# Are most pedophiles gay? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [April 10, 2005, 7:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-most-pedophiles-gay/298648 "2005-04-10T07:35:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Jerevan\_Somerville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/c37758/32.png) [@Jerevan\_Somerville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jerevan_Somerville)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2005, 3:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-most-pedophiles-gay/298648/41 "2005-04-12T15:43:48Z")
**Guinastasia** , thanks for the clarification. You may not be an expert but you’ve obviously read a lot more about this than I have. ---
**Author:** ![Hamlet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hamlet/32/2818_2.png) [@Hamlet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hamlet)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2005, 3:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-most-pedophiles-gay/298648/42 "2005-04-12T15:51:19Z")
> [@Scott\_plaid](#): > > That could be. It could also be that the witch hunters of Salem, Mass. where it is possible they were really killing real witches. It is also possible you are a purple alien maurauder, destined to wield the sword of Pixelius to save the entirety of the galaxy from the grip of Deathmachine. Your comparision is, on its face, idiotic. ---
**Author:** ![Scott\_Plaid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/258eb7/32.png) [@Scott\_Plaid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scott_Plaid)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2005, 4:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-most-pedophiles-gay/298648/43 "2005-04-12T16:01:22Z")
**Goddamnit!** _How_ did you guess? Now my **whole** mission is compromised! Do you know how many space bucks went into this mission! Now Deathmachine know where I live! Hope you like a galaxy where people are imprisoned unjustly, just because Deathmachine would rather have people tried by public opinion, or by combat, as opposed to by evidence, and actual harm done. ---
**Author:** ![Jerevan\_Somerville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/c37758/32.png) [@Jerevan\_Somerville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jerevan_Somerville)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2005, 4:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-most-pedophiles-gay/298648/44 "2005-04-12T16:05:01Z")
> [@Scott\_plaid](#): > > “it sounds like you are trying to separate personal cases from the question of whether a consensual sexual act harms people, in a general physiological sense, and that doesn’t make sense.” I’m still not sure I follow you. I have been largely addressing **non** -consensual acts, and asking specifically how (if at all) interact with the later manifestations of the victim’s inborn sexuality to affect their psycho-sexual development. If the question doesn’t make sense, it may be that I am not articulating it clearly enough, for which I apologize. Or it may be that the answer to my question is this: the development of an individual’s sexuality is completely separate from experiences of childhood abuse. Either way, I don’t think my question is “meaningless”. I ask because I have reason to wonder, and do not know the answer. I don’t understand how you connect what I wrote to this: > [@](#): > > It could also be that the witch hunters of Salem, Mass. where it is possible they were really killing real witches. After all, the culture of the time agreed that witches really existed. 😕 ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2005, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-most-pedophiles-gay/298648/45 "2005-04-12T16:07:45Z")
Ok, if we are limiting Pedophilia (and I think correctly) to sexual “encounters” involving a _pre-pubescent_ child- then the answer is no. Nor are they hetero. They are a 3rd sexual orientation. Some pedophiles prey upon either sex. But what they are looking for is a child who doesn’t have any secondary sexual characteristics- that’s one of the defining factors. Thus, the answer is “no, or neither”. And, yes, there is no doubt that these victims cannot really give ‘consent’ and are seriously harmed by such acts- if the acts are overt enough. Another term- which can be very usefule for this thread/debate- is “hebephilia”- which is a desire for young (often legally underaged) but sexually mature teens. This is less of a “perversion” (and certainly isn’t a severe mental illness like the sexual attraction to pre-pubescent children is), there is a chance of real 'consent" and I’d say there are more hebephiles amoung the heterosexual population (since it is way larger)- although it is possible that as a %, more homosexuals are hebephiles. It is possible that in some of these encounters, there is no real “harm”, and “more or less informed consent” was given (it depends upon the emotional maturity of the “victim”). After all- if we assume there is NO harm is a girl who is 18yo+ one day having sex with her 20yo boyfreind, we are being silly if we assume some sort of huge lasting harm if sex was consumated one day before her 18th B-day. :dubious: It is critical for these debates/discussions to separate hebephilia from pedophilia. The OP’s question has been asked here on these boards many times. Search is your freind. ---
