Unsure about the Sandusky ruling

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Not beyond YOUR reasonable doubt. However it was the jury deciding the case, not you, so YOUR reasonable doubt is totally irrelevant and may be ignored.

If you want absolute assurance, then you will not get it --- ever. According you your way of thinking (if one can call it thinking) we should not even bother with trials.

Close, but I think that I've provided a much more sophisticated argument here than just that.

His actions were ill-advised, and I could have explained to him in fine detail why they were ill-advised. It's something that is not discussed very often because people are afraid to discuss it out of fear of being suspected of pedophilia, but it's an important aspect of how our behavior toward children ought to change as they develop.

The way we typically handle very young children is borderline erotic, and that is just a fact. The reason we don't think anything of it is that the children are not old enough to have a sexual reaction to it, so it is taken as pure affection rather than something that could send confusing signals. Nevertheless, when we are handling very young children, particularly 6 and under, we frequently do stuff like pat them on the ass, gather up their legs and stroke their thigh, and several other behaviors that would be tantamount to foreplay with an older person.

However, if Sandusky's story is to be believed, he was trying to pull this on much older children than this would be appropriate with. At that age, they are old enough that they are going to react to it as sexual touching, even if you don't mean it that way. That's what I think got Sandusky in trouble with the mother he was apologizing to. It might have been that the child was one of those naturally gay ones. The child was a pre-teen with budding sexuality, and he found himself being held or touched in an intimate way by an attractive and charismatic older man. There are a thousand and one ways this could go terribly horribly wrong, as any reasoning, educated person would have told Mr. Sandusky. Someone might think it's harmless to cuddle a 12 year old boy. However, if he's not related to the person holding him and he is also likely to develop eventually as a gay guy, he will have a reaction in that situation. He wouldn't be able to help it. So yeah, even if Sandusky actually is innocent of actual molestation, he was being a dick, even according to his own story.

Nevertheless, I do not look at him and see a child molester. It's not something that is easy for me to communicate, but the tone he used in his voicemail to victim 2 followed the meandering, casual path of someone who is doing something perfectly normal and everyday. The "I love you" at the end of the message came across as an ordinary valediction. If you only looked at the words, you could color it as creepy, but I don't think that you could color it as creepy if you were paying attention to Sandusky's intonation.

I think I'm making a much better case than you seem to think, here.

Pedophiles groom older boys not only for sex, but also to keep silent. This is typical pedophile behavior, and I think easily explains why the boys in question didn't in most cases just say no.

The boys would also have remained "silent" if Sandusky hadn't actually done anything morally wrong, though.

Your argument works just as well for the null as it does for the positive, so it doesn't really hold water for you to say, "the children remained silent, and this proves that Sandusky is a pedophile because pedophiles always groom children to remain silent." Other situations in which a child might NOT complain that an adult in their life is molesting them sexually include the case where they actually are NOT being molested sexually.

I think that my skepticism of the verdict is standing up pretty well, here. I don't think that I would have a solid case for proving that Sandusky is innocent, but I think that I have a credible case for saying there may be a reasonable doubt as to his guilt.

Where in this thread have you done that?

His actions were ill-advised, and I could have explained to him in fine detail why they were ill-advised.

]It's something that is not discussed very often because people are afraid to discuss it out of fear of being suspected of pedophilia, but it's an important aspect of how our behavior toward children ought to change as they develop.

The way we typically handle very young children is borderline erotic, and that is just a fact. The reason we don't think anything of it is that the children are not old enough to have a sexual reaction to it, so it is taken as pure affection rather than something that could send confusing signals. Nevertheless, when we are handling very young children, particularly 6 and under, we frequently do stuff like pat them on the ass, gather up their legs and stroke their thigh, and several other behaviors that would be tantamount to foreplay with an older person.

However, if Sandusky's story is to be believed, he was trying to pull this on much older children than this would be appropriate with.

At that age, they are old enough that they are going to react to it as sexual touching, even if you don't mean it that way. That's what I think got Sandusky in trouble with the mother he was apologizing to.

It might have been that the child was one of those naturally gay ones. The child was a pre-teen with budding sexuality, and he found himself being held or touched in an intimate way by an attractive and charismatic older man. There are a thousand and one ways this could go terribly horribly wrong

as any reasoning, educated person would have told Mr. Sandusky. Someone might think it's harmless to cuddle a 12 year old boy. However, if he's not related to the person holding him and he is also likely to develop eventually as a gay guy, he will have a reaction in that situation.

Nevertheless, I do not look at him and see a child molester.

It's not something that is easy for me to communicate, but the tone he used in his voicemail to victim 2 followed the meandering, casual path of someone who is doing something perfectly normal and everyday. The "I love you" at the end of the message came across as an ordinary valediction. If you only looked at the words, you could color it as creepy, but I don't think that you could color it as creepy if you were paying attention to Sandusky's intonation.

I think I'm making a much better case than you seem to think, here.

Wait what?!

Forgive me for interpreting this wrongly, but are you saying it would have been more appropriate to pull if it were young boys?

Lol this whole thing is ridiculous.

Aww, and here I thought you had made tracks. This conversation was a lot more pleasant when you were NOT a part of it. How about you go back to being ancient history, dude?

No. I condemn you for it harshly for it because I see it as a deliberate distortion of my views. How dare you? You are obviously not intent on having a respectful discussion.

You do not belong in this discussion. Your responses have been spiteful trolling. You are a waste of my and everyone else's time.

Um....I really don't think you needed to go into detail on this. You obviously have given this a lot more thought than any of us?

All you are doing is putting your foot in it, talking about patting kids asses and stroking their legs. Where do you even get this stuff from? Never in my life does it occur to me if I'm touching a child wrongly or not, because I am not. You clearly have a guilty conscience with all that in your mindset.

I'll respond to this, actually. The reason I have thought about this is that I grew up with high functioning autism, and I had to actually reason out a lot of social nuances that most people take for granted. I had to labor mentally to grasp why it was socially acceptable to handle a six year old child in certain ways, but this seemed to change strangely as the child got older. I eventually grew out of most of the autistic symptoms, but I understand a lot of things at a conscious, philosophical level that most people don't even think about.

I don't care if you're HFA or what, you are still sick and twisted for thinking what this man does is acceptable.

MightyMorphin, are you really so stupid that you can't grasp the case I am trying to make, here? I don't think you are. I think that you are a troll, and I'm putting you on ignore for being an as*hole.