Why Child Molestation Is Bad

When the first accounts reported that the murderer in Pennsylvania was taking revenge for something that happened when he was 12, I wondered: molestation? This would seem to suggest that:

A man who laid siege to a one-room Amish schoolhouse told his wife he had molested young children decades ago and left a note saying he had "dreams of molesting again," state police Commissioner Jeffrey B. Miller said Tuesday.

Police said they could not confirm the claim by Charles Carl Roberts IV and that family members knew nothing of the alleged molestation.

...

Authorities said Charles Carl Roberts IV, a milk truck driver and father of three who lived in the area, wrote what appeared to be suicide notes before taking guns and an estimated 600 rounds of ammunition to the tiny school.

Roberts did not appear to be targeting the Amish, though, state police Commissioner Jeffrey B. Miller said Tuesday. He said Roberts apparently chose the school because he was bent on killing young girls as a way of "acting out in revenge for something that happened 20 years ago."

From the notes Roberts left behind and the telephone calls he made, it was clear he was "angry at life, he was angry at God," Miller said. Co-workers said his mood had darkened in recent weeks, but suddenly brightened over the weekend, Miller said.

"A few days before the shooting a weight was lifted," Miller said Tuesday.

The weight was lifted because he had figured out what to do, and had made up his mind.

From everything that I have read, child molesters aren't born; they are a consequence of having been abused under certain specific conditions that cause them to identify with the molester. It sounds like Roberts was sexually abused at age 12, either ended up molesting girls at some point that has not come to the attention of authorities, or thought that he was going to do so--and decided to take revenge on little girls for "tempting" him, while killing himself. (Molesters often persuade themselves that they are being seduced or tempted by children, rather than see themselves as the problem.)

I know that a lot of other bloggers (especially the law professor bloggers) don't understand why I am so enraged by child molestation, but this is the reason: it leads to enormous damage, and the damage keeps going for generations.