Is it time to REDEFINE PEDOPHILES?

[Danno 1,228]

Redefining pedophilia with pedophiles' help

"Minor-attracted persons" say we need to rethink how the mental illness is defined -- and some experts agree

We usually hear pedophilia talked about in terms of mental illness -- if not evil -- but Aug. 17 a motley crew of self-identified "minor-attracted persons" and mental health professionals have gathered in Baltimore to talk about it as a sexual identity. At hand is an issue deeply important to both groups: the revision of the diagnostic criteria for pedophilia.

The sponsor of the event, B4U-ACT, a support group aimed at preventing pedophiles from acting on their attraction to children, hopes to influence the relevant entry in the upcoming revision of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. Understandably, the idea of pedophiles helping to define their own mental illness has some unnerved. Earlier this week, the Daily Caller wrote about the event in a piece headlined, "Conference aims to normalize pedophilia." It's true that many in the community believe that attraction to pubescent or pre-pubescent children isn't a mental illness at all, but the symposium itself has the stated aim of raising awareness about fundamental problems with the proposed revision to the DSM's entry on pedophilia.

Richard Kramer, director of B4U-ACT, argues that the panel of experts responsible for the revision "represents only the narrow field of sex offender assessment and treatment." He believes it's important to also represent minor-attracted folks who have not offended and would like to keep it that way: "[The panel] bases its work almost exclusively on assumptions about, and research on, sex offenders, who do not represent minor-attracted people in the general population," he wrote me in an email. "As a result, the DSM includes inaccurate and misleading information and ignores the existence of minor-attracted people who are law-abiding."

It might seem counterintuitive for non-criminals to fight to be recognized alongside criminals, but B4U-ACT sees this as a way of fighting the stigmatization of attraction to children and the conflation of pedophiles with child molesters. Of course, "pedophile" has become cultural shorthand for "abuser" for good reason: We fear they will act on their attraction to children. An article on the DSM debate in the Harvard Mental Health Letter says the scientific evidence supports that concern: "Several reports have concluded that most people with pedophilic tendencies eventually act on their sexual urges in some way. Typically this involves exposing themselves to children, watching naked children, masturbating in front of children, or touching children's genitals." Kramer and his ilk argue that such scientific wisdom is based on skewed data that looks only at offenders, and that many child molesters are not technically pedophiles (i.e., they offend because of opportunity, not sexual attachment).

Such claims seem rather dubious when visiting a message board like Boy Chat, where it's easy to find men discussing how society just doesn't understand that many "young friends" enjoy having a friendship with a "boy lover." There are no mentions of sexual activity with children, as such posts are forbidden, and posters are effusive about how they would never think of "hurting" a child -- but one gets the sense that they're operating under a different understanding of "hurt." Most of the discussions focus on feelings of love and tenderness for young boys; it's all very reminiscent of how Michael Jackson would talk about his friendships with children. There are also conversations about how to find a "YF" -- for instance, one man says he is renting a room in his house to a woman with custody of her grandsons. He writes, "The boys have taken to me, naturally, and my landlady loves me. I'm taking it slow, but I've already been trusted to watch the boys ... another night coming this week; an overnight. They're cutie pies."

There is a general consensus within the medical community that pedophilia is a sexual orientation and as such is unlikely to change, so treatment focuses on helping them to suppress their desires through psychotherapy and medication. Fred Berlin, director of the Sexual Behavior Consultation Unit at Johns Hopkins and an expert presenter at today's event, compares it to the sort of treatment people with drug addiction or alcoholism go through. "They need to learn to not give in to cravings which are satisfying and very pleasurable but which their intellect and their conscience and society is telling them they ought not to act on," he told me by phone. "Now, can everybody succeed? No, but there are large numbers of people who experience these attractions and with proper help go on and don't continue to offend. There is good evidence to show that that's the case."

He says many pedophile activists are concerned that the term "has become a stigmatizing pejorative," a way of saying "that somebody is less than human." They're unlikely to get much sympathy from the general public for being stigmatized, but Berlin says it's in society's best interest to resist demonizing them. "The idea is to try to get folks who are sexually attracted to children to come forward and get help before acting so that children are not harmed," he said. "That's certainly a goal that I would fully support." He adds: "None of us as little children sit down and ask ourselves the question, 'Do I want to grow up to be attracted to men or to women, to boys or to girls?' Nobody sits down, reflects about that and then decides," he argues. "If someone realizes while growing up that they're attracted to pre-pubescent children, it seems to me it is very important for them to know that there are places they can go to get help before they act on those feelings."

This debate goes far beyond the push by pedo-activists, raising fundamental questions within the medical community about how we define mental illness. Controversially, the proposed DSM adds hebephilia (attraction to pubescent children) to the entry for pedophilia (attraction to pre-pubescents), creating the hybrid "pedohebephilic disorder." Psychiatry professor Richard Green, founding president of the International Academy of Sex Research, wrote in the Archives of Sexual Behavior, "In several European countries, the age of legal consent to have sex falls within the range proposed for the DSM as signifying mental disorder for the older participant," he writes. "If the general culture is accepting of participation by the younger party, but psychiatry pathologizes the participation by the older party, then the mental health profession pronounces a moralistic standard and, if successful, becomes an agent of social control."

Few of us in the general public are capable of thinking about pedophiles, or hebephiles, in emotionless, scientific terms -- but, luckily, we aren't the ones charged with treating them, or defining who "they" are.

http://www.salon.com/life/feature/2011/08/17/pedophilia

[Obama 2012 1,714]

This is another one of those "duh" articles.

Of course I've had this debate with a few 'special' members of this board as well who are offended at the idea that being attracted to young children is just as normal as homosexuality.

