The ethics of permanent public shaming of sex offenders
A new WA website which give the location of sex offenders may win public applause -- but does it really protect the community? Legal ethicist Neil Watt probes the rights and wrongs.
Oct 17, 2012
A new WA website which give the location of sex offenders may win public applause -- but does it really protect the community? Legal ethicist Neil Watt probes the rights and wrongs.
"Does permanent public shaming run contrary to rehabilitation, which requires that the former offender be afforded the opportunity to normalise their life within a community?"Ethics, at its heart, refers to those principles that promote healthy communities (or "human flourishing" as the classicists would have it). So honesty, politeness, mutual respect, courage, generosity, wisdom have been valued for as long as people started living in groups. It could be argued that the WA Community Protection website aligns with this aim as it promotes public safety. But does it? How? The answer should be provided on the website itself -- and the opportunity is right there in the answer to this frequently asked question: "What if I recognise a person’s photograph on this site?" Answer: "The photographs are provided primarily for the purposes of enhanced public awareness and safety. You can contact police if you have genuine concerns about your safety or the safety of any other person or to report suspicious behaviour." In other words, there’s not much you can do -- but the WA government wants you to know that there's bad guys living in your neighbourhood. Feel safer now? So what do you do with that information. Does knowing really promote community protection or is it far more likely to promote public fear against a group who, for the most part are not an ongoing threat? In fact, the possibility of vigilantism is a far greater threat to public safety than the offenders. For most of us, however, it simply adds to a general feeling of unease in our neighbourhoods and that is rarely healthy. Truth is we already know our communities are made up of all manner of people -- some we like and some we don’t; some we're glad to have around and others we wish would move somewhere else. The good, bad and downright ugly are everywhere. The challenge for all of us is to find ways to make our society function with all its diversity -- and that includes ways of reintegrating offenders back into the community so that they, and we, can get on with our lives in peace. Feeling safe is an important part of that and along with our own vigilance we expect governments to play a lead role in public safety. It doesn't help when the governments we entrust with this responsibility waste resources that play on the genuine fears of some without actually investing in strategies that reduce the likelihood of crime. Showmanship it is -- but community protection it ain't. *Neil Watt is a lawyer and consulting ethicist based in Sydney
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Hey, I’m 17 and this is what I think.
We are exposing people who have commited a crime aimed at a certain age group. Implying that the threat may be only towards that same age group. Therefore, exposing people who can be a potential threat to, in this case, kids, is only a good thing.
I repeat, I am 17 and I’m not a doctor nor am I a psychologist, but my assumption (and feel free to correct me) is that pedophilia is not a result of financial harship, stress etc, whta I’m trying to say is that this is something deeply implanted in the brain of a person. Its not like commiting a robbery, getting a slap on the wrist and a warning and thats it. This is a crime that results in serious prolonged trauma in the life of the victim. Right? Therefore, I fail to see how ‘protecting’ and giving these people [pedophiles] a chance to reintegrate back into the community and return onto the path of ‘normality’ is remotely possible. Exposing them, shaming them is a form of punishment, I agree. Yet doing the opposite is a perk that a man/woman who has sexually molested a child, should not get. I am all for it.
The article says we have to find ways to make our society function; ‘protecting’ from the community people who have commited a crime such as pedophilia is not making society function. Perosnally I believe jail terms are not necessarily the approriate punishment for people such as these, who have decided to take a person’s humility for the rest of thei life. Shaming is the right punishment.
I am for it.
Is it any more than base political opportunism in politicising, to the lowest common emotive denominator, a complex issue?
An issue that needs more than this sort of cheapjacks policy making to address it.
I agree with your ethical statements, but I would like to see references for your assertion that child-sex offenders mostly don’t present an ongoing danger. The stats I’ve seen indicate that child-sex offenders put a lot of effort into creating new “opportunities”, and generally have multiple victims.
Yes, it starts close to the family, where the pedophile can take advantage of assumed trust, but those fake-trust relationships can be recreated elsewhere.
Disgraceful. Irresponsible. Words fail me!
Ollie, at least you have your age as an excuse. How old are the WA Liberal MPs who voted for this? Old enough to know better, methinks.
Hi Clytie. I didn’t say there was no risk, just that in comparison to other crimes the risk of recidivism among this group is lower (see for example the research of Lievore (2005)). The main point I make, though, is that our communities are not made safer by websites like this which run counter to rehabilitative strategies.
Humiliation is not a good way to make people behave better.
Ollie Bolli, by the same logic you could apply the same type of “punishment”, ie. permanent, even after completing a jail sentence – to drink drivers.
Drinking alcohol (to excess) and then driving is not, “a result of financial hardship, stress etc….. [it] is something deeply implanted in the brain of a person” (and I’m not a psychologist either).
It’s not that long ago that homosexuality was a crime in several states – the last being Tasmania (I think). How outrageous would it be if people who were convicted of homosexuality were made to pay (after serving a jail sentence) by being outed on a government website? Many people are repulsed by even the thought of pedophilia but the things they say about peds now are very similar to the things some people said about gays and buggery and bestiality 20-30 years ago.
Shaming is a punishment alright but I think it’s gutless and primitive and I’m against it.
“Humiliation is not a good way to make people behave better.”
How do you plan to make a pedophile behave better? Tell him that what he is doing is very naughty?
Suspend him from the community for him to just return to his habits sooner or later?
Humiliation results in solitude. Perhaps solitude is the preferrable state for a child sex offender… methinks.
It’s just a populist website that empowers vigilantes to abuse those who appear on the list and hound them out of town. If it is important to recognise a sex offender to “be safe”, then there is a powerful argument to remove such people permanently from society. Clinical expertise should be able to give guidance on this not a dodgy website. When they did this in England, paedriatricians had bricks thrown through their windows because they got on the list.