Before I go on to answer a few of the questions which were being repeatedly asked in the previous topic, I would just like to quote a 'pedophiles perspective' first hand account which I read about in a book. This story is very similar to my own in many ways, but it is not my story. I found this story in 'Understanding and Addressing Adult Sexual Attraction to Children; A Study of Paedophiles in Contemporary Society (2010) - By Sarah D Goode'. This is a wonderful book as it provides one of the first (in my personal opinion) truly realistic and representative viewpoints of people such as myself. I would encourage anybody interested in this topic to go out and buy the book. If you cannot afford the book, or want to read it first, it is available to torrent, although I don't condone this as I think the author deserves credit for her writing. It is with this proviso that I quote from the book. I hope that any stakeholder in the book can appreciate the intentions of the author in writing is to combat media hysteria, and respectfully allow me to quote the following without asking for it's removal.
The following is an extract about a pedophile called David, and how he came to realise that he was a pedophile. This story is typical of people like me, so it would be safe to assume that I went through the same sorts of things.
David’s story will never hit the headlines, but it is one we need to hear. It is a
story of our time, and a story of profound sadness and pain. It tells us much
about our dread and horror of paedophilia. It is for David and others like
him, as well as for all the children, that this book has been written. This
autobiographical account was given to me in response to the final question I
asked in my research project. The question was ‘Are there any other questions
I should have asked you, or any other information you would like me to
know?’ David suggested that I should have asked ‘Have you ever considered
suicide and, if so, how close did you get?’ He then went on to write about his
own experiences. In the edited extract presented here, David paints a detailed
and vivid picture of how it feels, as a lonely, frightened teenager, to slowly
come to the horrific realisation that you yourself are ‘a paedophile’.
I remember exactly when it started. I had just turned thirteen and was
doing an important exam. I remember sitting in the school hall with about
100 other pupils and like everyone else I was nervous and looking around to
see if I knew anyone for moral support. As I looked around my attention
was somehow drawn to this particular guy, I didn’t know him but something
seemed odd about him and I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. I
could recognise that he was a handsome guy but there seemed to be something
a small bit more interesting about him. I looked over once or twice during the
exam a little puzzled but afterwards I didn’t really think anymore of it but
still, anytime I was asked during the summer ‘How was the exam?’ I thought
to myself ‘Wasn’t it odd that I thought that guy was odd?’
When I joined a new school, to my surprise, the guy I thought was ‘odd’
was there as well. As time went by and I settled into my new surroundings
and got to know new people and started making new friends, I began to
notice this guy more and more. It got to a point one night when I was in
bed that I started thinking about him and suddenly out of nowhere I imagined
kissing him! I remember it well because it sent a shiver up my spine
as I thought to myself that this was certainly not right, what worried me
most was not so much the fact I imagined kissing a guy but the fact that it
seemed to feel nice. The fright of it put it out of my mind and I vowed
never to think of it again. Besides, I like women, they’re sexy and imagining
being with Pamela Anderson felt nice too.
But now, not only was this guy in my school and my classroom, he was
also in my social group of friends. I soon enough started to figure that I
had an attraction to this guy because I was starting to have sexual fantasies
about him. They felt really nice but I knew there was something going
very wrong. I made sure that I never looked at an attractive guy, I learnt
very quickly to always casually look the other direction to the point where
it became almost second nature to me. After a time, I could see by the way
classmates and friends interacted with me that it seemed no one could see it in
me at all and I started to relax a little. ‘I’m not gay, I’m just straight and
confused’ I thought. ‘It’s just hormones and all I have to do is wait until they
calm down, I knew I wasn’t gay!’ That held me up for the rest of the year.
As I turned fourteen I was still in the group of friends with the guy I was
attracted to. His presence was an uncomfortable reminder of what was
wrong inside of me. As time went by the ‘hormone theory’ defence was
starting to wear thin and I started to consider that perhaps maybe this is it,
maybe I am actually gay. For the vast majority of my time I just basically
ignored it and just got on with life. By the time my fifteenth year came around
‘hormone theory’ was hanging by a thread and I guess the shock of having
homosexuality in the first place had started to wear thin. I reckoned if those
hormones were going to ever settle down they would have settled by now surely.
