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iPhone App Tracks Sex Offenders
The Narrative Fallacy writes "All 50 states in the US require the 50,000 people convicted of sexual offenses to sign a register so that their whereabouts can be tracked and monitored. The Telegraph reports that now users of the iPhone Offender Locator application can search for sex offenders living nearby a friend or colleague whose address is stored in their Apple iPhone address book, or they can type in a street address to generate a list of convicted sex offenders in the local area. 'Offender Locator gives everyone the ability to find out if registered sex offenders live in their area,' says the application developer, ThinAir Wireless, on its iTunes page. 'Knowledge equals safety. They know where you and your family are...now it's time to turn the tables so that you know where they live and can make better decisions about where to allow your kids to play.' Offender Locator uses the iPhone's built-in GPS to pinpoint the user's location, and then provide a map listing sex offenders in the local area. Tapping on one of the 'pins' dropped on to the map brings up a photograph of the offender, as well as their address, date of birth and list of convictions."
That's great for the very stereotypical creepy, mustachioed child molester, but ever-increasingly the phrase, "sex offender" has nothing to do with children at all. That same title now applies to people convicted of statutory rape, even if they were 17 & 18 at the time. It applies to people who streak, people who are caught skinny-dipping, people who are caught having sex in public (including in their car), and even people who happened to urinate behind a tree in some places. Yet they have the same social stigma & registration entries in the database as people who raped children.
So yeah, it might help protect your children, or it might just show you the house of a guy who really needed to take a leak, and happened to get caught. But hey, feel free to use it and get extremely paranoid at the rapidly growing number of people it shows...
How many more years until realtors no longer sell houses in certain areas to sex offenders? Or even more scary, how long until we only let them live in certain areas? Maybe even put up a fence around the area? Post guards at the gates?
Ya, getting a little dramatic, but this BS where any soccer mom can pick up her iPhone and gawk with her friends at all the "criminals" in their neighborhood.. It's getting sickening..
If these people are still dangerous, keep them locked up. If they are no longer dangerous, don't make public lists that they have to register on.
Either you're guilty and you pay your debt, or you're paid your debt and are no longer guilty.
Personally, if I had a daughter, I'd teach her to be aware of her surroundings and be wary of strangers, just like I was taught. List or no list, if a predator is out there, he's going to hunt. Some list that further punishes those that have paid their debt won't save my child, or yours.
I care more about knowing where known pickpockets are, in relation to my current whereabouts.
Not whether someone got caught taking a piss behind a bush, or who had sex with someone two years younger than them when they were a teenager.
When you overextend a label such as 'sex offender' (adding noise to signal), the label becomes meaningless, and those that actually deserve that label are less noticeable in the noise.
But not before dumb vigilantes attack a few paediatricians ...
Beware! Sex offenders!
Doesn't take much to get people up in arms. Most of us imagine some rampaging dirty old man abducting screaming children from the streets. It's terrible. They need to be tracked and dealt with - obviously.
But what percentage of the sex offenders really fit that description? How many were teenagers whose girlfriend/boyfriend was maybe a year or two younger than themselves? How many offenders were under age themselves at the time of the offence? Which offences are included in the category and what percentage of the offences fit into each of those categories? Does the category include men who have patted a women on the behind and ended up in court on the strength of it? Are women who brazenly expose their breasts at public events included too?
Before we go bandying around the 50,000 figure let's at least establish what it means.
On January 19th, a Florida state appeals court decided that minors could be prosecuted for child pornography even if the subject of that pornography is him/herself. The case involved two Florida teens who took pictures of themselves involved in sexual behavior. The photos were intended for their own personal use and neither teen shared the photos with anyone else. From Police Blotter:
On March 25, 2004, Amber and Jeremy took digital photos of themselves naked and engaged in unspecified âoesexual behavior.â The two sent the photos from a computer at Amberâ(TM)s house to Jeremyâ(TM)s personal e-mail address. Neither teen showed the photographs to anyone else. Court records donâ(TM)t say exactly what happened nextâ"perhaps the parents wanted to end the relationship and raised the alarmâ"but somehow Florida police learned about the photos. Amber and Jeremy were arrested. Each was charged with producing, directing or promoting a photograph featuring the sexual conduct of a child. Based on the contents of his e-mail account, Jeremy was charged with an extra count of possession of child pornography.
Source
"I have downloaded hundreds and hundreds of records, why would I care if somebody downloads ours?" Robin Pecknold
This is where I lose people. How does a list protect you, in _any_ way?
Do you routinely allow your children to walk into the homes of strangers? I suppose this list would tell you what strangers houses should be off limits.
Do you routinely follow _every_ "criminal" on the list in your given area and make certain to call your child on their cell phone to give them directions to "avoid" said "criminal? If so, I suppose this list could help.
Fact of the matter is, list or no list, predators will hunt. They will hunt their prey. Children, cute women, men that look scared, etc, etc, etc. A list will do _nothing_ to stop a predator. Unless you really believe that a sick individual with intentions to harm "your" child really will second guess their decision and decide, "you know what, I'm on a list and should probably stay in and watch a movie instead of picking up and molesting that little boy down the street. I know my loins tingle at the thought but you know, that list calms me right down and makes me not want to do it now!". Ya, the list saved another!
So again, how would a list like this _ever_ make you safer than before you had that list?
As Tarzan of the Apes said to the beautiful young Countess de Coude, "One does not judge the gazelle by the lions that attack it." That book, with that line, read when I was about 14, literally saved my life. I wish all victims of abuse of all kinds could realize this. It's NOT YOUR FAULT!!!
That is a bullshit argument. Are you claiming that your hormones, now that you have children, make you incapable of deciding something rationally? That is sure what it looks like to me.
"It's for the children" won't wash anymore. That excuse has been so grossly abused, and has been the cause of so much injustice, that I feel like spitting on anyone who says it anymore.