As many of you know, we here at CAGE have been fighting for our loved ones by speaking out about the insidious scheme created by law enforcement (LE) in response to a perverse federal incentive. With the rise of QAnon, fake news, and prevailing fear-mongering about the fictitious ‘stranger danger’, the salacious lies told, to keep the racket prosperous, have been quickly embraced.
Jace and I have recently had a number of conversations about inclusivity, sexual identity, and the extreme prominence of these ideologies. He believes people go too far to push LGBTQ+ and sexual alternatives to the simple man/woman dichotomy. He is not opposed to any person’s sexuality, he just doesn’t see what the fuss is all about. What our younger generation doesn’t understand is history. Or should I say they know it, but haven’t lived it. He doesn’t understand not being in an environment of acceptance. Current generations (X,Y, and Z) are much different than we were. They were raised online, privy to a diversity previous generations have never known, in an era where sexuality is open, where in certain places it is chic to be LGBTQ+. The previous generations of ‘hiding in the closet’, conversion therapy, ostracism – those mostly still exist in the minds of the elders, and small towns where not having been out of the county is considered something to brag about.
To that point, as it is older generations who typically lead decisions on legislature and policing initiatives, young people are easy prey to the proactive sting ruse on adult sites. I can’t say how many times I have heard someone say “I agree there was inducement but did you read the texts? He’s guilty.” I wrote an email to the WA state SOPB committee members trying to explain – I hope I managed to plant even one person’s mind with an alternative idea of what many, if not most men who respond on adult sites are thinking.
I’m attaching it for you all to read. It’s personal, so a little embarrassing 🙂 But then so is my fight to stop these stings!
Dear members of the Alternative Sentencing Subcommittee, 8/3/22
In our last meeting we were presented with an opinion that anyone who willingly participates, in a conversation concerning sex with a minor, is ultimately, and explicitely, complicit. I was not given the opportunity to respond, even though I requested it at that time. I personally find that position to be an obvious bias, and I ask that you allow me the minute or so it would take you to read this letter, to state my rebuttal.
I’m truly glad that this group recognizes that proactive stings very often use unethical, and in fact illegal tactics, such as inducement, confusion, and coercion, to entrap unsuspecting men.
Legally, after it’s been shown that the target has no predisposition toward the crime, and that the crime was created in the minds of law enforcement, eagerness to fulfill the crime is not supposed to be a deciding factor of guilt. Unfortunately all too often juries are swayed by the carefully crafted, police led conversation, and the abhorrence of the implied culminating action itself – specifically the thought of a physically harmed actual child.
In reality these men are presented with what is most often assumed to be a consenting adult, who wishes to re-live or fantasize about, being a minor in a sexual experience. Fueling a potential partner’s fantasy cannot create certainty that the fantasy itself is shared by these men. That logic implies no one would ever chose to entertain, or encourage another, to fantasize about what turns the other on sexually, if they themselves found it distastful. Most people recognize sexual desire does not reside in logic or truth. Take the series ’50 Shades of Grey’ for example. A blockbuster by any measure. Should one believe that everyone who read the book, or saw the movie, secretly desires an actual dominant/submissive scenario? Or that if given the chance they would all be willing participants?
In complete honesty I have a large stack of erotica next to my bed. My ex and I would fabricate and verbalize erotica weekly, as a normal part of our healthy sex life. The dirtier the better, taboo is welcome. Are we too ‘deviants’?
Making that leap, that the ability to participate with a partners verbal fantasy, automatically indicates ones own proclivity to that desire, reminds me of other historical fallacies concerning sex. Such as believing that a woman wasn’t raped if they experienced an orgasm, or became pregnant. At one time these, and many other obscure ideas, were accepted as ‘science’. Confirmation bias is a powerful, human reaction to an emotionally charged topic.
The truth is, these men show up often in spite of their intended partners fantasies, not because of them. To hold one’s desire to connect with a consenting adult against them is illogical. To point to such a conversation as proof that the target is ‘behaviorally deviant’ is also illogical.
I hope you will contemplate that there are alternative reasons why men show up to engage in consenting adult sexual behavior, even when the fantasy depicted is not their own. In my research I have found 10 reasons why men travel, after being told they are communicating with a minor, and I would be happy to discuss those scenarios with anyone who wishes. Thank you for your time and consideration. I truly appreciate all of your efforts.
