Most people don’t include the gritty details of their legal pasts under the info section of our Facebook pages. No one is forced to rattle off old parking tickets or to reveal past arrests. But as of August 1, sex offenders and child predators in Louisiana must make their criminal status clear on their social networking pages.
While the standards for sex offender registration and notification have always been high, a new law authored by Louisiana State Representative Jeff Thompson takes public disclosure one step further. It's the first law of its kind in the nation.
Jeff Thompson is the representative who authored the bill, and Jeff Jarvis is a journalism professor at CUNY who's been following its progress.
"What this law does is expand the currently existing notice requirements that Louisiana has had since 1993 to provide information about the people that come into your home by the internet in a social networking, social media settings," Thompson says.
Jarvis' concern with the law stems from the idea of where the line should be drawn on the restriction of sex offenders' rights. He fears that the marking of sex offenders on social networks could establish a precedent for more aggressive marketing. "If we forbid someone to use the internet, or now Facebook, then why not forbid them to use other tools of luring people, which could include their cars or telephones?"
Thompson acknowledges that there is a balance that must be found between First Amendment rights and the importance of public safety, but argues that his law has found it. "It's been a very compassionate, thoughtful process."
"Social media is a street corner, and if you live in the street corner near my house, you've already got to provide me with notice that you're a sexual predator. If you're at a street corner near a school, you must provide that superintendent with notice," Thompson says. In the case of social media, "that street corner is now in my house."
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Comments [4]
There is absolutely no need for the sake of victims, or for community safety to keep persecuting sex offenders after their time in jail.
These laws are useless, hurtful, destructive political ploys to frighten us to vote for those that believe that only an authoritarian state can rule us. I refuse to fall ploy to this demeaning politics, and I oppose with all my will such impositions of further state control. This I do for my children and my family and my community.
In ancient times Leprosy (now called Hansen’s disease) a catastrophic, disfiguring and ultimately fatal disease was wrongly believed to be easily spread. As such, the afflicted were banished for life to avoid any contact with healthy people. The Lepers were required to live in small, isolated parts of the cities or even shunned outside its protective walls. Many were required to wear a bell, similar to a cow bell, which alerted other people of their approach. Some cities also required the Leper continually shout “Unclean, Unclean” as a further warning. As illogical and absurd as the Leper Laws seem in light of our current understanding of Hanson’s Disease contemporary American Society continues to call for similar punitive, illogical and counterproductive statutes against Sex Offenders. The lifetime stigma of being “Unclean” ensured by the Public Registries and the myriad of regulations and restrictions imposed upon the registrants is the same.
The intent of this comparison is to demonstrate how scientifically valid studies have shown that isolation of Sex Offenders is unnecessary and detrimental. It’s a waste of human potential and a waste of public money. These laws deceive the public into thinking they will somehow protect their children from predators, but they do nothing to address the real problems and issues.
Who has read or heard about the recent Brian Bank's case?
If Brian Banks hadn't been on Facebook (a policy violation, but not against the law) then the girl who falsely accused him of rape probably never would have contacted him and then she never would have confessed she lied on tape and so he never would have been exonerated. He'd still be a registered sex offender with all the restrictions, regulations and stigma that goes along with the label. But instead, he's been given a fresh start and a chance at a real life.
There are thousands of people who had an underage girlfriend or boyfriend who they had some sort of sexual contact with and because of the age of consent laws in their state, or even the sodomy laws (oral sex too) and because someone reported them they are labeled a sex offender.
There are thousands of people who never committed a crime at all because an accusation alone with no corroboration is written into the statutes across the U.S. and an angry or vengeful spouse, ex or teen made a false allegation and so they are labeled sex offender.
There are tens of thousands of people whose crime were either viewing or downloading free and readily available child porn on-line or chatted with an undercover cop. They never attempted to meet anyone, they never touched anyone they were living in an on-line fantasy and they are labeled a sex offender.
Banning everyone who bears the stigma sex offender from social media sites making communicating with friends, family, future employers, manufacturers, politicians and customers a felony is not the answer. Neither is requiring them to advertise that they are an RSO to everyone and anyone. No other conviction in the U.S. mandates where you can live, who can live with you, where you can work, what website you can join or that you must announce your criminal history to all who come in contact with you as if you were a leper.
RSO's have the lowest recidivism rates (5.5-8%) of ANY conviction nationwide, but yet the media and politicians love to claim once a sex offender always a sex offender. Or they had 100 victims before they were finally caught. Or we know they will re offend it's just a matter of time. It's all hype and hysteria and the social media policies and laws are too.
Brian Banks' accuser was able to find him because of Facebook, without it he'd still be wrongly labeled with a future of emptiness and non-productivity. Thank goodness he ignored the policy and wasn't forced to post his status and thank goodness he wouldn't have been facing more prison time for a law (like Louisiana passed) that was tagged on years later (ex post facto) to a crime that never even occurred.
Sincerely,
Mary D. Devoy
Executive Director of RSOL of Virginia
rsolvirginia.org
Child sexual abuse is obviously horrible ... Mr. Sandusky might get 500 years ... but in the next town there is an abortion clinic where say 100 children are killed each month ... or more. And they aren't sentenced to anything.
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