If we're splitting hairs, by your definition of a compulsion, a pedophile would rape the first kid they are attracted to on the street, in broad daylight. There's an element of willpower in their waiting, or even just viewing child p*rn instead of openly assaulting or kidnapping kids. That can be extended to not giving in entirely to that compulsion. Call it self-training, like training a dog not to eat food sitting right in front of them.
I think the difference is the amount of help available to a person. An alcoholic has plenty of resources and is generally left alone as long as they dont harm anyone directly. Once a person is labeled as a child pedo, their life is over, regardless if they can resist the urge to not harm anyone. Its not so much giving a pass or empathy to a person inflicted with this behavior, but more so the lack of education, awareness and help for any sexual compulsion.
My understanding is most people sexually abused don't end up becoming abusers themselves. That's some SVU talking trope that most or even some people abused become abusers themselves. Certainly true that a tiny fraction of people sexually abused become abusers, but untrue that the act of being abused significantly increases the likelihood of a person becoming an abuser. My understanding is most of the time people with unwanted sexual compulsions can be effectively treated and aren't lost causes themselves without needing to resort to something like chemical castration or worse. I imagine, of course, there will always be exceptions for stricter monitoring and forms of punishment, likely not even aimed at rehabilitation to reintegrate back into society that you could deem truly lost causes. People truly with no remorse for their actions and zero intent on changing their behavior for the betterment of everyone. I don't know what is considered an effective treatment exactly but I imagine it involves some kind of talk therapy, medication that maybe inhibits libido in some form at least temporarily, being on a tight leash with your parole officer or whoever is monitoring you while still offering helpful resources to maintain being a functioning member of society that doesn't hurt other people or get off on stuff that involves people sexually hurting other people long term. At the same time I don't exactly trust the U.S. penal system to truly rehabilitate people convicted of whatever sexual charges that got them locked up in the first place. It's not like ex-felons in prison are taught rehabilitative skills to help reintegrate back into society. Most of the time it seems like a place where the convicted actually end up worse than they were off prior to conviction.
It’s unforgivable to sexually abuse a child. You are a piece of trash and you have likely ruined a life or lives other than your own. Im ok with life in prison or mental institutions for these offenders, depending on the depravity of the offense(s). Death penalty? Yeah I think it applies in some cases. I have children. If it happened to one of mine, I would probably kill the person If I could get at them. At that point, Im not the law, I am just a very angry/sad/vengeful dad.
I don't know about most of the time. In fact, it seems unlikely to me with someone who could do something so utterly evil in the first place. Do you take that chance by letting them go, and cross your fingers they are cured? What if they don't, and do it again? What if that child had been yours?
Yes there are examples of having tremendous willpower but that's usually the exception not the rule. I don't have a position on this but its not as easy as willpower which most humans don't have great control of.
Pedophilia has been a common and acceptable practice until the early 20th century. I'm guessing it's baked into our dna like alcoholism or degenerate gambling. There are people who can't control their urges but I'm not sure how deep that is other than pop culture references of sexual predators repeating the same crime after they get out. This is a trickier topic than it should be...
It's not a SVU trope and it's not a tiny percentage. https://www.inspq.qc.ca/en/sexual-assault/fact-sheets/sexual-abuse-childhood-perpetrators
I’m incredibly disgusted by the thought of this or by how others could do this to children. I will never understand that level of evil. I won’t even click on the link. Slow torture over a long period, I don’t know. No matter what it is, it won’t be enough.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barry_Crimmins This documentary covers a comedian who was raped repeatedly by one of his mom's boyfriends as a kid growing up and becoming a famous comedian and activist to combat child p*rnography sex trafficking. Saw this a few years ago and it always stuck with me. Not personally a fan of the documentary itself or the man actually until it gets to about halfway and covers the chapters of his life raising awareness about sexual abuse. I think the statistics of males being sexually abused is about 1 in 6. That means for 1 out of every 6 people that are dudes you run into, they've been sexually abused. By the same logic, 1 out of every 6 dudes you walk past is an elevated risk for sexually assaulting children and other adults. While I am not always keen on viewing humanity through an optimistic lens, I have a lot more faith in people than assuming almost 17% of the adult male population are sex criminals that haven't been reported or caught yet. Maybe your viewpoint is different. Even the link cited above says at best you're a 10% greater risk of abusing others if you've been abused yourself. It doesn't factor if you've been abused once or multiple times over or if you've been groomed for years as someone abused. It just cites statistics that not even the authors themselves can say draws reliable conclusions. I think saying if you've been abused and assume those abused will go onto become abusers just helps perpetuate a cycle of false rhetoric that makes people who were abused not want to speak up about what they went through. You're both a victim but also in the eyes of society viewed as a future sex criminal. Seems wrong IMO especially since we're talking about actual victims who have yet to commit any crime and need help and can only really receive help by speaking up. However if you speak up on your abuse, in the eyes of society you're already wrongly presumed of future guilt. Thus why I'm not a big fan of the SVU trope myself. It assumes victims will be future monsters. Real victims watch these shows that get marathoned on cable networks and assume they're doomed to a fate that they never even volunteered for by being abused themselves, don't speak up, don't get help and then actually do get caught up in the cycle. I just personally am not a fan of accusing victims of sexual abuse of future crimes they've yet to commit. It's counter productive to actually helping people who have been sexually abused IMO.
To follow up on some of the other posts I agree that just burying them isn't necessarily the answer but if victims grow up to become abusers is why it is even more important to address this and break the cycle. One of the few positives about how much surveillance and tracking there is in our society is that we have can use those tools to monitor people like this. It's possible we could structure sentences that require for sex offenders to not only have treatment but to be monitored, possibly for the rest of their lives depending on how serious their crimes were. They could be monitored both physically and online. While such a solution would be intrusive compared to the alternatives of locking them up, castration or death might be preferable.
I've seen investigators describe it as a mental illness that even when they don't want to and realize its wrong they can't help their compulsive behavior. they've said they known people who basically chemically castrated themsleves so they can just move forward in society. Its a terrible illness, if they aren't willing to do that, then theres no place for that. Children, the vulnerable, need to be protected and that is absolutely disgusting to imagine this being shared online.
