RantWoman is goaded to write by her morning blog reading, link shown at the bottom.
RantWoman is seasoning an email to staff at her housing community about the presence, horrors, of an admitted pedophile in our midst. Bear in mind, members of our communities are mostly not Quakers used to waiting in silence together under care of the purifying power of the Divine. The percentage of Highly Challenging Personalities and Very Difficult Life Issues is off the charts, even compared to the average Friends' Meeting. RantWoman notes a further correction: we have one known, acknowledged pedophile among us. How many more unacknowledged ones we have NO CLUE.
RantWoman has known of this individual for some time. He volunteers at one of the computer lab projects RantWoman has been involved with. He is actually one of the calmer of the volunteers, though RantWoman finds herself wondering whether appropriate medication may have something to do with this. Information about this person came to light about the same time RantWoman was having other conversations that started out more pedestrianly about simpler safety concepts. RantWoman first learned of this person's interests in context of discussing something else and the suggestion that RantWoman put this person's name into the search engine of her choice. Little did she know...
RantWoman cannot decide whether this person is brave, crazy or some of both to be speaking so openly of this fact of his life. RantWoman lacks the proper letters behind her name to opine, but that has never stopped her before: it seems possible, if one is beset by constant urges, that talking about said urges offers at least tangential ways of addressing them especially if other options are definitely inappropriate.
This person has never been convicted of anything and he at least smiled when RantWoman said she will have to cross him off her childcare list. He and RantWoman also had a good general conversation about different issues and perspectives that came up in Friends' Meeting. RantWoman did have a conversation with someone else in a position to know about one of those sad issues of digital inclusion that happens sometimes when one must consume one's porn in a semi-public place regardless of who might find indications left behind. Unfortunately, given the topic, the traces left behind are a big problem.
RantWoman knows lots of people who use computers in the library or in other public settings such as underfunded computer labs. RantWoman can tell sometimes just from accompanying sound effects that some of the people using the computers in such places are using them to consume porn. RantWoman generally thinks that consuming porn involving consenting adults is totally permissible and she can even sometimes be tender about the circumstances that cause people to do this. RantWoman definitely is less than charmed about sharing public space with people doing so. Still, RantWoman supposes that she needs to note the digital inclusion issue here and possibly ship the item off to someone who might put data points together differently than RantWoman alone has.
RantWoman thinks that this person being public likely will cause many sensibly to avoid him but will not necessarily help protect them from all the other people out there who might have similar problems. RantWoman is grateful at least that this person listened well to RantWoman's account of how talking about such topics can affect people with victimization experiences and how such folk find help they need and to the thought of empowering children.
RantWoman thinks she must tell this person he must never, ever, under any circumstances be alone with a child; this point dovetails with other safety issues RantWoman was already working about her computer lab projects. This person also understood RantWoman's perspective that sometimes excluding a problem person from part of a conversation helps other people be clearer.
RantWoman so wishes her daily problem list were a little simpler.
With an eye to keeping RantWoman grounded if she does send said email...
http://rantwomanrsof.blogspot.com/2009/06/safest-sex-offender-on-planet.html
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