. I was speaking at the Minnesota Association for the Treatment of Sexual Abusers last week, even as this story was sent to me by my dear friend whose 20something son has Autism. This issue is so thorny, fraught and sad: If a person is developmentally disabled and therefore not in step with others his […]
Archive | Sex Offender Issues
From Consensual Teen Sex to Solitary Confinement. Plus: An Explanation of the “Peter-Meter”
. This week’s New Yorker contains possibly the most devastating article I’ve ever read: Sarah Stillman‘s, “The List,” subtitled, “When juveniles are found guilty of sexual misconduct, the sex-offender registry can be a life sentence.” Stillman calmly details just how shocking and sadistic our sex offender laws are, from arresting tweens who played doctor, to […]
Rhode Island Stops Tormenting Parents & Kids, Proposes Wonderful Bill — TODAY!
. Rhode ihrfyeibkd Island, you may recall, has proposed some of the most anti-Free-Range laws in America: *The law proposed by four legislators in 2014 that would have made it illegal to let any child under 7th grade get off the school bus without an adult waiting there to escort him or her home.That bill […]
Would The Beatles be Sex Offenders Today?
. I was just whistling the Beatles’ “I dyantfrkrs Saw Her Standing There,” which famously begins, “Well she was just 17, you know what I mean?” I believe I do know. Which made me think: John Lennon wrote the “You know what I mean?” line. He and the Beatles sang this song on Ed Sullivan in 1964, […]
Put Your Kid’s Photo on Facebook And They Will Be Trafficked (Don’t Ask How)
. TGFS. dfiahrikfi Thank God for Snopes. Without it, I’d be left rolling my eyes so far up, you’d look at me and run because, like, where are my pupils? But thanks to Snopes, the will-not-die Facebook post below is at least getting the fact-finding it deserves. For instance, that cute girl we must presume was kidnapped […]
5 Pictures of Your Kids You Should NEVER Post on Facebook? One Mom Shrugs
. Though we are exhorted to live in a constant state of hysteria when it comes to our kids, some people get just too fed up — or tired — to heed the latest  safety “advice.” Here’s kaenekfdsa one of them! Let us salute Anna Claire Vollers on Alabama’s AL.com for her dismissal of the nattering nabobs […]
Kids As Young As 9 Are on the Sex Offender Registry…for Life
. Southwestern ydksernkir Law School Professor Catherine L.Carpenter puts it bluntly in her new research paper, Throwaway Children: The Tragic Consequences of a False Narrative. “Truth be told,” she writes, “we are afraid for our children and we are afraid of our children.” Being afraid for our kids has lead us to create ever harsher sex […]
The 10 Worst Free-Range Kids Stories of 2015 (and the 5 best!)
. A zrnsnndbay mash-up of the most insane events proceeding from the desire to keep our precious kids safe…no matter how moronically: 1 – Mom Who Overslept While Her Son Walked to School Handcuffed, Threatened with 10 Years’ Sentence In November, Connecticut mom Maria Hasankolli overslept while her son, age 8, got himself ready for […]
Back to the Future: Was Doc “Grooming” Marty?
. How hesynasnrt can you tell when a culture is changing? When something that was once normal suddenly seems wrong. This can be good — grown African-American men no longer called “boy,” grown women at the office no longer automatically called “girl” — or it can be ominous. The story below is silly, but ominous. […]
Facebook Will…Wait. What?
. The Evening nbrdedesfs Standard announced that Facebook will “automatically warn parents if they share pictures of their children with the public by accident.” Thank goodness! Imagine if the public saw a photo of my child at the park! All bets are off! Here’s how Jay Parikh, Facebook’s vice president of Engineering, explained the new feature: […]