Talk:Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act/Archive 3

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Critique should cover

Ok. I'll start (sorry for the quotes and boldings): It should cover the fact that specific aspects were opposed prior enactment of the act by treatment professionals. Congress asked for comment but did not follow the recommendations, which has caused the problems that are now attracting the criticism.

ATSA's response to Congres prior enacting the act: Re:Pending Sex Offender Registry Legislation (HR 4472)

• "The Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act (H.R. 4472) states that its purpose is to respond to “vicious attacks by violent sexual predators.” In fact, by being inclusive of anyone who has been convicted of any sexual offense, it applies to some who are not in fact violent sexual predators and do not pose a substantial risk of re‐offense."
• Specifically we offer the following major recommendations for HR 4472, all of which can be supported with scientific data:
  • 1. Delete the requirement of lifetime registration for juvenile offenders, who are very different from adult sex offenders in both their development and their risk for reoffense.
  • 2. Require or at least encourage states to adopt a tiered approach to identifying “high risk” offenders based on empirically‐based risk factors, such that aggressive notification and internet disclosure would be reserved for high‐risk sex offenders.

- Please MONGO read at least this paper to see where I and James are coming from. ATSA is very authoritative organization on this field.

Another ATSA's response with two more recomendations: Re: Pending Sex Offender Registry Legislation (HR 3132, S792, S1086)

and

ATSA's disenchanted comment after passage of the act: ATSA response to SORNA

• "Though the guidelines to SORNA indicate that it is the result of many amendments to the Wetterling Act, it must be noted that Ms. Wetterling herself has stated serious concerns about the current act and the use of the registry as mandated. She stated in a June 18, 2007 interview that, “We’re setting up an environment that is not healthy. It’s just anger driven, anger and fear. It’s not smart and it does not get us to the Promised Land.” ATSA agrees and believes there are more effective and less expensive means to safer communities"
• "Over-inclusive public notification dilutes the public’s ability to identify the most dangerous offenders. A growing body of research demonstrates that public disclosure can disrupt the stability of low-risk offenders in ways that may interfere with successful reintegration and may actually exacerbate risk for criminal offending"

I also would like to have a mention included that some reform groups and child advocates are echoing the worries of professionals.

I,m happy MONGO, that you give some slack here, and allow the light of objective criticism shine at least a bit.--ViperFace (talk) 17:57, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

Again...start a new section at the bottom of this page and place the paragrapgh roughly as you think it should be worded with refs you wish to use...one to paragraphs should be sufficient. Allow the myself and other a few days to look it over. Some respondants to Cantor's request at the NPOV noticeboard may have further input so allowing them time to chime in may be advisable. One other option that we can do is to simply create an entire article about the effects both good and bad that sex registries and related laws are having. I suspect a well referenced and neutral dispassionate stand alone article like that would be acceptable so long as it doesn't cross the lines of advocacy.--MONGO 21:04, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

Again...What are the RS's to back-up the good side?— James Cantor (talk) 21:07, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

Exactly how.many incidents of harm have come from those inconvienced by being registered offenders? I'm just asking because if more than 10 percent have valid examples then perhaps the law needs tweaking...but he way you fix that is to vote, not use Wikipedia as a platform to right great wrongs. As an example...there are approximately 5000 registered in one county in CA alone....do you have 500 incidents where the law has caused injustice to those that have to register? I would be surprised of one percent...50 examples could be made. That's the point about undue weight Cantor. You're taking one percent and pretending it means the law is broken to support your POV. Show me the 50 in that county so we at least have the one percent....or better yet...write your congressman and get the laws changed since as you and your reliable sources cited seem to claim...it's a bad law.--MONGO 21:18, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

You are asking me for WP:OR, which you cannot do. I am asking you for WP:RS, which you are required to do.

Your hypothetical surprise is irrelevant. It's the RS's that matter, and you are insisting that your view be given equal time despite not having even a single RS against a very long list of very strong sources on the other side.

And I live in Canada, btw. ViperFace is in Finland. If anything, we're in the better position to be objective.

— James Cantor (talk) 21:38, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

You keep citing articles that claim that this act and similar ones basically do more harm than good. There are approximately 750,000 registered sex offenders in the U.S. When the brilliant scientists did their research do they conclude that there were exactly how many that the laws wrongly penalized? 75,000? 7500 or 50? If they cited a few examples (which is all I am seeing) they seemed to have done lot of guesswork to conclude = bad law.--MONGO 21:51, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

You can believe or not believe whatever and however many scientists you want. But for it to be relevant to WP content, you need RS's to express those views. There are no RS's that express those views. You don't appear to be willing to revisit your personal view, which is up to you, but the mainpage must reflect the (overwhelming) consensus of the RS's. If the RS's say bad law, the page must say bad law. If the RS's say good law, the page must say good law. If the RS's are mixed, the page must express both views in proportion to how they appear among the RS's. What we have, however, is a long list of very high quality RS's saying bad law, and no RS's saying good law. You can disagree as much as you want, but you cannot overrule the RS's and force the page to reflect the personal belief you hold.— James Cantor (talk) 22:48, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

I'm just trying to have a conversation with someone who is an expert since I am just MONGO. My point that I failed to make apparently is that since you know, what are the control numbers from those research papers that determined that the incidence of wrongful penalty was bad enough to alter the existing laws. I'm not seeing (and I surely don't proclaim to have read each link provided with great detail) a percentage whereby conclusions are substantial enough to say for example that this is a bad law. Since you are an expert and I am just MONGO can you simply tell me what the percentages are?--MONGO 23:22, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

My willingness to engage in 'just a conversation' ended many personal attacks ago. Regarding the RS's however, they vary in their methods, conclusions, and recommendations. For empirical articles, I generally recommend a format like "Smith compared X and Y, finding a rate of Z, leading them to conclude A. On that basis, Smith recommended adopting policy M." For legal or ethical RS's, such as those from the ACLU, I typically recommend a format like "A policy review was conducted by Group-X. They challenged the ethical basis of the law which violated the principles of A and B."

