Whilst the nation’s inquiry into child sexual abuse continues to think on the terms it will use to define its investigation, it is most likely that it won’t include addressing the deeper causes of child abuse, and will focus instead on which department failed to make “that call”, or use the right form. That is hardly going to satisfy victims of child abuse, nor should it satisfy the public, either. (We will be writing a piece on the Inquiry next week, so we’d like to offer more thoughts on that later).
But a chance encounter with a paedophile online last week left us convinced that in order to make the most of the inquiry, we must first understand exactly how paedophilia works, and the many different mindsets that come to it.
On the evening of the 21st March, we were tweeting about child welfare matters, as we do, and happened to mention that research suggested a great many individuals who had been arrested for paedophilia related offences were in fact school teachers. This prompted a response from an online paedophile, Simon Falko.
What transpired was a hugely thought-provoking, and provocative conversation.
Simon Falko is one of a significant number of paedophiles using Twitter, but he is not underground. The police won’t need to scour the underbelly of the internet to find him, nor will they need to interrogate him about where he stands on paedophilia. All they need to do is read his Twitter feed. This is because Simon belongs to a group of paedophiles who label themselves as non-offending, actively and openly using social media to highlight paedophilia and access support. And within that group, Simon is something of an activist.
Like many vocal paedophiles online who define themselves as non offending (those who haven’t had sex with, or groomed children) and who view non offending as an important distinction in the paedophilia debate, he is open about his preferences. His Twitter biography simply says, “I started to realize in puberty I am not only attracted to women but also to young boys.”
Simon’s lists of people he follows and who follow him, make for sobering reading. Accounts belonging to young boys, toddlers, and naked men with large genitalia, as well as various accounts which clearly belong to paedophiles, their biographies declarations of underage desire – “I am sexually and emotionally attracted to children”; “I am attracted to young girls. Very young.”; “I am attracted to little girls.”; “Paedophile activist.”; “Christian boy lover,” all sit quietly alongside one another on the Twitter page.
There are also what appear to be accounts which share films about young boys, though not sexual in nature (films like Pagnol’s Glory to My Father, and the family comedy, Yours Mine and Ours”). A fascination with psychology, sexual behaviour and human rights also features, with accounts from Richard Dawkins to professors studying sexual violence against children evident. Simon also follows an association which provides treatment for sexual abusers.
It is a fascinating online community, and it is unique amongst paedophiles. For a start the community is visible, actively engaging members of the public on the stigmas it feels exist in relation to the practice of paedophilia, and of course, its members all label themselves as non offending. Simon’s own followers, like others in the community, distinguish themselves from other paedophiles through the medium of their Twitter bio – “I am a non offending pedophile”; “I am sexually attracted to prepubescent boys but I never have, and never will, touch a child sexually.”; “My sexual attraction to children does not prevent me from following my country’s laws, or practicing good ethics.”
It is a hugely political and often eloquent community, but why are they really there, and what do they hope to achieve by engaging the rest of us in a debate on the stigmatisation of paedophilia?
Simon told us that he wanted to be a teacher, but wasn’t sure he could be around children. When we asked him why he was so open about his sexual preferences on Twitter, his response was that he wanted to discuss paedophilia because, he felt, people had a distorted image of what it really was.
In particular, he was concerned that the term paedophilia was automatically associated with child molestation, rather than what he felt was a more romantic view of the preference or urge. Paedophilia, Simon explained, was also an emotional pursuit, where adults can and do, fall in love with children. Essentially, he wanted a distinction to be made between those who sexually assault children, and those who simply fall in love with them. But in reality, that is not such an easy distinction to make.
When we asked Simon if the line between offending and non offending paedophiles was stable, his reply was a little defensive. We then asked him what stopped non offending paedophiles from crossing that line: social conformity and a fear of punishment were, Simon felt, effective deterrents. But perhaps not deterrents that always lasted forever.
And then we discussed the mindset of those paedophiles who did molest children.
Simon told us that paedophiles who have sex with children, fall into two categories: those who simply didn’t care about whether their actions were hurting others, and those who had genuine difficulty controlling their urges. We asked Simon if he thought mental health could play a part in one or both of those categories, but we never got a reply, and then he silently slipped back into the Twitter stream.