**Author:** ![Hamlet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hamlet/32/2818_2.png) [@Hamlet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hamlet)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2005, 4:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-most-pedophiles-gay/298648/46 "2005-04-12T16:10:55Z")
> [@Scott\_plaid](#): > > [SIZE=3]just because Deathmachine would rather have people tried by public opinion, or by combat, as opposed to by evidence, and actual harm done. While slightly amusing, your posts continue to make no sense. I am not advocating trial by public opinion, nor am I making up evidence, I am merely pointing out that comparing the concept of consent in children to evidence of witch burnings is idiotic. I’ll stand by that point. ---
**Author:** ![Jerevan\_Somerville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/c37758/32.png) [@Jerevan\_Somerville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jerevan_Somerville)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2005, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-most-pedophiles-gay/298648/47 "2005-04-12T16:17:25Z")
> [@Scott\_plaid](#): > > **Goddamnit!** _How_ did you guess? Now my **whole** mission is compromised! Do you know how many space bucks went into this mission! Now Deathmachine know where I live! Hope you like a galaxy where people are imprisoned unjustly, just because Deathmachine would rather have people tried by public opinion, or by combat, as opposed to by evidence, and actual harm done. Oh, I think maybe now I’m beginning to understand what you’re saying. **scott\_plaid** , do you think I’m advocating punishment for **consensual** sexual acts? Because I’m not. I will grant that my arguments flow from a string of not-completely-unwarranted assumptions, the ultimate result of which is that pre-pubescent children aren’t capable of consensual sex – which in turn does imply the possibility of “harm done” to the child’s later sexual development (interference with, inhibition of, etc.). And I did suggest that that _possibility_ is why we as a culture do not generally advocate or condone adult-child sexual encounters. But nowhere in this thread have I spoken about punishment regardless of actual harm done, trial by public opinion, and the like. This is how I perceive what you’re saying. If I still misunderstand you, please correct me. ---
**Author:** ![Jerevan\_Somerville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/c37758/32.png) [@Jerevan\_Somerville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jerevan_Somerville)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2005, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-most-pedophiles-gay/298648/48 "2005-04-12T16:24:40Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Ok, if we are limiting Pedophilia (and I think correctly) to sexual “encounters” involving a _pre-pubescent_ child- then the answer is no. I can’t speak for the rest of contributors to this thread, but yes, this is how I have been looking at the question. > [@](#): > > Another term- which can be very usefule for this thread/debate- is “hebephilia”- which is a desire for young (often legally underaged) but sexually mature teens. … It is possible that in some of these encounters, there is no real “harm”, and “more or less informed consent” was given (it depends upon the emotional maturity of the “victim”)… It is critical for these debates/discussions to separate hebephilia from pedophilia. Thanks for this interesting addition. It does point out that “(pre-)pubescence”, and therefore the capability for consent, depend very much on the individual’s emotional, intellectual & physical development – and, I imagine, who gets to assess these. ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2005, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-most-pedophiles-gay/298648/49 "2005-04-12T16:29:41Z")
**Hamlet** , there is a point to be examined here, though. First, let’s tie off and place in the “clearly condemned” bin the idea of non-consensual molestation of children. It would be my contention that the degree of actual consent, and even instigation of sexual activity, in adolescents (and, regrettably, a very small but extant number of “sexualized” pre-pubescents) is something of a spectrum, ranging from the effectively non-consensual coercion of the typical molested child to a full-fledged enthusiastic consent in later adolescence. Clearly this is not reflected in the age of consent laws, which make little or no distinction between the forcible or coercive molestation of a small child and the active pursuit of sexual encounters by a mid-teen who is legally incapable of consent but in actual fact may be a willing enthusiastic co-participant and even the one who initiates a sexual aspect to a relationship. It would be my suggestion that figuring out