Yes it would. If I knew someone is thinking about murder and someone else is doing the murder, and I could choose, I would definitely take the one thinking about murder.

Now it would be great if no one was thinking about murder in the first place but the world is complex, and because we are able to choose to some degree, let's do that instead of saying "IDC, both is bad, I'll take any of them".

History shows us pedophiles exist. Some have thoughts, some commit crimes.

If we imprison all of them, that just means people will never tell you about it and they resort more to repression and crimes. But if we only imprison the ones who act on it, we open the rest of them up to the possibility that everyone accepts they won't "go away" and we could focus on making sure they don't act on it.

And there's potential: a combination of different therapies helping them learn to live with it in a safe way could go a long way.

If we help them, we help us.

But if we criminalize their thoughts, they will resort to crime, because that's all they know.

[–] degen@midwest.social 1 points 2 months ago (1 children)

I agree nobody should be imprisoned for having thoughts. I also don't think accepting something like loli as an outlet is helpful. Emulation of problematic tendencies isn't exactly therapeutic.

[–] hoshikarakitaridia@lemmy.world 5 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

While I don't think emulation is a bad way in every case, in most cases it's a huge risk and probably only helpful to a very small degree. This stuff can get very complex and I'm neither a scientist studying psychology nor a therapist, and for that matter I think those are the people that should brain storm a proper way to treat those people.

And we can start by calling them what they are in the first place. Sick in the brain. Mentally ill. And then we can start treating them properly.

And if they still commit crimes, then we can all say we tried our best and we prioritize our short term safety again over long term reduction and they will go to prison for (at least) a while.

But yeah, finding a better systematic way to prevent sexual crimes should be our priority over the satisfaction of identifying and shaming people with bad thoughts.

[–] degen@midwest.social 5 points 2 months ago (1 children)

We're basically on the same page here. I'm no professional either, and if it were black and white, there'd be no nuances to discuss. Mental health support is key, and like you said it can be hard to even talk about. It's unfortunately easier to hate than to help.

[–] hoshikarakitaridia@lemmy.world 5 points 2 months ago

Yeah I'm just trying to raise this take every once in a while in the hopes of making systematic progress on this issue at some point ^^