We know that paedophilia is a world-wide phenomenon, crossing boundaries, cultures and class divides, but our research on its prevalence in society and those who either engage or fall prey to it is still too limited. There are many theories today about why some adults engage in paedophilia, and although Simon and other non offending paedophiles would like a distinction to be made between those paedophiles that offend and those that do not, in practice this seems futile. The law already makes that distinction to some degree by charging and registering sex offenders, but as Simon points out, the risk of non offending paedophiles remaining non offending is not guaranteed.
So should we take to social media forums, hunt out these non offending paedophiles because they haven’t offended – yet – and demand that they turn themselves in? Absolutely not. This online community of visible paedophiles represents a remarkable milestone in the movements to both understand paedophilia better and to give paedophiles who want to contain their urges the tools to do so. There is of course, no denying that the internet also provides unfettered access to images and content featuring young children.
The question over whether paedophilia, defined in some quarters as an abnormal interest in children, is a mental illness is hotly debated. One school of thought tells us “the single greatest cause that drives an adult to sexually interact with a child is a sexual desire for a little girl or boy,” and that this type of urge is effectively a disorder, defined as such by the American Psychiatric Association in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, DSM-IV-TR. Whether paedophiles can contain this disorder, with or without treatment, is still unclear.
Simon’s Twitter account highlights that ongoing struggle. Juxtaposed accounts featuring research on paedophilia, sexuality and the ethics of sex sit awkwardly with accounts held, allegedly, by “Minor-Attraction/Pedo Friendly” thirteen year old boys, and young, gay men. Are Simon, and others in the community, using the internet to indulge in conversation and file sharing whilst using research and conversation to deter them from acting further on their impulses? Is there a darker side to their discourse? Nestled in amongst his followers is an account which claims to be “resisting the 21st century holocaust due to paedohysteria and creeping feminist sexual offence laws.” Simon is not following this account.
The community of non offending paedophiles online is a brave one. Willing to engage, and to discuss the issues, they represent a level of self awareness which should be encouraged and supported. As Simon told me, those paedophiles who do not go on to molest, make that choice because they don’t want to harm the children they love and some change their preferences over time, no longer drawn sexually to children. But not all paedophiles can make that choice or find their sexual preferences change.
If we consider that a romantic, or sexual desire for young children is indicative of a mental disorder, and we do, it is communities like these which offer us the best chance of understanding the phenomenon and greater opportunities for paedophiles looking for help and support, to find it.
You can read the conversation with Simon in full, below:
Researching Reform 
Natasa, the paedophiles will end up just as the PIE peadophile exchange information which people will say dont be daft Maggie Cameron did not bring in the sex education act so that children will be groomed for sex in the schools, well I say read the papers of the reports of the amount of young kids who are being charged and sent to detention centre for sex acts with each other , which takes me back to my letter to Cameron, do we now with the new sex act watch our children having sex instead of playing with toys and learning, paedophilia is all part of PIE to have sex with young children. This British Empire Parliment and the Lords needs to close down but then who can we trust to take over, and thousands of people went to war for what. NOTHING.
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Hi Maggie, I know what you mean. This group though say they are non offending, and whilst I’m sure some will go on to offend, or perhaps even have, it may be a community that genuinely wants to distance itself from those that do molest children. If that’s the case, they should be supported, I think.
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How many of those who rape children were abused themselves as children?
In my friends work, she found 100%.
Pedophile is a poor choice of word for a child rapist – as it implies love and how many pedophiles know what love is?
“The modern clinical term Pedophilia
The term Pedophilia (first recorded in 1951) is a modern term created from the Greek words (gen. paidos) “child” (see pedo-) + philos “loving.”
Contrary to public belief, the term Pedophilia has the unfortunate literal meaning of “loving children”, than the criminal action of child abuse. While Pedophilia has absolutely no religious significance as a word, its continued use as a term to describe child molestation and child abuse is misleading—implying those branded as “pedophiles” have some emotional empathy towards their victims (implied by philes/philos-love).”
http://one-evil.org/content/acts_child_molestation.html
Sex and love are not the same thing but society is groomed to believe that they are one and the same.
Kinsey training has a lot to answer for – grooming judges etc to believe child rape does no harm to the child and incest can be a good experience.?
But who actually sits down with the child victims and listens with eyes, ears, heart and intuition?
I would love professionals to meet my 14 year old neighbour who was raped and cut with bottles so bad that he needed surgery.
