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Originally Posted by Calgaryborn
Concessions and special treatment??? I think you are undervaluing the impact a pedophile has on his/her victims. As I've said we had a similar instance within the church I attend. Those who had been abused suffered while the guy was still there. I was easily able to look at the situation and use reason. I didn't feel the violation or the terror that these ladies felt. He couldn't harm them but, his presence churned up those feelings within them.
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I'm not clear, was the the guy the actual abuser of the abused? Or the people had been abused by someone else and just felt because this guy was also a pedophile that somehow that threatened them?
If it was their actual abuser, yes I could see how that would be more difficult to cope with, someone should find a different church in that case.
If it was just some other random guy, then sorry but while I do understand that his presence would "churn up those feelings", I don't think that's reason enough to, what, boot the guy from church? What church isn't going to have people who have been abused? You're saying this guy shouldn't be allowed to go to church at all? What if he's in church to try and get help, isn't church where he should be going?
What if it's not a pedophile, but a rapist who served his time and is out now? If someone in your church had been raped, does that mean the rapist has to be evicted from the church just so someone doesn't feel bad?
Or a guy who beat his wife? Yelled at his kids?
If a person is a clear danger to society, lock them up. If they aren't then they're free and have the same rights as the rest of us.
If someone who's been abused gets emotions they can't deal with when they enter the same building as a pedophile, I think that person needs help with their mind. Being abused is a terrible thing, but it doesn't have to be so debilitating (yes for some people it is, but I think with help it's possible for those people to become stronger).
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I pick my standard of justice, naturally. But I could live with something close to mine. You would think if the goal was a penalty equal to the seriousness of the crime we could probably come close to one another's opinion. At the very least in the end we could both say: he recieved a degree of punishment. The problem is by almost every Canadian's standards this fellow still has a debt to pay. Those who feel this way should express it and act accordingly.
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Definitely, laws don't change without input from the people.
I'm not a big proponent of punishment, it doesn't really accomplish anything, I could see where it is a deterrent and that works for things like running a red light or drinking and driving, but for the really extreme stuff it doesn't really mean anything.. how many pedophiles are there that sit in their basement and say "man, if only it wasn't illegal, oh well, I guess I'll play some golf." or how many sociopaths think "gee, that guy got a lot of prison time, maybe I shouldn't kill and eat this person"? In those cases punishment doesn't mean anything, and until we can actually know how to fix those people no solution is satisfying.