Age of consent, paedophilia, NAMBLA etc.

[SolemnBoy]

So, I was rewatching one of the older South Park episodes (don't judge me) and couldn't help but do some research on NAMBLA; The North American Man/Boy Love Association.

This is basically an organization that questions the stigmatisation of paedophilia and argues that sexual relationships between adults and younger children can be harmless and even beneficial as long as there's mutual consent. They wish to undermine the notion that children and teenagers are incapable of making their own decisions and sexually liberate themselves.

I for one, believe that the general attitude towards paedophilia is very harmful. Much like none of us chose to be LGBT, I'm under the very firm impression that people who are attracted to prepubescent children are equally unable to choose or control their inclination. It's not all that unusual for citizens, especially in smaller towns, to react violently towards people they (sometimes falsely) suspect to be paedophiles. I remember, at one point I spotted a woman in my own town handing out papers accompanied by a picture of a man and a textual description of his criminal history which invlolved sexual child abuse, for which he was sentenced to many years in prison. Apparently he had moved to our town and she wanted to raise awareness. I asked her where she had gotten the information from, to which she replied "my sister heard of it from some of her friends". I was shocked by the way people trusted the paper with absolutely no reasonable evidence provided.

If you believe our attractions are beyond our control, it's obvious that there's nothing inherently wrong with being attracted to something criminal. Therefore it makes no sense to prosecute people of a certain inclination. Some urges, however, obviously can't be acted out upon, for the safety of others in mind. To me paedophilia is one of them. I'm very open for a debate in regards to age of consent laws, but I stand by the limit propagated by my own country, which is 15. The reason for this is that I simply don't believe children younger than that can be expected to make benevolent decisions and evaluate their different choices properly. Do you agree or disagree? Do you support NAMBLA's rights to advocate such taboo opinions and what's your take on paedophilia as a whole? No attacks in this thread please, I find this genuinely interesting to talk about!

[dfiant1]

I can see this discussion opening a can of worms, nothing brings out the passion in people like a discussion of paedophilia.

NAMBLA is wrong, its a very small group of people that are effectively fighting for their own rights to seek sexual gratification in an immoral manner.

While a child may be aroused by sexual contact or the prospect of sexual contact giving the predator of that child the justification 'They wanted it' and 'They consented', they are not emotionally developed to understand the consequences of consenting to such an act so in essence any adult coercing a child for sex is taking advantage of the situation and abusing the child.

15-16 years old I feel is a reasonable age of consent as by that age most would be able to make an informed decision that those younger could not make, but having said that there should still be constraints, and I believe in many cases there are, like limiting the age difference between the consenting couple to 5 years.

10, 11, 12 year old boys and girls are going to experiment with their sexuality, some adult know that and are willing to take advantage of that, but children experimenting with their sexuality should be left to experiment with each other.

Paedophiles themselves I don't understand so I can't say that they can't choose or control their inclination to take sexual advantage of someone that is vulnerable. I believe as an adult we make choices and even a paedophile is capable of making choices and deciding what is right and wrong and doing what ever they have to do that remove the temptation to commit a sexual offense against a child.

[Pix]

This is basically an organization that questions the stigmatisation of paedophilia and argues that sexual relationships between adults and younger children can be harmless and even beneficial as long as there's mutual consent. They wish to undermine the notion that children and teenagers are incapable of making their own decisions and sexually liberate themselves.

No, it's about making children into sex objects usable by perverts.

If they were truly about liberating teens and children into making their own decisions then they'd instead try to make them into legal adults who could do all the things adults can do such as vote and sign contracts (like maybe from that military recruiter wanting that 10-year-old boy to sign on the dotted line). Choosing to have sex with other adults would only be one more adult choice they could then make.

However, I have not met a single man promoting NAMBLA who believed that. That means they don't believe kids can make adult decisions and therefore don't want to empower kids, they ONLY want to remove protection from exploitation offered to kids from creeps like them where they are still the authority figure who can sexually gratify themselves on children.

Btw, make it legal for children to have sex with adults and many parents will become pimps (some already are).

I for one, believe that the general attitude towards paedophilia is very harmful. Much like none of us chose to be LGBT, I'm under the very firm impression that people who are attracted to prepubescent children are equally unable to choose or control their inclination.

I consider equating homosexuality with pedophilia to be VERY harmful and playing right into the hands of bigots who want to ignore that homosexuality is about informed, adult consent. Pedophilia is not about that consent. Nor is necrophilia, rape (some people are driven to do that, too, and porn caters to that interest with "rape flix" btw), or bestiality. When I have attraction to an adult woman she can both know herself well enough to know what she wants without being easily manipulated (unlike a child and most teens) and can give informed consent.

A child, an animal, a corpse could not and even if I felt attracted to such then it would be up to me to control it because those I'd be attracted to could not legitimately consent as an adult can and therefore it would be a crime to move in on them just as it would be a crime for me to get children to sign (and enforce) contracts that made them my slaves at a sweatshop.

