According to this New York Times article, male sex offenders such as rapists are gaining access to erectile dysfunction medication thanks to a loophole. A cruel joke to their victims, many of whom of rapes who don’t have widespread access to emergency contraception. The last thing these monsters need is a hard-on, due to their tendancies to use sex as a means of violence, power, and victimization.
ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) — Federal officials are scrambling to find a way to plug a legal loophole that allows convicted rapists and other high-risk sex offenders to receive erectile-dysfunction drugs paid for by Medicaid.
The issue was revealed Sunday by the New York state comptroller’s office, which said audits covering the period of January 2000 to March 2005 found 198 sex offenders in New York received Medicaid-reimbursed Viagra after their convictions. Their crimes included offenses against children as young as 2 years old, Comptroller Alan Hevesi said.
[…]
She said legislation may be needed to address the issue. New York’s two senators, Charles Schumer and Hillary Rodham Clinton, both Democrats, said they would support such a bill. Schumer said he will sponsor the legislation.
”Giving convicted sex offenders government-funded Viagra is like giving convicted murderers an assault rifle when they get out of jail,” Schumer said.
Rep. Joe Barton, R-Texas, chairman of the House Energy and Commerce committee, said Monday he would try to end the ”perverse misuse of the taxpayers’ money” as part of the committee’s work to reform Medicaid.
Kahn said taxpayer-funded Viagra for sex offenders was an unintended consequence of Medicaid law and an issue the federal government hadn’t known about before Hevesi’s report.
[…]
”We are going to make every effort to see what the states or federal government can take to address this problem without harming people who have a legitimate need for this drug, such as men who had prostate cancer and diabetes,” Kahn said. ”We want to see what remedies there are to address this problem.”
[…]
Hevesi’s study only covered Viagra, Hevesi spokesman David Neustadt said. State auditors are reviewing whether other prescription drugs for sexual dysfunction are being reimbursed by Medicaid for convicted sex offenders in the state, Neustadt said.
Well it’s nice to see the government is scrambling about something in order to protect potential sexual violence victims. So while convicted rapists can pop a Viagra whenever they want, their victims must put up with self-righteous anti-choice/anti-contraceptive pharmacists and even hospitals and legislators, who continue to deny and restrict women’s reproductive rights, even if they’re rape victims. Viagra and all the constant preferential catering to men’s sexuality (and the continued medical and cultural disparaging of women’s sexuality) in the medical community and even government funding, is just another example of our culture’s “dicks before chicks” mentality to put it bluntly. How many erectile dysfunction medicine commercials do we see on television in comparison to women’s contraceptive commercials? And how many men have been turned down by pharmacists for their Viagra prescriptions?
The Second Amendment arguably does say that convicted murderers can have their old guns back when they leave jail. Similarly, I think prisoners generally have the right to reproduce if someone will help them, and clearly the courts haven’t made an exception for these particular criminals. (Or they’d have chemical or other castration.) It seems cruel because of the context — because the US discourages emergency contraception and generally treats women badly, not because of any inherent evil.
There is an inherent evil in lenient treatment for rapists, which (in my view) pretty much every rapist gets.
While we’re on the subject of emergency contraception, I hope more people start talking about the studies that have recently been released that concluded that EC works before fertilization, not after. So far, I haven’t really seen this discussed in the feminist blogs that I regularly read.
I understand that pro-choice people wouldn’t be that concerned about how EC exactly works, but to pro-life/pro-contraception people it is a very encouraging finding, and it can bring us closer to that oh-so-elusive common ground.
LAMom:
Hey, if it takes place before fertilization, I’m all for it.
Heck, if it takes place before karyogamy, I’m for it (karyogamy is the unification of the nuclei of egg and sperm). That is to say, I am willing to concede that the fusion of an egg and sperm does not create a new life until the nuclei have fused.
As for the “right to reproduce,” I think of it as a negative right, not a positive one. That is, the government shouldn’t prevent someone from reproducing, but they have no obligation to help them reproduce.
I find the idea of my tax dollars going to give stiffy pills to rapists disgusting. Actually, I see no reason why the government should fund Viagra for anybody. If you can’t afford Viagra, and you can’t get an erection without it, why should that be my problem? I don’t see that I have an obligation to give anyone an erection. But it is even worse when the Viagra is given to someone who arguably should be taking medicine to decrease their sex drive.
While I suppose there is a technical reason to cover Viagra and not contraception (Viagra corrects a dysfunction and contraception – unless being used purposes such as treating endometriosis – doesn’t), from a public policy standpoint I think funding contraception is far easier to defend than funding Bob Dole’s stiffy pills.
“Similarly, I think prisoners generally have the right to reproduce if someone will help them, and clearly the courts haven’t made an exception for these particular criminals. (Or they’d have chemical or other castration.)”
Chemical castration of rapists. Why doesn’t that idea bother me at all?
Ok, I hate to break it to you all, but the thing about being pro-life is… you believe that abortion is MURDER. I have nothing but sympathy for a woman who has been raped. But I will not give her the means to commit MURDER. Sorry, but two wrongs do not make a right. Why is this so difficult for pro-choicers to understand? And why do you not respect the right of the pharmacist to not be an accessory to murder?
Gee, none of us have EVER heard that before. Thanks for setting us straight. :-P
Seriously, I’m very aware that many pro-lifers consider abortion murder (well, sort of, but let’s leave that argument for another time). I understand that. No one is saying that anyone should be forced to do anything they find immoral.
However, you don’t have a right to live your life free of consequences. If you refuse to do a job, then you have no right not to be fired.
Imagine a prison guard who works on death row, who refuses to participate in the execution procedures. “Don’t you understand, two wrongs do not make a right!” he cries. “I have a right not to be an accessory to murder! You’ll just have to let this guy live, rather than go against my religious convictions.”
If you can’t in good conscience be a pharmacist, then don’t be a pharmacist. I will defend to the death your right – or anyone else’s right – to quit their job rather than perform what they consider an immoral act.
But the job of pharmacist is not “stand between patients and their doctors and make sure that they don’t get the health care their doctor has prescribed.” If that’s what you think the job is, then you shouldn’t be a pharmacist, any more than a death row guard who thinks his job is to prevent executions should hold that job.
A woman is wronged by being raped. Forcing her to endure a pegnancy as a result of being raped is wrong. So, by your logic, since two wrongs don’t make a right, EC is the correct course of treatment.
