I don’t think “Claiming to abuse children because the pedophile was themselves a victim of abuse” has anything to do with it. Girls who were sexually molested often grow up with unhealthy attitudes about relationships and sex, and seemingly unconsciously make extremely poor decisions. Their behavior can be overly sexualized and, if you ask them, they’d probably say there’s nothing they hate worse than sex (if in fact they could articulate it).
Perhaps savvy offenders, couched by defense lawyers, could pull the “I was abused, therefore I abuse” defense. My point is that the abuse screws with your psyche.
It’s quite well-known that those who are sexually abused as children are more likely to sexually abuse others as they grow up. You point out a potential confounding variable here - and it is plausible that there’s some genetic basis for pedophilia. If there is, then the presence of abuse may not be the cause but rather an epiphenomenon, and perhaps the child, if adopted, would be just as likely to grow up to abuse others.
However, if you’re arguing that, I’d say it’s incumbent upon you to find information to support it. I’ve never heard any such thing before - you could look to see if children abused by non-relatives are less likely to become abusers than children abused by relatives. Like I said, I’ve never heard of such a thing. I think it’s more likely that abusing children is hereditary - however, the mechanism for transmission across generations is not DNA, it’s emotional trauma.
It sounds like you’re evaluating the situation based on your opinions. Trying to intellectually understand a situation through the lens of ideology is not a very useful approach. You seem to have decided your viewpoint not on an evaluation of factual evidence but upon what you think the ethical implications of it are. The problem is that facts are facts; they aren’t subject to alteration because the truth is uncomfortable. In this case, it’s pretty much the consensus of experts - as far as I’ve ever heard - that children who are sexually abused are substantially more likely to sexually abuse children, both while they are still children and after they grow up. It’s better to examine the facts and try to understand the moral implications of them than to decide on a morally acceptable solution and try to find facts that fit it.
Just to jump in here: most men who molest girls (especially peri- or post-pubescent girls) are not pedophiles (or even phebophiles). They are men who do not prefer sex with very young partners, but are merely willing to engage in sex with very young partners because children are more manipulable, controllable or accessible than adult women (this appears to be less true of men who molest boys, who are more likely to be interested in children as such).
There are probably some people who for lack of proper brain wiring (whether due to genetic abnormalities or environmental effects) don’t have the “mate selection” module hooked up to the “age detection” module. I can sympathize with them (slightly), but it isn’t “natural” (unless you think that autism and other cognitive disorders are “natural” too). Most child molesters, on the other hand, pick children because they have difficulty relating to adults, or because children are easy prey. These people are not pedophiles; psychologically they are more similar to non-violent rapists, who are also men who have difficulties maintaining normal adult relationships.
Yes, in as much as they lack the empathy needed to recognize psychologically harmful and often violent behavior toward children.
If you want to watch a psychologist’s head explode try to get them to use the word “normal” in a sentence, particularly if it deals with sexuality. It’s a forbidden word because once codified it provides a platform for the word abnormal. This in turn implies a basis for corrective action. Homosexuality ceased being a psychological disease when the concept of normal behavior was replaced by the concept of harmful behavior. You could make a minor case that homosexual practices are harmful but you could make a better case for cigarettes or fast food.
The drunken Indian defense? Good luck with that one in a pedophilia trial. I’ll be one of the people standing outside with a pitchfork. It is unquestioningly damaging to children and requires separation from society first and psychological help second.
That (in conjunction with the title) is three questions, the answers to which people disagree, of course. Personally, I would go with “Yes, No, and Somewhat…like every other group.”
Personally, not being an expert on the subject (but still trying to be objective and mindful of the pitfalls of the alternative), I would say that if homosexuals don’t pick who they’re attracted to (and are thus not at fault for said attraction), and heterosexuals don’t pick who they’re attracted to (ditto), then pedophiles fall into the same paradigm. To say that pedos are “different” at that point is just prejudice, IMHO.
Not sure what you mean by “Falling to one’s own impulses,” so will wait for a clarification before I respond to this.