It's not all that unusual for citizens, especially in smaller towns, to react violently towards people they (sometimes falsely) suspect to be paedophiles. I remember, at one point I spotted a woman in my own town handing out papers accompanied by a picture of a man and a textual description of his criminal history which invlolved sexual child abuse, for which he was sentenced to many years in prison. Apparently he had moved to our town and she wanted to raise awareness. I asked her where she had gotten the information from, to which she replied "my sister heard of it from some of her friends". I was shocked by the way people trusted the paper with absolutely no reasonable evidence provided.

Not unusual? I never heard of that. Oh, that people believe things without basis, sure, but if he were convicted then he'd be on the registry and if he was not then that woman could be sued for everything she was worth, and probably would be.

If you believe our attractions are beyond our control, it's obvious that there's nothing inherently wrong with being attracted to something criminal. Therefore it makes no sense to prosecute people of a certain inclination.

I understand we can't control who we're attracted to. I can sympathize with someone who was born with pedophilia AS LONG AS they recognize children can't give consent and work to control that part of themselves.

That said, makes perfect sense to prosecute them for having sex with those who can't give informed consent.

Do you support NAMBLA's rights to advocate such taboo opinions and what's your take on paedophilia as a whole? No attacks in this thread please, I find this genuinely interesting to talk about!

Advocate? Sure. Their ideas need to be publicly refuted and it's a slippery slope when people aren't allowed by the government (as opposed to the public, mind you) to speak on taboo things (at least within decorum, no NAMBLA rallies at Disneyland, for example, though if Disneyland CHOSE to allow that then that should be their right, just as it would be the right of the public to stay away that day and maybe forever after).

[Woollyhats]

I agree to a very limited extent. As long as paedophiles fear public stigma, persecution, and even death, no paedophile will ever come forward.

They will hide.

And if a paedophile is hiding, you do not know he/she is a paedophile until he/she engages in sexual relations.

This is inefficient, helps no one, and increases the odds of not knowing how to keep children safe..

If John is a paedophile, and self identification as a paedophile is encouraged, John will be able to get psychiatric help, and individuals will know to keep their kids safe from him.

If John is a paedophile, and hides from fear of persecution, it is unlikely John will get therapy or be known as a paedophile until he "babysits" a relatives child.

This is logical.

Unfortunately, I ultimately have no solutions as to how to treat a paedophile, as they, like us, cannot change their sexual orientation. I do, however, agree that the current methods of responding to paedophiles is inefficient and not beneficial to us or them. I believe that if it was encouraged to receive psychiatric assistance for being a paedophile, and a paedophile who willingly self identified to receive said help was looked at in a good light, less sexual crimes would occur.

LAST NOTE: I actually strongly disagree with NAMBLA, as a child is not cognitively ready to make his or her own decisions. Even as teenagers, individuals are not fully mature in their frontal lobes which makes them more able to be manipulated, although most people gain the ability to think about complex problems during teenage years, so I still wouldn't feel personally comfortable knowing that people are having sex before around 16 - 18.

Conveniently , laws will usually agree with me. It's just not logical for an older person to have sexual intercourse with a child, due to a child's cognitive inability to fully understand consent.

So, to summarize, no, I don't logically believe that the shame and stigma placed on a paedophile is actually helping society, but neither do I logically believe that children are able to consent to intercourse.

[SolemnBoy]

You make some pretty good points Pix. Just to clarify, my description of NAMBLA is basically their own because I wanted to have a fair foundation for the discussion to rest on. I completely agree that their organization is most likely comprised of paedophiles who wish to give in to their urges under protection from the law. They probably couldn't care less about liberating children in non-sexual areas.

I'd also like to point out that I'm in no way equating paedophilia with homosexuality. I'm merely pointing out that I believe they share some very specific characteristics:

1. They are not conscious decisions made by certain people.
2. You may choose whether or not to act on your urges but you are not at fault for them existing to begin with.

In terms of everything else, I fully agree with you.

[sillyboy86]

I think I can summarize my opinions about pedophilia in two points:
1. Is some kind of mental or psychological disease, these men need to be treated by doctors, not judged from some inquisitor. Every case is different, obviously. Every pedophile needs help.
2. Children must be protected, this is the most important thing.

I've heard about NAMBLA in the past and I think is only something created by some vicious and intelligent pedophile to try to act protected by law. Maybe some of the members of the organization could be unconscious victims themselves, cause doesn't really know their own condition and are manipulated.
Like doped people 'ruled' by a fake friend.

[Sylph]

It seems to me in all my 19 and 9 days until 20 years of wisdom, that this is Pederasty all over again.

It's funny how History repeats itself, isn't? It's like watching a looping reel...

However, where Pederasty was a cultural and much more respectable form of what is known as today as Pedophilia, this modern form is much more detrimental to the mentality and emotional status of a child, as the times we are in now, would only destroy these aspects given the acceptance of such a law/movement.

Because, while Pederasty served a role, it had significance in society, this does not... it is by means of sexual gratification only.

