AquaPura, I’m sorry you had to have those images burned into your mind. I’m sure I would feel ill for days after seeing something like what you’ve described.
I disagree with the characterization that you are a “drama queen,” but for the sake of argument, let’s say that your reactions have been a bit emotional. Well, who WOULDN’T be a bit emotional, and maybe not presenting themselves at their calmest best, after seeing stuff like that?
To everyone who disparages the OP, I say: cut the woman some slack. It’s not like she’s upset because someone didn’t like the color of her shirt. She’s upset because she unexpectedly came across something that would horrify anyone with a shred of humanity. Sure, nothing she can say or do will help the children she saw being abused in those photos. Don’t you think that just MAYBE that sense of helplessnes has something to do with how strong her reaction has been?
Now, on those thumbnails. The dump-on-the-OP brigade is taking a somewhat inconsistent position here:
“Meh, 14-year-old boys will masturbate to ANYTHING.”
“Meh, they were only thumbnails - he wouldn’t masturbate to thumbnails, for heaven sakes!”
Make up your minds, people. You can’t have it both ways.
Also - at least in the past, which is the relevant time period here - I’ve seen porn sites with thumbnail sized-pics that were on the front pages, but to get to a full-size picture, you’d have to pay with a credit card. Has no one considered the possibility that he could have printed the thumbnails because he could get those for free, but not full-size pics?
The people who appear to take delight in goading the OP sadden me.
I din’t see too many people (or actually anybody) saying this, or that it is ok to jerk off to kiddie porn
I did see a lot of people that said “14 year old boys will download and LOOK at anything and everything”. Looking at something does not denote enjoyment or sexual pleasure though.
If I did a search through your computer right now, this very instant would I find questionable stuff that could throw you into a bad light? Or stuff that you maybe opened, but then decided was not relevant to the topic in hand? Maybe, god forbid, you have happened to come across and open something that is on a taboo / illegal / nasty item… would that random material brand you as a criminal or bad person that needed to be questioned?
What more so if I examined a 10 year hard drive of yours?
Err - but if he were really and genuinely into kiddie porn don’t you think maybe there just perhaps might be more than a single page of thumbnails? Sure - I can buy the argument about “that’s all he can get” be remember that this one page was amongst about 20 pages of other weird porn, not stuffed in amongst 20 pages of only young person porn or stuff that would otherwise indicate an interest in kiddy molest.
I have reviewed this thread, and you are correct. I withdraw my comment.
Two possible answers here:
A) You wouldn’t find anything I wouldn’t want my boss or my mother or my son to see.
B) You’d find stuff that would cast me in a bad light.
The correct answer happens to be “A.” But I’m not sure either answer matters. We’re not talking about me here, are we?
I am still repulsed by the rough treatment the OP has received. My personal opinion is that it is unlikely that the single page of thumbnails has any significance, and there is no reason to worry about the cousin’s proclivities unless there is corroborating evidence.
But while some posters attempted to reassure her, in a sympathetic fashion, others jumped on her and accused her of violating her BF’s cousin’s privacy and getting upset for no reason, neither of which is fair. If you reread the whole thread, as I have just done, you see it gets progressively more intense on both sides - to the point where she’s practically accused of holding back on “the big reveal.”
SHE has an excuse - she viewed material that no sane person would feel comfortable with and a lot of people would find extremely agitating. What’s the excuse of the people who are jeering at her?
My excuse is out of all possible actions, she statistically speaking did the WORST possible thing, which only made her and the bo feel better about themselves.
Thanks Carol, what you posted is pretty much the whole enchilada. I was quite disturbed at the subject material, in the very beginning of the thread JRDelirious summed it up for me by stating I had just ran across the one thing that just could NOT handle, and WHAM there it was right in my lap. It was what it was that upset me, not what it ended up being from. We did wait and present this in a calm rational manner, and going off half cocked and hysterical does not resemble the encounter we had at all. Thank you for understanding.
Oy, do tell. I could imaging so VERY many worse ways that we could have gone about this. Do tell. Not discussing this with him was never an option. Never. There are a very few things that if I found I would have to discuss with a loved one. Kiddy porn is on that very short list. Hell, I think it is the only kind of porn on that list. There is really nothing else that he could have been into sexually that I would have even raised an eyebrow about. Knowing that, is there a way you would have rather this been brought up? A better technique? Manner?