I started to slowly accept that I had homosexuality in me, I guess it’s not the
worst thing in the world. I was still attracted to women but it only seemed about
75/25. At some point I decided to end the remaining conflict and worry inside
me. Basically it went along the lines of a compromise, I said to myself, ‘Right, I
accept that I am seemingly stuck with homosexuality, so here’s the deal.
Homosexuality, you can go over to that corner and fantasise about whatever
you want and I’ll go over to this corner and live my life through heterosexuality
the way I want and we’ll just pretend we never met, full stop.’ I still felt a little
cheated but there didn’t seem like there was any other way of dealing with it.
Life went on as normal and as time went on it just didn’t seemto matter asmuch
as it used to, I became used to it and as such it was easily ignored.
I felt happy enough as I turned sixteen. But something had changed. As
much as I was peacefully ignoring homosexuality, I couldn’t help but make
a number of strange observations. Observation number one was: Why is it
that the couple of guys in my classes that I always thought seemed attractive,
are now definitely not as attractive as they used be? It seemed very
odd. Observation number two was: If I’m gay then why is it that I’m not
attracted to Brad Pitt? I can see he’s a very handsome guy and I’ve heard
he’s a gay idol but now that I take a look I find that I have no attraction
for him or in fact any adult male no matter how good-looking. Observation
number 3: Disturbingly, why is it that the only guys who do seem attractive
are the ones aged around twelve or thirteen? In fact, they seem more like
boys than anything else. I started to get a very bad feeling that something
was going very, very wrong. The more I looked at it the more worried I
was getting. I simply didn’t know what or why this was happening to me.
That was the year when Father Smith hit the front page of every newspaper
my parents brought home with them. A new evil was born from an
inferno of horror and fear and its name was Paedophilia. I had never heard
that word before that. Father Smith was a paedophile and as the newspaper
explained, a paedophile was a person who had an attraction to children.
Father Smith had sex with young boys. The only people I seemed to be
attracted to were boys. At first a wave of utter disbelief and confusion
passed over me. There is no way on God’s green earth I would do anything
like the horror Father Smith perpetrated on those boys. I started to think
that whatever Father Smith had it must be different from what I have. I
mean, why did he do those things? Why would you hurt any boy? It simply
didn’t make any sense whatsoever. As the weeks and months passed by I
read every article about paedophilia from the papers my parents brought
home. I made sure I was very careful not to let my parents or anyone else in
my family see me read these articles. One Sunday, in an in-depth investigation
of paedophilia, the newspaper finally explained why people like Father
Smith were so cruel to children. Paedophilia is an ‘incurable psychological
disease’ it wrote, and it is only a matter of time, circumstance and
opportunity before a paedophile strikes his victim.
As the realisation of what this meant set in, it started to dawn on me that
paedophilia, as a disease, must be like a cancer. A cancer of the mind.
What I knew about cancer was that it’s a disease that starts off very small.
So small you wouldn’t even know it was there. As time goes by it begins to
consume everything around it to the point that by the time you find out you
have it, it would be, more or less, too late to do anything about it. Then it
would kill you. I realised that paedophilia had started off small. I didn’t
even realise I had it all this time. I thought it was homosexuality. I’m only
sixteen now and that’s why I’m still a good person but as time goes by
paedophilia would slowly consume all that was good and decent inside me,
then it would only be a matter of circumstance and opportunity before I
start raping, beating and destroying boys too! I would become as evil as
Father Smith. There will be nothing I could do to stop it. Every night these
thoughts would circle my head time and time again. Fear started to grow
slowly at first but very surely. ‘Something’s coming’ I thought. Some kind
of remorseless and shameless joy from raping and beating innocent boys.
