OCD/fear of false arrest just won't stop.

Okay, I lost the original post since I left the page idle for too long, and it was a long-winded post so I am just going to try to keep this one more brief.

I am a 23-year-old gay male, and I have OCD; it was mostly just a handwashing compulsion and checking/hit-and-run OCD, but now it is an obsession about being falsely accused of a crime and not being able to prove myself innocent.

Basically, sometime earlier this year, I was trying to look for a particular porno that I saw a few years back; I didn't remember much of it, just that it was virtual-reality themed, and one of the scenes had two adult males acting out a father-son fantasy. I didn't care about the scenario, I just liked the actors; handsome, facial hair, etc. I couldn't find the video on the porn sites I used, so I figured I'd just Google what I knew. The long to short is, I thought I found a link to it, clicked it, and ended up on an atrocious site with photos of children being sexually abused, and panicked because I thought that I would get arrested for accidentally clicking on the link. Since then, the idea of being falsely arrested has manifested into the obsession I have today.

I could be on Facebook and worry that I accidentally liked or shared something with terrible content, I could be Googling pictures of a flower and worry that I got redirected to a bad page and it is now in my history. That the police will come looking for me, arrest me, and I won't be able to prove myself innocent. And in the event that they realize they made a false arrest and are concerned with being sued for targeting an innocent gay male, would plant evidence to get me locked up and save themselves.

The obsession tells me I would lose all my friends and anyone who could testify to prove me innocent; my reputation will be sullied, and I would have no choice but to "off" myself because I could no longer lead a normal life.

And about two months ago, I did a favor for someone and returned products to a store for them. Only to find out they were actually stolen goods. Which agitated this obsession to the extreme that it is now. I unreasonably check my internet history, even though I never look up anything terrible or incriminating, and it is frustrating because the obsession is just never satisfied. I love technology, I love social networking and how it brings people together, and this obsession has turned my favorite thing into my worst enemy.

Even googling my fear of false-arrest or what happened with trying to find the porno, never mind that it is just embarrassing to admit, but the obsession makes me think that if I were to be falsely arrested, that it would be leverage against me since the court would wonder why I have this fear if I'm not guilty of anything.

This isn't POCD, I don't have intrusive sexual thoughts about kids. Hell, I can barely stand kids, I don't know what to do with them, haha. The only two thoughts I have with kids are "How do I get this nosebleed away from me?" and the worry that if a child fell or was doing something dangerous, and I went to grab them and prevent them from getting hurt, a stranger would assume that I was a pedophile and accuse me of trying to touch the kid inappropriately. Of course, anyone in their right mind would know that is a very terrible accusation and assumption to make, but there are still homophobic people who think that way. Which is why I hate when I am out at a wedding or some event and a strange child tries to interact with me, because I am worried about strangers making false accusations.

This is just about being falsely accused of a crime and not being able to prove my innocence, the fear that the law will work against me no matter what. And I know it's an outrageous obsession, and I just want it to go away.

Even clicking "Submit" is petrifying, as though I am setting my life up to be destroyed by talking about this obsession. I just don't want to be misunderstood, and it's hard enough with OCD in general, but this is just embarrassing. But I've seen other posts and how supportive of a community there is here, and, I don't know, I guess I could just use that right now. Thank you.

I have been down this road before. There was a time where I wouldn't hang around the kids of my friends (I am normally great with kids), because I thought somehow one of them would falsely accuse me of doing something wrong.

I also wanted to volunteer for fatherless kids through the Big Brother/Little Brother program, but knew my OCD would skyrocket with fear.

I watched porn in my youth, and had the same concerns, even though I didn't even accidentally see something that might be questionable.

***trigger warning***
I was also afraid someone would use my hard drive to park CP on, back when there were stories about hackers using high speed (always on) connections for placed to store files "offline"
****

Like most fears of OCD, rational arguments tend to fail, when others try to support the person who is suffering. Still...

I think for the authorities to prosecute CP, they have to find it on your computer, or otherwise prove that you were activity involved with it online. Also, since you used Google (as you state) you may have come across a site that "looks" underage, but isn't.

Sadly there is a lot of this stuff on the internet and I'm sure the authorities are trying to catch people who actively involved, not someone who accidentally sees something for a few seconds.

otter.

Man after reading your story all I can think is "poor guy!"

I have no idea where you live but based on what you described, that is NOT a crime where I live.

1) you said you were looking for ADULT porno (not that I encourage that, but it's your choice)
2) You obviously didn't KNOW or INTEND to end up on that site (in my area you are required to KNOW or INTEND to access that kind or site with an INTENT to view it for it to be a crime).
3) It is hard for me to believe that you ACCIDENTALLY clicked on the link based on what you said. However, whether or not actually clicking on the link was an accident, that is beside the point as long as you didn't intend to view a bad site. Even if you intended to click the actual link, that is not the same as intending to view an illegal site.
4) You are implying that you immediately got off the site.
5) If you only accessed something like that ONE TIME and it was an accident, I can' t imagine that any court would believe that you wanted to view that.
6) My vote if I were a juror: not guilty. And I would wonder why a prosecutor would waste their time on a case like that.