The imprint of the pain and torture never goes away and he would love to suicide out to forget all about it. The “pedophile” violent rapist was highly manipulative and good at grooming professionals with twisting words.
That is not loving the child, that is dark sadistic cruel violence.
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Hi LP, the research I’ve read suggests that some paedophiles have been abused, but others are suffering with mental health difficulties for various reasons, too. Did you see the news item about the Earl od Sandwich who revealed recently that his father sexually abused him daily? His mother had left and the father suffered some kind of breakdown which meant he used his son as “comfort”. Just awful, but highlights the varied ways in which people come to abuse children.
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I don’t know about any number specific for child rapists. I’ve seen some numbers for child molesters (which is not the same as child rapist, we need to differentiate between cases when child is enforced to the activities by force or threats and cases without enforcement, though the boundary is not always clear) and they varied wildly, from about 20 % to about 90 %. Such a great differences suggests some studies are heavily biased. A lot of such studies are based on self-report and the offenders may lie to shift guilt from themselves to something else. Especially older studies may be affected by this (in newer studies scientists watch more for possible biases and try to prevent them for example by anonymisation of the participants). Also it needs to be stressed that not all of child molesters are pedophiles.
How many pedophiles know what love is? Most of those I know. And I think even a lot of child molesters do. A lot of child molesters don’t realize the level of harm they can cause. And I think it’s quite understandable given how media report child abuse cases. Typically they report the most serious cases and portray the offender as a monster who enjoy harming children. So someone can think that he loves children and what he do is totally different and can’t harm the child (while it can harm children, sometimes severely, though the consequences are usually much milder than those horrible cases media focus on). Quite a big part of child molesters are young pedophiles who often don’t admit to themselves they are pedophiles. They can get into situation that is tempting for them totally unprepared for it – and than it’s easy to go with wishful thinking, especially if the person gets sexually aroused. And I don’t say it is desriptive for all offenders. There are offenders who are selfish and don’t care about the children or even enjoy harming them. But it would be a huge mistake to consider them representative of all offenders.
I agree that labeling all child molesters pedophiles and calling pedophilia is incorrect. Those terms already have a different meaning in sexology. Maybe the term isn’t the best (for pedophiles pederast would be probably better, but that term already had some meaning). However, it happens that the meaning of terms get shifted and today -philia is used widely in psychiatry to describe a lasting strong desire for something (not necessary sexual) and it’s overall pretty neutral.
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wish i knew how to get on twitter then that simion would get s— from me so he is lucky, but i would face him any day then perhaps end up in Prison for beating s– out of him, and he would walk free as all of the paedos do.
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Hi Maggie! It was hard for me to write this article, my natural sympathy lies with the children in this scenario, but this community seem to want to remove themselves from the offending brigade. The fact that they need to engage with boys/ girls online though, even in a look don’t touch sort of way to me says they are mentally unwell and need help. If we help them, they don’t go on to offend.
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In 10-20 years time it will be a criminal offence to criticise or insult paedophiles (whether active or not) and the politically correct brigade will have won yet another battle……………..
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I hear you, but this isn’t about freedom of speech, really. This is about looking at paedophilia and the community and seeing the nuance in it, and whether that nuance can help our understanding of the phenomenon.
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They should criminalize pedophobia (hatred against pedophiles). No one should be assaulted for being a pedophile.
The media profits on pedophobia. Pedophiles are marginalized for their sexual orientation, as gays were a few decades ago.
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This is a very interesting conversation you have had Natasha. It may be a way forward. I think the essence is that everyone has feelings – we are complex beings and at least this chap is being honest about his, and in the present climate, extremely brave. I’ve long thought that we have to try and understand what causes paedophilia in order to try and tackle it. As you say, it seems to be very common. The over-riding consideration is the harm it does to children, true, lasting damage: and it takes away their childhood, their innocence. And as has been mentioned, then the victims often become perpetrators in later life. We hate what they do, but we also must try to get to the reasons why men and some women do this. We will never have a hope of stopping it just by hating those who do it.
I think it was a brave and forward-looking thing to do, to talk with this man. Some will pillory you, but I think you were right.
