Of course, this is unfortunate collateral damage for cure and some of the others that had ties with him. I do not think that everyone will or should shrug this off regardless if some are saying it was legal. The point is galen should have been squeaky clean since he was a advocate trying for change. In Many peoples mind a 30 something has no business sending flirty texts or speaking with an underage kid especially when his rules were NOT to have contact. So by doing this he was saying I will do what I want. I think he is at the point of needing serious long term professional help. But that is just what I think. I understand what alladin and Legal say, but as long as we have such a uphill fight for the cause people could be more responsible about their choices.

Thank you Aladdin and Legal - I had wondered about the age of consent. Something about this whole thing just smacked of a "railroad" and you have shown me that it is/was.

Advocate: I think it is important to understand that despite the legalities involved, people see what Galen did as a slap in the face to the cause and to the people who strive very hard to change their behaviors and leave their sex offenses behind them so they are seen as more than a sex offender.

Regardless if Galen's actions were legal or not, Galen made a poor decision that puts the cause and every RSO in the limelight for unwanted reasons, because Galen himself was in the limelight as a spokesman against sex offender laws - a light that he choose to be in and not one that was forced upon him.

So yes, people are right to feel disappointed, let down, or even betrayed on moral ground for it appears that indeed Galen's actions did not violate the letter of the law, but certainly its' spirit.

legal - I understand what you are saying but if not illegal then everyone needs to decide the morality of it for themselves. This idea in society that someone over the age of 15 and under the age of 18 is a child is fairly new. If legal I do not consider it immoral and I guess that is where ideas differ.

Also, to reiterate - what he did was a violation of his parole not a sex offense (referring to "leaving ones sex offenses behind them")

It was a violation of his parole only insofar as the court order / parole stipulation is legal and lawful. That said, yes, there is a big difference between law and morals. And insofar as my comment about RSO's working hard to leave their sex offenses behind them, I am speaking of the stigma's that are attached to them and that Galen's behaviors further those stigma's that other RSO's and those involved with them work hard fighting against.

I thought we were all working to put the lie to the idea that "once a sex offender always a sex offender" and leave sex offenses behind by DEMONSTRATING that people do indeed put sex Offendingbehind them, are indeed 'recovered' and once again actually are trustworthy. and no longer engaging in sex OffendING (not just working hard to 'leave our sex offenses behind in the sense that we want get people off our backs because they believed the canard that we could never again be trusted/ or the sense that we want people to go away away so we can sneak off, resume offending avoid consequences when/ if found out.)

What is legal and what is ethical / moral are not necessarily always the same. I would hope what we mean when we say "Working hard to leave sex offences behind" we also means "working hard to leave sex OFFENDING behind NEVER to go there again. 2nd chances are precious. People should value them and not blow them off on some 'technicality' even if not technically illegal. This is not just some conversation about legal semantics. Splitting hairs is for lawyers and re-offenders..

It's too easy to focus on harms done TO us by the system. I myself have plenty of reasons to be angry at a system that seems to systematically cause ongoing harm to me and to my family. But the "system" is out- there. I already know not to trust them.

But I also I already know (from too personal experience) that Sexual Abuse does actually cause great physical and mental harm and those who CHOOSE repeat their abuse of children and harm those who (personally) trusted them a 2nd time have demonstrated that by their own reckless ACTIONS that unless I (we / friends/ family/ movement supporters) to be personally harmed (a 3rd time) we should withdraw support. )

2nd chances are precious, No matter how loved they are, they have no right to expect us to brush their recklessness aside as of no consequence. Once you blow off trust for that 2nd time, you should realize that you may never get it back again no matter how charismatic (or sorry) you are. No matter how many hairs you split in your effort to put 'sex offendING' behind you as of no consequence. .

That doesn't mean you should not continue to attempt to recover if you think you have hit bottom this time , It does mean don't expect me to be your 'champion" or open myself up to being re-harmed/ disappointed again just because I feel sorry for you because you blew off those who trusted you.

What we are working to accomplish here in this 'movement' is not only to "leave our sex offenses behind" but to find strength to STOP OFFENDING Sexually and to show by actual recovery that the widely held prejudice (once a SO always a SO) which causes collateral damage and harm to us all is, itself, indeed unethical and wrong.

If we fail to pursue both goals then what is this 'movement' about? I intend to protect the vulnerable (the victims) and my efforts are not aimed at simply removing the social consequences suffered by sex offenders and families as a consequence of risky/ unethical sexual behavior but hopefully to show that actually recovery is possible and that those are the people (and the 'movement') deserving of respect. and support.

