Good letter, but a few points to quibble with. As far as the sex offender registry goes, it can be useful, if applied judiciously and used in proper context. Let's say you were going to hire a babysitter for your kids, running their name through the registry would be a good idea. You'd probably like to know that Miss Smith was convicted of raping her 12 year old student. If you are buying a house, it might be useful to know who your neighbors might be. Most of the registries list the type of offense, so you can distinguish between "forcible sodomy" and "indecent exposure." If I were still a single female living alone, I would probably choose not to move in next door the guy convicted of "forcible sexual assault with a weapon". In one case, I found out that an apartment that I was thinking about renting was next door to an adult prison rehab center that housed 5 different sex offenders. I decided not to take the risk. Small companies and organizations that cannot afford background checks may want to research potential employees, especially if the work involves children. If the registry is overexpanded to include the drunk frat boy that pisses in the bushes, it loses it's effectiveness. I dislike that the registry is used to leverage pleas out of defendants or used to punish defendants instead of used to better inform the public.

Since you brought up the D*** word, you neglected to mention that the accused were prosecuted(aka persecuted) by an overzealous, perhaps corrupt, DA. That is not something that we as citizens should have to take into account when we decide to engage in legal activities, even if those activities (hiring strippers and calling them bad names) are distasteful to some. When there was ample evidence showing that the men accused could not have been involved in any attack, or that it was unlikely that any attack even occurred, the case should have been dropped. One of the accused made a very good point that although they'd been through a horrible experience, they did not end up in prison because they had the resources to mount a strong defense, but there are those that do not have the resources to hire a defense team. It seems to me that there are high stakes for people with limited resources and the dice might be weighted against them (sorry for the multiple metaphors!)

Obviously 13 year olds butt-slapping and groping should not go to jail. The school and the parents screwed this one up big time. The bad behaviour went on too long without being punished, the parents that dismissed their kids actions as "boys being boys" only contributed to the problem. If the problem had been dealt with firmly and early, this never would have been a problem. And punishing kids by having them wear a "Kick Me" sign is ridiculous! Detention, suspension, community service work, and written apologies would have worked fine if applied when the incidents first happened. You start with small punishments, and only escalate to more severe ones like expulsion. In doing that, the kids that just messed up or went along because they didn't think it was a big deal stop doing this because they've learned that they will get punished and they are punished and realize that it is a "deal". You get one or two kids left that refuse to follow the rules and continually break them...those are the ones that merit harsher punishment, and if egregious enough, calling in the police.

As far as expected the victims to turn around and physically assault their attackers...this is just stupid. We KNOW that this doesn't work (Columbine anyone?), children should not be responsible be school discipline. That is the responsibility of the teachers, admins and parents. And yes, girls that kick boys in the nuts do get punished (been there, done that) as do boys who punch the bully that's been picking on them. Allowing kids or encouraging them to retaliate only brings in MORE chaos and trouble. As adults, we know that we can use force to stop or to get away from an attacker, it is illegal for you to go after an attacker afterwards. If two people get into a bar fight and trade punches, both are arrested and charged even if one person "started it". We want our children to grow up to live in a civilized society, we teach them to protect themselves, but we also need to teach them that vigilante justice is destructive. Oh sure, we all wish that the little guy one day stands up and socks it to the bully and good prevails. But typically the little guy just takes it and then turns on the littler guy...perpetuating the violence. If the little guy feels that he can go to a teacher and have effective action taken against his aggressor, then he will do so and we have safer schools and hopefully child who grow into healthy adults.

And as far as that stupid rapist list goes, some of them are so out there that it's just pathetic. But yet, in mixing those stupid ones (like 13, the nagging a person into sex) along with 7 (f-ing an unconscious person) or 31 ("If you penetrate her anally, orally or digitally against her will then YOU my friend, are ALSO a rapist") which is the definition of rape/sexual assault. You only look like an ass, both for the person that came up with the list and the person that posted it here (multiple times).