And I doubt your supposed sympathies for victims of rape when you would elevate the rights of a cluster of cells over the feelings and rights of a rape victim.
As for pharmacists who feel dispensing birth control or EC is murder, I do respect their rights. And I will happily pay my share of taxes that fund their unemployment payments as they look for a job more in line with their religious and moral beliefs.
I am confused about this article, which I saw yesterday. Does Medicaid really reimburse ED medicines of any kind – and if so, why? Is impotence medically threatening? Also, are there other medicines that are not covered? I don’t live in the US and am not up to date on this but have been told that some anti-depressants are NOT covered by Medicaid so poor depressed people will end up being suicidal or something because they have no money to buy them – yet ED medicines are covered? Why? (I would much appreciate someone telling me that my informant is wrong – please, please help me think our system makes any sort of sense at all.)
Men won’t die if they aren’t able to perform, will they? I am confused. Are other frivolous medications also covered by Medicaid? Such as Retin-A or cosmetic surgery?
“Men won’t die if they’re not able to perform, will they?”
No, but the rest of us will either wish to die because of the bitching about it, or else the ceaseless commericals for ED pills will make us want to kill ourselves.
I wish somebody would spend some time dreaming up pills that made pro-life people really pro-life and made people compassionate instead of buffoons. “ABORTION IS MURDER!”
Ampersand:
I don’t disagree that pharmacists should do their job, I just think that the pharmacy they work rather than the government should define their job (unless the pharmacy is government-owned, e.g. a military or prison pharmacy).
Still, I’m afraid that GayLikeAFox brought the discussion off-topic for this thread.
So back to the issue:
In any case, it should be pointed out that a lot of conservatives dislike the idea of providing Viagra as a medicare benefit, regardless of whether or not it is given to sex offenders. I agree with Lawrence Auster that the concern about it being given to sex offenders may wind up distracting us from the issue of whether or not it should be a medicare/medicaid benefit at all. I don’t think it should; why should we be forced to pay for someone else to get an erection?
“I doubt your supposed sympathies for victims of rape when you would elevate the rights of a cluster of cells over the feelings and rights of a rape victim.”
And I doubt your supposed sympathies for any human being when you support abortion. If you’re such a humanist, why do you not extend your compassion to the unborn? Why do you instead dehumanize them by referring to them as a cluster of cells and deny them the most fundamental human right? The pro-choice ideology is not one of humanism but chauvanism. Or do you really think that your prejudice against the unborn is objectively any more justifiable than prejudice against any other group of humans?
As for pharmacists not doing their job, there is a difference between dispensing medical care and being an accessory to murder, and I suspect that most pharmacists upon entering the profession did so because they were interested in the former. Pro-choicers have grafted an entirely different function onto the medical profession, in complete disregard for the traditions articulated by the Hippocratic Oath, and they expect no one to complain about it.
I happen to think giving Ritalin or Prozac or any other psychoactive drug to young children is a form of child abuse. Yet you never hear of pharmacists objecting to selling that stuff. The ‘pro-life’ pharmacists must obviously have more moral objections about preventing fertilisation of an egg than about giving a 7-year-old one of the legal alternatives to cocaine.
But that’s just my opinion and I don’t get to define child abuse by myself any more than a “pro-life” group gets to define murder based on what they think is murder. Doesn’t work that way. So if I was a pharmacist, I’d have no choice but to sell Ritalin, as long as it’s legal and as long as it’s prescribed by a doctor. I could find other political ways of objecting to the practice of prescribing that kind of drug for children, or I could simply quit the profession if I can’t stand it. Taking advantage of my position and deciding for others, beyond my competence and right, while still benefiting, financially and professionally, from keeping that position, would be completely unethical.
Pharmacists shouldn’t even enter the picture of the decision on which drug or medical approach to prescribe. It’s not their job. Refusing to comply with a doctor’s prescription is a betrayal of their professional duties. It’s a shame they’ve been allowed to get away with that.
On the Viagra thing, no comment…
Thing is, clusters of cells, even human cells, simply do not have human rights. People need to brush up on their use of legal definitions.
The “unborn” is not a legal person recognised in any legislation. Especially when “unborn” actually means “not even fertilised or implanted yet”.
Nevermind that, though, obviously today everyone gets to define their own notion of “human rights” and “person”, which includes unfertilised eggs but not Afghan or Iraqi men and women and children. Those we can bomb and hang from ceilings until they die, but a poor egg or blastocyst, that is still a million miles from being a person, needs to be put on a pedestal and protected at all costs. Charming.
It really doesn’t matter what the LEGAL definition of a “person” is… Keep in mind that the Supreme Court once decided that those of African descent were not people, so those who immediately appeal to the law to justify abortion might want to take a moment to reconsider their tactics. What matters is the ACTUAL definition of a person, which is and has always been, “A human individual”. Scientifically speaking, every individual member of the human species begins at conception. That is a hard, scientific fact, and those who would deny it are about as scientific and rational as Creationists.
What the pro-choice ideology does is it takes a whole group of human beings and says, “I’m sorry, but you aren’t human ENOUGH to count.” But the criteria that pro-choicers use for “personhood” (most notably birth) are just as arbitrary and irrelevant as those that racists and anti-Semites once used to exclude blacks and Jews from personhood. Or is one’s geographical location (i.e. inside or outside of the womb) really any less arbitrary than skin color or genetic ancestry? Just as one’s skin color does not affect one’s membership in the human species, neither does one’s stage of biological development (i.e. one’s AGE) or one’s geographical location (i.e. in the womb).
I particularly enjoy how pro-choicers, in an attempt to seize some sort of a moral high ground, so frequently drag into the discussion all sorts of entirely irrelevant issues (like the war in Iraq) in an attempt to make the opposition look bad. If you want to discuss the campaign in Iraq and Afghanistan, start another thread!
If GayLike is the face of “sympathy” for women who are raped, I think I’ll take my chances with the hard-hearted side.
But the criteria that pro-choicers use for “personhood”? (most notably birth) are just as arbitrary and irrelevant as those that racists and anti-Semites once used to exclude blacks and Jews from personhood. Or is one’s geographical location (i.e. inside or outside of the womb) really any less arbitrary than skin color or genetic ancestry.
I’m sorry, but this is so stupid an argument, so stupid, so old and yet so disingenuous, I have to wonder if we can’t just put in a request for a better troll. Doesn’t Amp deserve better trolls?