To assert that your attraction as a 40 year old woman or man to a 12 year old boy or girl is mutual and reciprocated both ways would be a lie. Or perhaps a delusion.

I will not debate a person's authenticity of attraction to whatever they are attracted to, however, this cannot be compared to Homosexuality, for the fact that consent can be given between two men or women of age, and not just the age when they can be sexually aroused and pleasured or the legal age of consent, but age to have their life in order, have atleast a highschool education, to actually know what life is, outside of a relationship with a person who already has these things...

There are many flaws and loopholes in this, that much is clearly obvious, and most are at the detriment of the younger persons.

So I do not agree with the movement/law and think that while their intentions may be "pure" for the sake of their "sexuality" or attraction, I do not think over all this is a good idea and would cause more harm than good.

I hate for people to feel subjected to walls and restrictions to their freedom of expression, however, for the sake of the children they feel attracted to, I do not think it wise...

And then again, this is part of the reason Pederasty came to a halt. Many psychological and emotional side effects and unforeseen circumstances that goes along with a relationship between a child/adult sexually, no matter how sincerely in love they may be...

I don't wanna offend anyone though :hugs-and-kisses-smi

[SolemnBoy]

I don't see why everyone's proclaiming that homosexuality and paedophilia can't be compared from a legal point of view, when no such comparison has been made at all. I just pointed out that neither are conscious choices, it has absolutely no effect on the legal consequences whatsoever.

Also, I'm not entirely comfortable saying that something like mutual attraction and affection between a child and an adult are impossible, but in the vast majority of all cases I'm prepared to agree that it's bound to be either a lie or a delusion, as previously mentioned.

This isn't turning out to be as much of a discussion as I had hoped. Someone disagree already D:

[Sylph]

I don't see why everyone's proclaiming that homosexuality and paedophilia can't be compared from a legal point of view, when no such comparison has been made at all. I just pointed out that neither are conscious choices, it has absolutely no effect on the legal consequences whatsoever.

Also, I'm not entirely comfortable saying that something like mutual attraction and affection between a child and an adult are impossible, but in the vast majority of all cases I'm prepared to agree that it's bound to be either a lie or a delusion, as previously mentioned.

This isn't turning out to be as much of a discussion as I had hoped. Someone disagree already D:

[COLOR="Green"]You silly goose ^.^ , I only say so for the fact that the both are apples and oranges, the level of consciousness or lack there of in comparison or not between them are completely different.

And they both have an effect on the legalities in some form or another, especially in this day and age, as nearly everything has repercussions and both have their severe and less severe points, however, to compare the two is not wise.

And while you may be uncomfortable in saying it, I have no problems doing so. As I talk about Erotic attraction or affection. There is no conceivable way for such a love to exist substantially. Even our Progenitors were inept at this art of love, whilst inventing it themselves...

Outside of strictly sexual relations, what of the emotional factors?

A child's adult partner will obviously be older, so what in the event of the older partner falling ill or dying? Emotionally, that child will be attached obviously and will suffer distress, trauma and numerous other things.

There is only so much you can ask of a child, even I have to admit that, and yet, to add a relationship & all of it's complex intricacies to the situation, is merely a bomb ticking...

I don't mean to be a sour puss Solemn babes, I am discussing with you, but we're just not in agreement unfortunately, or rather, of different mindsets on the matter.

Atleast we aren't arguing like me and Tinks

[/COLOR]

[SolemnBoy]

[COLOR="Green"]You silly goose ^.^ , I only say so for the fact that the both are apples and oranges, the level of consciousness or lack there of in comparison or not between them are completely different.

And they both have an effect on the legalities in some form or another, especially in this day and age, as nearly everything has repercussions and both have their severe and less severe points, however, to compare the two is not wise.

And while you may be uncomfortable in saying it, I have no problems doing so. As I talk about Erotic attraction or affection. There is no conceivable way for such a love to exist substantially. Even our Progenitors were inept at this art of love, whilst inventing it themselves...

Outside of strictly sexual relations, what of the emotional factors?

A child's adult partner will obviously be older, so what in the event of the older partner falling ill or dying? Emotionally, that child will be attached obviously and will suffer distress, trauma and numerous other things.

There is only so much you can ask of a child, even I have to admit that, and yet, to add a relationship & all of it's complex intricacies to the situation, is merely a bomb ticking...

I don't mean to be a sour puss Solemn babes, I am discussing with you, but we're just not in agreement unfortunately, or rather, of different mindsets on the matter.

Atleast we aren't arguing like me and Tinks

[/COLOR]

Except our mindsets aren't all that different. The only thing we feel differently about is the possibility of mutual love and attraction between child and adult. As extremely unusual as it is, I just don't see how it can be deemed impossible. To say that it cannot possibly occur would require extremely thorough research of a nature that can't be conducted under reasonable circumstances. I believe it can happen because "impossible" is a very strong word not to be underestimated.

Outside of this, our opinions are exactly the same and we're on the same side in terms of the juridical aspect of it all. I just wanted to open this up to debate because I enjoy talking about taboo subjects