Can We Talk About Pedophilia?
No, not the act of abusing children and/or engaging in inappropriate behavior with them. Such activities are criminal and should be subject to the strongest enforcement the justice system can bring.
I’m talking about adult attraction to children which never rises to the level of physical contact, but which may include viewing images that we find abhorrent, and may cause acute mental anguish for those with this condition.
A thought-provoking piece in Sunday’s New York Times argues that pedophilia is a mental illness and makes an effective argument that we’re treating it improperly. Read the whole thing before reacting reflexively. Here are some salient excerpts from Prof. Margo Kaplan‘s op-ed:
The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders defines pedophilia as an intense and recurrent sexual interest in prepubescent children, and a disorder if it causes a person “marked distress or interpersonal difficulty” or if the person acts on his interests. Yet our laws ignore pedophilia until after the commission of a sexual offense, emphasizing punishment, not prevention.
Part of this failure stems from the misconception that pedophilia is the same as child molestation. One can live with pedophilia and not act on it. Sites like Virtuous Pedophiles provide support for pedophiles who do not molest children and believe that sex with children is wrong. It is not that these individuals are “inactive” or “nonpracticing” pedophiles, but rather that pedophilia is a status and not an act. In fact, research shows, about half of all child molesters are not sexually attracted to their victims…
A second misconception is that pedophilia is a choice. Recent research, while often limited to sex offenders — because of the stigma of pedophilia — suggests that the disorder may have neurological origins. Pedophilia could result from a failure in the brain to identify which environmental stimuli should provoke a sexual response. M.R.I.s of sex offenders with pedophilia show fewer of the neural pathways known as white matter in their brains…
The Americans With Disabilities Act of 1990 and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 prohibit discrimination against otherwise qualified individuals with mental disabilities, in areas such as employment, education and medical care. Congress, however, explicitly excluded pedophilia from protection under these two crucial laws…(i)t’s time to revisit these categorical exclusions. Without legal protection, a pedophile cannot risk seeking treatment or disclosing his status to anyone for support…
Removing the pedophilia exclusion would not undermine criminal justice or its role in responding to child abuse. It would not make it easier, for example, for someone accused of child molestation to plead not guilty by reason of insanity.
A pedophile should be held responsible for his conduct — but not for the underlying attraction…(a)cknowledging that pedophiles have a mental disorder, and removing the obstacles to their coming forward and seeking help, is not only the right thing to do, but it would also advance efforts to protect children from harm.
What do you think? I tend to agree. I think that putting people in prison for viewing highly-objectionable material is a waste of money and does nothing to protect anyone from true sexual predators. I certainly think that it’s time for a rational discussion of this.
Tags: El Somnambulo, pedophilia, Prof. Margo Kaplan, Steve Tanzer Delaware
Many years ago, as a very new therapist, I had a client admit he was sexually attracted to children although he had never acted on it. He really wanted help and we were able to get him some help through a specialized unit of a psychiatric hospital. It was quite eye opening for me and since then I have recognized the need for treatment programs for this disorder. However, I think people who view child pornography are predators. They not only create the market, they conspire to commit molestation.
I take your point. Dr. Kaplan’s article doesn’t make clear whether she views those who look at child pornography the same as you do.
BTW, she does make clear that pedophiles shouldn’t have jobs that give them direct prolonged access to kids, teachers, for example.
Thank you so much for writing about this.
This subject is always on my mind because it is always in the paper and because I know two people who are currently serving jail sentences for child porn. Neither of these people are monsters; they were the product of a society where you cannot seek help for a problem without fear of punishment. And unlike every other punishment that you can complete, then patch your life up, a punishment for child sex crimes carries with it a lifetime of shame, tracking, reporting and websites where neighbors can find out exactly where the sex criminals are.
A.G. Biden has made a career of touting how tough we are on sex criminals. But the Child Predator Task Force, as far as I know, serves only to hunt down and punish the guilty. It does not try to stem the tide of the problem. In my mind, the sheer number of arrests that have been made recently is an indication of the abject failure of this Task Force to do anything meaningful about the problem.
I have had conversations with mental health professionals about this and they have indicated that it is difficult to receive mental help if you are afflicted with this problem, and that there can be criminal repercussions for doing so.
