My favourite quote, from a sex offender treatment program in the USA, is "Hurt people, hurt people". In other words, the people who commit offences and harm others, have usually been harmed themselves.

So most are neither bad or mad, but they are damaged. That damage, or trauma, affects the way that they interact with other people,or deal with certaain situations and it is this that usually leads to them offending.

Society likes quick and easy labels, like mad or bad, because then they don't have to engage with the complex causes of crime, or acknowledge that many offenders have been failed by the same society which now demonises them.

If you look at the people on probation or in prison, as a group, they are far more likely than the non offending population to have been in the care system, far more likely to have been excluded from school, far more likely to have a mental health condition and far more likely to have suffered some form of childhood trauma, which could be physical, sexual or emotional abuse.

All of these things have an effect on somebody's ability to cope with life's stressors and their ability to form meaningful long term relationships with other people. When these people go 'off the rails' and commit an offence, it's usually in response to an event in their lives which they find very stressful and that they can't cope with. The most common coping techniques that you see among offenders are anger/violence and alcohol/drugs, plus, in the case of SO nowadays, porn.

All of these are unhealthy attempts at problem solving or coping. They tend to resolve issues in the short term, but lead to long term consequences, like addiction, or in the case of violence and anger, to a life full of short lived and unfulfilling relationships.

That's why so much of probation's work is targetted at teaching offenders problem solving skills and emotional coping techniques. It's so that the next time they get stressed, they deal with it in a healthy way.

As a recovering addict myself from porn and narcotics and speaking to many other addicts of different backgrounds and usage history, the only thing i can confirm in all honesty is, addiction is real whether that be behavioural or substance.

I know many people who have had terrible childhoods, equally others who have grown up with everything they need, family, support, material things, friends etc.

for me, using porn initially was out of curiosity until it became necessity at the expense of other more meaningful things in life, however cocaine was offered to me when i was in an already vulnerable state having to deal with my mother dying from breast cancer but at the same time not feeling able to talk about it and 'putting on a brave face' inside i was crumbling though and narcotics seemed like a welcome escape until that very thing became the thing i wanted to escape from.

I know i am an addict that is just part of how my brain works, today i've learned to see it as a positive in that it carries over to things like my career, whereby i surround myself with everything to do with construction, constantly learning, perusing the screwfix catalogue and fantasising about the next power tool i want to buy. All this behaviour has been re-routed but it needs constant work, which is why i attend 12 step meetings.

There is also a lot of truth in the statement 'the opposite of addiction is connection' So when we become emotionally isolated, certain needs aren't being met such as companionship, love, sense of purpose, intimacy etc. It can often lead to trying to find a substance misuse approach to try and make us freel better or we turn to other behaviours such as watching too  much porn. the initial pleasure is soon lost during the come down when we have to face reality again. I have found that much of recovery is about learning to deal with life on lifes terms. understanding your emotions and being able to have a positive outlet such as being able to share stuff with people in confidence.

For anyone out there struggling with addiction or poor coping behaviours, please don't give up. Despite all the naysayers there are people out there who want to help and who will love you until you can learn to love yourself.

There are different types of trauma and they don't all occur in childhood, although people do learn a lot of their coping behaviours in childhood, which they then take forward as adults. Broadly speaking, those coping mechanisms can be either fight or flight and in the case of offenders that will translate to either aggression (fight) or addiction (flight). Addiction is a way of running away, or escaping from a problem.

In my Horizon group of 10 men, we had the following traumas.

3 people had suffered life changing illness or disability
3 had been victims of sexual abuse
2 had experienced the death of a close friend or relative

I don't think that this is unusual. Similar stories will be found in all the dozens of other Horizon programs around the country too.