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Hi Roger, thank you for your comment. I have to admit that this kind of conversation doesn’t come naturally to me. My default instinct is always with children and victims of abuse and it’s a protective instinct which is strong. However, this community actively don’t want to offend, which I think makes them different. Granted there may be some in the community who are not genuine, but this does seem to me from the research I’ve done to be a community in earnest. ofcourse, if paedophilia does come about due to childhood experience, we could argue paedophiles are victims too, and I can appreciate that point of view, as that implies they are adults who suffered as children.
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There is research indicating that pedophilia is born or may appear over time. It is not the fault of being a pedophile.
This story of victims of sexual abuse becoming pedophiles is controversial. If someone has been abused and therefore abuses other children, it may not be a case of pedophilia. Pedophilia is not a desire to abuse children.
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All this talk of harm; Ask yourselves where does this ‘harm’ come from, when there’s no coercion or force used — Kids are sexual beings. Also there’s no mention of the ages of the kids in this discussion, For example; If they in the age range of 11 – 15 that would come under Hebephilia (attraction to early adolescents) When there’s no force or coercion an a sexual encounter with a minor (notice I use the word minor,not to assume paedophilia)… Sometimes the only harm is the stigma from society; Often there is no actual harm…This was highlighted in the Rind study 1998..where they differentiate between consensual and non consensual sexual encounters between adults and minors: And to avoid contamination bias – They used more value-neutral words like child/adult sex rather than assuming ‘abuse’ which is a legal term only.
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Children are those who do not reach puberty, in general, those under 9 years of age. “Hebephilia” does not exist.
Puberty begins around age 9, not 16. Puberty is responsible for adult sexuality.
The average age of menarche is 12 years. A 12-year-old woman strongly attracts men 10 to 100 years old (men who have reached puberty).
Adolescence is part of adulthood. The majority of nature is puberty.
So I defend an age of consent between 10-12 years (as it was in England in the nineteenth century before the Puritans increased). At least in the nineteenth century puberty was later.
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Firstly, paedophile is not an appropriate term for this group of people, they do not `love’ children but are solely sexually attracted to them, mainly because children are innocent and vulnerable to their advances and can more easily be made submissive to their controls, manipulations, grooming techniques, and gaslighting, which an intelligent adult would usually resist.
Secondly, the vast majority of child rape and sexual abuse occurs within the child’s own family (approximately 96% of reported cases.) and is committed mostly by male adult relatives or older children in the family. This is the group of most concern and where interventions are most needed, but extremely difficult to prove as criminal laws, the evidence acts, and even the Family Law gives them protection because of the “grave’ implications of such allegations to their reputations (see Briginshaw principle – UK 1938). They are also protected by misogynistic and chauvinistic beliefs and attitudes in the legal profession and the judiciary.
Thirdly, I do not believe that paedophilia is a mental illness i.e. a form of madness and disordered mind. It is a distortion and perversion of emotions and sexual feelings which have been distorted and misdirected during formative years, perhaps in some cases by being subjected to some form of sexual abuse during their own childhood or a too closely enmeshed emotional relationship with a parent.
Fourthly, what concerns me most is the absence in Simon’s dialogue of any empathy and compassion for the sufferings of child victims of paedophiles which is typical of paedophiles. They are completely unwilling or incapable of understanding the severe and long-lasting harms which they cause to children. Sometimes physical, but always mental and psychological harms and traumas which frequently cause lifelong difficulties for the victims. Such harms have been well-researched but a reading of the testimonies of the victims of paedophile priests to Child Sex Abuse Inquiries would leave no one in doubt about how their lives are destroyed or seriously damaged. Or of the high suicide rates among victims of child sexual abuse and of their incapacity to form and maintain relationships with other adults.
Finally, I view Simon’s approach as a rather crude attempt at grooming and manipulating a mass audience to gain some form or degree of acceptance of their perversions, and it is a clever deception. I have often seen similar use of grooming and manipulations in Family Court proceedings, of lawyers, CAFCASS workers, and even judges by paedophile fathers seeking contact with and custody of their children in order to continue in their sexually abusive behaviours. Even fathers who have records of child sexual abuse and violence and yet present themselves as Father of the Year to gain the prize they desire. At least one Family Court judge has even asserted that even paedophiles have a right to contact with and even the custody of their children – I cannot countenance a more heinous belief and attitude by a member of the judiciary, knowing the traumas and harms which children suffer. We have even seen in the past how they even groomed and manipulated naïve politicians into accepting them.
Simon is very clever and cunning in his approach but you cannot fool all of the people all of the time.
