On Pedophelia

Italian road sign, “Attenzione Prostitute,”
featuring provocatively dressed woman,
confuses drivers, are they crossing or available?

It appears that the Unholy Church of the Unrepentant Pedophiles is coming in for more and more criticism, and rightly so I think. For a while the Church tried to pass off the problem of pedophilia as a peculiarly American problem. But now it has spread so far around the world that can no longer be used to dismiss it. It seems even the Pope himself is now thought to be guilty of protecting pedophiles, and there is, I gather, evidence this may well be so. This scandal involves quite a number of questions that are of interest. For example, some say the Pope cannot even be questioned about his role in defending pedophiles because he is a head of state (the Vatican). Does this mean, like Yoo’s argument about executive power, that heads of state are not subject to the same laws as other people? This seems unreasonable to me, what if the President or the Pope were themselves guilty of pedophilia (I am not suggesting this might be so). I mean, are there individuals who are in fact above the law? I do not mean this as a diatribe against the Catholic Church, but as an atheist and a non-Catholic I must confess I have always thought the Catholic Church was, shall I just say, “medieval.” When I think of grown, mostly older men, walking around in brocaded gowns and funny hats (and sometimes shoes), looking like wealthy women in the 16th century, I cannot take them seriously. What is worse, they attempt to tell the rest of the world how to behave and promote ideas that are themselves medieval. No female priests, for example. No birth control, abortions, euthanasia, and etc. As I understand it many members of the church do not even follow this advice these days, and I gather their membership is declining. Given how completely out of touch they seem to be I do not find this surprising.

But what I find of the greatest interest is how widespread pedophilia must have been for such a long time. Was there something about the Church that attracted pedophiles, or did priests become pedophiles because they could not marry? I do not find this latter condition to be very convincing because one would think priests violating their vows of celibacy with females would be much more common that it apparently is. Further, I think pedophiles, for the most part, are in fact interested in children specifically rather than other sex objects. I am not surprised that pedophilia occurred in the Church, I am surprised at how common it seems to have been. I am also surprised to learn how common it apparently is outside the Church. For example, the Boy Scouts are now in the midst of a scandal over pedophilia and it appears to have been far from rare in that organization. I note there have also been cases among some of the more fundamental congregations. And pedophiles are arrested, I guess, almost every day, especially in conjunction with child pornography. It also occurs with some regularity in prisons, and, of course, is known to be widespread in Afghanistan (I believe that it is more or less culturally accepted there). And adult/boy “love” was practiced in Greek culture and has long been fairly common in English boarding schools.

As pedophilia appears to have been so commonplace it makes me wonder all the more about human sexuality. To me the desire to have sex with children seems completely unnatural. But it is apparently fairly common. Has this always been so, or does this have something to do with evolution or cultural change? As far as I could determine the people I worked with in the New Guinea Highlands were completely unaware of such problems and, when informed about them, thought it was too stupid to be true (it apparently does occur in some places in New Guinea but is, I believe, pretty rare). When I think of pedophilia along with the current apparently insatiable demand for Viagra and Cialis, and that, also along with the more widespread acceptance of homosexuality in general, plus the seeming growing acceptance of oral sex (which prior to Hefner was regarded as a disgusting no-no), and all of this along with what we have learned in recent years about sadistic and masochistic sex, and other perversions so strange as to be almost unbelievable, I think our views about human behavior in general, and sexuality in particular, might need some serious updating. It could be the case that all of this has always been the case and has only come to light now in more enlightened times. I suspect, however, that even Freud, if he were still with us, would find his views on human sexuality rather naïve. “Sexual addiction” has not yet officially been including in the Psychiatric Diagnostic Manual (I forget its official title), but I bet it will before long (anything to make a buck), and I won’t even be the least bit surprised when a pill for it is discovered and marketed.

LKBIQ:
I can remember when the air was clean and sex was dirty.
George Burns

TILT:
Giant bamboo is the largest plant of the grass family.