My friends and I were talking and the topic of internet pedophilia came up. You hear about it all the time and there's even a T.V. show (forgot the name) devoted to catching these old creeps. Anyway, I thought it would be interesting to Google this and see what comes up and a lot of these articles actually turned up pretty informative.
http://www.crime-research.org/articles/904/ (Article)
There are different ways in which an offender can exploit a vulnerable child in cyberspace. Many offenders resort to seduction to lure their victims in. "These individuals are often willing to devote considerable amounts of time, money and energy in this process. They listen to and empathize with the problems of children. They will be aware of the latest music, hobbies, and interests of children” [3]. In a sense, these individuals are attempting to build up a virtual relationship/friendship where in reality they can eventually gain the child’s trust.
When characterizing high tech pedophiles that have been arrested, Special Agent and Chief Spokesman Pete Gulotta of the FBI’s "Innocent Images" Unit, says “they.re almost all white males between the ages of 25 and 45. "We’ve had military officers with high clearances, pediatricians, lawyers, school principals, and tech executives" [5].
Many kids (boys and girls) are logging onto the web these days and so are sexual offenders. These predators lurk the web hoping to gain an "innocent" connection with a child when in fact they're trying to get something sexual out of that relationship. They would try to gain a child's trust and use that as a way to convince them into whatever they want.
It's scary to read about how much time and work they devote into doing what they do. They are committed. But all I'm thinking about is how could anyone be so dumb to fall for such people? Either they're really dumb or the pedophiles are really convincing in their words. What types of conniving strategies are they using? How do they get a child out of their seats, away from the keyboard, and into their houses or wherever it is they go? Those are some serious skills. It also doesn't surprise me that men with legit careers are a part of this issue. So many people live half-lives these days and these are probably busy guys that don't have time to form real life relationships, but apparently have time to online flirt with underage children.
http://jahonline.org/article/S1054-139X(04)00171-5/abstract (Survey)
A national survey of a stratified random sample of 2574 law enforcement agencies conducted between October 2001 and July 2002. Telephone interviews were conducted with local, state, and federal law enforcement investigators concerning 129 sexual offenses against juvenile victims that originated with online encounters.
Victims in these crimes were primarily 13- through 15-year-old teenage girls (75%) who met adult offenders (76% older than 25) in Internet chat rooms. Most offenders did not deceive victims about the fact that they were adults who were interested in sexual relationships. Most victims met and had sex with the adults on more than one occasion. Half of the victims were described as being in love with or feeling close bonds with the offenders. Almost all cases with male victims involved male offenders. Offenders used violence in 5% of the episodes.
I was surprised after reading that most of these offenders didn't try to hide their ulterior motives. And I was even more surprised that even after knowing this that these kids claim to be in love with or have formed a close bond with the offenders. Obviously all they're looking for is sex and nothing more. These kids are too naive and that's why they're the main targets concerning this issue. With the rise of the new technological era, parents need to be more aware of the dangers the internet has on their children. I read this other article about a mom not even knowing that child pedophilia existed online until it happened to her son. Parents need to sit down and have conversations with their kids about not talking to strangers online or try to keep a distance if so.
Apparently these kids see it more as a mutual connection than a sexual offense. But I wonder how many of them will actually look back on this years later and realize that all it really was was a deceitful ploy to exploit their bodies. None of these men have any actual interest in developing a genuine relationship with them nor do they really care about getting to know them.
http://www.chainofchange.com/community-tv-networks-1/ (Video)
A group of girls decide to create a fake MySpace account pretending to be the typical 16 year old teen. Her profile describes her as a cheerleader, tennis player, and a skater who loves to shop and all that cliche stuff.
This is a video demonstrating a typical case of online chatting between an older guy looking for more than a "friendship" with an underage teen girl. Even though he doesn't explicitly say so, it's pretty obvious. No regular person you meet over the internet would tell you he wants to hear your voice or want to "get to know you better in person." Mind as well just glue a big sign on your forehead that says CHILD PREDATOR.
Most of the teens interviewed in the video seems to be aware of such cases though. That at least reassures me that there are plenty of girls (and boys) out there that are mature enough to recognize such a situation and know how to handle it carefully. Younger children need to be educated about this as well but I'm pretty sure most people have a basic understanding that strangers are not to be easily trusted.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Carrie,
ReplyDeleteYou read and write and summarize and argue well.
What seems to be lacking is a sense of empathy. Is it possible that your scorn for the "dumb victims" and claim that there's "nothing but" sex on the offenders minds are oversimplifications, that conveniently let you avoid the real issue?
It seems to me that part of the real issue is that many people, certainly including many teens, feel lonely, and unvalued. And a connection with someone who is interested in your feelings is pretty rare, and usually important to people. Does the involvement of sex mean that the rest was all just a fake-out? Don't teens also feel desire?
You seem to have begun with the assumption of "tricky predators" and "dumb victims". And those assumptions didn't let you figure out anything deeper than the typical dumb judgmental perspective of the mainstream media. I find that disappointing, since as an intelligent teen you are in a position where (if you don't cover your eyes) you could actually see what's happening in a more nuanced way.