Violated The Law Governing Sexual Expression In A Given Culture

August 28, 2014

The Role of Psychiatry in Sex Offender Management

"Medicine and law have a rich collaborative history in the management of persons convicted of sex offenses. Despite different assumptions about the offender and different perspectives about management and goals that may only partly overlap, each discipline offers significant expertise that promotes healing and risk management strategies while increasing community safety.

The term “sex offender” is a legal, not a psychiatric, designation. Sex offenders make up a psychiatrically heterogeneous group of individuals whose only unifying characteristic is that they have violated the law governing sexual expression in a given culture. The law may not greatly concern itself with the biopsychosocial antecedents of illegal sexual behavior, although it recognizes that questions of intent and incompetence or diminished capacity are important considerations."

"In 1973, the American Psychiatric Association eliminated homosexuality as a mental disorder in the sixth printing of DSM-II, substituting a new category, Sexual Orientation Disturbance."

http://www.psychiatrictimes.com/special-reports/role-psychiatry-sex-offender-management?cid=dlvr.it

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Ego-dystonic Sexual Orientation

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ego-dystonic_sexual_orientation

http://dictionary.sensagent.com/Ego-dystonic_sexual_orientation/en-en

http://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/oi/authority.20110803095744799

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3/10/14

Psychiatrists, Criminal Justice Experts At Odds Over Handling of Pedophiles

"It used to be that Americans convicted of pedophilia would get sentenced from one day to life in prison, and it was then up to the prison warden to decide whether and when they were safe enough to be released, Howard Zonana, M.D., explained in an interview. Zonana, a professor of psychiatry at Yale University, is a past chair of APA's Task Force on Sexual Offenders.

But today, Zonana continued, there is fixed prison sentencing for convicted pedophiles, and once pedophiles have served their sentences, they have to be released. Moreover, once they are released, they do not have to receive any treatment for their pedophilia unless they have a period of probation.“ So you can see why there is public concern,” he said."

http://psychnews.psychiatryonline.org/doi/10.1176/pn.41.10.0037b

Sometimes Of Dubious Quality, At Least

Last updated 12:35 02/10/2013 

Criminal assessments 'utterly useless'

"Assessment tools used to predict how likely a psychopathic prisoner is to re-offend if freed from jail are "utterly useless" and parole boards might just as well flip a coin when deciding such risks, psychiatrists say.

Publishing a study that found risk score tools were only about 46 per cent accurate on how likely psychopathic convicts were to kill, rape or assault again, they said probation officers and judges should set little or no store by such tests.

They warned that clinicians carrying out such classifications must be aware of their severe limitations, and make sure prisoners undergo comprehensive psychiatric diagnosis before any risks assessment is made.

"If you apply these (tests) to somebody who is a psychopath, they're utterly useless, you might as well toss a coin," said study leader Jeremy Coid, director of the forensic psychiatry research unit at Queen Mary University of London.

"They will not predict accurately at all," he told reporters at a briefing in London about his findings.

Coid and other forensic psychiatrists said the findings - which also showed the tools performed only moderately well in prisoners with disorders like schizophrenia, depression, drug and alcohol dependence - could have major implications for risk assessment in criminal justice systems."

http://www.stuff.co.nz/science/9235045/Criminal-assessments-utterly-useless

http://m.theglobeandmail.com/life/health-and-fitness/health/predicting-violence-in-psychopaths-utterly-useless-psychiatrists-say/article14654568/?service=mobile#!/

A Bug's Death

Friday, Sep 13, 2013 03:40 PM +0100

Study: Sadism more common than people think

"College students told to exterminate bugs showed "acts of apparent cruelty" and "everyday sadism," said researchers

People who enjoy being cruel are scarily prevalent, new research says.

There may be more sadists lurking in our midst than we’d like to think, according to a new study from the University of British Columbia and the University of Texas at El Paso. After offering a group of college students the chance to play exterminator and kill live bugs, researchers found “acts of apparent cruelty” and evidence of “everyday sadism”-a less pathological variety of deriving pleasure from being cruel."

http://www.salon.com/2013/09/13/study_sadism_more_common_than_people_think_newscred/

‘Everyday Sadists’ Among Us

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/09/16/everyday-sadists-among-us/?_r=1

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September 2013

Specificity of Sexual Arousal for Sexual Activities in Men and Women with Conventional and Masochistic Sexual Interests

http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs10508-013-0174-1

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Sunday, Oct 6, 2013 08:00 PM +0100

Sexual deviancy is normal

"Even in extreme cases, there’s “some tension” about whether sadism indicates mental illness. Not for the squeamish."

http://www.salon.com/2013/10/06/sexual_deviancy_is_normal

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Oct 12 2013 @ 9:04pm

How To Diagnose A Sex Deviant?