Because there is a very large literature here, summarizing every RS individually is unwieldy and unnecessary. Summary statements would instead take a form like "Several civil rights groups, including A, B, and C have expressed opposition to the Adam Walsh Act. Concerns included violations of X, Y, and Z." If there were large and opposing sets of RS's, we'd include both.

What is important and what is reflected in each of these examples is that we never speak in WP's voice; we never declare what is true or false. Rather WP (or we) simply summarize the content and conclusions of the RS's, whether we think the RS itself is right or wrong. WP would never recommend a repeal of a law, but one or more major groups calling for its repeal is certainly encyclopedic and should appear on the mainpage.

If you have a specific question about a specific RS, I am happy to suggest how I would summarize it.

— James Cantor (talk) 00:54, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

Your manner of outline here is more coherent than what you mentioned in the above thread where you asked what I would change in Viperface's edit. That edit by Viperface was reverted by User:Herostratus and I agreed with his revert in my initial contribution to this discussion here. Otherwise that version by Viperface is entirely unacceptable. However, your format here where you outline the issues and attribute it in the sentence followed by a supporting ref is the way to go. Again...this article is about the law itself. Overwhelming it with critique is simply not the way to go. Why not figure out a stand alone article and keep the critique here in summary style?--MONGO 03:43, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

I am not clear on what you are suggesting, but it sounds like a WP:POVFORK.

The difference between what ViperFace wrote and what I am suggesting is, to me, simple reformatting. I would remind you both that User:Herostratus himself apologized for rolling back so much (here), and that WP:NPOV#Achieving_neutrality reads "As a general rule, do not remove sourced information from the encyclopedia solely on the grounds that it seems biased. Instead, try to rewrite the passage or section to achieve a more neutral tone." Moreover, that section of the NPOV policy links specifically to WP:Preserve: "Instead of removing text, consider: Rephrasing or copyediting to improve grammar, more accurately represent the sources, or balance the article's contents". That is, the aggressive rollbacks and subsequent reverts were unnecessary, counter to WP policy, and based on a clear failure of AGF.

I suggest doing what WP:NPOV#Achieving_neutrality says we should have done in the first place: After reinstating ViperFace's text (this version), help him to reformat it to fit the structure I outline above, and then discuss/enact whatever further edits are necessary to get it the rest of the way there. Personally, I believe that ViperFace has shown himself perfectly able to do that, now that he's armed with exactly what to do, instead of getting attacked by reverts and accusations.

So, how does this sound to everyone? I'll reinstate the prior version noted above; ViperFace can have, let's say, two days to work on that; and then we can discuss anything that still seems to be speaking in WP's voice instead describing contents of RS's?

— James Cantor (talk) 09:38, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

No. That version was horribly biased.--MONGO 14:48, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

Now more than obvious you and Viperface never had any intention of keeping it within balance. You want a radical POV pushing platform to advocate your apologetics for deviant behaviors. If the law is so flawed why has it not been changed or even amended much?--MONGO 14:57, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

How many incidence of harm is good question. I would like to knoow the answer too, altough judging what is disproportional is subjective. I gave three examples somewhere above (I'm aware of many others) where the outcomes are arguably disproportional and registeation seems to serve no other purposes than destroying lives. Also it must be kept in mind that harm extends to children and other relatives of registrants. What comes to the piece you reverted, it was 5 rows of text. It was very condensed and I'm suprised I manged to include almost all points the critics are making. Also it was under "Critique" section, which by definition covers downsides of this law. The size of my edit was so small that it was outright under presentative to the ammount of criticism that is being presented by academics. Yet, you claim it was biased. I have already expressed my willingnes to setlle with this under presentive notion of criticism. You yourself stated earlier that let's wait for few days for others to comment. I folloewed and waited 3 days before reinstating it, you immediately reversed back and claimed SPA. You are demonstrating clear pattern of intelligent dishonesty here. At this point it's clear to me that you are not going to allow me to edit anything, so all I can do is to wait other users to decide who is wrong.ViperFace (talk) 18:14, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

Here is one more example of stupidity. 93% people voted "NO" when asked if this guy should be labelled for life. Here is another. Both are married with kids to their victims. This happens in offense based systems like AWA.

