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In my previous post I suggested that it is very hard to tell people online that you are a celibate pedophile without getting a strong negative reaction. I speculated that when people hear you use the term, they assume you are up to no good. You can say forcefully or calmly that you are celibate, that you will always be celibate, that you have no desire to change any laws, and that you hate child molesters as much as they do. But it still doesn't do much good.I have occasionally run into people who do seem to take in the message but then reply, "So why are you saying this? Why don't you keep it to yourself and do something productive with your time instead of talking about such an unpleasant subject?" They can understand why a pedophile would try to drum up support for lower age of consent laws, and they would savagely condemn him and oust him from whatever conversation is going on. But otherwise, what's the point?
We pedophiles do not disappear when you stop thinking about us. We're still here. We are hated so much that we keep our identities hidden. Since we must stay hidden, the only pedophiles you know are the criminals among us, and hatred of them is generalized to us all. It is a tightly closed, vicious circle.
A new way to look at a celibate pedophile who announces himself online is that he is taking one small step to try to break that circle. The revelation may seem strange, coming out of the blue. But he is not just trying to stir up controversy or cause trouble. If enough pedophiles do start announcing themselves, it will become more accepted.
He may not be asking for anything at all, just the willingness to be known and accepted. An anonymous environment is a place to start. People like to be known for who they truly are and not feel the need to keep a secret which is central to their self-concept. But of course there are some important changes a pedophile might want to society, starting with an ability to get psychological help without worrying about mandated reporting, and he might talk about some of those things.
The groundwork for those changes is people at large coming to view celibate pedophiles as real people who aren't so very different from them.
Celibate pedophiles do sometimes "come out" to friends and family. Sometimes it goes well and sometimes it does not. When it goes well it is still a secret shared within a very small group. But if attitudes started to soften a little, more could come out and they could come out to more people. Ordinary folks when conversing might realize that they both know a celibate pedophile. Perhaps at some point celibate pedophilia could be as accepted as being gay is today — which is of course still very far from ideal, but sounds like an unattainable dream to pedophiles.
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