Will Sex Offense Registry Changes be Part of Criminal Justice Reform?
The killing of George Floyd at the hands of law enforcement has sparked outrage and mass protests across the nation. Calls for police reform have created yet another divide among the American public. As we move toward what will likely be significant changes to the criminal justice system, will individuals on the sex offense registry be included in those reforms?
Why So Many Laws?
Throughout history the level of outrage associated with various types of criminals has changed, yet the moral disgust directed at sex offenses and sex offenders has remained constant. We use terms like “sexual predator” and “monster” indiscriminately to refer to individuals who have committed crimes ranging from minor sexual offenses to violent sexual assaults that end in murder. We pass laws to control sexual offenders based on the most high-profile and serious cases, yet most offenders do not fit these categories.
While legal control over sexual behavior can be traced to the earliest of civilizations, the 1980s and 1990s is when sex offense legislation began its dramatic rise in the U.S. There was an increase in the number of child sexual abuse cases prosecuted by the courts and recounted in the media. The high-profile disappearance of Jacob Wetterling, the sexual assault and murder of Megan Kanka, the abduction and murder of Amber Hagerman, and the kidnapping and murder of Polly Klaas were all presumed to involve children brutally harmed or murdered by previously convicted sexual offenders. These events launched a new wave of stranger-danger panic and get-tough legislation which remains today, despite minimal, if any, impact on sex offense recidivism or community safety.
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I know it’s easy to see such a movement going on and think, “hey what about us?” When’s it our turn? Well, let’s just hope that 50 years from now we’re not sitting here having the same conversations about sex law reform. This is their moment; a reckoning with the system at large, one we must all support. It’s been a long time coming and it would be a mistake to send a message to the public that says, “hey, this is about us too!” It’s not. Black men are being shot for being black and that must stop whatever it takes. Apparently good laws written forbidding such abhorrent behavior are being ignored by law enforcement and punishment is being evaded. We, however, ie our movement is simply about unconstitutional laws being used to forever punish and shame. We did wrong, we paid our debt, we get to have a chance at a better go of it. Period. Regardless of how anyone feels or whether or not anyone likes us. We are not asking to be understood, we are simply asking for the laws under which we suffer be in line with the Constitution. They are not shooting us, yet and I truly believe our turn is soon in coming.
I find your post thoughtful. But I don’t think it is right.
There doesn’t have to be a “what about us?” question because there is no “us”. Us is them. The $EX Offender Registries (Hit List) are just yet another part of the out-of-control, nanny big government (NBG) that is running an idiotic, illegal, and immoral incarceration business, all throughout America. The Hit Lists do not stand apart from the rest of NBG’s criminality. It is just one more harassment scheme that they created and are expanding as much as they can, in order to grow their business and brand. Their law enforcement criminals (LECs) are right there cheering it all on and trying it grow it as large as possible.
The Hit Lists are part of this movement. They are part of BLM. Nanny big government (NBG) is too big. NBG is out-of-control. NBG’s enforcers, a.k.a. the LECs, are out-of-control. All of it needs to be defunded, reduced, made less capable of harm, and neutralized.
I don’t know the facts, but it certainly appears to me that most of the people who have been attacked and murdered by law enforcement, have committed crimes before. They have been customers of the incarceration business. NBG loves encouraging those people to commit crimes and once a person has, that person is a customer that they don’t want to lose. NBG is going to do what they can to keep that customer coming back again and again. They do murder some of their customers every once in a while.
When a person is listed on the Hit List, that person is just another customer. I expect you know that people of color are disproportionately represented on the Hit Lists. Why would that possibly be? Because it’s part of the incarceration business. Those people of color who are listed are part of this movement. And I guarantee you that they are much more likely to be murdered by law enforcement than anyone else.
This country belongs to us – all people who believe in actual freedom and limited government. It is time to take the country back.
Yes, this was a comment that even in the last few days, i have changed my mind a bit on. If criminal justice reform is to be the issue at large, we most definitely need to be a part of that.
This week an elderly woman was violently assaulted by a man who has been arrested over 100 times. Obviously this man is a threat to society and should remain behind bars. While someone commits a sex offense with one arrest that get years beyond bars and when they get out they still have invisible bars around them. Something is seriously wrong with our legal system. Its about time true criminals stay behind bars, not someone who has been a law abiding citizen for decades that pissed outside or did other things legal at the time. Societal norms change human behavior doesn’t.
Okay, so TODAY (6/15/2020) the 1964 Civil Rights Act has been extended by the Supreme Court to include workplace discrimination protections to the LGBTQ+ community.
How is the Act not applicable to us now? We are discriminated against before we get a job because we are on the registry, and fired once they find out we are on the registry.