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Richard, I can understand your misgivings and criticisms, and to a substantial degree find myself on agreement in most, if not all, points. I am not expecting to convince anyone to think any differently, and so I must question why it is that I post; perhaps because there are few opportunities to speak one’s mind and heart in such a way.
I don’t disbelieve for a second there are non-offending paedophiles, largely because I count myself among their number. However, I don’t presume to speak for ‘paedophiles’ as a nebulous, often controversial, group, as much as I would not speak out on behalf of any conglomerate of distinct individuals united by a single criterion.
I would ask you to suspend your disbelief and moral outrage for just one moment, and imagine something. As I’m a man, I will use the male perspective. Imagine that you were born into a world where attraction towards women was considered taboo. Imagine your surprise, and even self-loathing, upon discovering that upon entry to your adolescence, you are afflicted with such an impulse.
Confused, alone, frightened. You are enraptured by their beauty, charmed by their personalities and compelled by their struggles. You want nothing more than to share in the experience of life – and each other – yet you know you cannot. For in doing so, you would be condemning your partner to a lifetime of suffering, all but for a fleeting moment of selfish bliss. You would be ostracised, incarcerated, even beaten to death. And worse, you could not take solace in your partner’s safety, for you knew that a lifetime of strife and turmoil awaited them.
And so it is for anyone unfortunate enough to claim to love children whilst also feeling attracted to them. It is physical and sexual, true, but also emotional. Realistically, few to no children would be able to engage me as an equal in conversation, but that doesn’t stop my caring for their wellbeing, nor for physical intimacy, the two of which are often diametrically opposed in this context.
I can’t speak to people who would act out their desires. Presumably they lack objectivity, self-control, empathy, or some combination of the above. I don’t think Simon was wrong in what he said regarding that, necessarily.
It’s just difficult. There is a litany of research out there to suggest that even in cases where a child consented to sexual contact, or even where they look back on their experiences with ambivalence or even positively, that it was still harmful to them or manifested in their lives in some way. Perhaps they became promiscuous, or perhaps found it difficult or even impossible to form healthy romantic attachments. That’s without confronting the most traumatic and abusive cases, in which case it is not uncommon for a person to lead a debauched, tortured and altogether too short existence. My heart goes out to that troubled teen, can you believe it? He doesn’t deserve to suffer like that; hell, nobody does, at least not one so young.
I can’t even begin to comprehend what it is to experience something so fundamentally damaging. How could I? I have felt (and continue to feel) the piercing sting and the dull ache of heartbreak, as I am thankfully not exclusive in my attractions. But without a foundation? It’s inconceivable.
The problem is that there are no certainties. Though I expect this will instinctively repulse many, if it was certain that a sexual or romantic encounter with a child would be experienced positively by them, with no negative emotions no lasting damage, no harm – or even to the contrary that it somehow helped them grow into themselves as people – then I would do it in a heartbeat. I believe in an anomalous minority of cases, this may be at least partially true.
However, not only are there no certainties but research indicates quite the opposite (with social hysteria making the experience even more confusing and isolating for the victim, who in some cases just wants their story to be heard and not feel judged). And so I seal this facet of my being to the furthest reaches of my consciousness, accepting it as a part of myself and controlling my impulses as necessary, but never allowing it to be known openly. I refuse to let it define me and never asked to be this way in the first place.
I just can’t see it as anything other than a human tragedy. For the paedophiles who do care and must eke out an existence of voluntary celibacy. And for the many children whose lives and potential have been devastated as a result of having been exposed to too much, too young.
I was never abused as a child. In fact, my own childhood was quite idyllic (far moreso than a turbulent adolescence and unfulfilling young adulthood anyway). I don’t know. I suppose I just wanted to portray that even if we harbour unconscionable desires, that doesn’t make all of us heartless beasts. Be as suspicious as you will, I don’t mind. In fact, I openly encourage it, as you do have childrens’ best interests at heart, and in a society rife with inept, young, single parents and broken families, I think love and support is desperately needed. I’ve said my piece.
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Most child abusers are not pedophiles.
Pedophiles can be parents and take good care of their children.
Although his sexuality is marginalized, the pedophile will not necessarily be unbalanced.
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It is total misnomer, since pedophile literally means pettyfriend, and gross crime of child abuse is neither petty nor friend at all!
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