Night after night alone in my bedroom fear was growing and growing, I
could feel it. There was such a hatred for paedophiles being expressed by
every newspaper and the thing about it was, they were right to feel that
way about Father Smith and people like him. People like me. I suddenly
realised at this point, that everyone in this life, my friends, my family, my
mum and dad, all hate me too, it’s just that they don’t know it yet! I started
to feel isolated from everyone around me. To feel alone in this world, to
face a battle with a cancer I might never win.
To walk around with a worried face or to act any differently would draw
questions from parents, teachers or friends. Questions I most certainly had
no answers to and a personal issue I could afford no one in my life to find out
about. When I was around people I literally reverted back to my normal
everyday self. What I thought was homosexuality had already trained me to
do this. I felt and displayed no fear or concern to anyone and dealt with
everyone and everything the way I would as if this thing didn’t exist.
At night-time, however, when I was alone in my room, that’s when Pandora’s
box would open and all hell rode out from it. How anyone could live with
the shame of sexually abusing boys is one question. But how could anyone
continue to live with the shame of knowing they are destined to destroy
boys is quite another. I asked myself, ‘Is it right for me to continue to live
knowing what I’ll end up doing to boys in the future?’ I felt the answer but
didn’t say it. Suicide had entered the equation. Suicide brought with it the
absolute, guaranteed and undisputable fact that I would never in this life
harm even one boy ever, full stop.
I knew that if I didn’t find my way out of paedophilia and soon then I
was going to die by my own hand. The search was on. I don’t remember
anyone around me ever talking about it even though I tried to listen for it. I
went back into the newspapers reading and rereading the articles, trying to
‘read between the lines’. I didn’t know exactly what I was looking for but I
thought I’d know if I found it. But as time went by there was a gathering sense
that I wouldn’t find anything in the newspapers. I had read these papers for
over two years now and the stories were always the same, time and again. I
was slowly losing hope that I’d find something to save me. Suicide was with
me night after night. As the weeks went by fear was ebbing away to the
sorrow of slowly accepting my fate. I had done everything I could, I’ve done
the best I can, I’ve explored all the options. There just wasn’t any way out.
I started to think more about the concept of suicide and what it meant. It
meant I was never going to hurt any boy, guaranteed. I then began to
realise that what I was going to do through suicide was to actually save
boys and anyone who actively does something to save another, especially
children, is called ‘a hero’. The term ‘a paedophile’ means ‘a destroyer of
children’. But I’m going to be saving boys not hurting them. It means I’m not
‘a paedophile’ in any way, shape or form. While it’s clear beyond doubt that
no one in this life could ever love ‘a paedophile’ it is, however, just as clear
that everyone in this life certainly loves ‘a hero’. Everyone loves a hero!
Everyone loves…me! Of course they do! Everything was perfect. Everything
was beautiful. Everything made brilliant sense, all questions answered. Suicide
isn’t a decision, it’s an understanding. A perfect understanding. The next
day I when I left my room I was walking around on a cloud. I could barely
keep the smile off my face. Everything felt so different, so bright. The horrific
disease had gone so I could find no fault within myself and therefore no
fault in anyone else either. Everything was perfect. After a couple of days
of walking around feeling great I knew the time had come to plan how I
was going to commit suicide. In my room that night I settled down to the
task of finding a way to commit suicide.
There seemed to be many ways to do it from drug overdose to walking in
front of a bus. I quickly enough generated a small list of priorities that a
suicide method must fulfil. Priority number one: it must at all costs be
guaranteed. Priority number two: it has to be quick. Priority number three:
if possible it has to be painless. The best way seems to be slitting my wrists
with a razor in the bathroom. This seems perfect. It’s absolutely guaranteed
beyond doubt, it will take five minutes maximum, it’s quick and of course
the deeper the cut the less the pain. Now that I picked the method and the
place it was now time to set the date. I chose a date about a month and a
half away. All I had to do now was sit and wait. I sat there on the eve of
the appointed day with the razor in my hand but I just couldn’t do it!