a way to give legal recognition to the actual state of maturity and “consensuality” (is that a legitimate word?) of the girl (or boy!) in such relationships would be the effective means of distinguishing between the life-destroying molestation behavior that calls for severe sentencing and the “technical sex crime” exemplified by **Dr Deth** ’s last example. Any thoughts on how this might be accomplished? I’ve known teens whose maturity and judgment were the equal of any adults; to say they cannot consent to a sexual relationship with a person they love is absurd. I’ve known other teens, including some older than people in the first group, who were so naive and “unsexualized” that any sexual approach to them would constitute molestation in a psychological even if not a legal sense. And how to translate that into something that can be legally enforced totally escapes me, even if I had the power to do so. ---
**Author:** ![Hamlet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hamlet/32/2818_2.png) [@Hamlet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hamlet)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2005, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-most-pedophiles-gay/298648/50 "2005-04-12T16:49:05Z")
> [@Polycarp](#): > > It would be my suggestion that figuring out a way to give legal recognition to the actual state of maturity and “consensuality” (is that a legitimate word?) of the girl (or boy!) in such relationships would be the effective means of distinguishing between the life-destroying molestation behavior that calls for severe sentencing and the “technical sex crime” exemplified by **Dr Deth** ’s last example. > > Any thoughts on how this might be accomplished? I’ve known teens whose maturity and judgment were the equal of any adults; to say they cannot consent to a sexual relationship with a person they love is absurd. I’ve known other teens, including some older than people in the first group, who were so naive and “unsexualized” that any sexual approach to them would constitute molestation in a psychological even if not a legal sense. And how to translate that into something that can be legally enforced totally escapes me, even if I had the power to do so. Hence, the age of consent laws. It seems to me that the legislative power would allow two choices here, either err on the side of caution and have an age of consent, or err on the side of a “child’s freedom” (to borrow a completely incorrect phrase from Mr. 2001). I have absolutely no problem erring on the side of caution. I see virtually nothing to be gained, with a massive amount of damage being done, by getting rid of age of consent laws. Given the leniency built in to the statutes in dealing with these grey areas, the existance of prosecutorial discretion, and the recognition of the judicial branch of their severity or lack of it, I think the only intelligent, well-reasoned answer is for the United States to have age of consent laws. I suppose, if I had to be creative, one could create a legal mechanism, much like a teen being “Emancipated”, where your collection of physically, emotionally, and psychologically prepared, yet underaged, teenagers would be allowed to petition the court for permission, to prove they can consent, and then they get a license to have sex with whichever adult takes a fancy to them. Personally though, I can’t see that happening. ---
**Author:** ![inkleberry](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/f17d59/32.png) [@inkleberry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/inkleberry)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2005, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-most-pedophiles-gay/298648/51 "2005-04-12T17:10:07Z")
Also, what I haven’t seen yet is the obsevation that there is little anatomical difference between boys and girls at young ages. It’s not about the genitals. It’s about control, power, and plain being f\*cked up. ---
**Author:** ![Scott\_Plaid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/258eb7/32.png) [@Scott\_Plaid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scott_Plaid)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2005, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-most-pedophiles-gay/298648/52 "2005-04-12T17:47:46Z")
Sorry, everyone, but the mention of age of consent laws really sets me off. When the mention of them is maid, or the fact that society feels a certain way, I can not shrug it off. True, it may be better to err on the side of caution, but when a school teacher gets in bed with a post-pubescent student, the only law that get violate should be those concerning marriage, assuming that the teacher is married. The age of consent laws protect against children being raped by adults, but it should not be applied to those recent cases of women with young men, morally speaking, as should have happened with the Texas anti-sodomy laws a few years ago. In addition, I would have less of a problem with the AOC laws if they were clearly defined across the board, for should a touring musician hop in the sack with a groupie, he might find that it is legally defined as rape, while it is not in his home state. P.S. Why did this argument move away from children to teens? Because of the use of the AOC laws in defense, generalized words like “youths” in this thread, and a refusal of people in real life to separate Polycarp’s examples of ephebophiles from potential rapists. ---