Godwin reference. We now return you to something relevant.
I like it when trolls show up and start ordering people to start new threads according to its own specifications as to the proper boundaries of debate.
It makes me feel all warm ‘n squishy inside. Either that or I sat in something. –Dot Warner
It really doesn’t matter what the LEGAL definition of a “person”? is…
Oh really? Then what do you think laws are based on? Do you think the crime of murder was established in all known modern legislations by consulting the stars?
What matters is the ACTUAL definition of a person, which is and has always been, “A human individual”?. Scientifically speaking, every individual member of the human species begins at conception.
Actually, “individual” means “single, separate” – a fertilised egg develops into a blastocyst and then an embryo by way of the cells separating themselves and multiplying into other cells; which also means, the egg can develop into more than one embryo, which means twins can be conceived; also, incidentally, it is physically one with the human body it resides in.
So no, in scientific terms, a fertilised (or non-fertilised, as may be the case!) egg is most definitely not an individual, yet. Just like in legal terms, it’s most definitely not a person, yet.
Perhaps you should be careful in talking of concepts like “legal” and “sicentific” if you don’t even grasp their meaning.
But the criteria that pro-choicers use for “personhood”? (most notably birth) are just as arbitrary and irrelevant
Oh right, so it’s those evil pro-choicers who coined that definition of person as a born individual human being. Of course, and we must disregard all legal principles because once we had bad laws too? Nevermind that racial segregation was not about *not* acknowleding the scientific and legal personhood of born human beings, it was about depriving people of equal civil and political rights.
Or are you saying you want equal civil and political rights for blastocysts as for persons? How about the little detail that a blastocyst is physically not a person? Can it think? Feel? Eat? Breathe? Go to school? Can you hold it in your arms and sing it a lullaby? Where is it, this cluster of cells? Somewhere out in space, or inside an actual individual, born human being and person with thinking, feeling capabilities, ethical capacity and legal rights? No, we must consider that person less than an egg, which is not a person. That’s sympathy for women, baby…
Yeah, that’s one of my faves, too. And when you point it out, they’re astonished at your impertinance. How dare you judge them by their actions! They’re special!
one’s geographical location (i.e. inside or outside of the womb)
ROTFL, I’d missed that… it’s a “geographical location”!! My of course, that’s the difference between an egg and a child.
This is not a troll, people, this is genius…
GayLikeAFox–
If you wish to keep commenting on this thread you will cease with you raving ad hominems against people. And STOP derailing this thread and making it your personal soapbox. Last warning. And I get the feeling that you’re not really Gay, but instead chose a username that would get people’s attention, as clearly you are out to just derail this thread and make it your personal raving soapbox. Knock it off.
Or is one’s geographical location (i.e. inside or outside of the womb) really any less arbitrary than skin color or genetic ancestry? Just as one’s skin color does not affect one’s membership in the human species, neither does one’s stage of biological development (i.e. one’s AGE) or one’s geographical location (i.e. in the womb).
Ok, so let’s say I’m 2 weeks pregnant (and don’t wish to be, but that’s rather beside the point). Is it an option to just move the clump of cells “geographical location” (i.e. remove it from my womb) and have it exist as a separate person? No? Well then I’d have to say that that the “geographical location” (I just love that) does indeed have a serious effect on the individuality and personhood of that clump of cells.
You figure out a way to remove it from my body and have it survive and you’re more than welcome to it. Until then let me have my damn contraceptives, EC, and hope that they don’t fail so that I am forced into an abortion that I don’t particularly want either.
On the Viagra thing, I just don’t get it and never will. Major double standard that falls right in line with the pregnant girl not being able to graduate, but the father can, girls can’t get contraceptives, but there’s no one trying to stop boys from buying condoms. The list goes on and on, but I’m preaching to (mostly) the choir so I’ll stop there.
Headline and quote from my local NP yesterday:
Hmm…..looks like the responsibility for this one does not rest at the feet of Dubya!
I really wish the American Christian Taliban would keep their religion OFF my body. Dictating that a woman go through an additional 9 months of trauma is cruel and unusual punishment, especially for someone who committed no crime.
And then what about her health during this FORCED pregnancy? Didn’t the “compassionate”? conservatives cut funds for medical aid, haven’t they defended aid to children, welfare, head start, etc. They don’t even want to talk about long term funding, necessary and needed funding for the raising of this child.
Adoption? How many of these “compassionate”? conservatives Christians have adopted a child, any child?
They only care about bringing the child into the world, but care nothing for it’s health, safety and quality of life once it is here. If they did they’d be all for funding programs and services that these children need.
Well it seems gibbie can’t write tonight
This paragraph should read:
“And then what about her health during this FORCED pregnancy? Didn’t the “compassionate”? conservatives cut funds for medical aid, haven’t they DEFUNDED aid to children, welfare, head start, etc. They don’t even want to talk about long term funding, necessary and needed for the raising of this child. “
“Or is one’s geographical location (i.e. inside or outside of the womb) really any less arbitrary than skin color or genetic ancestry? ”
Oh dear. So let me get this straight – if I live in CA and you live in NYC, that is somehow exactly the same as if you are an independent person walking around under your own steam and I am an organism made up of a few dozen cells that is entirely dependent on another organism (the mother) in order to live. What’s wrong with this picture?
Pick up a biology textbook. Being a fetus in utero is not a matter of being in a specific “geographic location”. The womb is not some kind of hotel room in which a fetus simply happens to be staying for a while. It is a part of the mother’s body, and SO IS THE FETUS.
Seriously, this attempt to decribe the womb as if it were some kind of holding cell that just sort of ended up residing in a woman’s body by accident is creeping me out. It’s as if they think that they can just take it out and put it back in again, like a cigarette lighter in a car. Like I said, creepy.
Well, it is their concept of all a woman’s good for, so at least they’re relatively honest.