While it most certainly wasn’t the last time I came close to suicide in
those first few years, no other time had such an impact on me. My psychology
had collapsed and I emotionally and logically flat-lined with no
more ability to function than to just show people what they wanted to see
so I could get to the end of my day and disappear under the pillow. The
story from that suicide attempt to now is one I would call a slow rebuild of
personal ideology and understanding of how my life works.
What I think this story does quite well, is combat the assumption that there is an 'us' and 'them'. The unfortunate reality is that pedophiles are 'normal' people like you and me. We are NOT evil by design, but live with a constant battle between desire and morality.
Now to address a couple of the questions put to me in the previous topic.
What are your views on the age of consent?
Having grown up in the UK, I have been conditioned to believe that 16 is an appropriate age of consent. Richard Dawkin, when referring to religion, challenges Christian's on the assumption that Christianity is the only true religion by pointing out that if they were born in the middle east, they would feel the same away about Allah, and if they were born in Asia, they may very well be saying the same about Buddah. My point is, I have been brought up in a society which believes that 16 is an appropriate age to have sex. I recognise that things were different in the past, and that this perspective varies depending on culture, but if I was to stand up and give my personal objective opinion, I would have to say that I believe sexual readiness is an individual thing. I don't think coercion, manipulation or social pressures should EVER factor into a persons decision to engage in sexual activity, and with that being said, I can only say that I believe it is an individual thing.
How do you feel about chemical castration?
I believe that society has a responsibility, in its role to protect children, to provide chemical castration to anybody who asks for it, but that it should never be forced upon a person. In the same way that children have a fundamental human right to the integrity of their body, it would be hypocritical for society to violate this right by forcing castration upon anyone against their will. I would personally never choose this option because I don't generally have control issues.
Why did you not just seek professional help, rather than going to the police?
First let me explain that in my mind, police would lead to court, and court would lead to support. I don't doubt that as humans, the police (on an individual level) would want me to suffer for my crimes, but I have faith in the BRITISH justice system, and knew that I would get a fair trial (which I did). Now, in answering this question, it is important for me to reiterate that I am only talking about the British system, and make no claims to know anything about the way the system is managed in America or any other country.
I'll start off by saying that for someone in my position, not only is there very little help out there, but the help which is out there is extremely restricted. I have family who work in the mental health profession, and can say from speaking to them that any counsellor faced with a client who exhibits these concerns will be in a very tricky situation. The media hysteria, legal confusion and general unease in our society means that in reality, most mental health professionals (unless they have previous experience of dealing with this) will report 'concerns' to the anonymous crimestoppers helpline. This is the reality faced by people living with my problems in the UK. There is one charity called the Lucy Faithful Foundation which offers support, but I have not yet had any support from them so I would not be able to comment.
Going to the police for me was ultimately a way for me to put a stop to my behaviour. I wanted to be sure that I could never fall foul to temptation ever again (in respect of looking at images) and that I would be access support to help me to deal with my problems. People have asked me why I didn't just destroy the evidence and try and get on with my life. People need to understand that I did this for myself more than anything, so I could build myself up again.
I would NOT have been able to make the same decision in America, and I feel fortunate that I live in a society which has a bit more perspective.
What ages are you attracted to?
I have never tried to engage in physical contact with a child in real life, so my experience is only with photographs, but I am sexually attracted (primarily) to children (girls and boys) aged between about 5 - 14. Since handing myself in, I have been spending time exploring whether or not I might be able to live life as a gay man, so my attractions for girls is diminishing. I still find boys aged 11 and up incredibly attractive, but have not looked at child porn since handing myself in. I have been able to cope without it, by looking at cute boys (non pornographic) on a computers. I have never really been physically draw towards children in real life. This is something which always confused me, because the media portrayed pedophiles as people who lusted over children at school and in parks without any sort of ability to control their urges. This was never the case with me. I have always been able to maintain appropriate relationships with children without it always being sexual.