**Author:** ![KidCharlemagne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ed8c4c/32.png) [@KidCharlemagne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KidCharlemagne)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2005, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-most-pedophiles-gay/298648/53 "2005-04-12T19:06:11Z")
> [@Hamlet](#): > > Despite your misleading thread title, I think you understand that there is no such thing as a gay pedophile. Being homosexual and being a pedophile are mutually exclusive groups. Certainly there are male pedophiles who prey on boys, but these are not homosexual pedophiles anymore than pedophiles who prey on girls are heterosexual. [Here is an excellent article about some of these issues.](http://psychology.ucdavis.edu/rainbow/html/facts_molestation.html) > > There is also this: In one study, 98% of males who raped boys reported that they were heterosexual. [Sexual Abuse of Boys, Journal of the American Medical Association, December 2, 1998]. I don’t think you mean “mutually exclusive” because homosexuals can be pedophiles. I’ve seen the study you cite and I also recall that somewhere on the order of 90%ish of male pedophiles who prey on boys have exclusively heterosexual adult relationships. **Lissa** IIRC over 90% of male pedophiles who prey on males were molested by men when growing up. I wouldn’t be surprised if the Male\>female stats brought that number down significantly. ---
**Author:** ![Hamlet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hamlet/32/2818_2.png) [@Hamlet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hamlet)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2005, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-most-pedophiles-gay/298648/54 "2005-04-12T19:32:04Z")
> [@KidCharlemagne](#): > > I don’t think you mean “mutually exclusive” because homosexuals can be pedophiles. Perhaps. Is a bisexual a homosexual-heterosexual or a heterosexual-homosexual? The same problem of labelling happens when discussing offenders who have sex with kids and adult women or men. ---
**Author:** ![Jerevan\_Somerville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/c37758/32.png) [@Jerevan\_Somerville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jerevan_Somerville)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2005, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-most-pedophiles-gay/298648/55 "2005-04-12T19:44:35Z")
> [@Scott\_plaid](#): > > Sorry, everyone, but the mention of age of consent laws really sets me off. … Well, as the person who feels he inadvertently lit that fuse, I apologize if anything I wrote came across as a blanket statement of “society feeling a certain way” or a defense thereof. That’s the last thing I intended. Just to be clear, I was not speaking directly to AOC laws (or anything legal, for that matter), but to the instinct of society to protect **pre-pubescent** children (at minimum) from sexual encounters – which, I hope you will agree, is a healthy instinct. We may not be able to define an exact moment when a child moves from being pre-pubescent to pubescent, but I hope we can also agree that for a certain period at the beginning of their lives, all children are unquestionably pre-pubescent, non-sexually-aware beings, for whom any sexual encounter is wholly inappropriate, if not actually damaging. It was to this specific period of a child’s life (not something vague like “youth”) that I deliberately confined my questions and arguments, mainly because that was the specific age-range/situation that interested me. But I also chose that tack because, like you and **Polycarp** , I recognize that there is no one-size-fits-all solution for sexual encounters involving older children who, regardless of what the laws say, **might** be sexually aware and truly capable of making meaningful choices – in which case we ought not deny them that choice. That, I think, might be a topic for another thread. Which I think we’d all gladly visit if you were to start it. ---
**Author:** ![Ms2001](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ms2001/32/18463_2.png) [@Ms2001](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ms2001)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2005, 12:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-most-pedophiles-gay/298648/56 "2005-04-13T00:52:38Z")
> [@Jerevan Somerville](#): > > Hmmm… I do see your point. But it seems to me that choices like ice cream, homework, bedtime, etc. are different in kind, not just degree, from a choice about sexual intimacy – mainly because, by virtue of being pre-pubescent, such a child isn’t capable of understanding any aspect of sexual intimacy in a way which allows a meaningful choice on the subject. Whereas such a child can have a personal/subjective understanding of ice