Yes, yes…(never mind the irony of your username ) but while it’s understood that homosexuals don’t like being associated with pedophiles, the comparisons are nevertheless often instructive: NOT TO SAY that they are the same thing, but there are many–oh, jeez, how do I say this–reasons that they are brought up in association with each other: not the majority when it comes to attractional vectors, both historically demonized for their “alternativeness”, neither being “proper Christian” behavior, etc. Gays may not like being lumped with pedos (I don’t blame them at all), but that doesn’t invalidate the comparisons, anymore than it invalidates comparisons with other groups which have been discriminated against for being unpopular by populations who want to justify their hatred.
That’s a legal assessment, not a factual one, IMO. The child may be just as “into it” as the adult, and thus no “exploitation” is happening on a fundamental level. To characterize it unilaterally as exploitation is to buy into the social norm that children by definition cannot consent (which is an artifical standard), rather than to acknowledge the facts.
This is (in my mind) such a bullshit argument for the following reason: Certainly a man cannot pass his genes on by having sex with his male partner. Or his other male partner. Or another male partner, for that matter. Secondly, by having sex with a person of the same gender, it’s possible that the partner may be killed, or rendered infertile. If the partner is the man’s own gender, he’s just shot himself in the evolutionary foot, so to speak.
(Yes, I realize that gays are not just male, and the same argument applies…although the “be killed” part is less likely (I’m guessing the “be killed” comes from physical trauma of being penetrated in excess of capacity to accomodate, even though a_i_w didn’t specify. My apologies if I’m wrong, here)…I’m not knocking gays, only pointing out that the “THEY CAN’T REPRODUCE SO IT’S SICK!” argument doesn’t really hold.
To put it more blatantly: condemning a sexual relationship on the grounds that it cannot result in reproduction is totally ignoring the mutual physical/emotional gratification aspect of the relationship. If reproduction was necessary for a relationship to be valid then we would require all married couples to get divorced if the female hit menopause, if the male got a vasectomy, if the female had a hysterectomy, if the pair were gay. THEY CAN’T REPRODUCE!! Split them, or not??? If not, then “ohmigod, one of them is only 10 years old so they can’t reproduce!” isn’t an argument against the relationship.
It is to some. Being offended as a means of squashing the valid comparisons is offensive to others.
If your last statement is true, then why do you object to pedophiles? Never mind the question of why the fact that you see no problem with one preference validates it over another that you do see a problem with?
People like Pat Robertson and (muchly worsely) Phred Phelps seem to believe that heterosexuality is morally and ethically OK because the sexual acts and love lives of consenting OPPOSITE GENDER adults aren’t doing anybody else harm and therefore really aren’t anyone else’s business.
It’s hard for me not to see a similarity there.
I’m not sure how this is “never” acting on the attraction. Would you “pity” a gay person who “never” acts on their attraction? How would you know if they were gay? Likewise, if a pedophile “never acts on that attraction”, how would you know they were a pedophile?
Agreed. but I would agree to that about someone regardless of whether society so designated them. That’s, ironically, what puts me at odds with the majority (on this subject, anyway).
I think YOU’VE hit it, as well. In a society that is so proud of itself for no longer discriminating against people on the basis of sexual orientation, we still make excuses for hating those that we don’t like.
As the rather semiperiodically chagrined owner of a penis, I can vouch for this. Needing to piss (not to be to earthy) can do it; waking up can do it; various other things can do it. What bugs me is the mentality that pre-adults (as defined by the local jurisdictional legislature) should NOT do it (appear to inspire an erection), or you’re a pervert.
This does not remotely fit with reality. Sure, people’s tastes change throughout their lives, but the concept that anyone under age X (as defined by GWB & Co) cannot be “effective” to any NORMAL person, but the day after birthday X is “Hubba, hubba!” is at blatant odds with the Universe. Shit, I hit puberty when I was twelve. Who did you expect to have originally grabbed my attention?
