Fashioning the Body: Versions of the Citizen, the Self, and the Subject

I had an interesting experience at work today. I work in a preschool at the community college, and the last few weeks since school started their have been alot of students on campus. One student in particular has stoped at the gate a few times to watch the kids play, and has talked to kids as well when they approach him. It seems like most people in the cultural flow of things understand that you aren't supposed to hang around play grounds if you dont have a reason to be there. But this person obviously doesn't understand this, today he was asked to move along and he complied, but came back and later and sat down on the benches near the play ground but wasn't watching the kids. A teach called the security and I found out this wasnt the first time security was called but it was the first time anyone had talked to the student about not talking to the kids. One teacher was getting the school in an uproar about a scary pedifile stalking the playground. I saw realived that the person she was talking about I had seen before and talked to he was no threat and completely oblivious to the fact that enjoying watching children play was a crime. I saw him walking by this afternoon and haveing meet him before was able to call him over by name. I asked him how his day was and he told me that he had been talked to about watching at the fence and talking to the kids and he was completely surprised at that being a problem. I talked with him about the discomfort at the center and thatr people hand been calling security about him and he was very understanding and surprised and than left. It made me so sad that peoples fear of sexuality is so strong that it seems to create a power that has the potential to transform an innocent confused boy into a petifile. It remined me of the way jean genet took on his label. And that we as a culture can forge criminals out of anyone by simily labling them and using the technology of fear to wheled the power of law over them. It is by alination that we create and mantian the illusion of abnormal sexuality and make it a reallity. There are dangerous people and it is not to say that we should embrace them with open arms but we should at least see them for who they are and try and give them a chance by helping someone avoid becoming a hub in the web of culture that people project there fears of sexuality upon.