Somebody just commented on my blog about a case in Louisiana that illustrates this concept perfectly: girl shoots herself in abdhomen to end pregnancy. Gets charged with murder instead of receiving care as an attempted suicide. These people want to save the lifeboat at the expense of the Titanic.
really interesting thing, this viagra for people in jail, does it matter whether they can get an erection if they aren’t going to have oppertunity to have sex with their spouse if they have one?
why should they be allowed to have sex anyway or enjoy that privilege they are afterall in prision to be punished for commiting serious wrongs, why should they be allowed to have fun?
and a sex offender doesn’t need any help in that area, or to be treated like he is a victim himself if he can’t at least masturbate if nothing else. I mean really, maybe the laws are the way they are because men write these laws and feel what if I end up in prision I should would still like my viagra or something.
prison is for punishment not entitlements for non medical needs,
RR
The Declaration of Independence says we all have the right to pursue happiness. No where is it written that the government and hence taxpayers shall be compelled to provide happiness to all who claim legitimate need of its like. Viagra for a sex offender is not used for procreation it is a tool used on their perverse journey to their unique sick and twisted depraved happiness.
Giving sex offenders viagra or any erectile enhancer makes the government complicit in the rapes, sodomy and child abuse that arises from predators having these drugs. There but for the fact the government enabled a known sex offendera drug that enabled him to commit his violent and vile crime a victim would not have been created at the time the criminal re-offends.
Giving sex offenders viagra or any erectile enhancer makes the government complicit in the rapes, sodomy and child abuse that arises from predators having these drugs.
Forcing a rapist to be impotent won’t nessisarily stop him raping – it may just force him to more violent acts. Someone should do some research into whether restricting access to viagra will actually prevent rapes, or just cause rapists to find new ways of attacking people.
While I agree the government paying for convicted rapists to get viagra isn’t right, I can’t find a justification of refusing to let them have it altogether – unless you are also make other rapists take drugs to make them impotent, then it would be unfair to restict a rapist’s access to viagra.
How about a lifetime’s supply of Viagra for rapists in exchange for them accepting a lifetime in solitary confinement. Seems fair to me.
Forcing a rapist to be impotent won’t nessisarily stop him raping
Assisting him in overcoming impotence definitely won’t stop him raping.
Assisting him in overcoming impotence definitely won’t stop him raping.
Well, he won’t nessisarily reoffend if he is given viagra.
It would be discriminating against those with erectile dysfunction, if the convicted rapists that need viagra are refused it, but as long as you can sustain your own erection then there is no problem with it. Either you stop all convicted rapists getting erections, or you allow all of them to have erections -even if they need medical assistance.
Personally I’d lean towards stop them all, except for worries on whether this might make them become more violent.
Either you stop all convicted rapists getting erections, or you allow all of them to have erections -even if they need medical assistance.
Sorry, not following. Nobody is preventing them from having erections, or from buying Viagra on their own time. What we are preventing is giving a sex enhancement drug to people with a proven track record of engaging in sexual activities that hurt others.
I must not get some of the issue. By providing erectile enabling drugs, one is not enhancing but restoring a person to healthful functioning. Isn’t this the purpose of medicine? Is it necessary that the function be essential to life to be funded? What if changing behavior like loosing weight, getting exercise and reducing stress will result in not needing blood pressure meds, should we require folks do what makes sense instead of allowing them to choose what therapy they will take? (Even if I have to pay for their unwillingness to live in a way where they do not need meds?)
Using the not necessary for life argument, I can foresee people saying that HIV infected folks that were infected during unprotected consensual sex meds should not be paid for from public funds as the illness was contracted from unnecessary and preventable behavior. (It is ludicrous, but similar in logic.)
I do not believe that we can discriminate against a legal citizen in our community based on past behaviors that have fulfilled the legal obligations as stated by the laws we are governed. It has nothing to do with how reprehensible the behavior is. If forced abstinence for the rest of a convicted sex offenders life is part of the legally mandated sentence, then that would be different. This of coarse is the preceding step to castration for male offenders. However I have not heard of such a thing in recent times. (No guarantee that would stop predation as much of sexual violence is less about sex and very much about violence. Talk about anger… how about revenge for loss of masculinity?)
As strange as it sounds to restore sexual function to people who have fulfilled the obligations of their sentence after committing a sexual crime is within their rights to govern themselves. If we do not feel that they are safe, the laws need to change and funding provided to keep offenders out of the public. Who gets to pick and choose others legal civil liberties? What if the individual is attempting to have a relationship with a consenting adult? Perhaps less focus on the dysfunction might allow greater restoration and less of a threat in the long run?
Too many variables to call for a blanket refusal. I am sure there will be abuses from some of those released. However, I am not willing to continue to punish all convicted people forever that may have changed.
As I was reminded on another thread, EC stops implantation, it does not cause aborting after implantation. Using the same standards, yes, this drug should be funded.
Blessings.
Rock,
“Medicare and Medicaid were established to provide lifesaving medication for the truly needy.”?
The CBO estimated that Medicare spending on impotence drugs would be $1.93 billion over 10 years, with $730 million being spent in the first five years. After 2010, the CBO estimate shows spending increasing by $20 million a year and figures that the government will be spending $280 million a year by 2015.
Government resources are finite. So who should the money be spent on? Folks who might die from lack of a medicine or treatment? Or guys who can’t get it up?
I don’t think any guy, anywhere, has actually died from not being able to have penetrative sex.
I do not have a problem with denying payment for male erectile dysfunction meds, if that is the policy for everyone. I may have an issue with withholding them from a specific group of people based on prior convictions or other moral grounds.
Depending on your political persuasion the motivation to spend that much money could be negative for the reasons you expressed or positive if you and your buddies owned a lot of stock in the company.
It is absurd to hold that we must treat everyone the same, regardless of their behavior. It is acceptable to withhold erectile medication from rapists just as it is acceptable to withhold the franchise from sociopathic felons.
The state deals in harshness and cruelty, and its basic assumptions should be harsh and cruel. Civil and religious society is the place for kindness and gentility. The state should execute criminals and deny them meds; civil and religious society should comfort them and provide for their needs as the spirit moves.
If the spirit moves one to provide Viagra to rapists, then one needs to take a hard look at which spirit is doing the moving.
“The state deals in harshness and cruelty, and its basic assumptions should be harsh and cruel.”?
GW would agree with you totally, that is how he justifies his war, torture, and civil rights infringements.
Your assumption of the state is rather odd. The state I would like to see deals in compassion, equality and Social Justice. Where remedies are sought to the issues and not someone’s ideas of retribution and punishment. Executing a criminal will not undo a crime. (Neither will restitution.) However in the working out of the issues hopefully they and we will become aware of our relationship to each other and humanity. To me that is what living this journey is all about.