Oh, that’s right. We are not included in the “ALL Americans” cabal. Fu¢k the U$A!
Hey JZ, I feel what you’re saying!
But I don’t say FU to the USA…
I say FU to the people who twist our beloved constitution in order to suit their own needs for hatred and revenge!!
Just my take on it.
Registrants are discriminated against because they are public.
Revert to a non-public police registry, as we used to have here and as we still have in Canada and other countries (and a few states), and a lot of that discrimination will evaporate. But when the state is publicly reporting an individual’s worst problems, what’s an employer (or their insurer) supposed to think?
The topic of registrants as a protected class comes up a lot on this forum. But they are not eligible to be a protected class under the text of the Civil Rights Act or other law that I am aware of. And fighting for “sex offender protection” (as detractors and the media would refer to it) might be an even tougher battle than a police registry. At least for the latter, we have studies and good precedent!
Are you are anyone going to ask that it be? What is the plan?
Hey Debi.
Great, incisive questions!
Here’s how I see it (and this is just my opinion):
This organization (and the others like it) are totally 100% volunteer.
SO’s like us only earn 1/2 (and often less) than other workers for the same job because our bosses know how hard it is for us to get another job. So we spend a lot of time scratchin’ and survivin’.
Even though we are very loosely organized, we suffer from an acute lack of funding (see above).
We live in a glass house. When we start talking about our rights, people get abrasive very quickly.
All we can do, it seems, is to ask each other to post and email and write-via-snail-mail and make phone calls as much as we can tear away from our days of scratchin’ and survivin’ to try just to stay afloat.
So here’s the deal (as I see it) – and, believe me, I am just a nobody – make a plan for yourself to help. Make phone calls. Write letters. Send emails. Strike up conversations. Learn to be an effective speaker.
It’s truly up to YOU and each one of us. This is truly about as grassroots as it gets!
Email [email protected] and ask if you can volunteer.
If you haven’t yet, look for NARSOL online.
You’ve heard of pulling oneself up by the bootstraps? This is it!
Just some ideas to chew on.
Yours with Deep Respect
JJJJ
If you call yourself a “sex offender”, or allow others to, you’ll likely always get less than others. Anyone who allows the Registry Hit List to be inflicted upon them without retaliating, is going to get a lot of immoral harassment.
Don’t accept it. Don’t accept lesser pay. Change and move. If you have to, create your own employment and be your own boss. The bottom line is to not accept it.
Also, the Hit List is naturally worthless. But people who are forced to be listed on it need to ensure that it is a lot worse than just worthless. Very few Registry Supporters/Terrorists are getting $$$ or anything else of value from the Hit List, but all good Americans need to ensure that the Hit List costs as much as possible, in time, money, morale, empathy, everything. The Hit Lists must cost and have consequences.
Amen, Will Allen! … Silence and Inaction = Consent!
Except I don’t call it a hit list.
I call it a Government Blacklist.
It is what fascists, and other control nuts, have used for centuries.
The plan is to keep funding our legal challenges to the registry. You’re doing that, right?
Also, and I missed this, do what JJJJ suggests.
Debi
I agree with everything that JJJJ posted. I would add If you know of others who share your opinions encourage them to get involved. No matter if it’s Standing up; Speaking up; or organizing groups to mobilize in state capitals. 25 years of this modern day slavery based on lies and fear has been going on long enough.
The lawmakers will always do what’s politically safe for them. They are the cowards ruling the swamp.
Civil discourse (marching, demonstrating and protesting) will never, ever work for this crowd.
Only organized and universal acts of defiance will.
Short answer, NO. As eloquent as Ms. Zilney is, despite an obvious copy & paste fail, “If the U.S. moves forward with a public registry,” politicians and the “average” citizen don’t bother to concern themselves with facts. They make decisions based on emotions, hatred being the most dominant.
Now, more than ever, “Americans” need a common enemy as to avoid coming to grips with things like “systemic” racism, wealth inequality, etc. “Sex offenders” will always be the go-to “whipping boy” to vent all grievances. Unless there are federal laws enacted to undo AWA, states, counties, cities, and municipalities will continue to craft and enact increasingly draconian punishments.
I hold out no hope for any “justice” reforms for “the likes of us.”
I agree with you look at the people that are calling for taking down statues of confederate soldiers. When they lived at a time when slavery and racism was tolerated. Registration and mass incarceration affects African Americans at higher rates today; yet nobody calls it out in public. How can we learn from history if we tear everything down because we are afraid to look at the hard truth? Just like today how can we face what’s being done if we can’t acknowledge the truth of what is being done in modern slavery.
No