Sex Offenders Banned From Online Gaming

[Vigil80]

Originally Posted by Scaryfaced

Tell me about it. I've attempted to stick to my personal rule to only give my student's high fives, but in some situations, you'd have to be a real asshole not to give a kid a hug. Especially around the young ones, I'd literally need to push a crowd of 10 or so kids away from my legs to keep them off of me.

And thus, I live in a small bubble of fear that someone's going to take it the wrong way and accuse me of something. Good times.

Basically just that story happened to someone I know.

It's one reason why I don't mind making an I'm-joking-but-no-really performance to my friends about hating children. I prefer the area around me be a child-free zone.

[PathMaster]

Originally Posted by Serapth

Actually as a parent, it changes very little. I, you know, parent my child and basically treat any people I don't know extremely well as potential abusers. If anything a registry causes a false sense of security.

On the otherhand, any person put in a position of trust or authority over my child ( daycare, teacher, even bus driver, have all been vetted to against not being sex offenders, but against criminal records in general.


So frankly the end result is a net loss. A potential false sense of security of people thinking they know who the threats are, with a potential loss in property value of the other people that live in that neighborhood.

So being told that a sex offender moved down the street across from your child's school playground, given a picture of said offender as well as his vehicle type, color, and license plate number would actually do nothing at all for you?

Originally Posted by bean

snipped

Being a good parent and teaching your child about situations is a great thing. That is obvious. Is the system perfect? By no means. But is it a great tool to get information on potential threats? Yes, I think so, as obviously many others. Having some knowledge is better than having NO knowledge.

[TheFlyingOrc]

There are actually way too many kiddy diddlers within a few blocks of me, apparently.

Like, 4 and 6 year olds. Gross.

[MagGnome]

Originally Posted by boratika

More than that, since this is a widely held belief, parents will now automatically assume I'm a paedophile. I don't know if anyone else has had that experience where you're at somewhere like a shopping centre and there a lost child who's visibly distressed and no one else seems to care and you just stand there not sure whether to help or not.

Note: I am not a paedophile, just in case anyone was uncertain.

It's something that's really stood out since I've been living in the UK, since it's especially bad here. They're just paedo mad.

This level of paranoia bugs me to no end. It's gotten to the point where I feel like I can barely interact with children without someone assuming I'm a pedophile. It's pretty screwed up.

Edit - Only seven Level 3 offenders in my area. Not bad. None of them are closer than a half-mile either. My zip code extends much farther west than I thought. Apparently three of them live together at one address, two at another, and the other two live separately. Looking at that stuff gives me the creeps though.

[Narradisall]

I can't say I've ever been concerned about them, but as others have mentioned, depending on how they put people on the list can make things tricky.

Normally whenever you hear about a kid being picked up, it's because they were left on their own somewhere. I constantly see children around 7-11 wandering around on their own in my area. When I was that age, my parents wouldn't have let me go outside anywhere but our garden on my own, let alone be found a 30 minute walk away.

[Deadend]

It's a culture of fear thing, really.

Treating every other human being as a potential threat? That is a horrible way to live. Assuming any men who doesn't stay as far away from kids as possible is a pedo? utterly fucked up. It's the world we live in, made of fear.

I looked up the sex offenders around me, almost all are level 3 and in their mid 40s with 1 offense listed.
The worst part? None of them "look" like a child molester, as you know how there is supposed to be a certain look to them? Totally wrong.

[National Kato]

[bean]

Originally Posted by Deadend

Treating every other human being as a potential threat? That is a horrible way to live. Assuming any men who doesn't stay as far away from kids as possible is a pedo? utterly fucked up. It's the world we live in, made of fear.

Yeah, these guys are kind of taking it in a ridiculous direction, which is probably a result of fear.

Treating people (especially males) as potential offenders simply means not letting them have private access to your kids. Most groups that have kids overnight now try to get parents involved so that you have multiple adult chaperones. Kids who are molested know their victims 90% of the time and usually have permission from their parents to have access to them. Your kid can still play sports with male coaches as these always have parents at practices and games, or learn karate at dojos where parents are welcome to watch or mixed ages are involved so that there are teenagers that would not put up with a diddling sensei.

Also, a big part of the protection is teaching kids that they can say "no". Kids who are fondled briefly and tell their aggressors to stop loudly and forcibly will make them stop in most cases as nearly all sex offenders aren't rapists but instead try to woo children the way the rest of us woo other adults. Counselors learning about this and teaching parents to teach them this in parenting books as well as teaching them to do so in school is a very big part of the reduction in sex offenses in our country. Plus, kids who do this are able to bounce back from the abuse because they did not lose control.

Finally, active parents that insist on knowing where there kids are at, who their friends are, and who communicate well with their kids have far less of a chance of this happening. Child predators look for the low hanging fruit and will go after an alcoholic's attention-starved kid - not the one whose parents clearly know where they are and what they are doing.