If we were to visit a prison in America today, we would find a disproportionate number of poor and people of color in residence. A large number of the prison population suffering from acute mental illness, they ought not to be punished for being sick, they need help and a secure environment to protect them and others, not punishment. Cruelty only fosters greater cruelty, it cannot be justified by one side and not the other. The “War on drugs”? has done nothing to reduce drug usage, building more prisons and locking them up has done nothing to stem the tide either. Treatment and institutions that treat the person not the crime are the best defense we have against further cruelty. It would be much easier to simply lop off a hand or gouge out an eye, but I don’t think it will create a better community.
Not all convicts are permanently dangerous. I deal with many individuals that were either very young or not in their right mind at the time of their offenses and have become completely changed and unlike the person that would hurt someone else. Many are reacting out of abusive situations in there childhood. Should mistakes in early life doom one forever? There are differing types of people; there should be differing responses and solutions.
The issue to me about denying a medical benefit that others receive to a convict is less about the substance and more about discrimination, simply being a convict is not enough. Blessings.
The state I would like to see deals in compassion, equality and Social Justice.
Uh huh. A state that deals in compassion, equality, and social justice will have its ass handed to it by the barbarians, and the peace-loving citizens of same will find themselves being tortured for fun by people whose concept of morality is “if it moves, kill it.”
The state does not have the luxury of being soft. That gentility is for the society protected by the state to pursue. Christ himself recognized this, and advised us that the kingdom of heaven will not be found in the principalities of earth, but in our own hearts. Do not look for the state to provide the Christian love which we are asked to generate ourselves.
The issue to me about denying a medical benefit that others receive to a convict is less about the substance and more about discrimination…
Indeed. Discrimination – as in, I am going to discriminate in terms of whom I am going to give erectile-enhancing drugs. Peaceable citizens, OK. Vicious rapists, no. I discriminate in terms of whom I give my car keys to. My teenage son, perhaps. My three-year old, no. A person who does not discriminate is an idiot in most circumstances, a moral monster in some.
“Discrimination” is not an intrinsically invidious term to sensible people. Although there are some forms of discrimination which decent people do find objectionable, declining to help rapists get hard-ons is not one of them. Find another argument for enabling violators of women.
You want to make sure the next Ted Bundy can have a nice woody ready for his victims, you go buy the pills and give them to him.
The state does not have the luxury of being soft.
Compassion, equality and social justice being things that make the state “soft,” and are incompatible with protecting its citizens. And if we become barbarians in the process, hey! We’ll have those soft religious folks to console us.
What any of this has to do with the perfectly rational state interest of refusing to buy Viagra for sex offenders, I have no idea.
By providing erectile enabling drugs, one is not enhancing but restoring a person to healthful functioning.
They are also enhancement drugs.
I agree there are mentally sick people who need care not punishment, but I must add what is considered sickness and which is considered an exercise in free will knowing that decision is wrong?
we may look at a rapist or murderer and say he is sick, sickness implies lack of responsibiltiy or lack of ability to know right from wrong, the sickness made me do it, but immoral implies deliberate assertion of free will to do a very bad thing to another human being.
so most murderers and rapists are immoral not sick. tho there are some who are truly mentally ill, but how do you distinguish between the two?
giving viagra is simply for the ability to have an erection, how does the inability to have one harmful to your health? many live with that their whole lives and are still happy and productive members of society, but being able to have sex can increase the quality of life somewhat, but why should a rapist who abuses that right be allowed to enjoy that privelege?
if we worry about discrimmination we are discriminating against people by putting them in prison for wrong doing. they are being singled out for “special treatment”.
most of these criminals better be glad they live in amercia, because in many countries, and history of many nations rapists and debilberate murderers were executed with in a few days of convicting them there was no years of appeals and supporting the criminal with free food water and other necessities.
many of the lesser crimes were punished either by cutting off body parts or repaying the victims several times what was stole or enforced labor.
of course many innocents were executed too because they thought they were guilty, and that is unacceptable too.
so there are alot of flaws, but it is better than nothing.
of course that was abused too, abuses are ineveitable, not acceptable by any means but we are talking realities here. not wishful thinking.
oh by the way there is not consenses on blood pressure meds, many people who have high bp are thin, and many who (like myself) blood pressure goes up not down as fitness is increased. bp meds are the only way for me.
I lost 20 pounds and increased my exercise only to have my bp spike higher and higher and stay there. so you can’t force diets on people, because history proves weight and fatness is irrelavent, for most anyway. a few might benefit such as extreme obese.
I have heard some doctors start to question fatness as having any bearing on blood pressure, in fact they are starting to look at lean muscle tissue on overweight people as the culprit, heavier people have more muscle tissue just to carry the excess weight around, since there is little blood in fat, (just look at a peice of meat and compare the meaty part and fat part, the fat is white but meat red that is the blood vessels and blood there.
so the heart has to support more energy and circulation to support lean muscle mass than fat. but losing overall weight both lean and fat can probably help that, I am sure for me, becaust taking bp meds has really hurt my performance in exercise, (o2 debt builds up easily now) so if I can shed this weight I am sure that will help, I hope.
anyway back on topic, I think the victims should have some say too on how rapists and murderers are punished too, they should be allowed to describe to the jury and judge, even in private if necessary the suffering they endured the night mares and how their lives have lost the quality it once had,
why should the murderer or rapists be allowed a better quality of life then their victims? why should they get medications the victim can’t afford as far as drugs for pleasure not for health?
I understand medications such as insulin, or bp meds or pain meds if they have a chronic condtion like migrains or depression. giving someone these medications is not helping them commit crimes. viagra is questionable, abuse it and lose it it might just be telling the rapist that his rights are greater than the victims and that what he did is not so bad and that he still has the right to enjoy sex.
but that is how I summize it anyway, I am just glad I don’t have to make those decisions, that is a heavy responsiblity. I guess that is why we have lawyers, constitution, juries, and the like.
RR
> we may look at a rapist or murderer and say he is sick, sickness implies lack of responsibiltiy or lack of ability to know right from wrong, the sickness made me do it, but immoral implies deliberate assertion of free will to do a very bad thing to another human being.
Not really. Only the most extreme forms of pathological dissociation from reality allow for the kind of complete mental incapacitation that would literally mean the person no longer distinguishes right from wrong, has no responsibility, no capacity for decision, no agency at all. That is actually very rare (otherwise lawyers would have a field day, if it was so easy to prove mental incapacity).