Janet - you seem to be ignoring the fact that Galen did not re-offend! He broke the rules of his parole but he did not re-offend. What he did was not a sex offense - it maybe morally bad to you but that does not make it a sex offense.

And once again I say that it is my belief that ALL humans are worthy of support - I do not pick and choose who I support

I just can't help it, I have to put in my 2 cents...

I have read through the thread, read the articles I have been getting about him and this is what I have seen.

I am not sure I believe that this is just a violation, in one of the articles I have read there was bail that was going to be require, the last time I checked, you can't get bailed out when you are on paper. You get let out when the PO says you get let out or you go back to prison to finish your sentence.

Also from what I understand he did a fair amount of traveling out of his home county and out of his home state, which means that he either needed all those excursions approved or he broke some rules of supervision. I have a hard time feeling sorry for him at all, he cut his nose off to spite his face, it's just silly.

Rules of supervision is NO CONTACT with anyone under the age of 18. Contact means in person, by phone, by carrier pigeon, by smoke signal or any other means that can be used to communicate. There isn't a lot of room for interpretation to NO CONTACT.

Since the court case isn't over for Galen, I won't say anything about whether or not he committed a new charge, I am sure that the prosecutions investigators have not had time to go through all of Galens things and electronic foot print. We just don't know if he has committed a new crime, but it is obvious that with the information currently available that he violated his supervision. That is on HIM. He knew the rules, he signed the rules, and he CHOSE to not follow them. What can anyone do with that?

But the fact that he caused harm to a movement that he claimed to care about is not as easily overlooked as him suffering his own fate by his own doing. What he and his buddy Graves did to the cause is what is the saddest here. But as Oncefallen said, everyone will recover, cause I remember SOHopeful and the beginnings of SOSEN and RSOL. Being a poster child for a cause such as ours has its pitfalls mostly because none of us are perfect, we all have skeletons and for some like Galen, there are other demons that need to be battled with before they'll be able to move forward. Hopefully he'll get some kind of treatment while he is in this time, although if he refuses not much anyone can do about that.

There is something that no one has mentioned that I think should be mentioned which is very high on the creep scale for me. Galen met this 16 year old at a funeral. A funeral! If I understood it correctly, they had never crossed paths before this encounter. Using an opportunity typically reserved for bereavement as a way to get closer to a 16 year old makes me very uneasy in just thinking about it.

This is not to suggest that most sexual abuse takes place this way. Unfortunately Galen's situation is atypical; most of the time, the offender knows the victim pretty well. But Galen put himself out there as an advocate which means his actions reflect upon our community as a whole. I hope we as a community stress that Galen's actions are not only atypical of registered citizens but also of first time offenders, who are usually family members, teachers, clergy, etc. Galen was neither of any of those things.

Galen was arrogant and thought he was invincible plus he was trolling for juveniles, he got caught by VA-DOC Probation and now Virginia will not only incarcerate him but most likely civilly commitment as an SVP when his due to be released and this time VA will win the commitment.

Galen communicated via the Internet with juveniles (per his own phone/computer data), he told them how to avoid detection (per his own phone/computer data) and he met up with other juveniles in person (per Josh Gravens account)

Galen deserves whatever he gets, no punishment is to harsh for a 30 year old who already has two separate sexual convictions for crimes against juveniles and has new charges in 2016.

The world is safer with Galen in custody and hopefully receiving Sex offender treatment.

http://goo.gl/ChtStF

Well there you have the final word - I guess that story is over ...

While I was on probation, and my house was being searched (again) by a team of probation officers, a quote I had written in a notebook was carefully scrutinized. It was a quote by Nietzsche - "We are like shop windows in which we are continually arranging, concealing or illuminating the supposed qualities others ascribe to us - in order to deceive ourselves."

I was very angry because my PO was making such a huge deal about me writing this quote - he kept telling me that me writing this quote meant that I was lying about being innocent and just trying to deceive everyone. I talked to a counselor that I knew at the time and this counselor told me something that has always resonated with me - anything can be distorted to mean whatever someone WANTS it to mean.

I didn't read where Galen asked this boy to do anything inappropriate. I didn't read that Galen said he wanted to touch this boy or have this boy touch him. I read that Galen comes across as an ego-maniac who is desperate for attention. I agree that he should not have had any contact because that is clearly a violation, I am just trying to add a perspective that he didn't actually say anything inappropriate.

Uh, yes he did. He tried to make the boy feel guilty for not giving him enough attention. That's called grooming. Remember, they met at a funeral. They was no other context to their relationship except Galen approaching the boy at the funeral. And he did say something that I felt was extremely inappropriate, referring to the boy's "good looks".