something doesn't strike me right

[Flying Spaghetti Monster]

I was reading this story http://www.cnn.com/2008/CRIME/06/16/internet.suicide.ap/index.html
and it got me thinking about the idea of making up fake people on the internet, which is what the woman did.
In the process of thinking about it, I remembered the Show To Catch a Predator. I could never put my finger on exactly what my problem was with that show. Sure they are catching sick bastards that deserve to go where they are going, but they are doing it by creating fake people on the internet and using interactions with them as evidence. It strikes me as manipulative and insubstantiative. I still can't put my finger on it, but the idea of a fake person being able to manipulate someone's emotions isn't good as the myspace story proves. Not only is the predator show doing that, but they are also using such interactions in a court of law.
I don't know
Leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

Thoughts?

 

[Starbreaker]

I was reading this story http://www.cnn.com/2008/CRIME/06/16/internet.suicide.ap/index.html
and it got me thinking about the idea of making up fake people on the internet, which is what the woman did.
In the process of thinking about it, I remembered the Show To Catch a Predator. I could never put my finger on exactly what my problem was with that show. Sure they are catching sick bastards that deserve to go where they are going, but they are doing it by creating fake people on the internet and using interactions with them as evidence. It strikes me as manipulative and insubstantiative. I still can't put my finger on it, but the idea of a fake person being able to manipulate someone's emotions isn't good as the myspace story proves. Not only is the predator show doing that, but they are also using such interactions in a court of law.
I don't know
Leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

Thoughts?

Well, I'm all for that show. Instead of them actually going after a real 13 year old, you can catch a perpetrator in the act. And I can almost guarantee you it's never their "first time" or they were there "just to talk". It's the same thing as sending in a police officer to pose as a hitman, which also seems to happen a lot while I am watching truTV.

 

[Trekker4747]

I was reading this story http://www.cnn.com/2008/CRIME/06/16/internet.suicide.ap/index.html
and it got me thinking about the idea of making up fake people on the internet, which is what the woman did.
In the process of thinking about it, I remembered the Show To Catch a Predator. I could never put my finger on exactly what my problem was with that show. Sure they are catching sick bastards that deserve to go where they are going, but they are doing it by creating fake people on the internet and using interactions with them as evidence. It strikes me as manipulative and insubstantiative. I still can't put my finger on it, but the idea of a fake person being able to manipulate someone's emotions isn't good as the myspace story proves. Not only is the predator show doing that, but they are also using such interactions in a court of law.
I don't know
Leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

Thoughts?

I don't think that the preadtor not actualy interacting with a child should change anything since he's under the belief that he IS interacting with a child, and (in the case of the show) goes to meet the child. So, can't say it bothers me any.

It's called a sting operation. And as long as the officer him/herself doesn't initiate the breaking of the law there's not a thing wrong with it.

On the MySpace case. The charges against the woman are very trumpped up. Some of the stuff they're charging her with is just beyond absurd. She's quilty as all hell for setting into action a series of events that led to the death of a yong girl. But conspiracy? Acsessing secure computers? A wee bit trumpped up.

 

[archeryguy1701]

Well, YYZ, the online interaction themselves are pretty insubstantial, but the fact that the guy goes to visit what he thinks is a 12 year old lass is pretty substantial. As for the myspace case... sdidn't the girl have a history of being slightly mentally unstable? Seeing how her daughter and the dead girl used to be best friends, that would probably be something the mom knew about. Maybe not conspiracy, but there should be something they can get her on. Maybe negligence of some sort?

 

[Paxil]

Undercover cop on messageboard: I am 12 years old.

Pedophile on same board: Want to see pictures of my penis?

That is not entrapment.

 

[Flying Spaghetti Monster]

I'm not saying it's wropng to put these perverts away. But asaide form the fact that this sting operation isnt fully legit (it is about ratings and Perverted Justice upped their fee when they realized that ..(its all about money not the crimes, despite all that they say) but the idea of anyone creating a false person on the net just bugs me.

 

[Trekker4747]

I'm not saying it's wropng to put these perverts away. But asaide form the fact that this sting operation isnt fully legit (it is about ratings and Perverted Justice upped their fee when they realized that ..(its all about money not the crimes, despite all that they say) but the idea of anyone creating a false person on the net just bugs me.

I agree the "merits" of the show is (very) questionable but, in the end, the men on the show came to what they believed to be the home of an underaged girl to engage in sexual interactions with her. (Or at the very least illegal contact/interactions with her.)

I don't care how he was "set up" no one made him go visit a teenage girl and bring along booze and condoms. People create false persons on the net all of the time. Everyone here on this board, I gaurante you, is a "false person" and not who they really are.

It's just what one does with/as that "false person."

Do they go on there to sniff out and catch perverts and criminals? Or do they do it to cause a teenage girl to get so emotionaly distressed that she kills her self.

Considerable difference between a false persona saying, "Hey, I'm a 15/f/MI! Anyone want to chat?!" then catching a pedophille and telling a teenage girl that she "should kill herself" and "the world would be better off without you."

 

[Flying Spaghetti Monster]

I fo agree with you. these guys are scum.

But maybe the idea of making up fake people should not be encouraged. there hs to be other ways to catch these guys.

