One of the best ways to keep kids safe and away from sex offenders is to provide a network of support around them.
That was the message presented Friday night by Alison Feigh, director of the Jacob Wetterling Foundation, at the Northland Arboretum. Full Article
Actually keeping kids away from sex offenders is no guarantee that they will remain safe. Once more the stranger danger is amplified while the danger of knowing someone too well is ignored. Moreover not every sex offense involves children, teenagers, adults, or even physical/in person contact.
Want kids to be safe? How about making sure no child is at risk to commit any kind of offense as a child, later throughout adolescence, and finally at any point as an adult. It seems people forget that all people start out basically the same as babies. Maybe now with around 7 billion people in the world its time to work on life long measures globally that insure new borns for the entirety of humanity in the future are born into a civilization where risk of someone committing a crime in their lives has been reduced to 5% or less. Yes this requires a lot of difficult work over generations, and centuries if not longer, but doing anything short of everything possible is not a good excuse anymore.
Another approach is to adjust the definition of sexual abuse / assault. A non-forcible relationship with a 17, 16, even 15 year old is NOT sexual abuse / assault in a sane world. Certainly not in a country where 12/13/14 year olds are not only prosecuted for crimes, but prosecuted as ADULTS.
Having an inappropriate conversation, with a fake or real person, under a certain age is not sexual abuse / assault. Having photos of a top-less teenager is not sexual abuse / assault.
There are many more instances of conduct that are NOT sexual abuse / assault. All this in a country in which the killing of 10s of thousands of children by its military all over the world is called ‘collateral damage’.
My opinion, feel free to disagree.
“Wetterling Foundation:” I hate that name for all the horror and terror against people those kooks have caused. And all the dead people that have served their time too! I also hate any other organization that keeps the myths and lies alive.
“Every kid should have five grownups in their life that form a safety net,” Feigh said. Often in these “safety nets” is where children are abused.