cream, homework and bedtime which allows for a meaningful (if unhealthy) choice. Can you explain this further? Do you agree that a child can know whether he enjoys any other form of physical stimulation, such as tickling or massage? If so, why can’t he know whether he enjoys sexual stimulation? > [@](#): > > So I do in fact think that, at least in this arena, it is appropriate to say that a child cannot know what he does/does not want (to phrase it your way) or to say that a child is incapable of making a meaningful choice (to phrase it my way). I suspect we’re not even talking about the same thing. Take homework, for example. A child might not know why it’s important to do his homework. He might not understand the importance of learning and practicing the material he’s being taught in class, or how knowing the material will affect him in future life, etc. You might say he can’t make a “meaningful” choice about doing his homework, because he doesn’t fully understand why it was assigned and what will happen if he doesn’t do it. But he still knows whether he enjoys doing homework, or whether he’d prefer spending his time on something else. You might choose to _disregard_ his opinion because he formed it without enough information, but you can’t deny that it exists. The same is true of sex. He might not understand why an adult is making advances towards him, or how the act would be viewed by society, or even that those body parts can be used for reproduction, but one thing he does know is whether he’s comfortable in that situation, whether he enjoys being stimulated and/or stimulating the adult or whether he wants it to stop. If he _is_ comfortable with it, you might argue that he shouldn’t be, but that wouldn’t change the fact that he is. That’s what I’m talking about, and what I believe the studies mean by “wanted” vs. “unwanted”. > [@Hamlet](#): > > Wouldn’t it be more proper to say that those two, and most of the other stuff you linked to, have been resoundedly attacked, not only on policy grounds, but also on scientific grounds by numerous different groups including the Leadership council and the Psychological Bulletin, which originally published the Rind report. They have also been soundly defended against those attacks. Feel free to draw your own conclusions from the reports, the criticisms, and the counter-criticisms. I’ve done so, and my conclusion is that the APA is as fallible as any other organization. > [@](#): > > to borrow a completely incorrect phrase from Mr. 2001 Say what you like about my phrases, but come on. I’ve been here for over 5 years, and there has never been a period or a space in my name. How can I do vanity searches if you spell it like that? 😉 > [@Jerevan Somerville](#): > > Just to be clear, I was not speaking directly to AOC laws (or anything legal, for that matter), but to the instinct of society to protect pre-pubescent children (at minimum) from sexual encounters – which, I hope you will agree, is a healthy instinct. I believe the instinct behind it, the general drive to protect children from everything that might possibly cause harm, is healthy. But it is often taken too far. When we deny that children are even capable of forming an opinion on these matters, we have gone beyond trying to protect real children, and started trying to protect our own romanticized concept of childhood innocence. ---
**Author:** ![Jerevan\_Somerville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/c37758/32.png) [@Jerevan\_Somerville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jerevan_Somerville)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2005, 1:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-most-pedophiles-gay/298648/57 "2005-04-13T13:43:52Z")
> [@Mr2001](#): > > Can you explain this further? Do you agree that a child can know whether he enjoys any other form of physical stimulation, such as tickling or massage? If so, why can’t he know whether he enjoys sexual stimulation? Yes, I do agree that a child can know whether he enjoys other forms of physical stimulation or intimacy (tickling, hugging, etc.). In my view, sexual stimulation is different. If a child is not yet sexually aware or developed, is it possible for him to be **sexually** stimulated – and therefore to know whether he does/does not enjoy the experience as sex _per se_? Bluntly, is it possible for a child “to have sex”? In my view the answer to all three questions is “no”. My answer to the first question depends on the definition (or my assumption) about what it means to be “pre-pubescent”; I may be alone in making the distinction for the second question; and I suspect that the third is debatable because it depends on how one defines “sex” in the first place. > [@](#): > > I suspect we’re not even talking about the same thing. After reading through the rest of your post, I think you may be right about that. Which is a good thing to realize. > [@](#): > > Take homework, for example. A child might not know why it’s important to do his homework. He might not understand the importance of learning and practicing the material he’s being taught in class, or how knowing