Poll: Morality of To Catch a Predator.

[CplDustov]

I was under the impression that the police doing that is some form of entrapment. Isn't that illegal? How does that work?

 

[crimsonshrouds]

hmm i find it interesting how pedophillia is now against the law when not even a hundred years or more ago a girl would get married as soon as they hit puberty.

Now i don't support it in any way but from a historical stand point its interesting to see how civilization has changed.

The only thing that bothers me is when the police bait people with hookers.

Thats because of a big change in womens rights, they are now allowed to choose who they marry, instead of just being told to marry someone

Yea i know that.

 

[Dags90]

So you're saying a pedophile doesn't deserve to be convicted as a pedophile if he was enticed to do an illegal act?

If I'm understanding that correctly, this approach would free a lot of people from responsibility for crimes. If a pedophile's crime is forgivable because he was lead to do so by a decoy pretending to be a minor, then a pedophile's crime would also be forgivable if he was lead to do so by a very flirtatious, genuine minor who convinced him to do something illegal he wouldn't have done otherwise. I don't believe that being enticed relieves someone of moral responsibility.

That's not what people are suggesting. It's a specific thing called entrapment when police officers coerce or deceive people into breaking the law and it's usually illegal. It pretty much boils down to "Those in the business of catching people breaking the law should have no business in enticing or coercing to break those laws for the purpose of arresting those people."

 

[Cheery Lunatic]

It does smell of entrapment, to be honest.

I wish they just stopped at publicly shaming them on national television rather than actually arresting them. It gets the message across more and prisons wouldn't be as clogged up.

 

[PettingZOOPONY]

Who cares these people were going to go fuck children, we need to stop protecting these pieces of shit while the honest people of the world get fucked by the same system that is suppose to get rid of these animals.

 

[Kortney]

I don't believe that being enticed relieves someone of moral responsibility.

I think it does to an extent. A few people on the show have been quite visibly, for a lack of a better word, mentally retarded.


Enticing that man to commit a crime is immoral. Putting it on television is immoral.

 

[PettingZOOPONY]

If you can be enticed to commit a heinous act like that you are not a man but a animal and deserve no rights.

 

[AugustFall]

He was on the chat room talking to underage girls/boys whatever. He was through the looking glass.

Ask yourself this: What if it wasn't a fake kid he was talking to online? The situation would be the same but he would have gotten away with it.

Edit: If you've seen the show you know that they don't ask the perp to show the "kid" pictures of their genitalia. They don't say, "Hey let's have sex." These guys are in the chatrooms looking for underage kids, face it.

 

[manaman]

Note: This thread is a discussion of the NBC program "To Catch a Predator". For those of you who aren't familiar with it, it involves police posing as young girls online and enticing men to come to a house. Once the person arrives at the house, he is greeted by cameras and eventually arrested by police.

I was recently watching To Catch a Predator on the internet out of curiosity when something stuck me.

Is this show morally right?

Now, for the most part - I believe that the show does arrest and weed out dangerous individuals. But sometimes I get the sense that they have been conned into doing it.

Take a look at the gentlemen in this video:


Would they of done this if it wasn't for the show enticing them to do so?

Discussion: Is the act of enticing people to commit a crime morally wrong?

Soliciting sex with a minor is illegal, it doesn't matter if it actually was a kid.

Now I don't agree with victim-less crimes, this being one since it wasn't actually a kid.

Yeah wait a minute... isn't this technically entrapment? Considering i'm looking at the definition of it right now for a stupid research paper. Are they arrested after chris hansen makes them take a seat over there

It's only entrapment if they coerce you into it. This might seem to skirt that, but if they don't propose meeting, and they don't force them to drive over it's hard to actually say they were coerced.

I did hear them say that the decoy suggested meeting for sex at one point. I don't approve of that.

