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Statistics Laundering: false and fantastic figures,
Jan 03 2010
A very critical and well documented description of the myths, claimed to be "statistics", about child pornography and child abuse.
A very critical and well documented description of the myths, claimed to be "statistics", about child pornography and child abuse.
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The Trauma Myth: Understanding the True Dynamics of Sexual Abuse,
Jun 03 2010
Susan Clancy, in a nutshell, describes her theories on why sexual abuse is not seen as such by victims until the therapist has "reconceptualized" fully for the victim how the victims truly were abused and how their trust had been violated, even though the victims originally deny having felt that they had actually been abused.
Susan Clancy, in a nutshell, describes her theories on why sexual abuse is not seen as such by victims until the therapist has "reconceptualized" fully for the victim how the victims truly were abused and how their trust had been violated, even though the victims originally deny having felt that they had actually been abused.
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Pedophiles Find a Home on Wikipedia,
Jun 25 2010
A Fox news article on the attempts of Internet advocacy groups to maintain balanced information on Wikipedia.
A Fox news article on the attempts of Internet advocacy groups to maintain balanced information on Wikipedia.
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The Sexual Revolution and Children;
Der Spiegel,
Jul 02 2010
Translated from Der Spiegel: a description of the revolutionary years around 1968, when child sexuality was to be 'liberated' from 'bourgoise's' norms and culture, thus had to become completely free.
Translated from Der Spiegel: a description of the revolutionary years around 1968, when child sexuality was to be 'liberated' from 'bourgoise's' norms and culture, thus had to become completely free.
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Redeeming the Worst,
Jul 21 2010
What we’re watching is a morality play about the meanings of crime and punishment, a play whose antagonists have shaped the history of the American penal system.
On one side are those who seek retribution. To them, criminals, especially sex criminals, are unchangeable (or, in modern parlance, incurable), their sins indelible. The state’s duty, therefore, is not just to protect society but also to avenge the victims.
The other side believes, foremost, in rehabilitation — in moral language, redemption. To their supporters, Polanski has attained secular redemption through art; Berkowitz, divine redemption through worship.
Evidence overwhelmingly favors rehabilitation.
The rehabilitation principle dominated American criminology for much of the 20th century.
But in the law-and-order 1980s, the punishers began to win.
I spent a recent weekend with [...] people — ex-sex offenders, along with their families and allies, at the national convention of an extraordinary national movement, gathered under the umbrella of RSOL, or Reform Sex Offender Laws.
What we’re watching is a morality play about the meanings of crime and punishment, a play whose antagonists have shaped the history of the American penal system.
On one side are those who seek retribution. To them, criminals, especially sex criminals, are unchangeable (or, in modern parlance, incurable), their sins indelible. The state’s duty, therefore, is not just to protect society but also to avenge the victims.
The other side believes, foremost, in rehabilitation — in moral language, redemption. To their supporters, Polanski has attained secular redemption through art; Berkowitz, divine redemption through worship.
Evidence overwhelmingly favors rehabilitation.
The rehabilitation principle dominated American criminology for much of the 20th century.
But in the law-and-order 1980s, the punishers began to win.
I spent a recent weekend with [...] people — ex-sex offenders, along with their families and allies, at the national convention of an extraordinary national movement, gathered under the umbrella of RSOL, or Reform Sex Offender Laws.
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New mental health 'bible' will lead to almost everyone having a disorder, warn experts,
Jul 28 2010
British experts have warned the trend of diagnosing yet more mental health disorders was 'leaking into normality'.
An updated edition of a mental health bible for doctors could mean that soon no-one will be classed as normal, experts warned today.
Diagnoses for 'disorders' could be based on symptoms including toddler tantrums, mild mood swings and binge eating.
Sweeping changes are being made to the U.S Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), which influences practitioners around the world.
British experts have warned the trend of diagnosing yet more mental health disorders was 'leaking into normality'.
