I think this is simply a scene wherein there is a gulf between what King was aiming for and what, for the sake of basic decency, he accomplished. I could sense his intention behind the scene, so I was able to soldier through it, even though, for a regular writer of disturbing events, it is disturbing in a way none of his other writings are, a way that elicits deep revulsion, rather than entertainment value (and I have to call absolute b.s. on the assertion that we were oh-so-casual about something like this way back in the primordial year of 1985). At the risk of being a bit indecent myself, I have to assume the scene (hell, the whole last 100 pages of IT) would not come about in their present form had it not been for King's decent into alcoholism and drug addiction at the time, and I would agree more readily with most Constant Readers' rapturous estimation of the novel had the last 100 pages gone down a wholly different path (funny, my opinions of the two novels Constant Readers seem to worship the most--THE STAND and IT--isn't as glowing, namely because of the former's deux ex machina, pious ending and the latter's utterly gonzo, seemingly cocaine-fevered one). Whether his addictions of the era had any interplay here or not, I feel quite vehemently that he could have accomplished his "bond for the ages" concept in any number of more effective ways.