Crime and Therapy

• Both sympathy and empathy are scripts by Don Nathanson, 3/23/97
  • Crime and Nourishment by Rich Kuyper, 3/27/97
    • Crime and Remorse by Ed Riemann, 3/30/97
      
      

Ed, Your recent posts, IMHO, recapitulate several thinking errors common to proponents of authoritarian approaches to the rehabilitation of violent offenders. One of these errors consists of yielding to the temptation to take comfort in the simplicity of black-and-white thinking when the complexity of the matter under consideration prohibits our doing so.

You wrote: “How about the background of the victim which is often a history of victimizations starting in early childhood? Are you suggesting that those who "prey" on these people should somehow have our sympathy?”

I might, by way of answering your questions, ask one of my own: Are you oblivious to the fact that “those who prey on these people” THEMSELVES often have “a history of victimizations starting in early childhood”? Consider pedophilia. Given that most pedophiles were previously victims of OTHER pedophiles one might say that victimization, in these instances, is often a rehearsal for predation. Suppose I am a therapist treating a 14 year old boy who, between the ages of 7 and 12, had been the repeated victim of a neighborhood pedophile. Presumably, as a victim, my client would, by your standards, be an appropriate candidate for sympathy/mature empathy (s/me). Suppose further that some stressor occurs, the boy’s parents divorce, perhaps, and in the wake of this event, my client victimizes his 7 year old cousin. Presumably, by your standards, now that the victim has become an offender, subsequent treatment should be devoid of s/me. That strikes me as nonsensical.

Far from being an unlikely exception, the above example of pedophilia is rather closer to being the rule. And it illustrates the gray realities that render black-and-white thinking increasingly inadequate in formulating treatment approaches for any number of victim/perpetrators.

You wrote: “I am in no way suggesting we "write off" those who have commited violent crimes. What I am suggesting is that we STOP giving them excuses for their behavior.”

There is, IMO, no INHERENT connection between the therapist’s maintenance of s/me and “giving them [offenders] excuses for their behavior” outside the minds of those entrenched in dichotomous thinking.

You wrote: “We, as therapists , have to attempt to make people accept responsibility for their behavior rather than give them excuses.”

The ‘motto’ of my offender groups, written each week at the top of the whiteboard by a different group member is: “The more responsibility I take for my actions, the more control I have over my life.” This is often done with a measure of good-natured ‘coaching’ by other group members. I have found this little shared routine to be an effective way to keep an important concept in the forefront of our groupwork without attempting to ‘make’ anyone do anything. In the course of group process, the motto is frequently referred to by group members and myself. This approach appears to me to be as effective to its purpose as any other I have tried over the years, though I have no doubt it could be improved upon. If you have been successful, Ed, in ‘making people accept responsibility’ using some other technique, I am certainly open to hearing about it. Again, I have not found that giving attention to the importance of accepting personal responsibility has interfered with my ability to maintain s/me or vice versa. Nor, in my experience, does sustaining s/me lead inevitably to providing offenders excuses for their behavior. If this is difficult for you to accept it is perhaps appropriate that you have moved away from treating stipulated clients.

You wrote: “For those who are truely remorseful we should attempt to provide the opportunity to reintegrate into our society.”

As Don’s tale of the reintegration of the Australian miner illustrates, and as my experience corroborates, the climate created by our particular approach to rehabilitation is often ITSELF a central fact in whether the client is able to get in touch with and/or express his remorse.

You wrote: “May I respectfully request that you pull back from your caseload a bit and look at them from a more objective(and victim oriented) perspective...”

I consider this excellent advice which one involved in my particular line of work can neither hear too often nor afford to dismiss lightly. I accept it in good faith. In the same spirit, Ed, I encourage you to examine the false dichotomies, faulty premises, and untenable assumptions which have, IMHO, compromised your understanding of what is useful and appropriate in offender treatment. If you are truly interested in expanding your thinking on this subject, I might suggest reading "Crime, Shame, and Reintegration" by John Braithwaite or the David Moore chapter in Dr. Nathanson's edited book, "Knowing Feeling".

• Crime and Injury by Ed Riemann, 4/5/97
• Shame, in the prison settings by Mell Williams, Jr., 8/9/97
• (No title) by (No author), 6/12/98