International Laws...

I know we were just chatting about homeschooling in other lands.  Sometimes I'll be in contact with homeschoolers from the UK, Australia and even strange places like Vermont.  You'd be surprised at all the different laws that exist in other places. 

It's surprising the things you find out just doodling around on the 'web.  Like the criteria for pedophilia.  See, I always thought it was "inappropriate obsession and/or *contact* with people who are just plain old too young to be obsessed about or um, *contacted*."  That was my working definition, anyway. 

I don't know what the criteria is, precisely, for Missouri (it probably doesn't include the little stars)... but that's sort of what I figure most reasonable people would think all the world over.  In PRACTICE, though, I can tell you that unfortunately the court system does somewhere between little and nothing to protect children around these parts.  Enter yourself a little plea bargain on a lesser charge and you get probation.  No lists, and the neighbours will never know.  "Worm," as the child's mother calls him, is not going to get any treatment, but betya he WILL be a lot more careful next time.  Sickening.

But maybe "the courts failing to protect people" is just the same all the world over.

Here's a little dandy from Australia.  Imagine being privileged enough to send your boy off to an exclusive boarding school.  Being hopeful that this will give your son the edge he needs to get into a good university and so on.  But later you discover the "housemother" provides literal sex ed lessons and in short, is a perv.  Eeew. 

And it's a "judge only" trial.  Wouldn't want the name of the school to get out or have this poor, poor bipolar person who couldn't POSSIBLY control her lust with little kids to be shamed.  Sorry.  Stuff like that is sure to help bipolar people be accepted as normal, everyday folks who just have a little regulation problem every now and again, eh?  I "get" that bipolar is hard to deal with.  I live with at least one person who is bipolar and I am NOT on any sort of "bipolar acceptance" blogrings, boyo.  But bipolar doesn't excuse pedophilia, shopping sprees, or... anything.  It might be a contributing factor in letting things get out of control, but it is not an excuse, and it doesn't mean people should be lenient with you.

Rich people do not always get justice.  I read about these children and was just positively sick.  They couldn't even go home and talk to Mum about what happened; they were trapped.  Yet the person who did this, who admits she did this, "could not technically be classed as a paedophile, as her sexual activity with children occurred over five months, not the six required for the diagnosis."

Something is realllly wrong with that.