Cindy Hamilton wrote:
> "gloria.p" > wrote:
>
>> Do you read the newspaper? *It was very safe in my children's day.
>> Not today. *There are too many people out there searching for kids
>> to molest and feeling entitled to do so.
>
> Are there any more, per capita, than there ever were--or do we
> simply hear about it more nowadays? Pedophilia rates are probably
> not much higher than 50 years ago, but I imagine it was hushed
> up a lot more readily then.

I think the reporting percentage is higher and the range of coverage is
wider. I also think that the result is neighborhoods that are slightly
safer because more perps are convicted combined with being perceived as
more dangerous because more perps are convicted.

There has been a movement for rape victims to go public. Stop blaming
the victim and stop tolerating the perp. The intent of this movement
may have been focused on violent rape of adult women but the result has
been all of the types of victims coming forward. Both individual
perverts and ones protected by large organizations (church is in the
news but not the only such organization). Being no longer hidden the
percentage of perverts and perps in the population is slowly declining.
At the same time public impression of safety is slowly getting worse
because the convictions make the national news not just the local news.