During any candidates forums I attend, I will be asking our candidates for the A.G.’s office (and others) if they will support legislation that makes it easier for people with sexual attraction to children to find and receive mental health services without fear of criminal punishment.
Nobody wants to discuss this and nobody wants to stand up for “deranged and dangerous sex predators” but that strategy isn’t working. The problem is getting worse, not better. Its time for a difficult and civil conversation on this issue.
The conversation will be difficult. It’s such an easy issue for politicians to demagogue that it will probably get worse before it gets better. Votes trump solutions until solutions can no longer be ignored.
Thank you for the distinction between pedophile and child molester, to very different and distinct things (age of victim the big difference) and should be treated as such.
I think honest and non emotional definitions are a good start to helping curb the problem and fallout from these two very different things. The honest and non emotional part is what the public has a hard time with, if your a downstate educator you are a child molester if your a Catholic priest your a pedophile?
Lets take the emotions out of this treat it with some honesty and try to find some answers.
No matter the distinction, both involve a sexual attraction to children that I just can’t even begin to contemplate. If that makes me less compassionate, then so be it. I am fine treating those who admit that have a problem and want help.
But to act like looking at child porn is a harmless victimless crime that does not deserve punishment, I’m sorry, I can’t get on that train. Those are real children whose pictures are being taken. The act of placing these children in certain poses and taking their pictures is abuse. And it would not be happening if not for the demand of them. Sure, punish the photographer. But also punish the person for whom the photographer is taking the pictures.
Mr Somnambulo wrote:
The logic behind the ban on child pornography was that the creation of child porn necessarily included the criminal exploitation of children. I can accept that logic, but find it implausible to assert that the government could make such a crime if the production of child pornography occurred outside our jurisdiction. It’s a stretch to state that the consumer of child pornography is a participant in the rape of a child, if that rape occurred in the United States, but it would seem impossible to me that the American consumer of child pornography could be a participant in the rape of a child which occurred in Thailand, and prosecutable under American law. If the Thais want to charge him, then let them.
I would add that drawings of child porn involves no victims, but will get you jail time anyway.
Would we think it fair to put half of all potential murderers in prison, even if the statistics showed that half of them would commit no crime? Yet with child porn, the numbers are even lower — something like 1 in 6 actually molest a child. We are jailing 5 other people to prevent the 6th from committing a crime.
I waited a bit to post my thoughts on this, because it is a tricky issue. Let me begin by posing a question.
A few weeks ago delawareonline published a few stories about teenages pummeling other people. One was a mentally disabled kid in Newark I think and I hope you’ll pardon me, I don’t remember the details of the other. There were youtube videos posted online that delawareonline put up on its site to accompany the stories. These were crimes and one (at least) was against a child. Did any one of you watch them? I didn’t but I imagine many did. Why?
Morbid curiousity, I suppose. Did the viewers break the law? I have a very hard time with the idea that watching a crime on video is also a crime.
Now perhaps the argument is that the reason most watched the assault was because it was “news.” They were intrigued, or whatever. Prehaps the cat from Tower Hill Wheeler watched child exploitation because he got off to it sexually. I certainly see the difference. But as a society we are really at the point of splitting hairs when we criminalize a state of mind or we try to draw a line between crimes.
So we can watch a video of a disabled kid getting his face kicking in for reason X but not a video of a kid being sexually exploited for reason Y. How do we discern X from Y anyway?
Both examples are vile and disgusting just as the acts they display are criminal. I just think maybe, maybe we are on very thin ice here.
interesting aside. Jennifer Lawrence made a statement yesterday that those who viewed the pictures and photos hacked of her iCloud account were perpetuating criminal activity. Notice she didn’t say perpetrating….
So we can watch a video of a disabled kid getting his face kicking in for reason X but not a video of a kid being sexually exploited for reason Y. How do we discern X from Y anyway?
Reason Y is Commercial Intent. People taking pictures of children being sexually exploited get paid for this typically, sustaining a market for this kind of thing. The people taking the video of the kid getting pummeled were just as exploitive, not for marketplace reasons, but to document their own atrocities in a twisted effort to show themselves as powerful and worthy of some respect.
