Obsession

Psychologists frequently mischaracterize a person who has admitted to committing as sex crime as overly „obsessed with sex”.

Well, I have known many such men, and am one myself, but we aren't „obsessed” with sex any more than an avid SCUBA diver is „obsessed” with water.

Sure, many men who want to please the psych doctors readily admit to being obsessed with sex, but only in so far as they really do think about sex far more than most „normal” people do. But that doesn't necessarily mean they are obsessed with it.

Obsession implies a constant preoccupation with something; which means you cannot think of anything without thinking about whatever obsesses you. Few sex offenders actually rise to this level of sexual obsession.

For example, a SCUBA diver may think about water for more than most „normal” people do. But as long as his aquatic thoughts do not impose upon his routine thoughts then he is not obsessed. Every time he sees anything that reminds him of water, or his diving gear, he relates it to diving and may even briefly fantasize „what it would be like” in that context. But he is not „obsessed”, he is just „interested”.

But a man who is „interested” in sex instead of SCUBA diving (or sports, or clothes, or food, etc...) is considered to be obsessed for having a similar perponderance of thoughts about what is interesting to him throughout the day.

This mischaracterization accounts for a lot of misunderstanding and consequently misdiagnosis and mistreatment for „sex offenders” who are really just misguided and simply need to be educated about their own sexual nature.

I'm not suggesting that this analysis is the magic bullet cure for all sex offenders, but I am certain that it could help a lot of men re-think their problem, perhaps in terms of an ordinary addiction, rather than a debilitating obsession.

If a man is told he is obsessed there is a good chance he may actually become obsessed. I would even assert that most serious obsessions are the result of the person at some point being told (or otherwise coming to believe) that they are obsessed. I say this because I have never met an obsessed person who did not know they were obsessed (perhaps such people exist, but I would imagine them to be confined in the very bowels of some mental institution – which would explain why I have never met one).

Obsession is only one of many mischaracterizations of so-called „sex offenders” that contributes markedly the „sex offender” phenomenon (and hence allowing sex crimes to prolifenate).

(Originally written by Joseph E. Duncan III - September 5, 2010 – 10 pm