Adler and Sex Offenders

Adler views sexual offenders as lacking social interest and tending towards a pampered lifestyle. I have been working with offenders for a number of years from an Adlerian perspective and have come to believe that whether a sex offender reoffends or not is directly related to social interest. However, because of the danger they represent to society they are often treated as undesirables and unredeemable. I believe this kind of hopelessness discourages social interest. I have advocated both a clear set of boundaries in conjunction with emotional honesty and compassion. Any ideas about how to encourage social interest and promote a sense of social equality while protecting the society from sexual aggression?

I'm doing a presentation on social equality and the treatment of sex offenders at NASAP this Spring and would like some dialogue on the subject, I am interested both in balancing the therapeutic need for the sex offender to enter into a social world of mutual respect and connectedness while at the same time recognizing the potential dangers.

I also am interested in looking at the issue of social embededness as it relates to the whole issue of why some people cross sexual boundaries in our society and others don't. I am concerned that as our culture becomes less personally connected that social interest while decline and sex offending will increase. Does that make sense? Let me know your thoughts on this subject.

Replies:

Treatment of Sexual Offenders, by Henry Stein, 12/22/96 Re:Treatment of Sexual Offenders, by , 09/13/03 Re:Treatment of Sexual Offenders, by Tim Chapman, 11/15/03

| Behavior OnLine Home Page | Disclaimer |

Copyright © 1996-2004 Behavior OnLine, Inc. All rights reserved.