Letters to the Editor	Letters Archive

Kinko's censors

I was trying to read The Guide's editorial section and discovered that the sex filter ("Smart Filter") at the chain of copy stores called Kinko's censors anyone trying to access anything but the home page.

Perhaps you could bring this to the attention of Kinko's corporate office in Dallas, Texas, and inform them that it is wrongheaded and censorship of the worst kind.

J. L.

Kinko's has not responded to our queries.

Touch = Rape

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I read and re-read the editorial Who Killed Father Geoghan? [October 2003]. I wanted to be sure I read correctly. I didn't want to make wild, emotion-based accusations. But after reading it several times it appears that the editor is indeed saying that an adult touching a 10-year-old's butt in a sexual way is acceptable.

I'll agree it's not equal to rape or murder or beatings, but it certainly is not acceptable! I agree that Father Geoghan's murder is wrong and the murderer(s) should be brought to justice. However it was correct to jail him for sexual molestation of a minor or minors. "Society's discomfort with youthful sexual expression" is decidedly not "astonishing." It is appropriate and understandable. While the occasional "playing doctor" among minors of the same age is understandable, coerced sex or intercourse between minors is not. And even more inappropriate is an adult touching (sexually), fondling, or having sex with a minor. There may be some minors between 16 and 18 that are ready for sex with someone 21 or so, but that is rare. And a 10-year-old is never able to give consent to anyone for sexual conduct. At that age, appropriate "sexual expression" would be limited to questions about anatomy and perhaps masturbation in private.

I don't know what you mean by "there must be a distinction between violent, hurtful acts on the one hand, and conduct that is not malicious or coercive on the other." If you are saying that sex between adults and minors is not malicious and coercive, you're wrong. Minors cannot give consent to adults for sex. Not legally and not emotionally. True, "affectionate touches" and "violent sexual assaults" are not the same thing. However, affectionate touches of children should never be sexual in nature. If they are, they're unethical and illegal. To put such a person in jail, on probation, and register them as a sex offender is by no means Draconian.

Father Geoghan's touching of a minor "desirously" was wrong and illegal. Defending sexual touching of minors is indefensible. Not only is it offensive and dangerous, but it would prove to those prejudiced against gays that homosexuality and pedophilia go hand in hand.

John Ross
mrjbr@juno.com
Los Angeles, California

Your careful reading of our editorial is appreciated; indeed, we do not equate sex with violence and do insist that any ethical law must punish violent, malicious acts differently than the same sort of acts committed without force or malice.

This principle is valid whether or not sex is involved. For example, a sweat shop owner who kidnaps minors for arduous, dangerous, underpaid, 60-hour-per-week jobs merits harsher treatment than a store owner who employs minors a few months shy of their work-legal birthday, or who offers 24 hours of work a week when the law limits of-age minors to 20 hours a week. (And we expect newspaper headlines trumpeting "Child Labor Sweat Shop Busted!" to be about a real sweat-shop, not a grocery store hiring 14-year-olds for after school work-- even though both may be in violation of child labor laws and thus subject to legally valid sanction.) Anyone who insisted on prosecuting both violations with the same verve and demanded the same harsh penalties for both transgressors would rightly be judged irrational.