What do you think the attraction is? What about midgits, youthful looking adults or adults dressed as children?
I think the attraction is to innocence. This is hard to explain to anyone who doesn't feel the same. I don't personally understand the attraction to breasts, but if I was to ask a hetrosexual male to explain the attraction, I doubt he would be able to typify it. Midgits and adults dressed as children do nothing for me. You can't really trick a brain. I am attracted to twinks though (gay term meaning hairless, youthful looking males), but I have had sex with a couple, and while I feel an attraction (and arousal) its nothing compared to the feeling I got looking at the images. I reckon it would be a manageable alternative, but its not really the same.
Some people claim that I am an enabler of child abuse. PLEASE explain to me how - I would LOVE to know..
I downloaded the images using P2P software. The sharing feature on the software was turned off, so nobody ever downloaded anything from my computers. The people who I was downloading images from had no idea who I was, or that I was downloading images from their computer, so they could get no sort of gratification from knowing that their material was being shared (the sharer is generally unaware of how many people are sharing their content). I never paid for the material and never went on any websites for the material which had adverts on, so I was not supporting the hosting of such content. Please, someone explain to me how I was enabling or supporting the creation of the market. That would be like claiming that if I was to pirate a song from the software, I would be supporting the artist. I would really like to know the logic behind this assumption. I am not being ignorant, I just like to get to the bottom of things myself, so until I understand the logic behind the claims, I don't think I was supporting the market in any way.
Do you want children later on in life?
To frame the answer to this question, I think it would be worth first considering the restrictions of not actually being sexually attracted to women. This in itself, for any gay man, would cause difficulties. I don't currently have a desire to have children, but if I was to want them in future life, I am confident that I wouldn't be overly concerned with my ability (or be it, lack of) to control myself. I will cross that bridge when I come to it, but it is hard for me to comment at such a young age.
What about friends and family?
I have lost a lot of friends and my place at university because of this, but my family are so far being supportive. I don't doubt that this is hard for my family to deal with, but they have faith in my character and knowing that they are well educated and able to come at this situation logically, gives me comfort.
Why would you hand yourself in? This seems stupid / naive
You have to understand just how hard it is living with such a terrible secret. Not being able to gain any sort of perspective over the situation, or talk to ANYBODY about your concerns is a very isolating place to be. I made the decision to hand myself in to break the cycle, no matter what the costs. I am a logical and intelligent person. If you don't understand the logic in my decision, then to say that I can honestly say that living with this secret (isolated, scared) is WORSE than facing public condemnation, maybe that will help you to appreciate just how hard it is. When making ones-self subject to public scrutiny is the FAVORABLE option, it just shows how hard it is. The decision I made was an informed one, so I am not naive or irrational.
How can you say that you are disgusted at child abuse if you 'got off' to images of it?
In my mind, looking at those images was the 'lesser of two evils'. I was made to believe from a young age that I was destined to abuse children. Yes, at first (when I was first accessing that material), it was of people roughly my age so I saw no moral issue looking at it, but as I grew up and realised it was bad, I felt that dealing with the sexual feelings by satisfying them (in a way that does not cause harm to others) is preferable to trying to suppress the urges in fear of one day snapping.
I took steps to ensure (as far as I saw it anyway) that I was not supporting the global market, and that I was just a fly on the wall, rather than a part of the problem. In that respect, I can still despise anybody who creates that sort of material or who abuses children.
END OF QUESTIONS
I may edit this topic and add questions as I get asked more, but I think I have covered the majority of the (reasonable) questions asked in the previous topic.
I would like to spend the rest of my life combating the hysteria perpetuated in the media, and help people in my situation who, from a young age, are confused and worried about their sexual orientations. Our society is failing people like me. I am by no means down playing the seriousness of the actions of child molesters, but then again I am talking about pedophiles, NOT child molesters.
I will add more to this topic as things come up, but please feel free to ask me anything.