Hate to break it to you folks, it is.

[nane1104 146]

From what understand (from working with victims of pedophiles and their families), pedophiles believe that children have a right to be sexual active and that they are just helping them to act out on that right. They don't consider it hurting the child at all, much rather, doing something good for the child.

I honestly don't know if I would consider pedophiles as mentally ill but certainly I wouldn't compare their sexual preferences to homosexuals.

[웃 910]

This is another one of those "duh" articles.

Of course I've had this debate with a few 'special' members of this board as well who are offended at the idea that being attracted to young children is just as normal as homosexuality.

Hate to break it to you folks, it is.

You 'think' a 54 year old drunk mentally challenged retard being sexually turned on by 8 year old boys is "just as normal as homosexuality"?

I'd say it's quite a bit different.

[웃 910]

This is another one of those "duh" articles.

Of course I've had this debate with a few 'special' members of this board as well who are offended at the idea that being attracted to young children is just as normal as homosexuality.

Hate to break it to you folks, it is.

Have you ever met a gay person?

Have you ever met a pedophile?

Is one a little more bizarre than the other? I'll answer for you, one should be locked in a cage and the other is harmless.

[rsn 135]

I'm amazed to see that people still directly respond to Paul. Really, amazing.

[Obama 2012 1,714]

and you all understand nothing about the psychology behind it all.

Get off your damn moral high horse for a moment.

If you'd read the article and pay attention, we aren't even talking about 'offenders' here. We are talking about individuals who have that attraction but choose not to act on them. So be offended all you want, these people are guilty of nothing more than their attractions.

Sorry folks. You can like it or not, but just as homosexuality is not a choice, wanting pre-pubescent children is not a choice either. Just as wanting pubescent isn't a choice either. The only 'choice' is the actions you take.

Wants and desires are not something we control.

As I said, we are not talking about action. We are talking about attraction. Two different things.

[scandal 951]

One is reminded of a spectacular piece of 20th century fiction.

The story of the romance of Humbert Humbert and Dolores Haze.

Smut? Filth? Or a classic work tinged with the dynamic of the human condition?

[웃 910]

and you all understand nothing about the psychology behind it all.

Get off your damn moral high horse for a moment.

If you'd read the article and pay attention, we aren't even talking about 'offenders' here. We are talking about individuals who have that attraction but choose not to act on them. So be offended all you want, these people are guilty of nothing more than their attractions.

Sorry folks. You can like it or not, but just as homosexuality is not a choice, wanting pre-pubescent children is not a choice either. Just as wanting pubescent isn't a choice either. The only 'choice' is the actions you take.

Wants and desires are not something we control.

As I said, we are not talking about action. We are talking about attraction. Two different things.

You have a little bit of a point.

But, being homosexual is harmless and not a disease.

Grown men wanting to prey on 8 year old boys is dangerous and is a disturbing mental illness. It has more similarities (in attraction) to a serial killer/rapist than a homosexual.

Edited August 24, 2011 by Lord Infamous

[Obama 2012 1,714]

You have a little bit of a point.

But, being homosexual is harmless and not a disease.

Grown men wanting to prey on 8 year old boys is dangerous and is a disturbing mental illness. It has more similarities (in attraction) to a serial killer/rapist than a homosexual.

fixed.

Dangerous? possibly. Disturbing? in modern society, yes.

That does not quantify it as a mental illness.

Do you have any fetishes? Something that turns you on more than anything else? Stop and think about that a second.

What we want and desire are not something we can control.

The number of people out there who have these attractions is a lot larger than society wants to admit. Just as people refused to admit for the longest time (and still are having a hard time coming to grips with), how many people are homosexual.

Society's moral code dictates how one can and cannot act, with good reason. However that does not mean just because someone has a different type of attraction than what you are accustomed to, that they have a mental illness.

[Danno 1,228]

From what understand (from working with victims of pedophiles and their families), pedophiles believe that children have a right to be sexual active and that they are just helping them to act out on that right. They don't consider it hurting the child at all, much rather, doing something good for the child.

I honestly don't know if I would consider pedophiles as mentally ill but certainly I wouldn't compare their sexual preferences to homosexuals.

I would think very few unusual sexual impulses are comparable to others.

And by the way, pedophiles are not the only ones who think children are sexual beings and should be encouraged to develop and express this.

[NigeriaorBust 4,087]

If a grown person can't keep their hands off someone without the legal capacity to content then the grown person should be surgucally prevented from doing damage to others.

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

Is it right to stigmatise people with pedophiliac tendencies who don't offend? Probably not.

But since the objection to pedophilia has to do with the criminal behaviours associated with it (people who sexually molest children are called pedophiles, not people who hold secret desires that they don't act upon) that are inherently predatory.

Presumably someone here has some ideas as to how we can rebrand pedophiles to "minor attracted persons" without endorsing or legitimising the criminal activities associated with the behaviour.

[Deputy Purple 1,294]

Wow, since when did the definition of Pedophile include only active (or previously active) Sex Offenders? I guess we should just call all men rapists?

Pedophilia IS NOT about an action, it's about being sexual attracted to prepubescent children and that's where it ends. Modern society has misused the word to define a group of people who sexually abuse child which couldn't be more wrong.

First, just because someone has the attraction to prepubescent children that doesn't mean they will act on it. I personally know a few adult men who have the attraction but will never act on it. I have a great deal of respect for them.

Second, just because someone has sexually abused a child that doesn't make them a pedophile. I won't go into great depth here but most Child Sex Offenders are not pedophiles. The children are victims of convenience not first preference.

The reality is not that we need to "redefine pedophile" but that people need to stop misusing the word.

[slim 1,533]

In before the lock!