Sure, I’m grooving on adults now, but I wasn’t born 30 years old. Get some perspective, people. It’s not pathological to have been young once.
First off, I’m using “pedophile” to mean “one who is sexually attracted to pre-pubescent children” and “child molester” to mean “one who has sexual relationships with pre-pubescent children”. Presumably child molesters would essentially be a subset of pedophiles–I don’t know what percent of people who have a sexual attraction to pre-pubescent children actually act on that desire; the overlap may approach one to one, or maybe only half of those with the desire actually act on it. Conversely, I suppose someone could be a “child molester” (as I’ve defined it here) without being a “pedophile”–for example, I could imagine someone molesting the pre-pubescent child of some enemy not because he really gets off on it but solely out of a desire to exact revenge upon his enemy–which would arguably be more evil than the poor bastard who presumably can’t help being sexually attracted to pre-pubescent children.
I’m confused–Is anyone arguing that heterosexuality is NOT morally and ethically OK? I don’t think Pat Robertson or Fred Phelps can possibly be arguing that heterosexuality is OK on the grounds that “the sexual acts and love lives of consenting OPPOSITE GENDER adults aren’t doing anybody else harm and therefore really aren’t anyone else’s business”, because if that were the case they would logically have to agree that the sexual acts and love lives of consenting SAME gender adults are also OK and no one else’s business. Which of course they aren’t. Those who claim that heterosexual sex is OK, but homosexual sex is not, have to make some other argument (such as, heterosexual acts are “natural” or “ordained by God”, whereas homosexual acts are unnatural, deviate from God’s plan, etc.).
Well, the distinction between wanting to do something and actually doing it seems clear enough to me. First off, if a pedophile is sexually attracted to children, but also believes it would be wrong to act on that attraction, and therefore NEVER allows himself or herself to act on that attraction, then of course no one would ever know they were a pedophile. On the other hand, if a pedophile had never actually acted on their impulses, but decided to seek out counseling to get help in preventing themselves from acting on their impulses, then I think I would feel pity for that person, for being saddled with a sexual drive that was (for whatever reason: genetics, environment, early childhood abuse, something they were exposed to as a fetus, fluoride in the water sapping and impurifying our precious bodily fluids, or some combination of some or all of the above) messed up to the point where they could never have a truly satisfactory sexual relationship without committing an unethical and criminal act. (Although presumably patient-therapist confidentiality would prevent me from ever finding out about such a thing.)
And, yes, I would pity a gay person who never acts on their attraction–or at least I would if the thing preventing them from acting on their attraction was a belief that homosexual acts were inherently wrong or bad. In other words, I would pity them for more or less the opposite reason I would a pity a (non-practicing) pedophile. I’d think “Gee, it’s too bad the obsolete and bigoted beliefs you’ve been instilled with are preventing you from having a happy and fulfilling life.”
In other words, I make a distinction between heterosexuality and homosexuality, on the one hand (sexual attraction to adults of the opposite or same sex, respectively) and pedophilia on the other (sexual attraction to pre-pubescent children, of whichever sex). Heterosexuality and homosexuality will ideally lead to sexual relationships between consenting adults, which can be bad or have bad consequences (rape, sexual harrasment, various sorts of coerced or exploitative sexual relationships, promiscuity to a degree which leads to the spread of sexually transmitted diseases, unwanted pregnancies, bad relationships of all kinds, “broken hearts”, etc.); nonetheless, hetero- or homosexual attraction on the whole seem to me to be very much a Good Thing, in that they can form some of the most important emotional bonds and furnish some of the greatest happiness in people’s lives. Sex between adults and (by definition) not truly consenting young children, on the other hand, is a Bad Thing.
Well, I think everyone else in this thread is assuming that a sexual relationship between an adult and a child below some age is inherently wrong, on the grounds that children cannot meaningfully consent to such a relationship (as they cannot meaningfully consent to a lot of things). Thus, “adult who has sexual relations with a young child” automatically equals “adult who harms a young child”. Maybe we’re all wrong about that, but it will probably take some serious argumentation to persuade us otherwise.