Besides, ‘sick’ can be used in a non-literal or rather non-medical meaning, to describe violent behaviour without anything like that being meant, any assumption that there is actually a full mental incapacity. I don’t think any anti-social behaviour has to be pathological for it to be ‘sick’ (wrong, perverted, malignant) in that sense. I think it’s best to keep actual illnesses (which do not normally impair a person’s moral judgement) very distinctly spearated from actual murderous or violent behaviour.
Are you basing your assessments of convicted people on experience or by what you think you know? There is a very good program on FRONTLINE (PBS) called The New Asylum, I would recommend watching it. There is a lot happening in our system folks do not want to know about. I currently work with 25-35 probationers and many parolees. There is justification for concern for recidivism, all one has to do is look at the stats. However if that is where one stops they are missing a large part of the story. Those that seek help for their dysfunction and receive it have much greater chances of recovery and a life free from addictions and other compulsive behaviors.
The de-funding of mental health services starting back in Reagan times has paralleled a rise in crime rates and a rise in police and prison modalities; they do not work for rehabilitation. The issues of victim’s rights and the need for reparations are all valid and need to be included in the discussion. However to simply treat all felons and convicts as evil and necessitating punishment for the rest of their lives does not square with the reality of what can happen to people who want to change if given the chance.
I employ many convicted felons, (including two for homicide) as a group, the folks I work with are not much different then places I have worked with fewer convicted individuals. There are those that love drama, those that are angry at the world, but mostly folks that want to get on and provide for themselves and their families and help others that are trying to make a new start. The horror stories of abuse that most of the people I deal with have to live with never cease to amaze me. It is incredible that they are as able to function as they are. (I cannot explain it.) It is easy to spout rhetoric about groups of people and not put a face on it. RAPIST, ADDICT, FELON, ABUSE such heinous words, implying heinous acts. I challenge folks that wish to use blanket judgments to justify treatments of individuals to come to a place where they can spend some time with the individuals trying hard to create a new life and see if they can condemn them after eating, teaching and working and worshipping with them.
It is strange that some of the very hands I have held in silence could do what they have done, however if a look at the footprints of my life were revealed it would be scary to see where they have been at times. I am not suggesting that all felons are rehabilitatable, or that all are worthy of grace. By the same token many are worthy of grace and do well when given the chance and the tools. Blessings.
No one is trying to keep felons who have done their time from starting new lives–nice strawman, though. We also aren’t conflating a felon who did time for grand larceny and a felon who molested kids or a serial rapist–though you seem to be. I am all for felons getting medical/preventive care and mental health services. However, I don’t see why I should pay for a sexual predator’s Viagra when we won’t pay for–and often deny access to–the EC his victim needs. That’s bullshit.
Rape is NOT a compulsive behavior. It is a crime of violence and entitlement. It leaves very real, broken human beings in its wake, but because the vast majority of them are women, they seem to matter little.
RAPIST, ADDICT, FELON, ABUSE such heinous words, implying heinous acts.
You don’t believe rape is a heinous act?
I do not say we should have to pay for anyone’s Viagra. I am simply saying that it is too easy to generalize about the treatment of people because of past behavior.
If a benefit is legally available to the public, I cannot support blanket discrimination, there may be compelling reasons why individuals should be denied access to treatments just as there will be some that support it. It should be one’s Dr. mental health advisors and their personal decision at which therapies they need to pursue for a given malady. (Obviously a person should not be empowered to rape or any other act of violence.) There is a lot of ground between a tweaked kid at a party with everyone drinking who abuses a girl while they are drunk and a serial rapist. (Not diminishing the act on the girl at the party in the least.) Nice straw man though. Both are rapists, with the label. However, the kid can learn and grow and become aware of the difference. If he does, isn’t that a good thing? Should he at 45 or 50 years of age still be labeled for who he was 35 years ago?
EC should be available whether Viagra is subsidized or not, what is your point?
I do not see where a person who has genuinely changed and has fulfilled their legal and civil obligations should be treated differently than anyone else. Treating a person as a criminal forever will do nothing to fix the broken beings and victims of crimes. Forgiveness though does allow for healing to take place and releases the abused from continuance in the place of being a victim.
mythago, absolutely heinous. That is the point, if we label with the words for the action it is dehumanizing and easer to simply treat all of the people with that label in one fashion. However if we take people as individuals and treat them as the unique human beings that each of us are (it is much harder) then we have to take responsibility for what we can do and that means being able to move on sometimes and yes it is conceivable that prescribing a drug to restore someone’s sexual functioning might be called for. It does not have to happen at the expense of anyone who has been hurt. On the contrary the more people that become aware of their place in the community and their responsibility to it, the better it is for all of us. Or, we can continue to have increasingly separate societies where there is greater marginalization; and that would be better? Blessings.
I do not see where a person who has genuinely changed and has fulfilled their legal and civil obligations should be treated differently than anyone else.
How do we measure whether someone has ‘genuinely changed’? You seem to be arguing that it’s OK to hand out Viagra to sex offenders because it would be cruel to punish them forever, but now you throw in the additional caution that they must be ‘genuinely changed’. What does a rapist need to do to prove that it’s OK to get state-funded Viagra?
Is it also dehumanizing to deny someone convicted of armed robbery the right to carry a concealed weapon?
I am not arguing that sex offenders get anything handed out to them. I am saying that if it is a practice for anyone else, that there is likely a group that has had issues in the past, and should not be treated differently than anyone else if they are in fact changed.
As far as knowing if someone has changed, it is very difficult to know another’s heart or how they will act under extreme circumstances. I wish there were a simple test. We do the very best we can and celebrate the successes while we learn from our mistakes. It is a process and non of it is perfection. (What works on one, fails miserably on the next some times. It is what keeps me getting up and doing the work day after day.)
I worked with a person who was convicted of rape at the age of 18, he did his time and was released from probation for that crime, but was registered as such. 10 years later I met him. For the 8 months I worked with him his wife and two children came to church to be with him every Sunday while he was in residence, and had regular visitation and passes the entire stay with us. He was no longer the kid with a minor girl, and appeared to have moved on from that time. Can I say with certainty that he would not rape? No. It occurred once, and not again from that time on that anyone knows. (Not that once is an acceptable number.) As he is dealing with other health issues and is not yet fully employed, it is conceivable that he is on public access for healthcare. Were he suffering from erectile dysfunction due to something organic or mechanically wrong with him, and his Dr’s recommended it, I would not have a problem with his getting assisted meds. (Real person, potentially real scenario.)