So if someone takes naked pictures of a child for free and puts them on the internet for free it isnt “as bad”? ( i realize that isn’t what you are saying, or what you likely believe…. I’m only running the logic)
conversely, if someone gets paid to beat up a kid on camera and sells that video…..
@cassandra: Under that distinction, homemade child porn would be OK as long as it wasn’t circulated. For example, I have not read — and I assume I would have, given Beau Biden’s preference for shooting fish in barrels — that the videos made by the Lewes pediatrician were ever circulated.
It’s a phony distinction. It didn’t work when they used it to try to criminalize adult porn, and it shouldn’t work for child porn. But I suspect it will, because if you go by our actions, child molestation is clearly the worst crime one can commit — worse than rape of an adult, worse than even murder.
We would not imprison innocent people to prevent murder, but we will imprison innocent people in the vain attempt to prevent child molestation.
@ben: exactly.
What if there is no money involved? What if it is shared by ill people for amusement & not payment?
(I feel compelled to note that this is an intellectual exercise only. I feel like I’m on thin ice just discussing it.)
Under that distinction, homemade child porn would be OK as long as it wasn’t circulated.
No, because the act of taking the pictures is one of the many things that is illegal and exploitative about child porn.
so it’s wrong because it is illegal?
Apparently.
Cassandra, you said the distinction was doing it for profit. One who does not circulate such images is not doing it for profit, but will nevertheless be charged with a crime.
There also exists the question about what counts as child porn. Pictures of naked children, I understand, count, even though the child is not being exploited in any way.
It’s wrong because it is child exploitation. That’s the original sin here — not watching the material.
Yeah, let’s get off the idea of the ‘making’ of the video (the assault or the porn). I’m talking about the “crime” of ‘watching’ the video. Is it a crime to watch a video of an illegal act and if depends on the state of mind/reason how do we determine that?
Are we prepared to parse the ideas that happen inside somebody’s skull and make thought crime illegal?
Hey Cass. I missed your last comment. Isn’t delawareonline posting the youtube beating sensationalizing and exploiting it? Clickbait and advert money and all that?
And if watching isn’t the crime (I reject the notion of sin)… why is the ex Hiller Headmaster on trial?
A further blurring of the line is that creation, trading, and possession of written child porn is not a crime. Presumably the argument would run that with respect to a story or narrative there is no specific “victim” being abused during the creation of the narrative.
I have seen cases wherein narrative child porn was accompanied by illustrations that–were they viewed without association with the narrative–would not have been considered illegal (they could have appeared in some of our more sexualized apparel advertising). Yet I do know of prosecutors who have contended that linking these images to a child porn story converted them into child porn and therefore made their possession a crime. [I don’t have a link and don’t have time to look for it right now.]
Point being: in protecting children from any form of abuse I am generally willing to have the state err on the side of caution, even when the legalities become strained. On the other hand, given the inept manner in which the State sometimes manufactures an abusive situation and refuses to back down even when its actions become logically and legally untenable, it becomes difficult to keep holding that position.
Violence porn is still porn.
Child violence porn, therefor.
DG, i think there is a bigger problem of our society considering sex to be worse than violence. Think about how you can show insanely graphic violent images on prime time cable…. buy you better not show a nipple. It’s just fine to show children being beaten up, apparently.
now, I should clarify…. i think images of children getting beaten up are AS BAD as any kind of child exploitation, im not saying that videos of child molestation “arent that bad”… just in case anyone has a hard time figuring that out.
@ben – I hear you. I make that point from time to time as well. Whether it’s ficitional (cop dramas) or real (like a news cast), we see bombs drop, dead bodies, blood and gore… all without batting an eye. But show a guy’s ass or a ladies breasts and all fucking hell breaks loose.
I agree. It taints our opinion and makes explaining the difference between the violence against kids video and whatever is in child porn (happy to say I haven’t the slightest idea) very, very convoluted.
In my opinion it’s the Colbert Theory again. The CULTURE just tells us that the sexual stuff “feels” worse so the laws make it so. No rational reason needed.
Isn’t delawareonline posting the youtube beating sensationalizing and exploiting it?
That’s a silly comparison.
The one you want is:
Someone manipulating a child into pornographic images vs. the person who took the video of the beating.
The porn is the images and you have to misuse a child to get it. The person getting the beating was clearly being misused, but the misuse was at the hands of the people doing the beating.
Well, Cass, you’ve proved my broader point. That explains nothing.
It’s not a silly comparison because we weren’t discussing the production of the videos we were discussing the viewing of the videos.
I’m just going to resign on this topic because I know without a broader forum we’ll never get anywhere. It’s a very hard topic on which to give serious thought and make nuaced arguments.
It is silly, because it is the production of the child porn that is the exploitation. The exploitation in the beating video is the beating, not the person videoing it. And I’ll add that the video helped the police find the people doing the beating.
And there is plenty to nuance to be had — the thing that is always true about child porn is that the exploitation is not in the viewing as much as it is in the production of it. I have grasped that you want to make this an argument about criminalizing what is seen. What you want to avoid here is that the production of what is seen (as it relates to child porn) is the exploitation.
It wasn’t a silly comparison at all.
Is the kid who got beaten up on camera… then had that video broadcast to the public any less of a victim than a victim of child porn? (no, they aren’t)
The only difference is, it isnt illegal for the news to do what they did, and our society seems to be a-ok with watching a kid get beaten up…. even if they make themselves feel better by scowling and shaking their head disapprovingly while they watch it. You are STILL contributing to the misuse of that child.
” What you want to avoid here is that the production of what is seen (as it relates to child porn) is the exploitation.”
No, what I want acknowledged is that the production of the porn using real children is the far more serious crime, and that viewing it is, at best, a lesser crime — and that if the porn in question victimized nobody, if it’s a drawing instead of a photo, no crime has been committed.
If you think imprisoning people for viewing child porn is a good idea, do you support imprisoning the drug users who constitute the demand side of that market?
I think there’s a difference between witnessing (stumbling upon) an event (the beating) and filming it – while not being the cause, or related to the event, and staging a child porn photo shoot/video. The difference is the motivation behind the camera.
In the second case, the child is victimized twice. First, when the photo/video is taken, and, then again, when it’s viewed. So, I don’t see the comparison between the two.
You’re all backing youselves into rhetotical corners. If the assault video was staged, say… like they lured the slow kid round the corner and took turns filming while others bring terror down on the kid while others laugh. I’ve seen bullying clips like this….
My position is once we begin saying, well, maybe the person who filmed wasn’t involved or stumbled upon the scene accidently or whatever. Or better yet we parse the word “exploitation” within an inch of its life…
Culture tells us that sexual exploitation of children (generally undefined and anywhere on the spectrum from mild or severe) ALWAYS needs to somehow be worse than anything else that somebody can think of… We get arguments like this…. a twisted knot of confusion.
No, what I want acknowledged is that the production of the porn using real children is the far more serious crime, and that viewing it is, at best, a lesser crime
I’m certainly not arguing differently — but I don’t have a problem with those who help create the market in child exploitation sharing in the punishment.
do you support imprisoning the drug users who constitute the demand side of that market
When they are caught, they often are. Not for using, but for holding. Even if it is for personal use.
I know they are. I’m asking whether you think it is appropriate. Just to clarify, I don’t think it makes sense to imprison drug users, and I don’t support imprisoning people for things they might do, but have not yet done.
“In the second case, the child is victimized twice. First, when the photo/video is taken, and, then again, when it’s viewed.”
The child is NOT victimized when it is viewed. The child has no way of knowing how many times it was viewed, and is not “victimized” by its viewing — just as Jennifer Lawrence was not in fact victimized by people viewing her naked photos, no matter what she thinks (I have not viewed them, BTW, so I’m not arguing this from my personal position).
If someone takes a picture of you, clothed, and then masturbates to it, have you been victimized?
Drug users, drug dealers are typically of age enough to know their choices and to know the consequences of them. I don’t think that law enforcement on low level activity makes any sense. Still — it isn’t as though the people involved don’t know the consequences of those actions. They can both choose to live with those consequences. Not so the kids exploited by porn.
Jennifer Lawrence was not in fact victimized by people viewing her naked photos, no matter what she thinks
If she didn’t say YES to releasing those pictures, then, you bet she was victimized.
I’m not saying they are the same thing. I am saying that the motivation of the person taking the photo/video is the distinction – which seems to be part of this debate.
If I stage a robbery and film it that’s very different then if I film a robbery I happened upon.
As far as the child no longer being a victim by people watching child porn… I disagree, unless you’re saying that that video/photo will never become public and the child will never be identifiable. But there’s always that potential, isn’t there? So while they may not be a “victim” by your definition today, they could be tomorrow, or maybe never. But that cannot be guaranteed. And that’s where I keep getting stuck on labeling this a victimless crime.
And for the record, I am 100% for offering people with these thoughts about children all the help they need.
At one point homosexuality was considered a mental disorder and through progressive thought that has changed. Where it was once considered a choice, we now understand there is no choice in the matter of homosexuality.
I guess give it a couple of decades and we will see if the “slippery slope” type of anti-homosexual rhetoric comes true.
Sex with children viewing child porn, some things are just wrong. But it seems that in some peoples mind no harm no foul.
Geezer – Dan Savage has informed my thinking on this.
“The child is NOT victimized when it is viewed.”
Perhaps not that specific child, however, the very act of viewing that type (violent or child related) pornography creates a demand for more of it. That demand that can only be filled by the abuse of people who don’t, or can’t due to their age, give consent.
Savage would argue that anyone taking part in that economy is an accomplice.
@jason
While I tend to agree with this line of thought in this specific instance, it heads down a tricky road (I’m trying really hard not to say “slippery slope”).
Warnography–war porn if you will–had an equal tendency to dehumanize the victims it shows and “creates a demand for more of it.” There is a distinction with regard to consent there … maybe. But it’s pretty thoroughly covered under the First Amendment.
But I will restate more firmly the idea I was trying to get to above: in this instance I can live with some legal inconsistency to protect people who have no ability to give consent.
Steve
Maybe you and I can live with some legal inconsistency to protect people who have no ability to give consent but for the ones who can’t that is where the tricky road begins.
In some states, a person can consent to sex at age 16. If a 16 year old affirmatively consents both to sex and to having it photographed or taped in one of those states, and tapes the activity himself, he has committed no crime. But if someone else views it, that person has committed the crime of watching child pornography, even if it occurs in the same state as the sex occurred. Try untangling that one.
@urchickenswhole
I tried. I really did. But I am not sure what that sentence meant.
Speaking of “demand” and an “economy” for child porn – when does money actually change hands? If money were paid online it would be rather easy to trace the culprits. But if no money is changing hands, it is hard to conceive of demand driving the creation of new pictures.
Accounts I’ve read are that to get access to new child porn, you have to contribute some. I don’t know if that is even a real thing, or if it is widespread and representative of an economy.
When you hear of a porn “distribution ring” I assume that usually means some dumb SOB was downloading porn via a torrent-based application, which most people don’t realize automatically makes you a distributor as well, and an unknowing member of a “ring” with the people connected to you via the torrent.
Mr Somnanbulo wrote:
Here you are getting into the obvious question of employer liability. If an employer knows that an employee is a pedophile, and that pedophile uses a computer at work, even a personal laptop which is nevertheless using the employer’s internet connection, the employer could be held liable for allowing the pedophile to access child pornography. Heck, someone could sue a company — and might well win — for keeping a person on the payroll the employer knew to be a pedophile, because the company provided the economic means for the pedophile to commit crimes even at home. That seems like a heck of a stretch, but put a case like that in front of a jury, and there’s no telling what the jurors could decide.
I’d like to thank everyone for the mature and intelligent debate that has occurred on this thread. Way to step up, DE Liberal.
I guess I’d be more interested to know what the law is trying to accomplish with its child pornography rules. It can’t be the protection of children. If we cared about children, we would have strict gun laws and fully fund Head Start. We would give mothers longer maternity leave and we would raise the minimum wage. We would also stop buying stuff manufactured by children in Taiwan and sold for cheap at WalMart. We would have interceded in Syria and Liberia before it was too late. No, we don’t care about kids. What we care about is sensationalizing tragic issues, overreacting and getting elected.
I do hope we can continue to have discussions like this with ourselves, with others and with our elected officials. Increasing access to mental health services is certainly a good way to start.
