被禁止的性行為與性暴力

成人與兒童的性接觸: 孌童癖: 有關的法律方面 1

今天，成人與青春期之前的兒童的性接觸實際上在所有國家都是犯罪行為。當處於青春期或青春期之後不久的青少年涉及到與青春期之前的兒童發生性接觸的時候，所牽涉到的法律就不那麼一致了（參見此處）。不管怎樣，普通公眾主要還是對專拈青春前期的女孩和男孩的成人感到焦慮。當與兒童有性接觸的這群人都被逮捕和因對兒童的性辱虐而受到指控的時候，這種焦慮常常被聳人聽聞的媒體所強化。不過，大多數諸如此類在美國、德國和法國引起公眾廣泛關注的媒體審判都以宣判無罪而告終[1]。對於這些案例，有復仇心理甚或有錯覺的個人早已撰造了一些錯誤的指責；報紙和電視已經把公眾攪合得歇斯底里了，而且營造了一種對被告敵意的總體輿論氛圍；警察的偵破工作已經被潑進了一些水分[2]；當事的兒童已經受到了誘供的引導，以至於他們的證言失去了法律效力；而所謂的“專家”終於成了徹頭徹尾不合格的庸人，如此等等。

正如能夠從這些審判中所獲悉的那樣，對性侵犯兒童者的迫害可能容易演變到對當事雙方都不公正的地步：錯誤的指控可能太容易被人相信了。當事的兒童可能不僅會成為性侵犯者的犧牲品，而且也會成為不適當的法律系統的犧牲品，因為隨著不同的線索出現，這個法律系統會持續不斷地一遍又一遍地詢問當事兒童。這可能歪曲和敗壞所涉及的案例，以至於最終，這個無辜者卻受到了懲罰，而罪犯卻逃脫了罪責。（欲知這些議題的詳細論述，請點擊此處）。萬幸的是，近年來，在許多國家，審判此類案件的法院已經變得更有了效率。法院會想方設法改進它們的專家的資質能力，並且也會極為小心不要“誘導”兒童的證詞。現在通常只會讓接受過專門培訓的接訪者進行調查詢問，而且會用錄影記錄下來。因而，兒童可以完全遠離審判室，而且此時還可避免受到反反復複的、不適當的和挑釁性的質問。

所涉及到的這類問題的複雜性，使得在像這種概要性課程裏不可能對它們作出細緻的判斷。要想學習有效地處理任何一個這樣的問題，則需要研修大量的專業高級課程。

Prohibited Sexual Behavior and Sexual Violence

Adult Sexual Contact with Children: Pedophilia: Legal Aspects 1

Adult sexual contact with children before puberty is a crime in virtually all countries today. When juveniles during or shortly after puberty are involved, the law is less uniform (see here). In any case, the general public is primarily concerned about adults seeking out prepubescent girls and boys. This concern is often heightened by sensational press reports when whole groups of people are arrested and accused of sexually abusing children. However, the most widely publicized mass trials of this sort in the USA, Germany, and France ended with acquittals (1). In these cases, vengeful or even delusional individuals had made false accusations, newspapers and television had fed public hysteria and created a general atmosphere of hostility toward the defendants, police work had been sloppy, the children had been subjected to leading questions and suggestions that invalidated their testimony, “experts” had turned out to be utterly unqualified etc.
As can be learned from these trials, the persecution of sexual offenses against children can easily become unfair to either side: False accusations may be too easily believed. The children may be victimized not only by sex offenders, but also by an inadequate legal system that keeps interrogating them over and over with differing results. This can distort or undermine the case so that, in the end, the innocent are punished and the guilty go free. (For a detailed discussion of these issues, click here). Fortunately, in recent years, the courts have become more effective in many countries. They try to improve the qualifications of their experts and also take great care not to “lead” their child witnesses. These are now usually interviewed only once by specially trained interviewers, and this is recorded on video. Thus, children can be kept out of the courtroom altogether and avoid being traumatized by repeated, inappropriate and aggressive questioning.
The complexity of the problems involved makes it impossible to do them justice in a general course like this. Learning to deal effectively with any one of them requires a number of special advanced courses.

(1) The McMartin Case, Los Angeles, USA 1983-90; the mass trial in Worms, Germany 1994-97; the Outreau trial, France 2001-05. These are just the most spectacular and notorious examples.