THE thought of giving a sex offender a second chance is a hard pill to swallow.

Why should they be given the opportunity to move on in life, after taking the innocence away from another person; particularly a child.

But Andrew Frost, who has been working alongside both offenders and victims for the past 30 years, says in order to rehabilitate these types of offenders — who we often demonise as “monsters” — the method of shunning is not the right way.

“The role of demonising sex offenders, and turning them into monsters gets in the way of detection and investigation of these people,” Dr Frost told news.com.au.

“We all think they are monsters, and when we find out who they are we turn them into monsters — and that doesn’t help at all in any way.”

As October marks Sexual Awareness Month, Dr Frost is in Brisbane today to give a talk on deconstructing the sexual offender at Central Queensland University’s Centre for Domestic and Family Violence Research.

Dr Frost will be among several experts speaking on the subject, which will include a discussion around the key consequences of demonising an abuser, and how we should be dealing with these people once they are released from prison.

“There are two regrettable consequences of demonising an abuser,” Dr Frost said.

“The first is that we are less likely to recognise them, such as celebrities. For many decades, cases like Rolf Harris [and Robert Hughes] didn’t come to light until a long time afterwards — because they weren’t the creepy men in the shadows like we are lead to believe all sex offenders are.

“These types of abusers aren’t jumping out from behind a bush with a lolly in hand, and they don’t look like the monsters we normally associate with sex offenders.

“If there’s an allegation towards Great Uncle X, for example, about what he has done to nephews and nieces, people often say no — because he’s a relative and an upstanding individual, and we don’t want to accuse those we love.”

Dr Frost said it was difficult to categorise sex offenders.

“As individuals, there are psychological characteristics of sexual offenders such as being a lonely or isolated individual, and difficulty with forming an adult relationship,” Dr Frost said.

“They [sex offenders] are a heterogeneous group, and have more in common with the general population than the criminal population.

“They cover all status ranks, incomes and demographics. While they are mostly men, it’s very hard to pin them down. While I’m not saying we shouldn’t categorise these people — because it can be helpful — I think we have got a bit preoccupied in the physical characteristics of these perpetrators, by giving them the title of monster, sick or demonising.”

Dr Frost said the other consequence of stigmatising sexual offenders, or a “shunning campaign”, is that we categorise them as a “monster” which only leads to further secrecy on the perpetrator’s part.

“These men, usually, are released from prison and isolated within a community — which is only more likely enabling them to do it again,” Dr Frost said.

“When isolated and demonised, they go underground — and that’s what creates the lonely circumstances and means they are likely to reoffend.

“For this reason, we have to be serious about rehabilitation. So instead of saying they are a sick individual, we need to acknowledge their problem as a social problem — and take action.”

Over the course of three decades, Dr Frost said he has come to the conclusion that there are at least five contextual elements common to most abuse.

“I’ve worked with boys and men for 30 years, and 10 years in the New Zealand Department of Corrections with sex offenders,” he said.

“One thing that became clear was a common set of circumstances where abuse thrives. These are secrecy, exploitation, grooming, blame shifting and collusion.

“We need to look at abuse as a social problem, because it’s easy to pass it off as a group of sick individuals.

“Where secrecy thrives, such as burying these perpetrators in society, that allows circumstances for abuse to occur in.”

While the sex offender needs to be held accountable for the sake of public wellbeing, Dr Frost says the best way to achieve this is that he or she accepts the bulk of this responsibility and complete rehabilitation programs that are based, among other things, on socialising forms of therapy.

“If we are serious about managing sex offending, we need to be serious about their rehabilitation,” Dr Frost said.

“In Canada and the UK, there is a notion called Circles of Support. What we often see is that when sex offenders are released from prison, they are not met with any support within the community.

“But with this program [Circles of Support], trained volunteers visit these people, and support and monitor them, because they need the opportunity to rehabilitate.”

Dr Frost said while he doesn’t believe sex offenders can be healed — because “they aren’t suffering from an illness” we as a community need to teach them how to meet their needs in a different way.

“They are like the rest of us, but have chosen a bad way of meeting those needs,” he said.

“Rehabilitation is a matter of helping these men form workable relationships with adults, and leaving the life of secrecy behind.

“Not just romantically, but simple adult relationships — which a lot of people won’t give them the opportunity to do.

“All of us are in pursuit of attaining certain human goods, including a sense of mastery, competence, and a sense of belonging. Those who engage in sexual offending, or any kind of criminal offending, are trying to attain such goals. In doing so they have chosen very poor means of doing so. They need to change these means in ways that respect the rights, needs and feelings of others.”