"Nikki and Frank's predicament is not an isolated incident. Across the country, young lovers are increasingly finding themselves caught in the nation's complicated web of sex-offender laws. Teenagers wind up on the public sex-offender registry, alongside violent predators, pedophiles, and child pornographers, for having consensual sex with an underage partner (or, sometimes, for streaking or sexting — sending racy self-portraits, which can be considered child pornography). The stigma of the sex-offender label is difficult to shed: "Once you're on the registry, good luck trying to explain it," says Sarah Tofte, who has studied sex-offender laws for the nonprofit group Human Rights Watch. "It's like you're in prison proclaiming your innocence. People think, Right, that's a likely story. Especially potential employers."" Source Absurd!!ViperFace (talk) 01:04, 18 December 2014 (UTC)

Ok. Now that heightened emotions are probably calmed a little I'll add proposal to cover some of the criticism section below. It's just a draft, a start for further elaboration (of course no too detailed) and some more content and refs are pending. Please contribute and comment if you wish --ViperFace (talk) 04:01, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

I contributed below as requested. What a POV push.--MONGO 04:56, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

What a great effort to work towards consensus by striking all and offering nothing as alternative. I don't claim to know why you behave like this, but since your arrogance and wickedness has been exponentially increasing along the amount of evidence presented in this discussion, cognitive dissonance would explain a lot. At this point it is becoming increasingly hard for you to admit being wrong without feeling of losing your face. I don't blame you, it's very typical behavior of human being. To be honest I was hoping input from other users than you, but by all means keep on coming back to express your hurtfulness, so that everyone may see who is the rascal here.ViperFace (talk) 14:09, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

Were you or were you not accusing me of personal attacks last week?--MONGO 16:15, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

Not sure whether I did or not. I think it was James who spelled it out. If it came from between the lines of some of my post, it was not completely uncalled-for keeping in mind some of your comments:

• "Well, we sure wouldn't want convicted sex offenders to be inconvenienced would we James. You'd be happy to provide...of that I have no doubt." --MONGO 14:54, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

• "You guys seem to be very specifically focused on degrading articles. That isn't going to happen here or anywhere else on this website." --MONGO 05:12, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

• "The two week long POV pushing that you and your accolade Viperface, a single-purpose agenda driven editor, have been presenting is a desire to move the article away from the fundamentals into a long sappy this law sucks and needs to be changed platform to advocate your apologetics for deviant behavior...that was there before you two (or is it five with sock puppet and IP accounts all promoting the same thing POV)"--MONGO 17:10, 13 December 2014 (UTC) --ViperFace (talk) 21:12, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

Anyway, I'm not so much into personal battles, so I try to take this to more productive bath once again and I apologize that I have admittedly lost my temper some times during this heated debate. Now, after carefully reading through what has been said above, the criticism section is not probably the best idea, what James presented Talk:Adam_Walsh_Child_Protection_and_Safety_Act#Arbitrary_break would definitely be better. I tend to slam all the criticism on the table at once which does not leave too much space for pros & cons type of discussion. This is probably not a good way to proceed and I see why some editors object my style of editing. Also MONGO, having read through the article you quoted here, it deals exclusively with the primary intent of the law to create seamless system to distribute information between states and federal government, and some legal questions around the act (of which I don't know too much). I think this objective is where the law has succeeded well, and I think it is a good law when judging solely by this component. I assume there is RS with supporting results with respect to this component e.g. showing less non-compliant offenders etc., which of course should be covered in the article. To be honest I haven't read any critique aimed at this objective and I have personally failed for not elaborating my knowledge with RS dealing with this specific component and not putting my opinion on it forward in our discussion. However, this is not the component the overwhelming criticism is aimed at. The criticism is aimed towards: abandoning risk-based system which is more helpful for general public and law enforcement (for predicting risk of recidivism better), widening the number of offenses covered, application to juveniles etc. points I listed below. I'm not saying that this is completely bad law, but merely that some components were not so well deliberated before passing it, and those are the components attracting the heavy criticism from all over the place, from child safety advocates and civil right organizations to treatment professionals. I'm not a Nambla advocate, I'm merely into public policy questions due to my studies. This piece of legislation (and much of related U.S. laws) strikes me as a prime example of well intended policy with severe drawbacks which no one though through prior enacting it. They were in so much hurry to crack down on predators that the baby went out with the bath water. I hope saying this clears some of the atmosphere between me and you. --ViperFace (talk) 21:12, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

Time for some outside views. Please see WP:NPOV/N#Sex_offender_and_Adam_Walsh_Act

This is very clearly going nowhere. So, I have brought the issue to the NPOV noticeboard for (hopefully) input from uninvolved folks experienced with NPOV issues, including due weight and false parity (the central issue here). I don't know if anyone there will come here, or if comments will be entered there only.— James Cantor (talk)

There is adequate RS material to include a section on criticism of the law, and it should be included. It should not overwhelm the article, though - and I see no issues with a simple paragraph like was outlined (then struck through) below. I am no proponent of the behaviors addressed in the law, but no law is without flaw. Reasonable professional and sourced criticism of the law should be welcome. ScrapIronIV (talk) 14:16, 18 December 2014 (UTC)

Following ScrapIron's support and what FourViolas said here I proceed and add slightly condenced version of what is presented below. I encourage anyone objecting this edit to follow WP:Neutral_point_of_view#Achieving_neutrality and WP:PRESERVE rather than totally removing it.

Arbitrary break

I'm happy to try to explain whatever I can. However, your description of the Adam Walsh Act is not entirely correct. The law contains multiple components, only one of which is a national registry. The problem with the tier system is that it has no basis in science and forces states to replace superior risk assessment procedures that have been validated across a very large number of studies.