And as to the whole issue of what is “natural” versus what we humans find to be “good” or “moral”, the New York Times has a rather gruesome article, (just in time for Mother’s Day!) One Thing They Aren’t: Maternal (free registration required) about some of the “natural” ways (non-human) mothers interact with their own offspring (e.g., starving the weakest member of the litter, letting the stronger sibling push the weaker sibling out of the nest, abandoning newborn babies, eating their own young, and so on). None of the maternal actions described in the article seem to be “pathological” (although some of them are adaptions to harsh environments or difficult conditions): they’re just the way those mothers have been shaped to achieve maximum reproductive succes by Natural Selection, red in tooth and claw and utterly, absolutely without conscience or morality or pity.
My grandfather was “introduced” to sex when he was 10. His father was a sort of military cop; the “introduction” was done by the wife of the highest-ranking officer.
He views anybody with two figures in his/her age as being “old enough”. This includes his two daughters and five grandchildren. He’s tried to get us females “white horses” (guys who’d pay to deflower us); he’s tried to bring the boys to brothels.
I don’t give a shit whether it’s natural. I still want to rip his head off.
I use “pedophile” to mean the same thing as you (although I consider the diagnosis to be valid–if it’s going to be valid as a pathology–only if they’re exclusively attracted to pre-pubescents). “Child molester,” on the other hand, is reserved (in my mind) for someone that imposes their relationship on a child without the child’s consent (IMO, age should not be a factor in determining abrogation of consent: if the circumstances would be rape with an adult, then it should be rape with a child; if it’s NOT rape with an adult, then it should NOT be rape with a child. We may not approve of the encounter, but that doesn’t justify our arbitrarily condemning it. Age-based “ability to consent” as an argument is a red herring, IMO).
From what I’ve read on this topic, while child molesters and pedophiles overlap to some degree populationwise (as would be expected), it is by no means a one-to-one correspondance (in fact, I remember reading a statement somewhere–how’s THAT for a cite!?–that the majority of pedophiles are NOT child molesters, and the majority of child molesters are NOT pedophiles). If you want me to start gleaning Google for “pedophilia” links, I can try to find it, but well…it’s bad enough that I panic when the phone rings. If people start knocking on my door, I’m moving).
Kidding aside, I would tend to believe this (again: AWESOME CITE, right?). For one thing, people who violate others tend to be in the minority generally, so an attraction to a demographic doesn’t automatically parse into guaranteed criminal behavior on a general basis. Secondly, people who victimize seem only concerned with success, not secondary concerns such as arbitrary demographics. From what I’ve heard, the reason so many children get victimized is precisely because they are easy targets. They are small, they fit into the trunk of a car, they are physically weak, and they are naive and easily manipulated psychologically. The fact that “ooh, baby, they’re hot because they’re only nine!” may not be nearly as important as “ooh, baby, they’re easy to abduct and fuck because they’re only nine and their body fits in the crawlspace!”
Not to my knowledge. The problem comes when people take the mentality that “this sexuality isn’t right for ME, so it’s not right for ANYBODY!! Oh, and the sexuality of others can BITE MY ASS!!” I don’t see how the condemnation of gay sex by Phelps, Robertson and their ilk is much different than condemnation of pedophilic sex by a lot of the same people who condemn Phelps, Robertson and their ilk for being prejudiced. The rationale seems to be the same: “We think they’re icky for who they want to fuck, so they’re all perverts!”
Well, sure…logically.
Exactly.
Same point that I’m driving at. Those who claim that adult sex is okay but child sex is not, have to make some other argument (such as, adult acts are “consensual” or “ordained by Society”, whereas child acts are illegal, deviate from Society’s plan, etc.) The arguments against pedophilia don’t appear to stand up to scrutiny any better than the arguments against homosexuality.
The prejudice is a lot more successfully entrenched, though. That’s what pisses me off so bad about it.
True, probably.
But that would constitute “acting on” their predilection, surely.