As for the guns, there is less sympathy from me there, I am very anti gun, and deal daily with their results. I do know of people that have been taken off paper and had their rights restored that are legally able to carry a weapon. (In my state just about anyone can anywhere.) I would encourage them not to. It is a good but not equal comparison. One could argue for the beneficial relational qualities of sexual relations, as one could argue for the defensive need for guns. I will go for the first far more than the latter. I do not agree that it is dehumanizing to deny carrying a weapon; however labels have been used to dehumanize people forever. The right does it well, it is not men and women, people, that are of the same sex that want to have the same rights as others to get married, they call them a name instead, it is easier to treat folks differently when we call them something other than ourselves. It also hurts very much. Blessings.
Before beginning, please note that as a matter of faith and practice I hold that your position – that we should give people chances, attempt to forgive, and so on – is not only wise and true but is. in fact, a moral imperative that is not optional behavior. However, the appropriate locus for these moral assessments is at the level of the individual human being. It is not at the level of the state.
I am not arguing that sex offenders get anything handed out to them. I am saying that if it is a practice for anyone else, that there is likely a group that has had issues in the past, and should not be treated differently than anyone else if they are in fact changed.
Fair enough.
Does the state possess the means or the competence to look within the human heart and determine whether someone has “changed”? Should it attempt to do so?
Or should the state – as the legitimate repository of deadly force – restrict its determinations to questions which are determinable on a more objective basis? Bear in mind in your answer that the state is the part of society which has the legitimate right to go around killing people. Do you want the killing machine to work on objective principles, or subjective individual moral judgment?
As far as knowing if someone has changed, it is very difficult to know another’s heart or how they will act under extreme circumstances.
Indeed.
We do the very best we can and celebrate the successes while we learn from our mistakes. It is a process and non of it is perfection.
This is an acceptable counsel of achievable results, for private citizens, as well as a cogent summation of the learning process.
Some learning curves are steeper than others. Some learning processes carry consequences far more severe than others. (The best reason I’ve ever heard offered for letting your kids make mistakes when they are young is that the consequences at that age are (usually) way less severe than at later ages. It’s better to learn that stealing is wrong by taking a candy bar and feeling bad about it, than it is to learn that stealing is wrong by taking a diamond necklace in a robbery and going to jail for 20 years.)
In the current topic of discussion – giving sexual aids to sexually dysfunctional perhaps-former rapists- how would you characterize (a) the difficulty of making the determination that someone has changed, and (b) the magnitude of the consequence of an incorrect determination?
And with those characterizations in mind, do you believe it would then be (a) prudent or (b) imprudent for the government (the set of public bodies charged with the maintenance of the peace and the upholding of each citizen’s right to be left in same) to roll the dice and attempt to determine the status of each maybe-former rapist?
Well, golly, Rock, the point of the original post was that Viagra was available for free through Medicaid to convicted sex offenders, but EC is often not available (let alone free) for the survivors of their rapes. IOW, it was about the double-standard that is par the course when it comes to sex, birth control, and sexual violence.
“One could argue for the beneficial relational qualities of sexual relations, as one could argue for the defensive need for guns. I will go for the first far more than the latter. ”
This is based upon a myth. Sexual predators don’t have trouble getting laid. Many have wives and girlfriends (and many are church-going family men). Rape and sexual assault can and does happen in relationships, so your point about the benefits sexual relations for convicted sex offenders doesn’t wash.
“Treating a person as a criminal forever will do nothing to fix the broken beings and victims of crimes. Forgiveness though does allow for healing to take place and releases the abused from continuance in the place of being a victim. ”
Lectures on how the naughty survivor should just forgive, like it’s that easy does not allow for the survivor to move on. Forcing the issue to someone who was violated isn’t going to help them heal. If anything, it will make it worse by giving them the impression that their anger–and their fear–is not valid.
Forgivensess is something the survivor decides to do, on their own timetable. Not when you preach it, or the perp demands it. It is not something you or anyone else can dictate or push. Some people never grant forgiveness. That doesn’t mean they haven’t moved on. Some people grant it too soon because they believe the lectures coming from all sides–that they should forgive, that they will never be whole if they don’t forgive, and that they are lesser people if they don’t forgive. Problem is, it doesn’t help because they weren’t ready and the peanut gallery was more conerned with shaking their fingers at the survivor than oh, showing a shred of compassion.
People are discriminated against due to past (convicted) actions. You cannot get certain jobs if you have been convicted of certain crimes. The SEC rules that convicted felons can’t serve as executives on publicly-traded companies. They could be 100% reformed, but it doesn’t matter. There is too much of a worry of them screwing people over again.
These guys want to pay for their Viagra, let them–I’m not stopping them. But they sure as hell shouldn’t get it on my dime–or on their survivors’ dimes. You don’t have a right to an erection. Your health doesn’t suffer, and you won’t die. There are plenty of people with more pressing medical problems who do deserve our resources.
As far as knowing if someone has changed, it is very difficult to know another’s heart or how they will act under extreme circumstances. I wish there were a simple test. We do the very best we can and celebrate the successes while we learn from our mistakes. It is a process and non of it is perfection.
We’re talking about the government making a decision as to who has ‘changed’ enough that we can pay for their Viagra. How do we make that decision? You keep conflating what we, as individual humans should do, with what the government should determine.
I would guess that your friends who ‘get paper’ and carry guns are somehow having their convinctions expunged.
(a) the difficulty of making the determination that someone has changed, and (b) the magnitude of the consequence of an incorrect determination?
I find it terribly difficult. I have found that after years of working in addiction and related criminology that it is still possible indeed it happens that we just get it wrong. Some of our folks are adept liars. On the other hand, it is more frequent that the light goes on in someone’s head and they get it and start changing their life.
