In US Prisons D&D is mostly played by sex offenders

OgreBattle · Post by **OgreBattle** » Sat Oct 19, 2019 3:55 am

Funny Q&A on it: https://www.quora.com/Why-was-Dungeons- ... nd-Ragland

"I’ll tell you something else about D&D in prison: at least 75% of the people who play it are sex offenders.

There’s a variety of reasons this could be but mostly I think it comes down to two things: 1. Most federal sex offenders are in for computer related crimes and those who are good enough with computers to commit crimes with them are generally nerdy and part of the D&D general demographic, 2. I also think there’s something among sex offenders that makes them gravitate towards anything with elements of fantasy.

For this reason, I never played at the gym. Literally there would be tables full of D&D groups playing every afternoon and evening for hours and most of them were sex offenders. They weren’t bad people. Most of them didn’t have hands on offenses at all. But some of them were extremely weird, however, and associating with them in prison can create a guilt by association.

So instead I played in my unit with a small group of friends who also lived in the unit. It was my first time playing D&D and that was true for everyone else who played except our DM.

Well, where I was doing time was a giant complex with a Medium, Low and a Camp. By this time I was at the low. They already had the Creative Minds Program at the Medium. About 7 months into the Creative Minds Program being tested at the low they axed it over at the Medium and banned some people from playing D&D.

The reason was that at the Medium they had the SOMP (Sex Offender Management Program) and apparently some of the inmates in that program were using D&D to do… inappropriate role playing. The people that ran the program also didn’t feel D&D was healthy for those people in treatment because of the fantasy elements and “escapism.”

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Sat Oct 19, 2019 11:51 pm

OgreBattle wrote:The reason was that at the Medium they had the SOMP (Sex Offender Management Program) and apparently some of the inmates in that program were using D&D to do… inappropriate role playing. The people that ran the program also didn’t feel D&D was healthy for those people in treatment because of the fantasy elements and “escapism.”

Has there been any concept that has given human civilization brain worms more than Puritanism, or more abstractly Christianity? I think there's fascism and that's it. And most forms of fascism are really just Christianity plus industrialization.

The Adventurer's Almanac · Sun Oct 20, 2019 1:38 am

Hot take there, Lago. I'd like to see some science done on the effects of roleplaying and sexual... deviancy? Misconduct? I dunno, I just wonder if RPing out your fetish with a bunch of other sexually frustrated weirdos actually helps you not want to do more weird sex offense shit.
You can't really blame them for engaging in escapism though, it's fucking federal prison. What else are you supposed to do?

Iduno · Post by **Iduno** » Sun Oct 20, 2019 2:21 am

The Adventurer's Almanac wrote:Hot take there, Lago. I'd like to see some science done on the effects of roleplaying and sexual... deviancy? Misconduct? I dunno, I just wonder if RPing out your fetish with a bunch of other sexually frustrated weirdos actually helps you not want to do more weird sex offense shit.

I read Lago's comment as meaning the thing you're arguing.

Grek · Post by **Grek** » Sun Oct 20, 2019 2:23 am

The Adventurer's Almanac wrote:You can't really blame them for engaging in escapism though, it's fucking federal prison. What else are you supposed to do?

Suffer, obviously.

maglag · Post by **maglag** » Sun Oct 20, 2019 4:03 am

Lago PARANOIA wrote:
OgreBattle wrote:The reason was that at the Medium they had the SOMP (Sex Offender Management Program) and apparently some of the inmates in that program were using D&D to do… inappropriate role playing. The people that ran the program also didn’t feel D&D was healthy for those people in treatment because of the fantasy elements and “escapism.”
Has there been any concept that has given human civilization brain worms more than Puritanism, or more abstractly Christianity? I think there's fascism and that's it. And most forms of fascism are really just Christianity plus industrialization.

Islam says that it's a sin to make any depictions of people/animals.

So portraits? Comics? Movies? Miniatures? Cartoons? Video-games? All forbidden by Islam.

There's a reason why you don't see a lot of Islam artists in the main media after all, and why followers of Islam will rather murder cartoonists.

Libertad · Post by **Libertad** » Sun Oct 20, 2019 4:19 am

Lago PARANOIA wrote:Has there been any concept that has given human civilization brain worms more than Puritanism, or more abstractly Christianity? I think there's fascism and that's it. And most forms of fascism are really just Christianity plus industrialization.

Randian Objectivism.

...

Awoo. <3

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Sun Oct 20, 2019 11:43 am

Iduno wrote:
The Adventurer's Almanac wrote:Hot take there, Lago. I'd like to see some science done on the effects of roleplaying and sexual... deviancy? Misconduct? I dunno, I just wonder if RPing out your fetish with a bunch of other sexually frustrated weirdos actually helps you not want to do more weird sex offense shit.
I read Lago's comment as meaning the thing you're arguing.

Indeed. The idea that engaging in safe fantasy will encourage people to sin is some sick Puritan shit.

Orca · Post by **Orca** » Sun Oct 20, 2019 11:59 am

I can believe that at one prison there's a strong correlation with sex offenders, statistics can do all kinds of things with enough chances, but in general? As against that, the American military has a fair number of people familiar with roleplaying games (lots of time to kill apparently; not unlike prisons in that respect), and military veterans get arrested at higher rates than the normal population for all kinds of offences.

OgreBattle · Post by **OgreBattle** » Mon Oct 21, 2019 5:35 am

The guy talking about his prison expeirence says it's probably because the sex offenders are mostly internet crime people, and internet crime people are more likely to be into D&D

Libertad wrote:
Awoo. <3

Love that Junko Ohashi song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eGslweDOihs

The Adventurer's Almanac · Mon Oct 21, 2019 1:56 pm

But does playing D&D make you more likely to be into internet crime?

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Mon Oct 21, 2019 5:00 pm

The Adventurer's Almanac wrote:But does playing D&D make you more likely to be into internet crime?

It probably increases the chances of you committing piracy, if you didn't already do that.... but technically, that's NOT a crime (or at least, no one would ever try to give you a 1000 dollar fine after a jury trial when you had to be proved to be the person who did the DLing beyond a reasonable doubt when they can sue you in civil court for 4000 dollars and attorney fees).

The Adventurer's Almanac · Mon Oct 21, 2019 8:08 pm

So were I to twist your words, I could say that D&D makes you more likely to commit piracy. Someone should bring this issue to WOTC's attention, this is clearly a slippery slope that leads to federal prison time.

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Mon Oct 21, 2019 9:05 pm

I think the premise of the quote in article is based on cherry picked data sampling. The US Federal Prison system has 200,000 inmates, but only about 2,000 of them are sex offenders. I don't know how they are distributed, but I'd be really shocked if it was anything like uniform.

Most federal prisons can't have 75% of the D&D players be sex offenders because most federal prisons don't have enough sex offenders to form a gaming table.

-Username17

elotar · Post by **elotar** » Tue Nov 05, 2019 12:42 pm

LOLd!