That said, I'd like to jump to the bottom line: That you think that an entire large set of RS's are making a strawman argument, or should have been designed another way, or are comparable to a previous situation, etc., is irrelevant. WP pages do not summarize what WP editors believe; WP pages summarize what RS's contain. If you had some RS's claiming that other RS's were making strawman arguments (or whatever), then we must certainly include them. But that's not what we have. Rather, we have a virtually unanimous opinion across all RS's on the topic. You, like Mongo, are free to believe that all the RS's are wrong and that you have discovered something that has eluded every published expert on the topic. But what goes on the mainpage is what is in the RS's, not just the RS's you happen to agree with (which sounds like none). You can have whatever beliefs you want, but the only beliefs that belong on the mainpage are those that appear in RS's (nevermind a proportionate number of RS's).

— James Cantor (talk) 23:22, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

That is all fine but what do you think an adequate outline should be for this article? I see it as a statement about the law says, why it was implemented, when, by whom, and then a careful expansion of pros and cons. Do you think it should say he law sucks and should be repealed? I'm really confused about why this article needs to be an advocacy platform for change.--MONGO 23:37, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

Skipping over the embedded and false assumptions, I believe it would be more effective to go about this the other way around: Of this version of the mainpage, which includes ViperFace's well-sourced text, yet still needs work, what do you think needs to be rephrased and how would you rephrase it? That is, what in this version fails to reflect the basic form I described below, in this comment? — James Cantor (talk) 02:36, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

I can't really join ViperFace and "contribute to the article by presenting RS favorable to your position," as he urges me to do above and is apparently doing himself. That approach is one reason reason the criticism section reads like advocacy - because that's how it's been written. It seems to me the focus of the article should stay on the act itself. A separate criticism section is not the best way to neutrally present material. If some of the sources are to be used, they should be integrated into the existing body of the article. Tom Harrison ^Talk 12:07, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

I don't want to speak for ViperFace, but I think his intent was to invite you to present whatever (positive) RS's you thought were missing. Personally, I am indifferent to exactly where the RS's go. To me, the important part is that the information is supplied to readers at all. I think the information can be successfully integrated (without an explicit criticism section) by:

• Expanding the Compliance section to why states are resisting (using the reaction of reports from state boards as the RSs) and how the federal law is pressuring them to comply (threats of losing funding);
• Adding a section on "Legal challenges" for the various lawsuits about it;
• Expanding the section on "Effects" (perhaps rename it "Effectiveness"?) for the data on efficacy;
• Add a section on "Reactions" or "Public reactions" to include the statements from the various professional societies and the public (ACLU, HRW, etc.).
• Also, I think I would rename the "Legal applications" section to be "Provisions" and to embed the "Visa" section within that.

I believe this structure would provide logical placement of the RS's that need to go in, and to allow for the addition of any other RS's that come forth later, and avoid an explicit criticism section. How does that sound?

— James Cantor (talk) 13:40, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

ViperFace (talk) 17:47, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

Consensus building

I believe it might be useful to review where we are at this point. If I misrepresent anyone who’s commented, do please set me straight. (Pinging User:ViperFace, User:MONGO, User:ScrapIronIV, User:FourViolas, User:Tom harrison, User:DHeyward, User:Noterie, User:Flyer22, User:Herostratus, User:My very best wishes.)

As I re-read the talk pages here, at Sex offender, at the NPOV noticeboard entry, and at ViperFace’s talk page, this is how I see things: ViperFace made several well-sourced, but dramatic, changes to two related pages. Knowing that these are volatile topics, folks reverted much and repeatedly (and skeptically) cautioned the new editor. With more discussion, reflection, and time for folks to read the RS’s presented both by the new editor and by James Cantor/User:James Cantor, just about everyone (there being a single? exception) has come to see that the RS’s are valid, and indeed represent the dominant view of real world experts.

So, at this point in the discussion, User:MONGO appears alone in his dissent, bringing us to the need to decide if we are nearly at consensus needing only a few more tweaks, or if we have already reached consensus and are instead experiencing disruptive editing from a single editor, which no amount of content- or policy-related discussion will resolve. As folks would guess, I believe we are at the latter.

Mongo is not producing anything like a list of the RS’s presented by the alternative view, Mongo is presenting no text that might be used to compromise or resolve the conflict, Mongo has repeatedly engaged in combative language and multiple (and empty) threats of admin and other wiki-legal discipline, and refuses meaningful talk such as responding to text suggestions by striking out a newbie’s suggestion saying “I contributed below as requested.”

As I say, I think my view on this is clear, but I before bringing it AN/I (these pages and the relevant issue seemingly falls under the ArbCom’s Sexology restrictions), I thought it important to seeks others’ input.
— James Cantor (talk) 20:10, 25 December 2014 (UTC)

The new material is sourced, and does not appear to be pushing any particular point of view. A passing mention of the criticism of this law and its efficacy (or lack thereof) is more than warranted here. I am unsure why this is being constantly reverted. I don't even think it is a dramatic change. All I am seeing is an accusation of "POV" and "single purpose account" and immediate reversions. The latest blanking of the new section was performed only a minute after it was posted - not even enough time to read through and analyze the new contributions.

I am a new editor here myself, and only stumbled across this discussion when reading policies and the noticeboards. I have no dog in this fight.

