Punishing Sex: Sex Offenders and the Missing Punitive Turn in Sexuality Studies

Abstract

At precisely the same time that gay and lesbian activists were securing marriage rights for same-sex couples nationwide, courts and "tough on crime" state legislatures were devising new ways to regulate sex. Despite recent estimates that over 750,000 Americans are registered sex offenders, few sexuality scholars have examined the growth of punitive policies regulating sex offenders. In this article, I draw on a unique set of data on the population of sex offenders in the United States to analyze: (1) whether recent trends in sex offender registration mirror those of corrections more generally, and (2) whether these policies disproportionally impact racial minorities. Findings reveal that sex offender registries grew dramatically between 2005 and 2013; that this growth is out of step with concurrent trends in corrections; and that black communities are disproportionately impacted. I conclude by considering whether these data reveal a new mode of "governing through crime" specifically targeting sex.It might as well be admitted that sex is a disgrace.Michael Warner (1999) There is a big secret about sex: most people don't like it.

Toward a Critical Criminology of HIV Criminalization

“…Assessing the behavior of criminal justice actors is crucial for two reasons: first, criminal justice actors possess far greater discretion than most other government officials; and second, criminal justice actors are often empowered to use serious, and sometimes deadly, force (Vorenberg 1976;Waegel 1984). Criminologists are well-placed to link HIV criminalization with other criminological trends, including the punitive turn and the harshness of criminal sentencing; victim's rights and the restorative justice movement; incarceration and its alternatives, including problem-solving courts; and the collateral consequences and sex offender registries (Hoppe 2016;Lancaster 2017;Speakman 2019;Velez 2013). A criminological critique of HIV criminalization may also benefit from similar concerns about "carceral feminism" and the use of law-and-order responses, including harsher sentences, for sexual and gender-based violence (Taylor 2018).…”

“…The so-called "War on Drugs" increased punishments and transferred money and resources from the federal government to state and local police agencies for fighting crime (Alexander 2012). Hoppe (2016) has linked the "War on Sex" to the punitive turn. Criminal laws targeting human trafficking, new civil confinement measures for "sexually violent predators," and publicly accessible sex offender registries appeared during this era, alongside the new prohibitions on HIV transmission and non-disclosure (Hoppe 2016;see Lancaster 2017).…”

“…Hoppe (2016) has linked the "War on Sex" to the punitive turn. Criminal laws targeting human trafficking, new civil confinement measures for "sexually violent predators," and publicly accessible sex offender registries appeared during this era, alongside the new prohibitions on HIV transmission and non-disclosure (Hoppe 2016;see Lancaster 2017). Decriminalizing HIV could be part of a growing countertrend of "penal moderation" or the "downsizing movement" in criminological research, which focuses on reducing the economic burdens of a carceral dystopia and increasing restorative and rehabilitative alternatives (Bosworth 2011;Pickett 2016).…”

“…Sex offender registries publicly reveal HIV status for persons convicted of HIV-specific criminal laws (Levinson and Cotter 2005). Critical criminology has criticized sex offender registries for punishing a particularly stigmatized form of "deviance" that is overbroad and encompasses crimes that are situational or tied closely to age and maturity (Hoppe 2016;Levine 2017). One result of HIV criminalization is that the political strength of PLHIV is reduced through social exclusion and deprivation of civil rights (including the right to vote), which further reinforces marginalization (see Howard 2017).…”

Constituting the ‘sexually violent predator’: Law, forensic psychology, and the adjudication of risk

“…This construction of the sexual predator has spillover effects for all sex offenders. Megan's Law, for instance, is premised on the assumption that treatment of sexual offenders is futile and that they will remain dangerous-indeed that they are guilty not just of bad behavior but of being bad people (Hoppe, 2016;Simon, 1998). This is further evidenced by the rarity with which SVPs are released from custody.…”