"To make any real moral traction, we must abandon the rhetoric of righteousness and instead turn our efforts to clarifying, using science rather than scripture, laws, or even (and especially) our own gut feelings, how a sexual act or orientation is harmful to those involved. In my book, at least, doing harm is the only thing that makes a person a pervert."

http://dish.andrewsullivan.com/2013/10/12/diagnosing-deviancy

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Oct. 7 2013 11:47 PM

What Is Truly Perverted?

"Over the 18 long months in which it was in production, Perv therefore evolved from being a light scientific treatment of weird sex to a book with an actual moral message. And that message turned out to be embarrassingly obvious, really. As a society, we’ve been dawdling over the irrelevant questions of what’s “normal” and “natural” for far too long."

http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2013/10/perv_how_a_book_on_sexual_deviancy_got_a_moral_message.html

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October 9, 2013

We’re All Perverts

"Deviant sex, almost by definition, is bound to gross out more people than normal sex—but disgust doesn’t justify hatred.

The following is an excerpt from PERV: The Sexual Deviant in All of Us by Jesse Bering, published October 8, 2013.

You are a sexual deviant. A pervert, through and through."

http://www.alternet.org/books/were-all-perverts 

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October 17, 2013

You’re Doing It Right 

http://themidnightdiner.wordpress.com/2013/10/17/youre-doing-it-right

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10/24/2013 @ 7:28PM

Getting In Touch With Your Inner Sexual Deviant

http://www.forbes.com/sites/daviddisalvo/2013/10/24/getting-in-touch-with-your-inner-sexual-deviant/

Same As Yours

May 03, 2013

The Evil Brain: What Lurks Inside a Killer’s Mind

"Homicidal madmen don’t have much of a capacity for gratitude, but if they did, they’d offer a word of thanks to Charles Whitman. Whitman was the 25-year-old engineering student and former Marine who, in 1966, killed 17 people and wounded 32 in a mass shooting at the University of Texas, before being shot and killed himself by police.

Earlier that day, he also murdered his wife and mother. Criminal investigators looking for a reason for the rampage got what seemed to be their answer quickly, in the form of a suicide note Whitman left at his home ..."

http://science.time.com/2013/05/03/evil-brain/

What Makes a Psychopath? Answers Remain Elusive 

http://www.livescience.com/7859-psychopath-answers-remain-elusive.html

What Makes Us Moral

http://www.time.com/time/specials/2007/article/0,28804,1685055_1685076_1686619,00.html

Free will is an illusion, biologist says 

http://phys.org/news186830615.html

Where evil lurks: Neurologist discovers 'dark patch' inside the brains of killers and rapists 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2273857/Neurologist-discovers-dark-patch-inside-brains-killers-rapists.html

Date: 06 February 2013 Time: 05:37 PM ET

Brain Area 'Where Evil Lurks' Doesn't Exist: Neurologist

"Is there really a part of the brain "where evil lurks"?

Evil is alive and is lurking in the brains of certain individuals, if you believe news reports linked to a respected German neurologist. The news of the scientist's discovery, however, has attracted some naysayers — including the neurologist himself.

According to The Independent, Dr. Gerhard Roth of the University of Bremen's Brain Research Institute reportedly discovered "the region of the brain where evil is formed and where it lurks" by performing brain scans on violent convicted felons ..."

http://www.livescience.com/26918-gerhard-roth-brain-area-evil.html

Merits Of The Case

19:00 16 August 2012

Scientific explanation of psychopathy cuts jail time

"Serial sex offender Raymond Henry Garland, considered one of Australia's most dangerous sexual predators, was officially diagnosed a psychopath last week. Psychiatrist Joan Lawrence told the Brisbane District Court that Garland had an "almost 100 per cent chance of violent reoffending." Garland has been dealt four indefinite sentences – but research out today suggests that biological evidence of psychopathy could alter the length of such sentences."

"It's usually up to the judge to decide what factors to balance at sentence, how they should be weighed and what evidence to consider, and that results in very varied sentencing," he says. "I think there should be less discretion involved in sentencing, although judges hate the idea."

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn22189-scientific-explanation-of-psychopathy-cuts-jail-time.html?DCMP=OTC-rss&nsref=health