Stranger Danger and the "Stranger" in Your House

I woke up at 7:00 AM Monday morning to a news report about a controversial sentence dealt by a judge in Corpus Christi, Texas. The judge in question decided that it was enough that the community be informed that convicted sex offenders were living in the area as required by Texas’s version of Meagan’s law, so he required a group of sex offenders to put signs in front of their houses announcing their criminal identity. While many feminists and children’s advocates cheered on the judge for meting out this sentence, I cringed.

My life: 1966-1971

My parents taught me to repeat my address and phone number to a police officer should I get lost, coached me not to talk to strangers, especially if they offered me candy, and did their best to not let me out their sight when we were at a store or other public place. They bought into the “stranger danger” stereotype hook, line and sinker. They were almost paranoid that a stranger would kidnap me, molest me and possibly kill me, so we went over the “stranger danger defense” lesson a lot.

Meanwhile, my grandfather molested me every time we went to visit. He would come to the back bedroom where I was supposed to be napping and do unspeakable things to me while my mother and grandmother were doing the dishes after lunch. Once, because I was bleeding and more afraid of the blood than I was of breaking the silence and risking all the horrible things that my grandfather said would happen, I tried to tell my mother what my grandfather had done. She would hear none of it: it didn’t fit her understanding of child molestation, so my story couldn’t be true. Instead she believed some story that my grandfather made up about me jumping on the bed. From then on it was as if she had given my grandfather carte blanche to do what ever he wanted.

A lot of feminist and children’s advocates hail Meagan’s Law and the state level prototypes as wonderful. Because of my own experiences, I have my doubts. There’s no denying the fact that Meagan’s Law, if effectively followed, will protect a few children from some obvious offenders who are very, very likely to molest again. What parent in their right mind would let their child play with the neighborhood convicted child molester? And what school or church program would let a convicted child molester work or volunteer around children? This is the intended effect of the law, and it is very good.

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