To me, that’s not operating on the “opposite reason,” it’s operating on the same one.
But this seems to ignore the fact that pedophilic relationships can “ideally lead to sexual relationshiops between consenting adults, which can be bad or have bad consequences (enter list)…” Your argument still seems to proceed from an unprovable premise: Adult/adult = Good; Adult/child = Bad. This may be true, but you don’t seem to have proven it. You seem to have started with it in order to justify it.
I’m assuming you’re not including me in “everyone else in this thread.”
Let me know when you outlaw all of those things, too, then.
Maybe you are, maybe you are not, but it might perhaps behoove us all to consider the possibility.
I think the seemingly innate, compulsive, and completely refractory characteristics of various paraphillias indicates a strong genetic component, but hard evidence is lacking. To the extent that paedophillia violates general standards of decency and orthopraxis, it is considered a mental illness. Given the victims of a pedophile’s drives are often horribly traumatized, calling it a disease is reasonable. I doubt the status of pedophiles will change, as the objects of their desire quite naturally lack the faculties required to even cope with such overt and often aggressive sexuality. Molestation is quite necessarily a kind of rape, and the realities of child development leave this an immutable fact.
As a gay person, I was initially offended by the OP mentioning pedophilia and homosexuality in the same message, but then, when you get to be an old faggott like me, you have had a lot of time to think about things like this and to come up with the answer (since you are not out cruising the bars).
I have heard that question and that comparison many times before. It has been and continues to be trotted out by conservatives every time a country, state, or other jurisdiction proposes decriminalizing gay sex.
"If homosexuality is normal then should we accept incest /pehophilia/bestiality/necrophilia/people who want to hump your lawnmower and leave it all sticky, etc. etc. etc. "
The simple fact is that the question compares two behaviours that in reality have nothing to do with the other. The question itself is based on a very outdated premise. Namely, that there are two classes of human sexuality. 1) Sex between a husband and wife with a marriage cerificate in the drawer next to their bed, which is good sex, and 2) all the other forms of human sexuality, which are bad sex and will send you to Hell.
Obviously, for conservatives and people on the religious right, the second class is a package deal. You either reject all forms of sexuality in this second class and make them all illegal, or you lock up your hamsters and post guads around grandma’s corpse at the funeral home.
Since the VAST MAJORITY OF CHILD SEXUAL ABUSE IS PRACTISED ON FEMALE CHILDREN BY MALES (usually fathers and older brothers) you could just as easily ask “if heterosexuality is normal, is men having sex with little girls normal?”
Or, “if masturbation is normal, is sex with your dog normal?”
Now, one might draw a comparison between pedophilia and homosexuality on the grounds that they are both non-procreative forms of sexuality. But then so is the sex between your mom and dad (or between you and your opposite-sex spouse) after the woman reaches menopause or for that matter when you are using birth control.
You could just as easily say: “If it is legal to bury tulip bulbs in your back yard, we would have to allow people to bury a corpse or a leaky oil drum in a back yard. After all, they are all forms of burying. If you allow one you must allow the other.”
I believe some people began discussing what is natural. Others have been discussing what is normal. I think what we should be discussing is what forms of sexual behaviour can be accepted in our society as 1) legal and 2)a socially acceptable.
Mind you, legl and socially acceptable are two different concepts again. Very few countries that I know of make it illegal for consenting adults to turn each other on with “golden showers” as part of their sexuality. I am NOT into it, but I understand from many psychiatrists and psychologists that we would be shocked and surprised to learn how many people ARE into getting pissed on. Yet there is quite a difference in this case between legal and socially acceptable.
So in summary, in answer to the OP: As a gay person, I do not have to answer that question or deal with that comparison any more than the guy planting tulip bulbs has to discuss or compare his behaviour relative to people who want to bury corpses in their yard.
I’m not sure that I would quite agree with this. There’s no question that the victims of car accidents (often children) are often horribly traumatized, but we don’t call driving a disease. Would it be “reasonable” to do so? I personally think not.
