What do you think of “paedophile hunters”?

[Username721]

Just curious really.

Are they doing the work of the Lord? Or is vigilante action never ok? Leave it to the police or is this sort of thing everyone’s business?

Honestly, they generally cause more harm than good. They often ruin any Police investigation because they've broadcast evidence and conversation etc all over the Internet. Often they are guilty of entrapment etc.
Some are dodgy as fuck as well, know of one who was arrested himself for Child sexual offences. Think a lot of the people involved as decoys are vulnerable too.

I know five child sex offenders. Four from the same family. One who actually WAS caught by a paedophile hunter. I cannot express the amount of savage satisfaction it gave me to see him confronted by big blokes live on Facebook when he was trying to meet an 11 year old girl for "rough sex." He got away with touching up little girls and pinning teenagers in doorways and rubbing his crotch against them in full view for years. Always "he's harmless, he's a bit slow, he could never do anything to hurt anyone, he just can't get a girlfriend."

Yeah. Savvy enough to hide a mobile phone he used exclusively to groom and to send pictures of his penis to children and send BDSM type demands. Cunning enough to give fake names and take two buses to go to where he was planning to meet these kids. Yeah, I clapped and cheered when I saw him go to pieces when confronted with his messages!

I support them wholeheartedly. If the police don't catch them, someone will. That's good.

Surely much of that should be social services?

the police can remove kids in an emergency situation, but the reviewing and making the decision as to whether children are safe at home is social services. In school hours all that should be done by the appropriate safeguarding authorities, the police should only be looking at the crime aspect.

the police’s job is to investigate crime. Yet increasingly they also provide social, ambulance and mental health services because they aren’t fit for purpose, while chronically under resourced themselves.

sort out mental health care, social
services, and the other billion things that aren’t within the police’s remit (like putting down distressed wild animals at the roadside because no vet or RSPCA can get there). Then the police may have a chance to do some actual investigating of you know, crime.

ETA not saying your friend was wrong or not doing a fantastic job, just that if others were able to do/were doing their job then she wouldn’t have ended up in the burnout situation she did.

I would have been quite happy for the convicted sex offender in my wider family to have been dealt with by vigilantes.

Honestly, they generally cause more harm than good. They often ruin any Police investigation because they've broadcast evidence and conversation etc all over the Internet.

So if they aren't paedophiles themselves, they are helping paedophiles.

Ghoulish, prurient, attention-seeking thugs.

There is an excellent episode of Criminals on Netflix with Sharon Horgan where she plays a paedophile hunter. Well worth a watch.

Nap trapped with my baby so I’ve stuck this on.