What I have seen is a history of sourced edits and compromises on one side of the discussion, and deletions from the other side of the aisle. Some of the deletions have been accompanied by less than kind words, and even veiled accusations. And now, people on both sides of the discussion having been getting personal and emotional. I don't believe that this is how the WP:BRD process is supposed to work. So, rather than just deleting this content, editors should modify it, or present an alternative.

A law is just a law. Sometimes they work well to curb behaviors deemed undesirable by a community, and sometimes they don't. It appears there are genuine concerns about this particular law that are worthy of some mention. Does it belong in the lede? I don't think so. Should it be completely suppressed? Absolutely not. Keeping it in a separate and limited section of the article is entirely reasonable, and has definite support on the talk page.

I am not bold, nor am I specifically knowledgeable about the topic, except for where this article has directed me to look into it. I will not undo the recent deletion - at least not yet. What I will do is try to contribute an eye to POV, and add my two cents where appropriate. Bottom line is that what has been added comes across as (adequately) neutral, reasonable, and worthy of inclusion. It should be included. ScrapIronIV (talk) 20:14, 26 December 2014 (UTC)

James Cantor is as biased on this subject as anyone I have come across. This article is neither the place not the venue to engage in platform pushing, agenda pushing or POV pushing. I offered several times for Cantor to produce a neutral worded short critique section that clarifies the possible flaws in the law...all he and ViperFace have produced is a series of agenda sources that support their apologetics for this deviant behavior. He failed to gain consensus for his views at the NPOV noticeboard so he threatens going to another noticeboard to try and eliminate anyone who doesn't agree with his agenda here...that's forum shopping if I ever saw it. Good luck. Produce a neutral summary of the actual proof that the law is bad, that it does more harm than good...something that demonstrates that even 10 percent of those adversely impacted even exist. I asked for Cantor to show more than some opinion pieces by social scientists and law professionals that the law is doing more harm than good...he hasn't done that. All I see is sources that cite a few cases where the law has been detrimental. These few examples are never going to be sufficient to compel legislative changes. VioerFace has admitted he wishes to use this article as a platform for his advocacy...apparently in his home country they may wish to adopt legislation similar to this one and he is opposed to that. As ViperFace has stated, peopkebhefe may read this article which will possibly influence their decisions there. That is not what Wikipedia exists for....we are not a place to promote such an agenda.--MONGO 21:16, 26 December 2014 (UTC)

I absolutely agree that Wikipedia should not be used for activism. But, to be honest, I am not seeing it in the wording of this criticism section. I don't think that the intent in what I read here is that the law does more harm than good, nor that the law is bad. When I read it, my take-away is that the law could be better, and that it is not as effective as it could be. I do not think that those are unreasonable claims.

I do think that the sources could be improved, though. If there are ideas "frequently expressed" in research, I would like to see a source for that. The same can be said of the "prevailing consensus" statement. Sources to back those statements up should be available, if the claims are supportable. I don't think that using the ATSA website for those citations would be adequate, because then there would be too much dependence upon an individual source for things described as frequently expressed, or prevalent. Perhaps this would be a good place to start. ScrapIronIV (talk) 22:12, 26 December 2014 (UTC)

The issue is the inability of Cantor or ViperFace to provide a succinct and neutral section and they have yet to do so. Soon as myself and others give them an inch they want a mile. They just want a foothold of POV laden arguments here to get a foothold to expand on later. Check the edit history of ViperFace on this article and look at his earliest edits and you'll see exactly where he and Cantor want to take this article.--MONGO 22:37, 26 December 2014 (UTC)

That Mongo dislikes all text suggested is, of course, his right; however, his comment above suggests that his problem isn't with the text we're actually discussing, but is instead with text that exists only in his imagination. Because he has yet to suggest any text at all, however, he/we are not improving the page. Rather, we are in the situation of Mongo's personal IDONTLIKEIT to any suggestion while indicating no alternative. In the absence of even a single editor agreeing with his view, that behaviour is the very meaning of disruptive rather than productive editing.

ScrapIronIV's suggestions are perfectly reasonable, although statements from a large, international professional society which has as members most of the world's topic experts can probably be used to support more claims than most RS's can, IMO.

— James Cantor (talk) 15:58, 27 December 2014 (UTC)

Your intent is to support a POV laden piece that endorses your twisted view of the legislation, a view based on apologetics for deviant behavior and defended by opinions defined from a tiny fraction of those compelled to comply with the law that may have been adversely impacted. I enjoyed reading some of the weak arguments put forward by the references you support, in which "experts" defend their apologetics for this deviancy by reciting a miniscule few examples...."Joe only did this and now he can't get a job or find a place to live" nonsense. I mentioned earlier that these "examples" of inconveniences do not even represent a noteworthy percentage except for those opposed to the legislation due to their defense of oftentimes heinous behavior. All this article is is a recitation of the legislation, who passed it, when and why. I have no problem with a short summary of critique because there are few perfect laws...but that has not been the edits you have made or supported. Until you are capable of providing a neutral worded nonpartisan summary critique we will find no common ground.--MONGO 17:31, 27 December 2014 (UTC)