Those are the 3 things parents should do to protect their kids. Freaking out that sex offenders exist or are in close proximity is ridiculous. Most of them don't offend again after they are caught once, and they have cars. Proximity is irrelevant.

[Widgetcraft]

4chan went through a phase a while back where they were constantly looking up and posting various sex offenders. I'll always remember one, with the worst 'alias' ever: Poops. There were like five variations of it, but it all boiled down to something like Poops McGee.

EDIT: Actually, now that I think on it, I believe the alias was Poopoo.

[bean]

Originally Posted by MagGnome

This level of paranoia bugs me to no end. It's gotten to the point where I feel like I can barely interact with children without someone assuming I'm a pedophile. It's pretty screwed up.

You guys really worry about that? I hug kids spin them around in helicopters and tickle them in non-bathing-suit places. I just only do this when I'm with their parents and they are doing so too.

Again, the thing to worry about as a parent is just private access to them. . . well, I guess I do worry about it a little maybe. I've been asked to babysit before and I've only done it when I've had a girlfriend who will be there too, but the reason in my head is that I don't really know what to do if they act up. I'm great with well-behaved, fun kids, but I have no idea what to do if they act like the little fuckstains I've seen some of my friends kids behave like.

[ExpendableGrunt]

Originally Posted by muddi900

This obsession with paedophilia is weird...

Considering how many militant anti-homosexual crusaders who turn out to be closet self-hating gays, I'd consider anyone who leads the charge against the evil pedophiles to protect the children suspect at the very least.

But, as others have said, this is simply bullet-proof political posturing. Hard to come out against bad legislation when you run the risk of being painted pro-pedophile. I think it's funny (sad, not haha) that most everyone in this thread realizes this, but this flim-flam still works on US voters. The level of ignorance is pretty astounding.

[RandoM51]

I keep hearing predator/prey in this thread. Somebody classed as a predator is obviously somebody who needs to be in prison, not somebody sitting at home bummed out that he can't post on facebook.

This seems pretty over the top to me, more political posturing for the voter than anything else. On top of that, reducing past offenders' options in terms of lawful entertainment seems like a bad idea.

[Wasson_]

Yes. Amongst the laws that need reform, that cause serious problems for legions of people in their day-to-day lives... sex offender, child-care/custody, and oh yes...marijuana possession / usage.

and they just piddle about with Gay marriage and Abortion. shit that's nobodies business. Really now, it don't effect shit.

people just wanna get high, squeeze some titties and then maybe have a kid out of wedlock that they don't know what to do with...I say, throw these people a bone politicians!
/bangs shoe on pedestal.

[Ultima Thulian]

I don't see how this bill will be particularly effective, but I agree with it in principle. Like Ink said, it doesn't seem hard to circumvent it. That being said, there is a lot of hyperbole going on this thread. It's XBOX live, not the fucking Work Force; barring them from playing Halo 3 isn't shutting them out of society. Likewise, complaining about (exaggerated) paranoia about pedophiles while simultaneously engaging in (again, exaggerated) paranoia about being mistaken for a pedophile is both ironic and humorous to me. No one is going to think you're a child-fucker for giving a kid a high-five, Jesus. I do agree, however, that the stigma and categorization of sexual offenders is messed up, though it does vary from state to state.

[Ultima Thulian]

Originally Posted by Wasson_

and they just piddle about with Gay marriage and Abortion. shit that's nobodies business. Really now, it don't effect shit.

Except gays and women. It does "effect" them, but there aren't very many of those around, thankfully. Hopefully Congress understands just that, and after smoking some particularly dank shit, come to realize that we should all get together and be all right. One Love, I miss you Marley.

[Narradisall]

Next step will be making being gay akin to being a sexual predator.

*evil hand rubbing*

[Ultima Thulian]

Originally Posted by Narradisall

Next step will be making being gay akin to being a sexual predator.

*evil hand rubbing*

They've already tried that, sorta. Being gay was considered a mental illness at one time. Don't even get me started on sodomy laws. Currently, the anti-gay movement has been trying to equate homosexuality with pedophilia, saying that pedophiles typically victimize people of the same sex as their own.

[TheFlyingOrc]

Originally Posted by ExpendableGrunt

Considering how many militant anti-homosexual crusaders who turn out to be closet self-hating gays,

An overstated phenomenon.

I'd consider anyone who leads the charge against the evil pedophiles to protect the children suspect at the very least.

The worst possible kind of speculation. There are plenty of perfectly reasonable explanations to why politicians would support this before we need to resort to "They probably wanna have sex with kids themselves!"

[txshurricane]

Originally Posted by Deadend

Treating every other human being as a potential threat? That is a horrible way to live.

That's not fear, that's prudence.
Do you buckle up every time you drive? If so, does that constitute paranoia?

[muddi900]

You are more likely to die by car accident then get raped.