 

[archeryguy1701]

Well, there aren't many options. Maybe have a real kid do the chatting for them? Maybe just rely on blind luck that they might catch wind of a meet up? By faking to be a kid, they get the pedophile to admit to their intentions, and if the pedophile actually shows up, then they know that he, she or it was serious about what they wanted to do. It's the best way.

 

[Trekker4747]

I fo agree with you. these guys are scum.

But maybe the idea of making up fake people should not be encouraged. there hs to be other ways to catch these guys.

Only way to do it, to satisfy this line of complaints, is to really put underaged kids at a computer and have them chat with the pedophilles. Which, I dunno, kind of strikes me as wrong. Somehow.

What difference does it make if a real 13 year old is sitting there or a 30 year old when both are going to say their age is 15? Or whatever?

That's not the part that matters. The part that matters is that it is illegal to talk dirty to a underaged child (or someone you beleve to be underage) and to further meet them for sex.

I can think of no better way to catch them unless you want to wait until AFTER the child has been victimized to nail them for it.

 

[Ptrope]

In the process of thinking about it, I remembered the Show To Catch a Predator. I could never put my finger on exactly what my problem was with that show.

What really offended me about the show was that this was being treated as entertainment. NBC was getting great ratings, obviously, or they wouldn't have done it, and they did it for weeks on end; it quickly reaches a point where you realize that this has gone far beyond a public service and is playing upon prurient interest.

 

[Trekker4747]

In the process of thinking about it, I remembered the Show To Catch a Predator. I could never put my finger on exactly what my problem was with that show.

What really offended me about the show was that this was being treated as entertainment. NBC was getting great ratings, obviously, or they wouldn't have done it, and they did it for weeks on end; it quickly reaches a point where you realize that this has gone far beyond a public service and is playing upon prurient interest.

It still, though, provides a public service because, in the end, it's still getting would-be pedophiles off the streets.

 

[Starbreaker]

What shocks me is the amount of people that are caught who consent to having their segment air...

 

[IJD GAF]

In the process of thinking about it, I remembered the Show To Catch a Predator. I could never put my finger on exactly what my problem was with that show.

What really offended me about the show was that this was being treated as entertainment. NBC was getting great ratings, obviously, or they wouldn't have done it, and they did it for weeks on end; it quickly reaches a point where you realize that this has gone far beyond a public service and is playing upon prurient interest.

It still, though, provides a public service because, in the end, it's still getting would-be pedophiles off the streets.

Well, yeah, but I don't see why they have to broadcast it on a major network. Is it a funding issue? Does the police department need the resources of NBC in order to pull off such a sting? If that's the case, I'd say it's a funding problem.

I have the same reservations as Ptrope. Why exploit the situation for the purpose of entertainment? That seems to me to be extremely poor taste.

 

[Ptrope]

Actually, legally, the police department can't accept money from NBC to do this; they are called in when an arrest is necessary, but they are not compensated for it. The organization NBC is working with, however, despite being not-for-profit, has 'accepted' a 'consultancy fee' in the neighborhood of $100,000 to $150,000. It's great that they can continue their work, and there's no question that they provide resources that the police may not have or can't afford.

NBC's motivations, however, have been called into question quite a bit, as have their statistics regarding how large the problem is. There have also been ethical questions raised about how far the organization they were working with would go to entice their subjects, in many cases pushing the meetings even when the man was trying to stay out of it. And in one case, the NBC staff's insistence that a very public arrest be made before they had to pack up and leave may have been responsible, directly or indirectly, for a judge's suicide after he realized what he had been caught in, while the NBC staff and host was present; thankfully, they didn't get it on camera.

 

[CaptJimboJones]

I've always had a problem with this show, in the sense that the network news is jointly part of a sting operation. NBC doesn't need to be there. The group "Perverted Justice" could cooperate with the police and catch the guys without having TV news cameras and a TV "journalist" confronting the suspects.

If NBC wanted to report on the sting after the fact, that's fine. But I have a problem with journalists acting as defacto law enforcement officers. It blurs the lines too much and creates problems for both police and journalists as to what their actual roles are.

The police should be doing their jobs, and the journalists should be reporting on it. They shouldn't be working together as part of some TV Crime Fighting Unit.

 

[Trekker4747]

I've always had a problem with this show, in the sense that the network news is jointly part of a sting operation. NBC doesn't need to be there. The group "Perverted Justice" could cooperate with the police and catch the guys without having TV news cameras and a TV "journalist" confronting the suspects.

If NBC wanted to report on the sting after the fact, that's fine. But I have a problem with journalists acting as defacto law enforcement officers. It blurs the lines too much and creates problems for both police and journalists as to what their actual roles are.

The police should be doing their jobs, and the journalists should be reporting on it. They shouldn't be working together as part of some TV Crime Fighting Unit.

I blieve Perverted Justice does a lot of work on their own and just occassionally does the Catch a Predator shows and NBC just wants to "get into the mid of a sicko" because, I suppose, people like watching sickos on TV get caught and confronted with their perversions.

I don't think NBC's shows are "good" for the sense of entertainment value ("Hey mah! Check out these sickos on da TeeVee!" and next year, watch Pedophilles (ok, Ephebophiles) get caught in HI DEF!!!!!

But, still, in the end sickos are getting caught and put in jail and I can't find a problem with that. I guess, in the case, the ends justifies the means no matter what the motivations are for NBC.