From the tendentiousness of the proposed addition, the changes do seem motivated by ideology, and may be connected with a desire to change the legislation. It's not a good idea to use the project to advance an agenda. Moreover, separate criticism sections often lead to poor articles. In this article as in many others, differing views should be presented in context. Finally, the burden is on the one who wants to add the material. It seems to me that the arguments presented by James Cantor and ViperFace for the proposed addition (though it's lined out now - ?) are inadequate. Tom Harrison ^Talk 20:56, 27 December 2014 (UTC)

The proposed addition doesn't appear to be anything more than an attempt to discredit the law rather than describe it. It's advocacy of a certain view rather than objective criticism. I'd expect there are criticisms from all sides including that it doesn't go far enough. --DHeyward (talk) 02:47, 28 December 2014 (UTC)

Er...you'd expect? So, not only have you presented no such RS's, but also you haven't even bothered to look? You're just opposing the dozens of RS's showing exactly the opposite of what you believe solely on the basis of you don't want to believe it...and don't want actually to check your beliefs? Nice.— James Cantor (talk) 17:34, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

I've removed the embedded personal attacks in your heading. You expect us to agree to your apologist edit suggestions by attacking those that disagree with your POV pushing and personal attacks? No way and no how.--MONGO 17:52, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

1. Identifying/labelling editing as disruptive (such as your striking through other editor's proposals and deleting other editors comments) is not personal attack. Resolving disruptive editing requires identifying it as such.

2. A personal attack requires that the comment be personal. The section title refers to the edits as disruptive and says nothing about you as a person.

I can suggest only that you bring the issue to ANI or other appropriate forum (in addition to ceasing to: edit and strike-through others' comments, fail to present RS's in support of your view, label other editors as SPAs etc, and presume you know the minds and motivations of other people (which does constitute personal attack)).

— James Cantor (talk) 18:11, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

Its not a label to identify a SPA if that is an easily demonstrated thing, as myself and others at ViperFace's talkpage and the NPOV noticeboard have done. Perhaps in your eyes your edit suggestions appear neutral but not to me. It looks like a laundry list of excuses to make excuses for deviant behavior. What part about this being simply an article about the law itself don't you get? repeatedly myself and others have made overtures of compromise where a neutral treatise of critique could be interwoven in the article, but what you want is an entire rewrite, heavily laden with apologetics those that are overwhelmingly believed to be a threat to society. I even agreed that as with almost any law, some fallout that adversely impacts those that have done minimal crime may be more harshly penalized than they should be. However, even with those compromises, you and ViperFace have yet to produce a neutral treatise on that aspect of the law's potential faults.--MONGO 18:58, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

1. How it looks to you is irrelevant. How it looks to the RS's is what matters. And you have yet to provide any RS's, whereas I have listed dozens showing that you're wrong. If you provide RS's, I am happy to write text that includes them. It's silly to claim text is biased for failing to include RSs that don't exist. It isn't that the text is biased, it's that the RS's don't say what you want them to.

2. So you're not denying that you haven't even looked for RS's to support what you want on the mainpage? Or, you did look, find some, but you're not going to share them with anyone?

— James Cantor (talk) 19:43, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

PS- It's hypocritical to say that it's okay to call out someone for being a SPA, but it's not okay to call out someone for disruptive editing.— James Cantor (talk) 19:43, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

What is your goal here anyway? Your reliable sources mainly discuss sex offender registries in general and either don't say a thing about this act or do so only in passing.--MONGO 23:16, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

My goal is for WP pages on this topic to reflect proportionately what is contained in the RS's on the topic. (Wow: A professional scholar wants WP to reflect the content of the scholarly sources. Amazing, I know.)

The effects of registration are entirely relevant to the law that mandates registration. The effects of the other provisions of the law are similarly entirely relevant. The ethical concerns posed by the law, as expressed by multiple, major civil rights groups, ditto.

I would ask you the same thing of "your" RS's...except that you don't have any. So, given your complete inability to provide any RS's, there's little point to asking what your goal is. (Moreover, neither of our "goals" is relevant. What matters is WP's goal, and that is to convey the content of the RS's.)

— James Cantor (talk) 23:41, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

Then you're still in the wrong article since your "reliable sources", as I already stated, either do not mention THIS ACT or do so in only a superficial manner. Do scholars in your field of "scholarship" routinely try to pass off a one percent fail as hard proof that something doesn't work? Maybe that why it's called "soft" science.--MONGO 02:13, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

LOL Nevermind being mere sophistry, that's not even good sophistry. SOME of the RS's are about registration directly and mention AWA indirectly. SOME are about AWA directly. That SOME are indirect is not at all an argument to exclude all direct and indirect RS's. That you continue to provide NO RS returns us to the same point yet again. I can only repeat: Present whatever RS's you like, direct, indirect, and otherwise, and I will be happy to support their inclusion on the mainpage.

As for me, I am known most for my research in neuroscience, hardly a soft science in anyone's book. That you again refer specifically to me personally (and to my profession) rather than to any RS or policy is, of course, what makes your comments personal attacks rather than good editing.

