives passed H.R.1761, the "Protecting Against Child Exploitation Act of 2017." It is intended "to criminalize the knowing consent of the visual depiction, or live transmission, of a minor engaged in sexually explicit conduct." Going further, those convicted of such a practice would "be fined and imprisoned not less than 15 years nor more than 30 years, 25 years nor more than 50 if two or more prior offenses and would get 35 years to life, and 30 years to life if a death occurred." While broadly targeted at child pornography, it seeks to expand current legislation and make "sexting" - teens texting each other explicit images and words - a federal criminal offense. The bill was pushed by Rep. Mike Johnson (R-LA) and was backed by the National Fraternal Order of Police and the National District Attorneys Association, among other conservative groups. Johnson insisted, "The first responsibility of any just government is to defend the defenseless. In Romans 13, Scripture refers to the governing authorities as 'God's servants, agents of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer.' Among the most despicable criminals who deserve the full measure of our wrath are those who sexually abuse innocent children."

The bill's passage received little media attention. One report notes that two Republicans - Reps. Justin Amash (MI) and Thomas Massie (KY) - and 53 Democrats voted against it. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-TX) warned, "While the bill is well intended, it is overbroad in scope and will punish the very people it indicates it is designed to protect: our children." Rep. Bobby Scott (D-VA) cautioned, "Under this law, teenagers who engage in consensual conduct and send photos of a sexual nature to their friends or even to each other may be prosecuted and the judge must sentence them to at least 15 years in prison." [...]

In the Reagan-era America of the 1980s, the U.S. took on two domestic wars - a war on drugs and a war on sex. Both have been failures. Politicians, law enforcement and people with good intentions, conservative and liberal, including otherwise "progressive" feminist and gay-rights advocates, agreed with the religious right that something had to be done with those who violated sexual consent. [...] Unknown to most Americans, sex crime rose between 2005-2014. The Bureau of Justice Statistics' National Criminal Victimization Survey found in 2014 (the last year available) that there were 284,350 reported rapes or sexual assaults of persons 12 years or older, up from 207,760 in '05. More than two-thirds (69%) of reported teen sexual assaults occurred in "the residence of the victim, the offender, or another individual." It notes that between 1992 to 2010 there was a 56 percent decline in physical abuse and a 62 percent decline in sexual abuse. In additional to conventional criminal proceedings, sex offenders face harsh prison sentences. Adding insult to injury, as of 2006, eight states - California, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Montana, Oregon, Texas, and Wisconsin - allowed chemical castration; Alabama is considering it. More worrisome, some 5,000 individuals - often identified as Sexually Violent Predators (SVP) - are placed in indefinite detention with few legal rights of appeal. [...]

Like the war on drugs, the war on sex has proven a failure. And, like the Trump regime's effort to impose ever-more punitive law-enforcement measures on convicted drug users, one can expect the same - if not worse - treatment of sex offenders. They have become 21st century witches.

source: Article 'The Sex Offender: the 21st Century Witch' by David Rosen; www.counterpunch.org/2017/06/23/the-sex-offender-the-21st-century-witch/; Counterpunch; 23 June 2017