Ole Martin Moen, University of Oslo’s Centre for the Study of Mind in Nature, “The ethics of pedophilia,” Etikk i praksis. Nordic Journal of Applied Ethics, (2015), 9 (1), 111–124, doi: 10.5324/eip.v9i1.1718
Pedophilia is bad. But how bad is it? And in what ways, and for what reasons, is it bad? This is a thorny issue, and sadly, one seldom discussed by ethicists. I argue in this article that pedophilia is bad only because, and only to the extent that, it causes harm to children, and that pedophilia itself, as well as pedophilic expressions and practices that do not cause harm to children, are morally all right. I further argue that the aim of our social and legal treatment of pedophilia should be to minimize harm to children, and that current practices are often counterproductive in this respect…The overall approach I will defend is that pedophilia is bad only because, and only to the extent that, it causes harm to children, and that pedophilic expressions and practices that do not cause harm to children are morally all right…
Some stats are that “roughly one in five girls, and one in twelve boys, are victims of sexual abuse.” A “meta-analysis sampled 65 original studies from 22 countries and concluded that the best estimate of the global prevalence of child sexual abuse is 19.7% for girls and 7.9% for boys.” 1 Some of the studies result in the following.
Study results from John Briere and Marsha Runtz’s 1989 AD survey of 193 male college students2: 9% “had had at least some (more than zero) sexual fantasies involving prepubertal children” 5% “admitted to having at least once masturbated to such fantasies”
7% had “at least some likelihood of seeking sexual contact with a child if they were certain that they would avoid detection and punishment”
Study results from Kathy Smiljanich and John Briere’s 1996 AD survey of 279 students3: “similar result” as the above “roughly seven out of eight pedophiles are men”
Consider social “norms” such as a grown man who enjoy having their grown woman lover call them “Daddy” or childish games of holding someone in a painful and submissive position until they cry “Uncle” and you get a hint as to what lays in the background of such personages’ minds.
Study results from Kathryn Becker-Blease, Daniel Friend, and Jennifer J. Freyd’s 2006 AD survey of 531 male students4: 7% “admitted to having some sexual attraction to children”
3% “would consider seeking sexual contact with a child if they were certain that no one would find out”
Study results from Nathaniel McConaghy’s 1998 AD and Michael C. Seto’s 2009 AD meta-analyses5:
5% males “are to some extent sexually attracted to prepubertal children”
According to WHO’s [World Health Organization6] definition (quoted above) a pedophile is someone who has a sexual preference for children. Note that a pedophile need not ever have acted on his preference in order to qualify as a pedophile, according to this definition. Is it immoral to have a sexual preference for children?…
Being a pedophile is unfortunate for the pedophile himself, who will most likely not have a good sexual and romantic life, and for a number of children, who might be seriously harmed by his actions…But is being a pedophile, in the sense of having a sexual preference for children, immoral?For something to be subject to moral assessment, we usually assume that it must be something that, in some sense, we control or choose. If something is entirely outside of our control, such as our genetic makeup, it seems that though it might be more or less fortunate, and perhaps more or less pathological, it is not properly subject to moral assessment.
Do pedophiles choose or control their sexual preferences? Nothing indicates that they do. The competing scientific explanations of pedophilia are conditioning, childhood sexual abuse, and neurodevelopmental perturbations [the same as for homosexuality and transsexuality / transgenderism]…it seems most plausible that pedophiles do not choose their preferences, and that though their preferences might well be both unfortunate and pathological, the mere fact of having such preferences is neither moral nor immoral.
Ole Martin Moen also notes:
Even if we grant that it is not immoral to be a pedophile, it might still be immoral for pedophiles to seek sexual contact with children. To do so is an action, or a series of actions, and actions are subject to moral assessment.
Interestingly, this is exactly what I argue with regards to homosexuality: the impulse may not be chosen but the action, the “lifestyle,” is.
Regarding “The Harm Argument” he notes:
On the one hand, there is bodily harm. If small children are penetrated, or otherwise raped, they have a significant chance of being physically harmed. So much is indeed uncontroversial…most adult-child sex does not involve violence or penetration. Though there are many tragic counterexamples, the most characteristic pedophile activities are cuddling, caressing, and genital fondling, and when full intercourse takes place, it occurs most commonly when the child is well into adolescence….
