Pedophilia. Is it a problem, and is there a solution?

[Sasquatch]

Uh, Alice, homosexuality, heterosexuality, and pedophelia are all EXACTLY like one another. Sexual orientations are a complete mystery, but they behave exactly like one another in all notable ways. The only thing that differs is the object of the desire... but the desire itself is the same.

I know you'd like to believe that pedophiles are monsters, I know I would love dearly to say "they're not human" and leave it at that. I don't know what makes them what they are, no more than I know what makes one strait or gay, but it's all different facets of the same thing.

What makes pedophelia forbidden isn't about the desire, it's about the ACT itself. Children cannot understand what's happening, they can't participate, and the emotional trauma is profound... as a psychologist, I know full well the damage that child molesters leave in their wake. Little difference between a child molester or a strait/gay rapist. Except, children are less equipped to deal with, or recover from, such acts.

I completely agree. How can somebody say homosexuality is perfectly acceptable, but that paedophilia is somehow sick and disgusting? As far as I'm concerned, they're both sick and unnatural, but at least homosexuals I don't look down on simply because I disagree with their sexual preference.

That difference being that it is possible that most sexual paraphilias are due to external events and a person's enviornment, while its possible that homo/heterosexuality is at least in part, determined genetically.

Of course. Homosexuality is genetic. Just like celebacy :rolleyes2: . It's not a subject of what can and can't be proven, it's what can and can't be logically supported by scientific evidence. Paedophilia and homosexuality are alike in the sense that not only is it an attraction that is unnatural for reproduction, but that nobody knows exactly what causes it. A lot of people have different beliefs as to what leads to certain attractions, but none have been proven, and very few have any evidence at all that can be logically used to support them.

I would have no problem with a 8-10 or so year old had a relationship with an older person. ... However ONLY if the child was mentally matured enough to understand.

If I have an eight-year-old daughter and I find out she's having a sexual relationship with an older guy, he'll be lucky if I don't beat him to death. But I'll do my best to do just that. No child at eight or ten years old is mature enough to carry on a physical relationship. Hell, most teenagers aren't mature enough to carry on a physical relationship.