the material will affect him in future life, etc. Agreed. But I am not suggesting that “meaningful choice” requires an assessment and understanding of future effects and long-term consequences. I’m talking about the child’s reaction/response to the experience in the moment, as it happens: do I like what is happening? how do I feel about this? do I want to keep doing it, or stop? Now, if I understand you, you would say the child can answer these questions about sex as meaningfully as he could about homework. I can see your point, but I don’t accept the equivalence of the two activities, for reasons I’ve tried to outline above. > [@](#): > > You might say he can’t make a “meaningful” choice about doing his homework, because he doesn’t fully understand why it was assigned and what will happen if he doesn’t do it. As I said above, his understanding of the consequences of doing/not doing don’t enter my consideration here – just his present-time awareness of the experience. > [@](#): > > You might choose to _disregard_ his opinion because he formed it without enough information, but you can’t deny that it exists. No, I am not denying that his opinion exists. But there is difference between acknowledging its existence, and acknowledging that it has any recognizable meaning. This distinction is played out all the time here on the SDMB. You may well choose to decide that I have formed my opinions without enough information or that my opinions are based on faulty assumptions (both of which may well be) – in which case you are quite free to disregard my opinions as “meaningless”. > [@](#): > > The same is true of sex. He might not understand why an adult is making advances towards him, or how the act would be viewed by society, or even that those body parts can be used for reproduction, but one thing he does know is whether he’s comfortable in that situation, whether he enjoys being stimulated and/or stimulating the adult or whether he wants it to stop. Which goes back to the issue of whether a child can “enjoy” stimulating or being stimulated in that particular way. And this is another area where, I agree, we may be talking about two different things: what constitutes “sufficient information” for a meaningful choice? Obviously we have differing ideas about that. > [@](#): > > If he _is_ comfortable with it, you might argue that he shouldn’t be, but that wouldn’t change the fact that he is. That’s what I’m talking about, and what I believe the studies mean by “wanted” vs. “unwanted”. OK, I believe I follow the arguments/opinions that lead you through to these definitions. Still, I have to stick with my original assessment, which flows from my own arguments/opinions: that all pre-pubescent sexual encounters are, by virtue of the pre-pubescence, “unwanted”. > [@](#): > > I believe the instinct behind it, the general drive to protect children from everything that might possibly cause harm, is healthy. But it is often taken too far. When we deny that children are even capable of forming an opinion on these matters, we have gone beyond trying to protect real children, and started trying to protect our own romanticized concept of childhood innocence. I don’t _think_ I’m protecting some “romantic” notion of childhood innocence. Rather I think that there is time at the beginning of a child’s life where he is biologically, physiologically, emotionally, intellectually and spiritually incapable of having, or processing, a sexual experience _per se_. Until such a child has developed these faculties of sexual potential and awareness, I see no point in allowing sexual encounters because of the potential for harm, while I see no harm in taking steps to protect the child from them. Likewise, once I saw that the child was beginning to develop these faculties, I would acknowledge this and trade one set of protections for another: instead of protecting him from all sexual encounters, I would offer advice to help him navigate his options and choices, in the interest of keeping him healthy and safe while exploring his sexuality. Granted, this kind of protection can be taken too far, to a point where it denies the child-person’s right to choose at all, at any age, on any subject. But that doesn’t mean we should throw all caution to the wind; rather it means that we (as adults, as a society) have other work to do, too: we have to pay attention to ourselves and keep those over-protective instincts in check, lest we squash our children’s development. Parents have to grow along with their children. ---
