This question was kind of prompted by the response to 2.5 inches dubious thread about vaginal lubrication.
Surely it must be like tight-rope walking along a razors edge, trying to amass knowledge about this much taboo-ridden subject?
Does anyone know what specific qualifications people would need to go into this field of research, and how they deal, day in, day out, with the mental anguish, and tales of horror they must encounter, once they are qualified? What sort of checks are made to ensure these people are not doing it for the wrong reasons?
I’m hardly surprised this thread has had no responses yet…I won’t even type “pedophile” in my google search bar! Surely this kind of reaction cannot be germane or productive, in fighting the ignorance and fear surrounding this topic?
They study it like they study virtually any other criminal behavior. You don’t think they allow them to actually engage in the activity do you? No, of course not. They study the offender himself, using various tools such as MRIs, psychological testing and interviews. They don’t need to observe the pedophile being a pedophile in order to learn what makes him the way he is any more than they need to learn about psychopaths by watching them commit murder.
An acquaintance of mine studied it as part of his Master’s research. Specifically he sought out forums and the like. This was in about 1999. He won’t talk much about it, he said it was absolutely horrid work but I believe there was some police involvement. All those involved in the research had counselling provided too IIRC.
There may be multiple avenues, but there is an FBI profiler by the name of John Douglass who studies pedophilia (among other sex crimes) and his degree is in Criminal Psychology.
Regarding coping with the horror, I understand it is an ongoing challenge. John Douglass had a breakdown at one point and he explained that it is almost inevitable in that field because there is no one to whom you can vent.
I have a neighbor/friend who is the Deputy District Atty for the County of Los Angeles Child Sex Crimes Unit and she sees a counselor on a regular basis to deal the psychological issues that go with the territory.
As far as a checks and balance system, I have no idea.
Which brings me to another question; if as some people claim, child pornography is so damaging and corruptive, what about these people who watch it as part of their job, trying to catch the offenders? How the fuck do you specially prepare for a job like that?
Well, I think the claim is mainly that it’s damaging to the children–which it certainly is. I really don’t know how one prepares for such a thing, or even if one can properly prepare for such a thing. I suspect it’s much like any other job which exposes one to frequent horrors, such as homicide investigators or emergency medical personnel: they become hardened to it after a while. Or they don’t, in which case they don’t last long in that particular career path.
Not everyone can work at it, obviously. But then again, think about the CSI or first-responder types who have to check out gruesome crime scenes -- in any of these cases, working on it day in and day out is clearly not a task for amateurs. A responsible Law Enforcement agency will screen the people assigned to these tasks before entry and periodically thereafter and provide them the necessary training and, as needed, counseling support. The way the world works it is necessary for some people to look at those things most of us would find physically and morally repulsive, to the point of risking traumatic stress, if they are going to set them right. It's not that the viewing of CP is "so damaging and corruptive" to an otherwise disinterested observer, it's that when viewing CP the otherwise disinterested observer is observing evidence that something extraordinarily damaging and corruptive happened*(*). *
As Q.E.D. said, the “damage” is to the victims. But a willing consumer of CP will not *feel * specially traumatized by looking at a bunch of vids or pics, obviously. Now, it may be that popular media makes it look like the “only” “expected”, “normal” reaction is to want to kill the bastards who did that on sight and curl up crying on the floor, or else you’re being drawn in. But I’d wager that in reality, a **non-**pedophile, depending on his/her level of emotionality, may have any of a range of reactions and could just as well end up with one closer to head-shaking disbelief than to raging post-traumatic stress fits. I’d think that both in research and in enforcement you want to have people who’ll keep their heads on straight, without becoming so hardened they stop caring.
*(Meaning actual recorded/photographed molestation. If someone wants to draw cartoons of the entire Pokémon cast getting it on, who cares…)
Eh, I can think of a few lines of investigation which would be informative, were they not ethically impermissible. For instance, one might conduct functional MRI scans on pedophiles and normal adults, while the subjects are exposed to stimulating material, to see if it’s the same brain regions which are excited in both. Though I suppose this could be done with simulated material, depending on the current state of the laws and the courts’ decisions.
Kind of a hijack but isn’t that a point of anti-death penalty advocates, it’s better to keep them alive and study them to make them learn what makes them tick?
My father studied under Dr. Bill Marshall, one of Canada’s leading experts in the field of deviant psychology and professor emeritus at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario. I’ve E-mailed Dr. Marshall and cited his opinions on the SDMB, in fact.
He gathered quite a lot of his information through a lot of interviews of convicted pedophiles. It is worth noting he spent most of his career in Kingston, which also happens to have a lot of prisons in the area, so convicted sex offenders were easily come by. Experiments of the sort Chronos described are also used.
As for what “Checks” were required, it took Dr. Marshall decades of study to become a respected psychologist. I don’t think pedophiles usually put that amount of work in.
Something similar has been done. Except that instead of a RMI, they affixed something to the subjects’ penises. They showed them nude or suggestive photographs of women and children, and had them listen to recordings of sexually explicit material (involving both consensual and non-consensual sex, with adults as well as with children). And the subjects were all random participants, not especially paedophiles. The only thing I remember is that the %age of men aroused was why higher that you would expect (but I don’t remember the figures at all).
Since this had been posted here, maybe someone will be able to provide a link.
I’d imagine they cope by doing the best job they can and believing that they can catch the bastards responsible and save other children from suffering the same fate.
John Douglass, who Enola Gay mentions in Post 8, writes in one of his books that watching sexual serial killers commit their murders is a law enforcement tool. Whether or not it’s a resource academics use I don’t know. Some criminals apparently film or audio tape their acts and some of these are in FBI files. I would think they would be of some interest to anyone studying the subject.
I can’t comment on Douglass’s reliability. His books are for popular consumption certainly. I would describe them as light reading if not for the subject matter. He does view and/or listen to the tapes which are gruesome in the extreme, he says. Don’t bother reading him with any scholarly or even prurient interest; he doesn’t give detailed descriptions of actual crimes he has viewed.