Psychological harm is more complex and more controversial than bodily harm…Presumably, psychological disorders, or symptoms thereof, constitute harm…the evidence for the harmful psychological effects of adult-child sex seems solid.
“Robert Ehman, a philosopher who has defended adult-child sex” argues that “Although there is a good deal of clinical data on the effects of adult-child sex on the children, there is little in the way of controlled scientific research.”
He distinguished children who come to clinical and legal attention “are apt to be more negatively affected than those who do not.” He admits that voluntary adult-child sex which is considered good by both, “remain invisible to clinical observation” (Ehman 1984: 4337).
It is noted that Ehman further argued that “adult-child sex is harmful only, or predominantly, because of society’s way of viewing and handling sexual contact between adults and children. The harm, he suggests, is the result of a self-fulfilling prophecy. In Ehman’s view, adult-child sex is made traumatizing by a culture that labels it with strongly evaluative terms such as ‘abuse,’ ‘assault,’ and ‘molestation,’ which tells the child it has been scarred for life. The harms are culturally contingent, and to support this view, Ehman points to places where adult-child sex were viewed and handled very differently, such as Ancient Greece (Ehman 1984: 435-4368).”
Note the point: corrupt culture all the more, by ousting traditional Judeo-Christian family values all the more, and pedophilia would be a-okay. Ehman’s argument is preposterous on various levels including that many children are raped well before they are exposed to any concepts of sex much less abuse, assault and molestation. They are damaged because an unholy act is being done to them. Also, it is damaging because their bodies, even strictly on a biological level, is simply unprepared to engage in any form of “sex.”
Moen writes:
The US National Institute of Drug Abuse funded a study of 1,400 adult women which showed that “childhood sexual abuse was significantly correlated with increased likelihood of drug dependence, alcohol dependence, major depression, and general anxiety disorder (Zickler 20029). Other studies identify a strong correlation between sexual abuse and various psychological disorders such as dissociative identity disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder, borderline personality disorder, and various eating disorders.”
Meta-analyses estimate that between 51% and 79% of sexually abused children display symptoms of psychological disorders (see Hornor 201010).
On a related note: note that the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force and the National Center for Transgender Equality sponsor an Executive Summary titled, “Injustice at Every Turn: A Report of the National Transgender Discrimination Survey (lead authors in alphabetical order: Jaime M. Grant, Ph.D., Lisa A. Mottet, J.D., Justin Tanis, D.Min. with Jack Harrison, Jody L. Herman, Ph.D. and Mara Keisling).
The summary refers to the “the human rights agenda” or “Transgender and gender non-conforming people.” The summary is of a 6,450 person study “from all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, Guam and the U.S. Virgin Islands” and “provides critical data points for policymakers, community activists and legal advocates to confront the appalling realities documented here and press the case for equity and justice.”
The summary notes, “A staggering 41% of respondents reported attempting suicide compared to 1.6% of the general population, with rates rising for those who lost a job due to bias (55%), were harassed/bullied in school (51%), had low household income, or were the victim of physical assault (61%) or sexual assault (64%).”
You will note how the push is to interpret the “staggering 41%” as, exclusively, being the result of some or another form of discrimination. It does not consider whether it has to do with the fact that homosexuality and transsexuality / transgenderism tie to childhood trauma such as molestation or are lifelong commitments based on what would otherwise be fleeting feelings of confusion which would have resolved themselves. Rather, the feelings of confusion are turned into a lifestyle which leads to a life of confusion.
Thus, childhood trauma and rebelling against one’s very own body/biology is dismissed—this is about the blame game and victimhood mentality.
For a further example, the summary notes that “much higher rates of HIV infection, smoking, drug and alcohol use and suicide attempts than the general population…over four times the national average of HIV infection, with rates higher among transgender people of color” are, solely, the result of “the appalling effects of social and economic marginalization.”
The American Journal of Psychiatry published a paper by Joost à Campo, M.D., Henk Nijman, Ph.D., H. Merckelbach, Ph.D., and Catharine Evers, M.Sc. titled, “Psychiatric Comorbidity of Gender Identity Disorders: A Survey Among Dutch Psychiatrists,” Volume 160 Issue 7, July 2003 AD, pp. 1332-1336. This regard serious psychiatric disorders within LGBTQ personages.