The magnitudes of the consequences of getting it wrong are huge. I have lost 18 people in the last 24 months just that I know of. (As in dead.) Several more have been arrested and many are still on the margins still not finished with the insanity. However there are many who do get it right and that is what we try and improve on. Our program works closely with the courts, drug courts and probation and mental health offices to give both teeth but also better assessment of the individuals. We need to find more funding and more centers to have treatment for individuals who have issues and find themselves involved in crimes. The statistics are just stark; jail no treatment high recidivism, jail or probation with a treatment program, huge difference. We work with judges on community service and victim restitution in a lot of cases as part of the felons program, we also use mental health and counseling to a high degree, it works. All this helps to reduce the risk of incorrect determinations, but it is inevitable that with the current system of crime and punishments, the perpetrators meet the states obligation and then are simply released regardless of true repentance or change. It happens hundreds of times a day.
(a) prudent or (b) imprudent for the government (the set of public bodies charged with the maintenance of the peace and the upholding of each citizen’s right to be left in same) to roll the dice and attempt to determine the status of each maybe-former rapist?
There is absolutely no easy answer for this one. Not simply with rape but in the entire gambit of criminal behavior. I do not see it as solely the Gov. job, I think as a community it is our role as well to work with people and help them change. I look hard to reconciliation as opposed to doing time. Doing time does nothing to contribute to the community or the victim, and frequently aggravates the offender to a harder line. (I see so many dope fiends go in with drug issues and come out criminals it is terrible.) It does keep a dangerous person out of harming others which is a valid function.
Prudent or not, it is happening every day, and we need to get better at changing folks, more cells is not the answer. As with most issues dealing with people, we are so dynamic there is no one answer. We continue to try and change people for the better one at a time, just as you do with your persuasion and discussion on this blog. It is creating a vision of caring that gets people involved and things do get better. Blessings.
Jeepers Sheelzebub, I thought I was clear in stating IMO EC should be available (along with counseling, support, and medical treatment) for victims of rape. I would go along with subsidizing it for others as well. I also thought I was clear in that IMO that the elimination of erectile dysfunction drugs from public funding would be fine with me as well.
There does seem to be a double standard if one compares these two drugs and assistance. I do not believe that eliminating support for erectile drugs will get EC into one rape victim’s hands, so there is a breakdown here. I also do not believe in enabling anyone to do harm to another, however not all people that have been harmful in the past are harmful now. If the law states that they are entitled to a program and they qualify then that should be OK. Unless a compelling case can be made as to why they should not receive a benefit. Serial rapist in my book would be a disqualification. I just do not like the blanket usurpation of benefits by any cause.
“This is based upon a myth. Sexual predators don’t have trouble getting laid. Many have wives and girlfriends (and many are church-going family men). Rape and sexual assault can and does happen in relationships, so your point about the benefits sexual relations for convicted sex offenders doesn’t wash.”?
Great generalization about all sexual offenders, I am sure because you say so it is true. However I am not speaking of predators, I am speaking of individuals that have made mistakes, and yes, sexual relations with a loving partner can be a healthy expression and deeply relational.
” Lectures on how the naughty survivor should just forgive,”?
What are you talking about? Where was there any judgment on the victim in anything I said? My experience and belief systems tell me that forgiveness at some point is a very freeing thing for the victim. I never said forgive and forget, we often never forget the wrongs done to us, but forgiveness releases the victim from the event to hold power over us that practice it. Who said anything about demanding or expectations? What peanut gallery are you talking about? Do you just keep all this anger and frustration around to dump whenever you get a chance? Please do not assume you know where I am coming from just because you have encountered people as quick to be judgmental as you seem to be.
A large part of our therapy for folks dealing with resentments and anger issues are exercises to help them identify those wrongs and release them from the power to continue to affect them. Forgiveness is one part of that process. (Many carry baggage for years and it is like the day it happened every day, some choose to let go, it works.)
I find it ironic that the SEC has higher standards than does Congress.
“You don’t have a right to an erection.”?
Why do you feel the need to personalize this? Thank you for clarifying this to me, I was confused until you came along. I agree that funding for erectile dysfunction meds could easily be eliminated, and possibly should be, the point I suggest is that to make a blanket law regarding all of a group of people could be discriminatory, (like all abortion should be illegal) all the rest of the baggage is yours. Blessings.
Mythago,
“I would guess that your friends who ‘get paper’ and carry guns are somehow having their convinctions expunged.”?
I do not know of any of my friends carrying guns.
There are rights restored to people on completion of their judgments. Voting rights, firearms, etc are often restored to people when they complete their sentences. I do not support or recommend people carry guns. However it is a right guaranteed by the Constitution, and we have to live with that until it changes. As I said, I would try and convince someone who wanted a gun to find another way to find peace. Blessings.
“Jeepers Sheelzebub, I thought I was clear in stating IMO EC should be available (along with counseling, support, and medical treatment) for victims of rape. I would go along with subsidizing it for others as well. I also thought I was clear in that IMO that the elimination of erectile dysfunction drugs from public funding would be fine with me as well. ”
Great, wonderful, it’s fine with you. Problem is, it isn’t fine with the powers that be, and *that* was the subject of the original post, and the source of my comments to that effect. I make a comment about the double standard, you ask me what the point is, and your answer to my reply tells me that it flew right over your head. Read the original post. It’s bullshit that traumatized women can’t get EC–even on their dime–but the sexual predators who violated them could get Viagra.
“Great generalization about all sexual offenders, I am sure because you say so it is true. However I am not speaking of predators, I am speaking of individuals that have made mistakes, and yes, sexual relations with a loving partner can be a healthy expression and deeply relational. ”
Uh, no, it’s “true” in that many people who are charged with rape, sexual assault, or child molestation are either married, partnered, or dating people. IOW, they already experience sexual relations with a loving partner. I dispute that will help anyone in changing WRT rape and sexual assault because rape and sexual assault are crimes of *entitlement*.
“Do you just keep all this anger and frustration around to dump whenever you get a chance?”
I am not dumping–I’m calling bullshit. You’ve conflated all felons with sexual predators and accused us of judging all felons and wanting to deny them second chances. There’s a huge difference between denying a felon a second chance and not wanting to pay for a sexual predator’s Viagra.
BTW–I suggest you take your own advice about assuming where someone is coming from.
Sorry, I can’t paint with that broad a brush.
I read what I wrote and your responses seem to be from a larger body. I do not get half of what you are accusing me of believing from what I feel or wrote.
I do get nervous when it is easy to apply broad generalities and lump people together as if they are all the same.
“Accused us”?? Who are the us? And I suppose I am them? Great… That’s just perfect.
Blessings.
Rock, kindly re-read what you wrote and stop with the passive-agressive innocent shrug. Seriously. It’s getting tiresome.