An updated edition of a mental health bible for doctors could mean that soon no-one will be classed as normal, experts warned today.
Diagnoses for 'disorders' could be based on symptoms including toddler tantrums, mild mood swings and binge eating.
Sweeping changes are being made to the U.S Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), which influences practitioners around the world.
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DSM-5 Proposals for Paraphilias: Suggestions for Reducing False Positives Related to Use of Behavioral Manifestations;
Archives of Sexual Behavior;
39(6), 1239–1244,
Aug 10 2010
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Crimen sollicitations: Tabooing incest after the orgy ;
Thymos;
4(2), 168,
Oct 01 2010
Late modernity's binary intrigue of child sexuality/abuse is understood as a backlash phenomenon reactive to a general trans-Atlantic crisis concerning the interlocking of kinship, religion, gender, and sexuality. Tellingly dissociated from 1980s gay liberation and recent encounters between queer theory and kinship studies, the child abuse theme articulates modernity's guarded axiom of tabooed incest and its projected contemporary predicament "after the orgy"-after the proclaimed disarticulation of religion-motivated, kin-pivoted, reproductivist, and gender-rigid socialities. "Child sexual abuse" illustrates a general situation of decompensated nostalgia: an increasingly imminent loss of the child's vital otherness is counter-productively embattled by the late modern overproduction of its banal difference, its status as "minor. " Attempts to humanize, reform, or otherwise moderate incest's current "survivalist" and commemorative regime of subjectivation, whether by means of ethical, empirical, historical, critical, legal, or therapeutic gestures, typically trigger the latter's panicked empiricism. Accordingly, most "critical" interventions, from feminist sociology and anthropology to critical legal studies, have largely been collusive with the backlash: rather than appraising the radical precariousness of incest's ethogram of avoidance in the face of late modernity's dispossessing analytics and semiotics, they tend to feed its state of ontological vertigo and consequently hyperextended, manneristic forensics.
Late modernity's binary intrigue of child sexuality/abuse is understood as a backlash phenomenon reactive to a general trans-Atlantic crisis concerning the interlocking of kinship, religion, gender, and sexuality. Tellingly dissociated from 1980s gay liberation and recent encounters between queer theory and kinship studies, the child abuse theme articulates modernity's guarded axiom of tabooed incest and its projected contemporary predicament "after the orgy"-after the proclaimed disarticulation of religion-motivated, kin-pivoted, reproductivist, and gender-rigid socialities. "Child sexual abuse" illustrates a general situation of decompensated nostalgia: an increasingly imminent loss of the child's vital otherness is counter-productively embattled by the late modern overproduction of its banal difference, its status as "minor. " Attempts to humanize, reform, or otherwise moderate incest's current "survivalist" and commemorative regime of subjectivation, whether by means of ethical, empirical, historical, critical, legal, or therapeutic gestures, typically trigger the latter's panicked empiricism. Accordingly, most "critical" interventions, from feminist sociology and anthropology to critical legal studies, have largely been collusive with the backlash: rather than appraising the radical precariousness of incest's ethogram of avoidance in the face of late modernity's dispossessing analytics and semiotics, they tend to feed its state of ontological vertigo and consequently hyperextended, manneristic forensics.
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Interrogating the Essential: Moral Baselines on Adult-Child Sex;
Thymos;
4(2), 149-167 ,
Oct 01 2010
In this paper I emphasize the multiple ways dominant moral and essentialist understandings feed into the wider regulatory norms and conventional thinking governing adult-child sexual relations. Clearly, researchers are not immune from the ascendant material and symbolic hegemony enjoyed by child sexual abuse (CSA) paradigms. Indeed the experience of the seven critical writers and researchers cited in the paper, coupled with the author's own experiences carrying out PhD research in this area, clearly reinforce this point. I contend that sociological and Foucauldian insights on age and sexual categorization can offer a helpful tool-kit for unpacking the contested claims from CSA survivors, child liber ationists, and the specific case of one respondent who resists victimological labelling of his sexual experiences with adults.
