When the molested one turns into a predator

I feel quite depressed today so I decided I may as well get the entry written I had planned as a follow-up to the one I wrote yesterday. These subjects can get me down, but molestation happens, so we have to deal with it. There is another result to suppressing talk about molestation and not learning as much as we can about what is going on, and that is that molested children or teens may then grow up to molest others in turn.
I will never forget the story a pedofile in Utah told me and one of my sisters about being molested at 5 years old for 2 years by a teenager his mother took in. This teen had been kicked out of his own home. This five year old then grew up to molest many children and teens including one of my children. And not once was he ever arrested and charged with any of his crimes. He was dead by the time my son admitted he had molested him on a vacation trip we took to Utah when he was 7, even though I had asked him and he had denied it. He said it was too hard for a boy to confess this to his mother! He was just one among many this pedofile targeted, some teens for long periods of time, so it is for certain their sexual natures were altered by their encounters with him. So what could have been done about him, realistically speaking.
Even when I was five I had my doubts about the punishment that might be meted out to the molester who abducted me 3 different times and took me down into the corn to molest me. I was afraid that if I told, my dad would shoot him on the spot. I felt it was up to me to decide whether this man lived or died. When he started stopping to a widow's home who had a beautiful little girl around ten I figured he was after her. My conscience hurt me so I decided I had to warn the family. I decided to tell her best friend, only when I went to tell it, I just could not admit he had molested me. Instead I said that he had already molested this little girl and I described to her friend everything this man had done to me. She must have thought I was insane, or they both decided I was after she told her friend what I said. The ten year old called and threatened to have me arrested for telling such horrible lies about her. I apologized and said I would not tell any more. I felt horrified at myself for choosing this way to warn her.
While I was waiting for further punishment for my admitted transgression of lying, the man suddenly disappeared! I think now that she probably told an older brother and I tend to think he told the molester what I said. My tormenter must have decided he had better get out of town before all hell broke loose. I tried to find out what happened to him but no one knew. I didn't worry too much about it I was so relieved he was gone and I didn't have to worry about him anymore.
Two years later another family hired man acted inappropriately with me, and my torment began all over again. This time the molesting did not go further than some fondling of my little button breasts (I was still not in puberty yet of course)and a pawing of my thighs from time to time but it was enough to scare me to death about what might be in store for me. I really thought I was going to go mad since I did not dare talk to anyone about it. No one can imagine how many hours I spent analyzing the problem and trying to figure out what could be done. For one thing, he was not a stranger with no relatives as the other one was. This one had many relatives who I was sure would come to his defense and would be absolutely furious at me for trying to ruin a man's life if I told anybody. Again I thought I had to determine this man's punishment without having to suffer too badly myself.
I came to a compromise. I finally got old enough that I was able to stop doing any activities that might put me in his proximity. In other words, I did not accuse, I just tried to see he got no opportunities. That worked but later on I wondered if I made the right decision.
I think I did just barely. Why do I think this, because I think there are many molesters and most of the time they are not reported to the law which is the most extreme solution. They are dealt with much like I dealt with mine. People are convinced that all child molesters need to be punished by being sent to jail and then treated like the scum of the earth. I am not so sure but what this idea does not worsen the problem. I think this solution that is touted as the right one causes people to think that they don't have to deal with it. Think how slowly the wheels of such justice turn. It takes an awful lot to put a child molester in prison. Yes, extreme cases have to be put there if they have proved themselves to be monsters who might target any child that falls in their hands, but most molesters fall short of that and generally speaking are never reported. They are not disgraced nor treated like the scum of the earth. Child molesters are treated very differently depending on who they are, how respected, how powerful their family is and so on.
So what exactly am I advocating? More common sense in approaching the whole problem. Extremist reactions kept me silent. I wanted everyone to be able to hold on to their tempers and to use common sense in how they handled it. Had I not feared that the first molester would be murdered if I told the second molesting would probably never have occurred. This man would have known better than to molest me. I was forced to protect my molesters from those who might have murdered them. So my protectors were not helping me at all by going to extremes.
My dad was the main one I feared. He threatened to kill a man who had rustled some of his cattle, not many, and he had already been arrested. My Lord, if he would attack a man who had rustled his cattle and try to beat him up and then threaten to kill him what would he do to someone who had molested his daughter. That molester was a dead man.
That kind of justice is too extreme, so we need to get more civilized about what we do with molesters. What we want to do. I have been heavily criticized for befriending a man later on in adulthood who had molested his daughter. I did it initially for his child's sake. I wanted to find out what caused this man to do such a thing. I wanted to see if he could be reached. I would guess after considerable talking to him that his rough childhood had something to do with it. I have talked to other 'low lifes' and befriended them. I make no apologies for this. I felt that to motivate these men to rein in their own savage natures would have a more lasting effect. I was sure that the daughter of this man had loved him and would applaud what I did. I was sure she wanted him to change. She did not want him killed. And the first thing he needed to do was commit to sobriety I thought.
You might say I practiced the philosophy of those without sin cast the first stone. Is there something terribly wrong with that? I don't think so. I used to ask myself what would Jesus do? I think he would not have sentenced these men to death, for beyond that where is eternal life? If we believe in Christ's teachings we will not put people to death for such crimes. We might have to restrain them but we don't live by the law, eye for an eye tooth for a tooth once we have accepted that Christ had a better way. I don't think too many people are Christian when it comes to child molesters. That's hard.