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Fighting Paedophilia

Oct 01, 2012 Editorial

Last week, “Child Protection Week” was observed with a flurry of activities by the Human Services and Social Security Ministry under the theme “Adults – take action against child abuse – the time is now”. Cabinet spokesperson Dr Roger Luncheon (still on the job after his copyright faux pas) averred that in Guyana, the adults in politics are taking action by strengthening the existing Sexual Offenders Act with the Prevention of Crimes Amendment Bill which will be debated in the upcoming parliamentary session.
The good doctor of the Office of the President took pains to assure that, “In those two pieces of legislation, convicted paedophiles would be subjected to monitoring for life.” We believe that the government, and especially the OP, could have sent the strongest possible signal that it was serious about fighting paedophilia by being more forthcoming in a case that hit the headlines two years ago. To the public at large it appeared that a cover-up had been effected.
Paedophiles can be found in every demographic category: old, young, educated, uneducated, professional, non-professionals – and of all races, colours and creeds. Typically, however, the paedophile is male, single, seemingly fascinated with children – especially around puberty and targets shy, handicapped, and withdrawn children, or those who come from troubled homes. They work to master their manipulative skills and often unleash them on troubled children by first becoming their friend, building the child’s self-esteem.
At the time of the high-profile paedophile case, which was incidentally when the Sexual offenders Act was in parliament, we had editorialised: While the bill addresses some of the issues emanating from paedophilic behaviour they do so in a generalised fashion. We believe that the matter is serious enough to warrant specific legislation. Take the issue of bail: the above cited instance of an alleged paedophile committing sexual offenses while out on bail is not the exception – it is rather the norm. This circumstance raises the larger issue of exactly how is society to deal with a crime that incarceration appears to have no effect in diminishing.
Because of the deep-seated nature of the paedophilic imperative, some in the medical community have begun to view paedophilia as a disease rather than a crime. They have amassed evidence that at least some violent and antisocial behaviour have genetic links and signposts, but have been unable to isolate a biological cause for paedophilia. In our view, it is a mistake to label a behaviour—even a behaviour with some biological and genetic determinants—a “disease” because it ultimately means abandoning the concept of volition altogether. To do so would place us on a very slippery slope – for if there is no volition where is the crime?
The repercussion from the activities of paedophiles reverberates so widely that we need to even revisit the putative benefits of incarcerating the offender after conviction. In the developed countries, lifetime recidivism rates show that “rehabilitation” alone in jails have not been very effective for sex offenders, and we know that deterrence is unlikely when most offenders are able to “get away with” multiple acts before apprehension. Now it would not be practical from an economic standpoint to keep all convicted paedophiles locked up for life: the only treatment that works and is feasible is castration of male offenders.
There have been much debate and discussion on the long-term deleterious effects of corporal punishment on children but these pale almost into significance when compared to those of paedophilia. While it may sound harsh, in an effort to stop male paedophiles, male child molesters have the option of being chemically castrated in several states in the US. “Chemical castration” is a term used to describe treatment with a drug called Depo-Provera – a common birth control pill for women – that, when given to men, acts on the brain to inhibit hormones that stimulate the testicles to produce testosterone. The only drawback is that the drug had to be administered monthly and may be counteracted.
In Guyana, we propose that the procedure must be made mandatory on convicted paedophiles.

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