 

[thedeathscythe]

If they even thought about doing it, no matter the reason (depression, curiosity, loneliness who knows) then they need help. Maybe they were enticed, and they wouldn't have done it otherwise, but there was that seed of a thought and imo, it's better that they're locked up and given treatment (they don't just throw em in jail and that's it, they try and help them, I don't know how). Many of them are very experienced(?) at it and say it's their first time but you can kind of tell that they've probably done that at least once or twice before.

 

[Mcface]

Google "perverted justice" they are the group that does most of the work. they also make ALL of their transcripts available. in the overwhelming majority of the cases, all the "12 year old" does is say "12/f/Florida" etc. the guys go on for hours about sexual stuff, while the decoy mostly goes "yeah. cool. sure. yeah" read them and you will probably rethink your answer.

Remember, these are not 18 year olds being baited to have sex with 15 year olds. These are 40 year old men trying to sleep with 11 year old girls. Even if they handed it to them on a silver platter, its still fucking sick and they deserve every second of it.

 

[Dags90]

It doesn't matter if they're falling for bait, because they essentially have broken the law. Let's say I give you a gun, and the option to walk away or kill someone. I tell you there will be no consequences to you if you pull the trigger, but that the gun is loaded, and obviously deadly to the person. I do not tell you that I am an actor working for the police. The gun is actually empty. If you pull the trigger, you are a murderer because you committed an act with intent to kill someone by your own free will, even if you were baited to attempt to kill someone, but never ended up killing them.

The same applies to these pedophiles. They are flirting, talking dirty, and eventually driving to these decoys' houses, pulling the metaphorical trigger that would lead to the crime of them having illegal sex. This makes them sexual predators. Even if they were deceived into the situation, they were not forced to make the choice. They were offered a choice to either have sex with a minor or ignore the minor, and they chose to have illegal sex.

What if the gun was loaded? Would it be alright then? I mean, you'll probably get me in time, you just have to wait for me to hold it at someone. The only real difference in the scenario is that one has "live bait". From the standpoint of "policing enticing people to commit crimes" its the same situation.

Another moral gray spot is that the organization that does this work is paid by MSNBC. They're essentially paid to entice people to do this because it makes for good ratings. I find that really, really distasteful.

Maybe they were enticed, and they wouldn't have done it otherwise, but there was that seed of a thought and imo, it's better that they're locked up and given treatment (they don't just throw em in jail and that's it, they try and help them, I don't know how).

And we have our first thought crime supporter.

 

[Brotherofwill]

I think it's immoral. I also think it's quite sad that anyone would willingly watch such a show. I hate TV.

They are now allowed to choose who they marry

:O

 

[PeterDawson]

I can see how it can seem like a con, but as long as they make it clear that the person is definitely a predator then its fine. If the person isn't a predator and didn't realize the cop was pretending to be underage I could see a problem. So as long as it focuses on catching people who are definitely predators then I don't see the problem. Well, except that they're being plastered on TV, which can ruin one's rep, and is it moral to forever deem a person a predator? It can get them blamed for something that isn't their fault. I'm really starting to backpedal on this...

Okay, let me put it this way: I'm fine with predators being busted, but as long as they're not people who think they're talking to someone who they thought was older and legal, turns out they're not and by that point they think they're so in love they're willing to chance it. Society won't like it, but it was manufactured. Also seeing them on TV is a bit of a problem.

 

[Russian_Assassin]

SHIT!​

Morality is lost on me. All and all it's just a meter of how good or bad something is and I do not believe in good or bad.

 

[crudus]

You could argue it is entrapment I guess but I have never really seen how it was done. There is a difference between the potential criminal coming onto the "child" and the child just saying "wanna sex, lol?" out of nowhere. I imagine what happens is some form of the former with the latter happening later.

 

[Tdc2182]

Well, it is a very shallow way to get show views, but then again, that's pretty much what television is these days.

 

[Hatchet90]

The show doesn't entice the "victims". The show simply poses itself as a 12 year old and the victim does the rest. It's illegal to convince the victim, and legal vice versa.