— James Cantor (talk) 04:31, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

We are at the same point since all this article is about is the act itself and isn't a platform for advocacy. Once you actually present a neutral critique section that gets consensus for incorporation let me know.--MONGO 06:04, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

Note: I did not receive Cantor's ping via WP:Echo above, and have only just now significantly read this discussion. Yes, this talk page is on my WP:Watchlist, but I am mostly ignoring all these sex offender disputes. I have enough contentious articles to worry about. I just stated the following at the Sex offender talk page: "As shown in my sex offender discussion with ViperFace above, I was clear that certain types of sex offenders are a threat, or are very much a threat, and that I was not asserting that consensual close-in-age matters with regard to age of consent are a part of that threat. I think it's clear, except apparently to ViperFace, that I was not referring to all sex offenders. So if anyone refers to what I am in agreement on in this case, keep that in mind. I was not reverting ViperFace; nor am I in complete agreement with ViperFace's view of things regarding the topic of sex offenders." Flyer22 (talk) 07:22, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

I'm aware what you meant there. Some subsets are known to be more dangerous than others. Dangerousness is feature of the person. Committing a crime (even a repulsive one) does not necessarily mean that the person is dangerous in future. This is the problem the criticism is mostly aimed at: the law does not differentiate between seriousness of the crime nor the danger the offender poses, it merely concentrates to the statute that was violated. The system is not seen as effective as it could possibly be by majority of academics. ViperFace (talk) 22:50, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

Criticism section

After reading the entirety of both this page and the NPOV discussion, I have 3 distinct impressions:

1) There appears to be a pattern of reverts and edit warring, primarily fron user MONGO, that are innapropriate. Multiple other parties have exhaustively listed a slew of RS covering a broad swath of criticism that should be contained in the article. All attempts to reason are fought off with less than impressive arguments, and more importantly, no references or citations that contradict.

2) I am impressed by the conduct, tone, and perseverance of those who wish this article to reflect that content. It's nice to see a sustained argument less about wikilawyering and more about comprehensive and rational arguments supported by sources.

3) I find myself in amazement that after all this discussion, the intractable editing of essentially 1 person with no argument except WP:IDONTLIKEIT has prevented this article from being a better source of information. There is clearly consensus, let's make this article better.

I've reverted MONGOS entire revert/striking of criticism section. It's impossible to have evaluated the entire section and go through the sources, making a bad bath determinat ion all in less than 60 seconds. 07:06, 4 January 2015 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2600:1008:B15B:D2BF:0:2D:5342:3001 (talk) 06:54, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

I agree that a criticism section is called for.... Mongo, c'mon, back off a little willya? For one thing, the points made on the merits of the case by various editors are compelling and convincing. It is a pretty bad law, you know. If the criticism were based on false data or disingenuous arguments or whatever that'd be one thing. But they're not, it seems.

Hey, I'm the person who rolled back the original edits in the first place. I'm telling you, Mongo et al, it was never my intent to prevent all mention of objections. They are sufficiently notable and worthwhile for it be a service to the reader to describe them, so let's. My original objection was threefold: 1) to not dump on the law in the lede, 2) to provide a reasonably concise description of the objections, so as not to overwhelm the rest of the article, 3) to provide the "other side" for balance, if there is one (it seems there isn't one, much beyond beyond "the law is popular"). Those having been met, we're good to go with some sort of criticism section IMO.

So let's not fight over this. Let the criticism section go forward (the current version has been hammered out some and seems pretty good, but if you want to take out or change individual statements that'd be fine). Herostratus (talk) 17:24, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

It seems to me that this is not so much about the content of the edit, but the fact that it was edited by me. Unfortunately this has gone to somewhat personal and MONGO is watching me like a hawk blocking everything I try, so I guess it's better if someone else does the editing.ViperFace (talk) 23:02, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

Actual criticism of the law would be acceptable. The problem is that most of it is synthesized about how a different method might be more effective presuming objectives that may or may not be intended. Taken at its face value, the law achieves its objectives of creating a national database. Issues regarding how states investigate/arrest/prosecute/sentence child sex offenders is unrelated. Disparities are unrelated. Whether a different law would be better is irrelevant and places wikipedia as an advocate of change rather than an encyclopedia of knowledge. Perhaps this material belongs in a "treatment for sex offenders" page but nearly all of this criticism is unrelated to this law. --DHeyward (talk) 07:31, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

For a foresight article, see Prohibition in the United States. This was enacted and repealed. It doesn't have a "criticism" section, rather it simply has facts about the enactment, effects and repeal. A section that tries to establish a "better" prohibition that doesn't exist is simply not relevant to an encyclopedia. --DHeyward (talk) 07:43, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

Criticism is mostly towards conviction based registration mandated by the act, adding more listed offenses that require registration to those states already using their own conviction based registry system, and listing juvenile offenders. The act requires states to abandon risk based systems and adopt conviction based systems instead. Risk assessment tools have been shown to be superior to conviction based registration in predicting recidivism. Thus, tier designation under AWA is not effective in describing offenders risk to public. All this leads to:

• loss of judicial discretion of judges
• over-broad registries when numbers of low level offenders have to be included
• diluted registries where truly dangerous offenders may hide among large amount of non/low risk offenders (parents and law enforcement have to divide their attention on large number of offenders)
• arguably disproportional punishment to some non-dangerous offenders
• combination of AWA and state legislation may undermine low level offenders ability to lead law abiding lives by causing unemployment, homelessness etc. instability
• ability of some dangerous offenders to escape registration when allowed to plea down to non-listed offenses (risk assessment might catch these)