Frankly, I am not sure what my rection would have been if I had seen this in my brother’s collection, of even if I had run across it on the web. FTR - I have NEVER seen anything that struck me as either illegal, dangerous or anything else. Not that I would expect to, becuase comparatively speaking I rarely search for / look at porn (other than a few vanilla erotic literature sites I am familiar with)N
But looking at it rationally - there are two likely scenarios:
The kiddy porn was a “random” download and he has no interest
Cousin is a dedicated pedophile with an extensive collection and good network.
In the case of (1) - by confronting the cousin, you are risking the realtionship for no more gain than making yourself feel better
In the case of (2), chances are* cousin has considered the possibility of people asking questions, and is well prepared with a “convincing” story. If he is a dedicated pedophile do you really think he’s going to break downj and confess? So by confronting him you are just going to drive him even further underground. Maybe in the future to find an excuse or reason to get away from you, one of the few people that may be able to shine a light on the behaviour. CairoCarol - I agree with you about the increasing vehemence in this thread, which is really not in the best interests of reasoned discussion or neccessarily fair to Aqua.
What has been pushing my buttons here is the increasing stridency of “but he masturbated to it”. I recently came out of a job where I was on a number of occasion accused of activities and motivations that were totally untrue - but those accusations were used to support other accusations.
This is why I have been so strident in the defence. IF you are absolutely SURE the cousin is masturbating to this sort of kiddy porn you need to do a lot more than just mention it to him over a computer game. If you are not sure, then you shouldn’t use the language to yourself, let alone in any public forum (even an anonymous message board).
I work in the media - I know and understand the value of getting my spin on things first. **Aqua **is here saying “he masturbated to it”. He has no defence, even if we read the whole thread, there is a good proportion of people that will simply take away “cousin masturbates to kiddy porn” when all that is actually known is that kiddy porn was found in a masturbation folder. (there is a difference)
I don’t like this phrase, or likely, or has probably - as I have no data to back it up, and statistics only matter when you have a group to model anyway - they don’t apply well to an individual. So I have to ask myself “what is my action if I were in his shoes”
I have never known anyone to get so worked up over this sort of thing. If the relative was pictured in the act with a child yes- but this reaction (IMHO) is not the reaction I would expect of anyone.
Well here we are then. I figured there was some underlying reason why you keep freaking out over any intimation that he masturbated to the pictures. I am at loathe to point this out to you ben, but this isn’t your situation. He DID masturbate to the pictures. He did. I am not inferring this, I am not guessing, I am not surmising. He did. He told us so himself. He told us it wasn’t a current habit, offered us free range access to his computer and house if we wish it, and we believe him. The pictures were from a time when his sexuality was developing. I am not going to torture him under the lights for it. The big deal here was not that he masturbated to it many years ago, but that it may have been a current habit, and lets face it, how DO you bring that kind of thing up. What made me ill and upset wasn’t that he used those pictures for their intended purpose once upon a teenage life, but that some sick individuals MADE them and posted them for other people to find. I have a problem with people abusing children, a weakness, I know…
Intellectually, I knew all about child sexual abuse, having it stare you in the face and having it associated with a loved one where you aren’t sure of it’s reason for being there? Double whammy. I was not prepared for that, but it seemed to turn out ok on our end. For that at least, I am grateful.
From your description (full penetration of six year olds by an adult), I don’t think it can or should be put down to “developing sexuality” (which I think is a possible explanation if it were to be two 12 year olds for example).
There are a lot of things that I can give a pass to stupid 14 year old - A LOT, but jerking off to a six year old being raped by an adult is not one of them. I wouldn’t consider that anywehere near approaching normal or excuasable behaviour. ESPECIALLY in America where you would have to live under a rock not to at least suspect better.
From my understanding pedophilia is not something that you pick up / put down at will - but rather something that you need serious help overcoming.
This is the second part of my argument - you need to do more. I said it much earlier and I will say it again, having established that he positively did jerk off to kiddy porn, you need to do muysh more.
The problem most of us are having with the way this panned out is that you had absolutely zero indication or reason to suspect that it was a current habit; and that as such, you didn’t need to bring it up.
Nowadays, maybe. Then? Not so much. As others who were around when the internet was relatively new have pointed out, this kind of thing popped up all the time. Were some 14 year old kid just printing out every porn image he came across, it’s simply not a far reach.
From my understanding, this guy is not a pedophile, and never was.
I’m just… speechless… that someone is actually suggesting pushing this witch hunt even further.
Heh - Well in that case my four year daughter is in for a really fun time. For her next birthday I may well just give her a very special present. Teach her nice and early the concept of filial piety. :eek: