Mmm, perhaps fear was a bad choice as a word. That being said, my comment:

 

 

Simply put...I was saying that if you don't like it, then why read it? Why bother with a comment? Don't waste your time nor mine. As for snide comments - it pretty much comes down to the fact that: 1) I don't want to deal with them because of my mood. 2) It's my blog and just like anyone else here, I reserve the right to - if i want to - be picky on things. Oddly enough I'm not normally picky and have never deleted comments or blacklisted people for their opinions. (etc.)

 

 

 

 

Btw, Nitro, I'm going to go make sure I have it all right before I reply to your first comment. I think I do, but you never know. 

 

~AJ

AJ: Almost every argument that works for homosexuality also works for pedophilia.  The pedophile feels just as attracted to kids or teens (depending on the kind of pedophile they are) as a gay person is attracted to the same sex, or for that matter, heterosexuals are to the opposite sex.  They feel just as discriminated against and abused because of their sexuality as homosexuals do.

In fact, they (pedophiles) use the similar treatment by the government, medicine, psychology and science (as well as the general public) as evidence that they are "normal" and it's just a matter of time and education before they will be just as accepted by society as gay people are now.

They also point to the past to show cultures that allowed pedophilia, showing that it isn't detrimental to anyone... just like homosexual activists do. 

When homosexuality was taken out of the DSM, it was the result of a huge political campaign launched for that purpose.  As you pointed out, it isn't a simple procedure, but it also isn't exactly scientific either.  But then again, "scientific review" boards have a lot more to do with the names that can be dropped than the raw data, no matter what the topic might be.

My point is, the same procedure and pressure that was used to remove homosexuality can also be used to remove pedophilia.  If we base it completely on what is and isn't in the DSM, are we willing to accept pedophilia as "normal" if it were taken out of the DSM?

Would you embrace pedophilia as "normal"?

 

From my reconning, I think where homosexuality was in the 60, pedophilia is today.  We see a lot of examples of it being not only tolerated but even defended.  It is joked about in songs and even has a few Supreme Court decisions promoting it. 

It may be a "slippery slope" to bring it up in connection with same sex marriage, but it isn't if when the argument for ssm is based on "you should be able to marry who you love" or "equal rights".   As we speak, many of the arguments being used to support ssm are being used to defend pedophilia.

Again... before the accusations fly... I don't equate homosexuality with pedophilia because they aren't the same thing at all.

 

Perhaps, but most people fail to differentiate between something that is a DISORDER (pedophilia) and something that is not. 

 

 

 

Uh, ted, it's simple. Pedophilia IS detrimental to the non-consenting child (Just ask my younger sister...). I don't know where they (p) were pointing to, and why would anyone trust them when they're obviously having issues. It would be like believing a robber that told you that he didn't steal the money. As for homosexuality ted, ultimately it *isn't* detrimental to anyone who accepts it or deals with it.

Now wait, let me finish. 

What I mean is that there are those who may realize that they're homosexual, but don't want to be. If they choose to ignore it, and further complicate things - then - it becomes detrimental, causing all sorts of problems. Wheras if they accept it - that it is there and a part of who they are, then it isn't detrimental. 

Essentially: Ego-dystonic sexual orientation.

 

It's a diagnosis that's in the DSM; to paraphrase it is when the sexual orientation/preference is known, but the person chooses to fight it (i.e. it conflicts) because they wish it were different, though it is what it is (fact). Treatment is often sought. 

(Am.Psych.Assoc.)

 

Essentially it's what some of those pop culture priests and missions deal with. You know "heal the homo," and "fight the sin." >_> Oddly enough, many of the people running these things are not exactly qualified to deal with psychological/psychiatric disorders, etc. 

Makes me want to go to them! Anyways, back on topic. 

 

Homosexuality, as shown through the various studies, poses NO danger to the individual, nor the bystander, plain and simple. 

 

I would love to see you prove it is detrimental; I'm confident I could counter it. 

 

 

Where you there? Proof? Evidence? 

 

 

Granted, as could it be used to do anything, but the fact is that they are the experts. They're the ones that know what they're talking about and made the decision based on what facts/evidence they had. To be honest, I could make the same damn argument about anything you bring up here. Credibility is key. 

First off, I highly doubt it will be, there's just too much evidence against such an action. Secondly, even if they did, I wouldn't prefer it, but I would accept their expertise on the matter and do my own reading on it.

 

 

Ted,

The problem with your argument is that a homosexual person would first and foremost be able to get consent from a legal adult. They are also of safe and sound mind (setting aside the points about mental health issues due to whatever life brings). A Pedophile cannot get legal consent to marry a child, nor can he/she enter into any contractual marriage.

Also, while they could enter into a contract with a child in some states, they all (to my knowledge) require parental consent. Next, according to my (credible) sources, (and they are the experts when it comes to psychiatric and psychological issues and information) pedophiles are shown to likely not be of safe and sound mind. That's a big difference ted, because that means that they are not mentally fit to enter into any contract (not only that but they have to name out the terms of the contract anyways). 

The reason why the pedophile is not of safe and sound mind is because Pedophilia is a mental illness/disorder. The definition of that, according to the APA (et al) is: "...a psychological or behavioral pattern that occurs in an individual and is thought to cause distress or disability that is not expected as part of normal development or culture," and their definition of homosexuality, “...implies no impairment in judgment, stability, reliability, or general social and vocational capabilities." 

 

 

AJ: Everything you just said about pedophilia was also said about homosexuality until fairly recently in our history.

How often do we hear that convicted pedophiles should never be allowed out of prison because it can't be cured... they are "made" that way apparently.  How is that different than the concept of trying to "cure" the gay person?

Furthermore, all my arguments here have been based on the person themselves.  How they feel within themselves.  If a gay person never has a same sex encounter are they any less gay?  If a pedophile never has a sexual experience with a child, are they any less a pedophile?  Up until a few decades ago we expected the gay person to curb their desires for the same sex.  Today we still expect the pedophile to do the same.  In fact, we demand that they go against their sexual proclivities while we claim "equal rights" for everyone else.

In fact, our society has pretty much done a 180 when it comes to homosexuality.  Not only do they have the right to their sexual desires, no one has the right to deny it of them... even in situations where it would be illegal for heterosexuals to engage in sexual activities.

Today we have the cases where an adult woman gets pregnant by a minor.  We still arrest her and punish her accordingly, but look that the public outcry against doing that.  How many boys really consider sexual activity with adult women a "negative" thing?  How many people in general do?

If an 18 year old gay man has sex with his 16 year old lover any different than the same two 2 years later when the younger one is 18 and the older one is 20?  Of course there is a difference, but what would the reaction be if the 19 year old was arrested and charged with statutory rape?  The irony is people would defend him by pointing out that you they don't arrest 18 year old heterosexuals for having sex with 16 year olds... of course, the irony would be that both are just as illegal in a state where the age of consent is 18.

As far as what you said about parental consent, let me tell you another story about the friend I talked about in my "3 friends" article.

In one of the conversations we had while he was still in prison, I asked him, "where were the parents in all this"?

His answer was by far the most ominous thing I've ever heard...

"By the time anything sexual was going on, the parents loved me so much that they would have taken my word over the word of their own teenager."

That is one of the reasons I keep so up to date on pedophilia.  It is also why I (admittedly) get on my soapbox about it at times.  It's not just an abstract concept to me, not when there are parents who allow it, a public that defends it and an APA that actually considered the question of taking pedophilia out of the DSM.  OF course, to their credit, it stayed in there where it belongs... but it was far from unanimous.

Don't believe me that pedophilia is emerging from the dark corners of the YMCA and movie theaters to the light of day?

http://www.intermale.nl/boy-teen.html

This is a bookstore in The Netherlands, these books aren't hidden, they are on display both in the store and on the internet. Notice the name of the bookstore while you're there.

 

 

 

That is true for statements about morality. But it's not true for statements about what is natural. Homosexuality is natural because it occurs in nature outside human influence. It's a normal natural behaviour.




And what's the problem with accepting both?

If 10% of cows were two-headed, wouldn't we simply accept that 10% of cows were two-headed? Much less than 10% of sheep are black, but do we condemn black sheep (except metaphorically) or call them "un-natural"?




Actually, it does. That's exactly what defines normality. If black sheep appear with a rate of 1 out of 100 sheep, we should accept black sheep as a normal, although rare, occurence. It is not out of the order, it is normal. It conforms to a pattern.

Maybe about 10% of the human population are homosexual. That appears to be a pattern. It's normal.

It's about the same percentage as blue eyes and yellow hair (perhaps). And blue-eyed and yellow-haired individuals are quite normal too. Nobody would (or should) look at them and claim that they are un-natural and not normal and hence must not be accepted.




Pedophilia, the emotion, is acceptable, although not normal (it does not regularly occur in human beings). Acting on it is not.

The problem with acting on pedophilia is that it involves forcing other people to participate, i.e. raping children. The problem with raping children is not that the rapist enjoys it but that the children are being raped. (Similarly the problem with murder is not that the murderer derives pleasure or some other advantage from the deed but that the victim is dead afterwards.)

Homosexuality does not carry with it that type of problem. It is perfectly possible for homosexuals to live out their urges without affecting anybody else in any way other than ways in which heterosexuals also affect other people.

You cannot be an active pedophile, murderer, or thief without affecting other people against their will.

But you can be a homosexual, heterosexual, or blacksmith without affecting other people against their will.

As a heteroexual I am as affected by a homosexual practicing his sexuality as a homosexual is affected by a heterosexual practiving her sexuality. Neither carries with it the problems that pedophilia and murder come with.

The concept of marriage is changing to accept it.

Depends on if you're teaching your child tolerance or hatred. What if you were an anti-Semite?

Cannabalism, rape, murder, even throwing of ones feces all happen in nature.  Does that mean they are "normal"?  What we woud define as pedophilia and even incest occur in nature also.  Does that mean they are normal?

 Could it be that human beings are the only ones who even give either much thought?

 

btw, I'm glad we do. :~D

 

 

Depends on the animal.

For certain species of spider, cannibalism, rape and murder are common and normal. They usually happen during mating. It's a part of their behaviour.

For certain apes and monkies throwing feces is quite normal too, I believe. (Alternatively, they are signs of behavioural disorders among apes kept in captivity; I don't know.)

For the human species I would say that cannibalism, rape and murder are not normal. There are arguably fewer murderers and rapists among us than homosexuals. We simply don't have the number of children to survive as a species where murder is normal. If we had as many murderers among us as we have homosexuals we would have died out thousands of years ago.

 

For some species they are, for some they are not.

Incest was probably normal for humanity before we decided, as a society, than it should be illegal because of the effect it has on descendants. That was probably several thousand years ago. The Bible still tells us stories of people who were very close to their cousins.

Pedophilia was normal, I believe, in Greek culture before Christianity.

Homosexuality is natural, normal for many species including humanity, and doesn't create victims in any way other than that in which heterosexuality also creates victims.

 

I'm pretty sure animals don't have sex with their young.

 

Just because something happens in nature doesn't mean it pertains to humans.  I had a rabbit that always killed her babies.  I found out that that wasn't unusual and quite common.  So what does that tell us? 

We should be allowed to kill off our offspring as well?  

I think it's rationalizing when we point to nature and say...well there's homosexual sex in animals so that makes it right.  We are not animals, we are rational, thinking, emotional, human beings...although I have to admit sometimes it's hard to tell the diff. 

Men having sex with men and women with women is NOT natural nor is it how we we were created.  We are going outside the natural for self gratification and we do so in many ways not just homosexuality.   

Some eat their young.

I wouldn't rule it out.

Nevertheless, not everything that is natural is also normal. And not everything that's normal for one species is also normal for another.

 

...

What would be the point? Animals only mate to produce offspring, not for pleasure.

It tells us that killing once babies is natural and normal in some species.




The Romans did it. For them it was natural and normal.

For us it isn't.




Nevertheless, homosexuality is quite natural and normal. It's even normal in our species (even though killing our young is not).

A lot of things are natural and normal for our species and therefor forbidden by various laws. Other things are not natural and not normal and also forbidden. The mere presence of some law, in the Bible or elsewhere, that prohibits a certain act doesn't mean that the act is unnatural or not normal.

Ask a German or Englishman whether eating pork is natural or normal.

No, it is natural. If it weren't, those urges wouldn't exist in so many people. It's not a disorder affecting a small minority, it's programmed into a very large minority (my guess was 10%). It's very normal.

In contrast to incest and pedophilia it is also victimless. You can claim that it creates victims but then that is the same type of victim as created by heterosexual relations.

If that were true we wouldn't have the discussion about the benefits of homosexuality.

 

Leuki, so if a pedophile lived in a society where it is not taboo, would that mean that sex with kids is normal for that person?  If the society was one where people start having kids shortly after puberty, would sex between the pedophile adult and adolescent be considered harmful?

Do animals know that mating with the same sex won't produce offspring?

That's what it was like in ancient Greece.

 

You are asking two different questions.

Pedophilia is always harmful, like cannibalism. But in some socities it was normal. And both are normal for many species.

Homosexuality, like heterosexuality, is both natural and normal in many species and societes. The only difference is that there is no society I know for which homosexuality is normal but heterosexuality is not (unless you count gays as their own subculture).

Homosexuality, like heterosexuality, does not produce victims except in the sense that people who practice it voluntarily or or hear of it can be said to be "victims" of either.

Table:

Subject                                    Natural?                                Normal?                                 Harmful?

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Murder  per se                          no                                           no                                           yes

Cannibalism                           yes, for some species            yes, for some cultures           yes

Pedophilia                               no                                             yes, in some cultures           yes

Heterosexuality                      yes, in all relevant species   yes                                          no

Homosexuality                      yes, in many species              yes, in some cultures            no

 

By "Harmful?" I mean the question whether it harms people without their consent. By "in all relevant species" I mean all species that reproduce sexually except the one species of lurch that lives somewhere in Utah (if memory serves) where the males died out and the females keep reproducing by producing clones of themselves after engaging in mating rituals with other females. By "Murder per se" I mean murder for reasons other than cannibalism or getting rid of a competitior. (Note that most animal species will not actually kill a competitior. It's not normal to kill.)

 

Probably not, but neither do our urges.

You can probably explain to a very intelligent ape that homosexual sex won't produce children. But he won't care when the urge hits him. The same is probably true for humans. While we are all, I think, clever enough to understand that homosexual sex doesn't produce offspring, certain body parts in some people are not convinced.

This is true for heterosexual sex as well. While everybody knows (or perhaps hopes) that sex with a condom doesn't produce offspring, the body is still very much in "go and create offspring" mode.

 

Nothing wrong with acceptance, did I imply that?

Also never suggested homosexuality was un-natural, I know it occurs. Still IMO that doesn't make it normal. A person could have a 104 degree fever, it happens, it occurs naturally, 10% of the world (figuratively) might have a fever at any given time, but that hardly makes it normal.

Here's my opinion of what makes homosexuality "normal". It is the persons desire to be considered normal and the political correctness of a large majority of the world community to oblige them. People deiced what constitutes normal and homosexuality has been accepted within the circle of normalcy. Pedophiles have not due to more extreme social stigma.

Believe me I'm not passing judgment when I use terms such as normal or abnormal, it's not meant to be derogatory. IMO any life form that fails due to neurological reasons to use the hard-wired instinct to attempt procreation with a mature, and willing opposite is abnormal. I personally don't have a problem with it. There are plenty of abnormalities out there, by birth and by physical action. But, just don't expect me to believe it's normal just because others wish it to be so. IMO this position prevails more than the religious one that the gay community likes to place in the position of enemy.

That would be a great argument if we where discussing physical features. If you can point to a study where the black sheep mates only with other black sheep or juvenile sheep, you may have something there. We are talking about something that for all apparent reasons occurs within the brain since anatomical features are not affected.

BTW I believe your numbers are high. 10% (30 million) would almost equal the entire Black population of the US. Just in my travels, I doubt that 1 in 10 people are gay (I could be wrong, but many would be hiding it well with opposite sex spouses and children). We may never know unless it becomes a census question.

You're lumping murderers and thief's into the mix and I believe these to be effects of environment and upbringing. If you put Homosexuals into this category (or even pedophiles) then you might as well blame society for their existence. Kleptomania is a mental disorder of course and differs from common thievery.

You bring up something here that begs another interesting question here. Is an adult male that rapes young boys a pedophile, or a homosexual, or both? One thing it does prove IMO is pedophilia and homosexuality are two distinct conditions.

IMO the only thing that separates homosexuals from pedophiles socially (and again, I'm not suggesting it is the same condition or even related) is a source of willing partners. Pedophilia is only considered wrong because it exploits an unwilling partner.

Leauki, what I'm getting from you is basically, homosexuality is normal because it happens in nature, but any other sexual act that isn't accepted by our society might be normal, but isn't natural.

Like I said emotions are clouding judgment. That's OK, it's just not a convincing argument.

I might not have been clear enough.

Everything that happens in nature without human interference is "natural".

Everything that happens a lot in a given population (of animals or humans) is "normal".

And everything that harms somebody without their consent is "harmful".

Homosexuality is natural (since it happens in nature without human interference) and normal (since it affects a large minority of the human population) but not harmful (since it doesn't harm anybody).