**Author:** ![Jerevan\_Somerville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/c37758/32.png) [@Jerevan\_Somerville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jerevan_Somerville)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2005, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-most-pedophiles-gay/298648/58 "2005-04-13T14:53:19Z")
> [@Mr2002](#): > > Take homework, for example. A child might not know why it’s important to do his homework. He might not understand the importance of learning and practicing the material he’s being taught in class, or how knowing the material will affect him in future life, etc. There is another qualitative distinction between sex and homework etc. which I think is important, but which I couldn’t quite articulate until now: A child is capable of initiating “homework” or “bedtime” on his own (however rarely either might occur!). Because the child can exhibit **on his own** a desire for these activities, we can say that child has some understanding of the experience of “homework” or “bedtime” _per se_ which allows him to make a meaningful choice, or at the very least have a meaningful opinion. But… is a pre-pubescent child capable of **initiating** a sexual encounter as such, and/or of expressing a desire for such an encounter in the same way that mid- or post-pubescent individuals do? If not, then doesn’t that cast _some_ doubt on his ability to understand a sexual encounter _per se_, and on his capacity to “choose” to participate? I think it does cast doubt – sufficient, in fact, to disallow his capacity for consent. ---
**Author:** ![Jerevan\_Somerville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/c37758/32.png) [@Jerevan\_Somerville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jerevan_Somerville)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2005, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-most-pedophiles-gay/298648/59 "2005-04-13T16:45:43Z")
**Mr2001** , sorry I mistyped your username incorrectly in my last posting. I should’ve caught that one on preview and did not. I would not want to reduce your results of a vanity search! 🙂 Anyway, one more line of thought occurred to me, and then I think I’m finished. We could go round and round on the question of whether a child truly can consent to a sexual encounter, and never come to any agreement. And in doing so we’d be overlooking something very important. So, for the sake of argument, let’s assume you’re right: that a pre-pubescent child does have the capacity for this consent; and that the child’s sense of his own pleasure in the encounter – regardless of whether the child understands the encounter as “sexual” in any way – can be construed as “consent”. As a result we say that the child can “choose” the encounter. Such a chosen/consensual encounter is defined as “wanted” and therefore (so the argument goes) not “harmful”. Alright. Now, what happens when the child does not enjoy the encounter, and does not want it, expresses non-consent, makes a choice against it? Does the older/adult partner respect that and desist? Certainly not in all cases – otherwise there would be no “unwanted encounters”. In the other words, the important thing we’re overlooking is that **children in these situations are rarely, if ever, given the real opportunity to choose or consent**. Thus the child’s capacity for choice/consent is rather beside the point, because he can have no effect on what actually happens, verbally or otherwise: the unequal nature (physical, emotional & intellectual) of the encounter usually prevents the child from acting on, or enforcing, his choice. These encounters are clearly “unwanted” (harmful) and clearly they do occur. No matter what we might decide about the child’s capacity for choice/consent, we cannot assume that the would-be sexual “partner” will agree with us, or abide by the child’s wishes. Yet we wish to protect the child from “harmful” experiences. How, then, do we accomplish this, except by protecting the child from **all** (because they are unequal) sexual encounters? ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2005, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-most-pedophiles-gay/298648/60 "2005-04-13T18:06:40Z")
Well, I think we have strayed into GD territory. However, a pre-pubescent child cannot give\* informed\* consent. Sure, there is a possibility that whatever the molester is doing might “feel good” to the child- or that the child may do it because it makes that adult happy- which makes the child happy. However- that really doesn’t make informed consent. The pre-pubescent child has no way of knowing (at that point in time) that what the adult is doing is both legally and morally **wrong**. When the child finds out- there will be deep psychological trauma. You could have a child happily consent to being killed- would that then be OK? This has also strayed off the OP’s question of 'are most pedophiles gay?". I think that we have answered it- when we are talking about pre-pubescent children, we are really talking about a 3rd sexual orietation. Some pedophiles (Oh and note- when we are restricting “pedophilia= pre-pubescent children” we are almost 100% talking about male pedophiles. Fpr some reason, almost no females ever prey upon pre-pubescent children) prey upon male pre-pubescent children, some upon femals, some upon both. However, those that (for example) only prey upon male pre-pubescent children are not “gay”. They are “pedophiles”. In general, that sub-grouping would not be attracted to, or have sex with, a normal fellow male. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-most-pedophiles-gay/298648.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-most-pedophiles-gay/298648.md?page=4)