Ehman also claims that since “Children of both sexes are capable of and interested in various types of sexual experiences…we should be open to the view that sexual contact between an adult and a child will sometimes be mutually desirable” as Ole Moen puts it in reviewing Ehman’s assertions.
Of course, this is not to deny that reflection places the abuse within a fuller context and thus, as Harvard psychologist Susan Clancy (201111) found that part of the psychological trauma “tends to become a problem later on when the memories are processed and examined, and the actions more fully understood.”
Ole Martin Moen further writes:
…why some pedophiles who engage in adult-child sex might be less blameworthy than we intuitively assume, even though what they do is wrong…Could it be…that many pedophiles are ignorant of the truth of the empirical premise that adult-child sex exposes children to such harms?…
Due to self-serving biases…it will take very serious reflection on the part of pedophiles to realize that the actions that they like so much systematically expose the other party to a serious risk of harm…pedophiles have at least some justification for rejecting the mainstream view. To the extent that the mainstream view is that adult-child sex is categorically very harmful…when pedophiles discover, for instance, that NAMBLA, the North American Man-Boy Love Association, has had a number of teenage members, some pedophiles might think, not entirely without justification, that the mainstream view must be mistaken…
Another factor that might mitigate blame is bad moral luck on the part of pedophiles. Pedophiles are unlucky to be pedophiles, and we should concede that for many of them, it must be very difficult to go through life without ever seeking sexual contact with a child. Why, we might ask, should we expect it to be easier for pedophiles to abstain completely from adult-child sex than it is for others to abstain completely from adult-adult sex?
This is a fascinating point as culture, at large (although this seems to be quickly changing) demands that abstaining from adult-adult sex is simply impossible but abstaining from adult-child sex is a must the violation of which is punishable by incarceration.
Moen refers to “Fictional stories and computer-generated graphics”:
How…should we assess ways to satisfy pedophilic preferences that do not involve any actual children, such as the enjoyment of fictional stories and computer-generated graphics with pedophilic content?…One explanation might be that even though virtual children cannot be harmed, real children can be harmed as a result of what goes on in virtual reality…
Of course, within this context “virtual” would have to strictly mean illustrated via computer graphics or otherwise. This is because if “virtual” means videos, photos, etc. then they likely include depictions of actual children being molested. Also, see my article Why do Atheist countries lead the production of child pornography?
Moreover:
…we have no reason to believe that what pedophiles desire is to harm children. Pedophiles desire to have sex with children…This is not to deny that some pedophiles’ intentions are in fact abusive or disrespectful, or expressive of ill will. Very likely, some pedophiles prefer outright violence against children…There are, however, arguments as to why pedophilia is a mental disease…This view assumes there is something pathological about the very state of being sexually attracted to children…
Ole Martin Moen’s conclusion includes:
If my arguments in this article are sound, then being a pedophile—in the sense of having a sexual preference for children—is neither moral nor immoral. Engagement in adult-child sex is immoral, but perhaps not always blameworthy to the extent that we intuitively assume. Finally, the enjoyment of fictional stories and computer-generated graphics with pedophilic content is, in and of itself, morally acceptable.
If these conclusions are correct, what practical implications follow?…we should stop the outright condemnation of pedophiles. Condemning pedophiles for being pedophiles is unjust, and non-offending pedophiles, rather than deserving condemnation for their pedophilia, deserve praise for their admirable willpower. Possibly, today’s condemnation also prevents pedophiles from telling health professionals about their attraction to children, and insofar as detection and counseling can help prevent abuse, this is very unfortunate…
Also, note statements by Margo Kaplan, Law Professor from Rutgers University, “Pedophilia: A Disorder, Not a Crime,” New York Times – Opinion Pages, October 5, 2014 AD:
…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…It is not that these individuals are “inactive” or “nonpracticing” pedophiles, but rather that pedophilia is a status and not an act… 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…
While treatment cannot eliminate a pedophile’s sexual interests, a combination of cognitive-behavioral therapy and medication can help him to manage urges and avoid committing crimes…
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