True, but overt/often aggresive sexuality seems (to me, at least) a bad thing, no matter who it’s directed at. I have no problem with pathologizing sexual aggression, but to pathologise a preference for partners in general because the aggresiveness is bad makes no sense to me. Condemn the aggressiveness, if you want; but saying pedophilia is bad because children get traumatized is like saying male heterosexuality is bad because women get raped. Raping women is bad, but we don’t condemn being attracted to them on that basis.
Also true, but molestation isn’t part and parcel of pedophilia (if it’s defined as simply an attraction to children), so condemning the latter on the basis of the former isn’t justified, IMO.
Valteron: Welcome to the thread and thank you for posting. I’m in the process of responding to you, but not finished yet. Didn’t want you to feel ignored, though.
[sub]I should really stay out of these things. It’s too much of a pet peeve.[/sub]
I’m more leaning towards the former, that it may not be a simple apples or oranges kind of thing, since as I understand it the vast majority of sexual abuse is carried out by family. It could go either way, trauma, genetics, combination…
I agree with you, but I question the particular correlation/causation. I am not questioning that those who abuse tend to grow up to be abusers. Maybe I need to do some more reading on how these conclusions have been derived and how much background has been done to subcategorize abusers/child molesters, especially when good hard data with regard to otherwise unreported abuse can be hard to come by.
Not all that long ago false accusations from recovered memory games and such data could also still be falling into much of the data still be handled today. Just because I claim daddy abused me does not mean he did or didn’t. Makes for alot of research based on opinions of the truthfulness of the subject who under the circumstances may have plenty of reasons to look like a victim him/herself to attempt to mitigate blame, in his/her own mind or in the minds of others.
If they didn’t seek help on their own, or didn’t get caught, a psych evaluation is a rare thing.
Sure, a lot of people separate human sexuality into those two specific gourps (which I believe to be a faulty distinction). A lot of people are also idiots (this may or may not be a coincidence). What seems relevant (to me, at least) is that the desire to separate sexuality into approved/disapproved is pretty prolific; yet factual bases for doing so do not appear to frequently be as much of a concern.
Mmm…yeah, to some people, but I’d warrant not to the majority of us.
Now, if you’ve been on this board very long, you know someone is going to ask you for a cite to support your claim of the “VAST MAJORITY” thing. Nevertheless, as you claim, one could ask “if heterosexuality is normal, is men having sex with little girls normal?”
Yes, one could. And your point here is?
Yes, one could also ask that. Again, your point?
Again, I don’t disagree with this, and so I don’t understand what point/argument you are attempting to make.
Well, you could say this, but the last sentence wouldn’t be true.
“Legal” is a function of the laws that we make and therefore not something we are fundamentally constrained by. “Socially acceptable” is also up to us.
I certainly agree that you do not have to answer to anyone for your personal life, but I’m not really grasping your position here, largely.
A child is likely to have ridden in a car many many times before being in an accident. He or she is likely to have numerous and varied associations with riding in a car. The experience of being injured in an accident would be seen with some perspective. Molestation is probably a child’s first sexual experience. ISTM* the unhealthy associations or other psychological affects would be significantly different.
[sub](Of course IANA mental health expert in any way and was not molested as a child and only experienced the mildest of auto accidents as a child.)[/SUB]
I completely disagree with this. Those who get off on rape have a classic paraphillia. Direct comparisons to any non-pathological sexual orientation fail immediately.
) but while it’s understood that homosexuals don’t like being associated with pedophiles, the comparisons are nevertheless often instructive: NOT TO SAY that they are the same thing, but there are many–oh, jeez, how do I say this–reasons that they are brought up in association with each other: not the majority when it comes to attractional vectors, both historically demonized for their “alternativeness”, neither being “proper Christian” behavior, etc. Gays may not like being lumped with pedos (I don’t blame them at all), but that doesn’t invalidate the comparisons, anymore than it invalidates comparisons with other groups which have been discriminated against for being unpopular by populations who want to justify their hatred.
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