Respectfully,
Kathleen Hambrick (Co-Founder of CAGE)
The Lady Justice Myth 
I wonder if any of these people consider that these people are presumed innocent until proven guilty, in a court of law. And that we will never know if any of these “future” crimes would have in fact happened, we don’t know what was in their mind, and we can infer what we want from their text communications, but really we’ll never know… because it never happened.
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You make excellent points. Unfortunately, this does not compute with most of our lawmakers. I believe that in time, things will get better. Those of us who do get it, need to continue to make arguments like yours.
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Kathleen, would you send me the “10 reasons” you refer to in this email. I am hoping it will be helpful to my son’s lawyer.
Marlene
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Hi Marlene – have you watched the youtube video of my presentation to NARSOL last year? That describes the 10 reasons, and gives examples from people I have spoken with…The 10 reasons I have heard, in order of most common to least common are:
1. Roleplay
2. Thought it was catfishing – went to verify
3. Enticed through LE psychological grooming
4. Desire to help a minor in danger
5. Desire to hook up with the adult (situation of adult w/ minors)
6. Missed declaration of age or not told
7. Told age while en route or at meeting location
8. Interested in finding minors
9. Lonely / just wanted to hang out
10. To get help (knew it was a sting)
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Thanks for your reply, Kathleen. I am 74, and next to helpless online, but I will try to find the YouTube clip you mention.
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Here is a link to the presentation 😉
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Sorry, it didn’t take in these comments, I have emailed you the link Marlene. Love to you and your son.
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Kathleen Hambrick. I would love to speak with you directly. I have some valuable insight to all this as I to have been a victim of this corruption. I have spent 2 years studing criminal law and may have figured out how to stop this entrapment. Pleade reach out to me. Thanks
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Sex should not be a crime, and playing along with someone else’s sexual fantasy should certainly not be a crime. These sting operations have been used to criminalize individuals who seek adult casual sex relationships online, in appropriate places for that. They have criminalized men for playing along with the sexual fantasies of the decoys, who force their own sexual fantasies about minors on the men, to then accuse those men of wanting to have sex with a minor and needing to be stopped from raping a minor. Remember, the idea of sex with a minor is always coming from the decoys in these sting operations, NOT from the men they are entrapping in adult places where no one would expect to find a minor, certainly not any minor pushing and even demanding sex from random adult male strangers they find in these adult content places. The men are simply being used to look like “child predators” because they were seeking consensual adult sexual relationships in the right places online for this. The decoys (the real predators) know very well these are the perfect places to entrap men to use them to create these fake cases against them. It has absolutely nothing to do with trying to save or protect any real children from any real risk or real abuse. If that was their real intention, they certainly would not be pushing sex on the men and even demanding it, the way they do in these sting operations. It still amazes me that so many “professionals” have overlooked many very disturbing details, even in these chats alone, that reveals so much about the mentality of these fake heroes who are doing this. There is nothing heroic about their behavior.
Unless you really think there are children (and even specifically “virgin” children) who are using adult hookup sites and sex forums to throw themselves sexually at random adult male strangers, simply because they are “bored” and curious about sex, it makes absolutely no sense to support or defend what the fake heroes have done in these sting operations. And if you are someone who believes this is really happening, you have a lot of explaining to do. The behavior of the fake heroes in these sting operations and their claims, justifications, etc. just don’t add up or make any sense. Someone needs to clear that up for them because so far, they haven’t been able to do that for themselves. The only defense they have is that the men they entrapped “wanted to have sex with a minor. Therefore, they needed to be stopped from raping a minor.” It’s clear to me from behavior that it was the decoys who were fantasizing about minors wanting to throw themselves sexually at men. The logic they use that these men would have given in to one of these imaginary young teens (or even 12 year olds) that are so desperate for sex they want to find anybody they can find to do this with, makes a lot more sense if you apply it to them (the decoys) who are the ones who created these imaginary minors for their own sick thrills and self-serving purposes. Based on behavior, I would bet that it is the decoys who are much more likely to give into a minor demanding sex from them. They are obviously the ones who have spent a lot of time fantasizing about minors wanting to throw themselves sexually at men. You can’t say that about any of the men they entrapped in these sting operations. Their behavior simply shows they are willing to play along with someone else’s sexual fantasy. That is not predatory behavior, and it certainly does not make them dangerous predators, as these fake heroes have also fantasized about and forced that fantasy/delusion onto the public and onto so many “professionals” who are supposedly helping fix these nonpredators. All they’ve done is further victimize those men, the only real victims in these sex sting operation cases.
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