Steve
It’s the people who choose a morally relativistic viewpoint that makes it difficult for them to allow any intellectual wiggle room in cases like this. If all morals are relative, than for them, the law, cannot in anyway make any inconsistencies that may be based on a moral vantage point. I think that things like a moderating view on child porn show what may be a weak point of moral relativism.
@urchick
People who invoke the specter of moral relativism always make me apprehensive, as there are only two ways to subscribe to the idea that morals are always absolute: (1) morals derived from a particular religion/philosophy and held to be binding on all peoples and in all times despite differences in belief; or (2) morals derived from “scientific”/logical reasoning in the complete absence of religious/philosophical belief, and held to be empirically derived to the extent that one may no longer question the underlying assumptions. Neither appeals to me, and both have long histories of leading unfortunate places.
99% of Americans who invoke moral relativism as inherently bad or evil insist on an absolute morality based on evangelical protestant theology, which is itself based on the idea that reason was corrupted in the Fall of Man, and that only Faith provides a reliable moral compass. I see morality as a lot messier than that, and I acknowledge that context matters–an act acceptable in one situation is not universally acceptable in all situations–and the reverse.
My personal morality is willing to accept some legal inconsistency for the protection of children, but it is a limited inconsistency.
Steve
Thanks, good thoughts.
“Perhaps not that specific child, however, the very act of viewing that type (violent or child related) pornography creates a demand for more of it. That demand that can only be filled by the abuse of people who don’t, or can’t due to their age, give consent.”
That argument was rejected by the courts when a victim tried to sue a doctor who had viewed her in a video. The problem with it logically is that if no new videos were ever produced, there would already be millions of such images and viewing them still would be illegal.
The same demand-side argument is used to jail drug users. By that logic, everyone in the World Trade Centers was guilty, too, and the attack on it was justified.
Cassandra, I’m not talking about the state of affairs as it is. Yes, drug users are jailed. I’m saying they should not be, and I’m saying that criminalizing the viewing of pictures creates thought crime. I am against it for the same reasons I’m against the “hate crime” legislation.
For those who insist that the child is victimized if the video is made public, fair point. But that’s not the standard we use to claim victimization. The law as currently written claims that child porn produced without victims — a drawing, for example — is a crime. It also claims sexual intent for innocent things like photos of a toddler in the bathtub.
I am not claiming that making the videos is a victimless crime. The point is that we have criminalized the thought process of pedophiles in a vain attempt to eliminate the crime on the demand side. It didn’t work with drugs, it won’t work with pedophiles.
@Geezer:
Attenuation is the issue. Imagine trying to prove a casual relationship between (1) harm inflicted and (2) watching the video. You can prove a relationship beyween some de minimis amount of harm and watching the video; however, beyond nominal damages, you are stuck (unless you impose joint and several liability, which imposes disproportional liability). Proximate or legal cause is the limiting factor, not logic.
I’ve always found it interesting that when talking about drugs, we focus on prosecuting the suppliers and treatment for the users.
However, when it comes to pedophilia and child porn, we have statements like:
“And it would not be happening if not for the demand of them. Sure, punish the photographer. But also punish the person for whom the photographer is taking the pictures.”
It’s not like the Cartels are supplying conflict-free drugs, but somehow a user is a victim while a pedophile is enabling violence. Huh.
Davy: Sorry I was unclear. I didn’t mean the court relied on that logic, just that following that logic to its end makes every consumer of everything guilty of something.
I do not believe the victimization can be proved legally OR logically.
@Geezer:
Would you support divestment from a company or country that perpetrates wrong?
Mr Geezer wrote:
That depends upon your definition of “proved.” For the legislature, the simple fact of the conclusions of the individual members is proof enough, because the legislature has the power to make such things crimes, or not, and you aren’t going to get much sympathy for pedophiles from the public. There’s no reason for legislators to change their minds on this, none at all. Who wants to be the state representative running for re-election, when his opponent can say, “Our representative voted for pedophiles, voted to make child porn legal!”
It’s enough to say, “All child molesters looked at child pornography,” without even having to prove that statement, for the legislature to conclude that child porn is the enabler.