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The only celibate pedophile I really know is me. What I want to know most about others is whether they are good people. Ethan Edwards is the co-founder of Virtuous Pedophiles. Blog posts reflect his personal views, and are not statements from the organization. Celibate pedophiles generally stay hidden, all too aware of the hatred and prejudice they are likely to encounter if they reveal themselves. Some of us appear in discussion forums online, and I posted some anecdotes of [the things we do].There is a natural tendency among those of us conversing online to think that we represent all celibate pedophiles. But it's not a random group of us who show up. Requirements for participation are access to internet technology and a willingness to read lots of text. These could in turn be correlated with economic status and education. Another requirement is the desire to come online and make oneself known. If celibate pedophiles are content with their situation and don't consider their attraction as a strong part of their identity, they would have little incentive to show up, even anonymously. Desire aside, another requirement is a willingness to come online. Nervous pedophiles may understand that the apparent anonymity provided by an anonymous email isn't great protection. Law enforcement could quite plausibly track them down with a warrant, or the ISPs could be storing that information for use later if laws or police procedures change. These hurdles a pedophile has to pass before speaking up online could be correlated with other important differences.
Anonymous surveys of college students have provided interesting data on the prevalence of pedophilia in the population, but I am not aware of any correlations with other interesting traits — except maleness. Far more men than women report a sexual interest in children.
There have also been studies considering sex offenders against adults in comparison with pedophilic sex offenders against children. Several interesting differences have been found. Of course these are not studies of celibate pedophiles, but it is a reasonable scientific inference that if sex offenders against children differ from offenders against adults in certain ways, celibate pedophiles and law-abiding teleiophiles (ordinary folks) would also differ in those ways. Those studies indicate that pedophiles are on average shorter, less intelligent, and much more likely to be left-handed.
The only celibate pedophile I really know is me. What I want to know most about others are not such incidental matters as whether they are short or left-handed. I want to know most of all whether they are good people. I'm also interested in whether they are outgoing or reserved, kind or selfish, trustworthy or devious, impulsive or more controlled. Intelligence may be correlated with some of those things, but only weakly. (The correlation of pedophilia with intelligence is itself not very strong, so the result of combining the two is an even weaker relationship.)
And now I get to the point of the post. Except where we have evidence to the contrary, the most sensible conclusion is that pedophiles are just like everybody else. Do they tend to be unkind? It is just as likely that they tend to be kinder. In particular, there is no reason to think that pedophiles are more devious, less ethical, or less in control of their behavior than other people.
There is another point. Ordinary people cover a certain range on just about any trait you can think of. The assumption ought to be that pedophiles cover the same range. This idea of great variability within a group is one we should be familiar with. If you've never met anyone from some ethnic group, you may begin with certain stereotypes, but as you get to know several of them you will see that they are quite different from each other. In the case of pedophiles, it may be a long time before you get to know very many, but you should still assume that we are a group with the same diversity as any other.
Lastly, a very small percentage of teleiophiles commit sex crimes. The assumption we should start with is that only a tiny percentage of pedophiles commit sex crimes. There may be reasons to alter that assessment, but the baseline from which we should start is that just as few pedophiles commit sex crimes as teleiophiles.
This content was taken from Ethan's longstanding blog, Celibate Pedophiles. Some of the titles and taglines have been edited for their inclusion at thepword.
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