I agree with DHeyward: The law is successful in its main objective, that is creating the uniform database and tracing offenders across state lines. I have not witnessed a single RS disputing that. However, almost all other aspects of the law are attracting criticism from academics, child safety advocates, civil right organizations, legal professionals. Such a wide spread criticism among those familiar with actual content of the act is encyclopedic IMO. Capital punishment in the United States article has debate section. I'm ok with including debate section, but it would be leaning to side of criticism anyway since there is virtually no RS to support this act. Notion of general public supporting the act and its success in tracking offenders (if any, I have not seen any supporting RS yet) are pretty much all there is from the supporting side of the debate. ViperFace (talk) 23:58, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

I'm done with your advocacy and POV pushing on this article. It's obvious your intention on this website is to advocate a position and every time I have encountered someone an editor like that they end up banned. If you care about writing a neutral encyclopedia then branch out and find a new series of articles unrelated to the ones you have been so single purposely been working on.--MONGO 03:21, 10 January 2015 (UTC)

I agree with MONGO. The criticism cited isn't about the law or the act. It has very little to do with the it. This isn't the article to argue for pedophile reform as it has nothing to do with it. -DHeyward (talk) 04:15, 10 January 2015 (UTC)

The criticism cited is directly related to the provision mandating states to abandon superior risk-based systems and adopt conviction based system instead, which is seen to cause the problems listed above. The points listed above appear virtually every study dealing with the act.ViperFace (talk) 09:01, 14 January 2015 (UTC)

Hello everybody! I've been busy with my studies so I have not been able to stir up the unrest here for a while. Unfortunately there seems to be no progress nor consensus building of any kind going on, so I'll make an attempt once again to build something covering the downsides of the act. Please, find my suggestion below. I'm planning to move it on main page after a week or two unless broad resistance occurs. I'd like everyone who has taken part of our past discussion (and everyone who stumbles on this) to address their opinion whether to proceed with suggested edit or not by commenting "yes/no" or some other expression of approval/disapproval, so that we get a picture of how close/far we are from consensus. I'm hoping those who vote "no" to point out which parts should be changed/deleted/improved somehow. I know, it's long, almost the size of history section... Hopefully discussion stays more civil than on last round and strictly on the proposed edit.ViperFace (talk) 21:41, 28 February 2015 (UTC)

Controversy (suggestion)

Adam Walsh Act and individual state legislation alike effectively erase judicial discretion of the judges by enacting mandatory registration and public notification procedures based solely on conviction offenses. Therefore, neither mitigating factors nor actuarial risk presented by individual offender has no influence to the application of registration requirements. AWA also amends previous federal guidelines by requiring states to register more offenders (e.g. juveniles), extends the length of registration periods, and mandates states to publicly identify at least all offenders convicted of offenses that are statutorily defined as tier II or tier III offenses. In addition, AWA makes these amendments to apply retroactively to those who already completed their initial registration period and broadens the range of offenses against adults to cover crimes that involve sexual contact, while preceeding Jacob Wetterling Act act was limited to assaults involving sexual acts, such as rape.

The laws tendency to treat all offenders categorically the same regardless of true severity of the crime and ignoring actuarial risk assessment tools as well as its retroactivity has generated criticism. According a survey, politicians believe that sex offender laws are too broad due to their extension to nonviolent offenses, low-risk offenders, and thus diluting the law enforcement potency of sex offender registries. Some have called the law "overly harsh” and possibly wasting resources and scarlet-lettering wrong people. Some judges have expressed their displeasure when having to label now-adults with steady lives who committed their crimes as children as sex offenders. HRW has urged states not to adopt the act.

Prior implementation of AWA in Ohio 76% of adult and 88% of juvenile offenders were designated on least restrictive category or had not to register, while 20% of adults and 5% juveniles were classified as "sexual predators". After re-classification mandated by AWA 55% of adults and 46% of juvenile offenders were placed in the highest and most restrictive tier 3. 41% of adults and 43% of juveniles previously in lowest category and 59% of adults and 45% of juveniles who were not previously registered were assigned to Tier 3. Some law enforcement officials and child safety advocates say that non-discriminatory registries mandated by AWA which include all offenders makes them less useful in helping public and police to identify and monitor truly dangerous individuals.

Some research results suggest that broad public notification exacerbate collateral consequences of registration for low risk offenders, possibly obstructing any protective effects and diminishing the benefits of registration. At least one study suggest to increased non-sexual recidivism among offenders subject to public notification while studies finding decrease in sex offense recidivism rates have been limited to AWA non-compliant states that apply scientifically validated risk assessment tools and reserve community notification to only high-risk offenders. At least one study suggest that broad community notification policies increase sex offender recidivism. Due to these findings the rationality of AWA's non-discriminatory strictly offense based criterion has been questioned. Professionals generally recommend adopting risk based approach and narrow notification scheme, in which all or most offenders are required to register but only small subset of high-risk offenders are subject to public notification.

RSOL, along with American Civil Liberties Union have raised constitutional challenges against amendments passed to bring individual states in line with Adam Walsh Act. Recently some state supreme courts have found states sex offender registration to be punitive, rather than regulatory, thus finding retroactive application of AWA to be in violation of the constitution. Other supreme courts have ruled AWA's life time registration of juveniles unconstitutional. ViperFace (talk) 21:41, 28 February 2015 (UTC)

Note

I have posted this note at WikiProject Law to ask for outside input.— James Cantor (talk) 19:11, 6 March 2015 (UTC)