In this paper I emphasize the multiple ways dominant moral and essentialist understandings feed into the wider regulatory norms and conventional thinking governing adult-child sexual relations. Clearly, researchers are not immune from the ascendant material and symbolic hegemony enjoyed by child sexual abuse (CSA) paradigms. Indeed the experience of the seven critical writers and researchers cited in the paper, coupled with the author's own experiences carrying out PhD research in this area, clearly reinforce this point. I contend that sociological and Foucauldian insights on age and sexual categorization can offer a helpful tool-kit for unpacking the contested claims from CSA survivors, child liber ationists, and the specific case of one respondent who resists victimological labelling of his sexual experiences with adults.
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Introduction to special issue on "Boys' sexuality and age of consent";
Thymos;
4(2), 95-98,
Oct 01 2010
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Sexual consent and human rights;
Thymos;
4(2), 99-102,
Oct 01 2010
The basic human right to sexual autonomy and self-determination encompasses two sides: it enshrines both the right to engage in wanted sexuality on the one hand, and the right to be free and protected from unwanted sexuality, from sexual abuse and sexual violence on the other.
This concept elaborated by the European Court of Human Rights, in the light of European legal consensus, suggests that the age of consent for sexual relations (outside of relationships of authority and outside of pornography and prostitution) should be set between 12 and 16 years. In any event the age of criminal responsibility should be the same as the age of sexual consent.
The basic human right to sexual autonomy and self-determination encompasses two sides: it enshrines both the right to engage in wanted sexuality on the one hand, and the right to be free and protected from unwanted sexuality, from sexual abuse and sexual violence on the other.
This concept elaborated by the European Court of Human Rights, in the light of European legal consensus, suggests that the age of consent for sexual relations (outside of relationships of authority and outside of pornography and prostitution) should be set between 12 and 16 years. In any event the age of criminal responsibility should be the same as the age of sexual consent.
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Social Response to Age-Gap Sex Involving Minors: Empirical, Historical, Cross-Cultural, and Cross-Species Considerations;
Thymos;
4(2), 113,
Oct 01 2010
Social response to age-gap sex involving minors has become increasingly severe. In the US, non-coercive acts that might have been punished with probation 30 years ago often lead to decades in prison today. Punishment also increasingly includes civil commitment up to life, as well as scarlet-letter-like public registries and onerous residence restrictions for released offenders. Advocates and the general public approve, believing that age-gap sex with minors is uniquely injurious, pathological, and criminal. Critics argue that public opinion and policy have been shaped by moral panic, consisting of unfounded assumptions and invalid science being uncritically promoted by ideology, media sensationalism, and political pandering. This talk critically examines the basic assumptions and does so using a multi-perspective approach (empirical, historical, cross-cultural, cross-species) to overcome the biases inherent in traditional clinical-forensic reports. Non-clinical empirical reviews of age-gap sex involving minors show claims of intense, pervasive injuriousness to be highly exaggerated. Historical and cross-cultural reviews show that adult-adolescent sexual relations have been common and frequently socially integrated in other times and places, indicating that present-day Western conceptualizations are socially constructed to reflect current social and economic arrangements rather than expressions of a priori truths. Analogous relations in primates are commonplace, non-pathological, and not infrequently functional, contradicting implicit assumptions of a biologically-based "trauma response" in humans. It is concluded that, though age-gap sex involving minors is a significant mismatch for contemporary culture—and this talk therefore does not endorse it— attitudes and social policy concerning it have been driven by an upward-spiraling moral panic, which itself is immoral in its excessive adverse consequences for individuals and society.
Social response to age-gap sex involving minors has become increasingly severe. In the US, non-coercive acts that might have been punished with probation 30 years ago often lead to decades in prison today. Punishment also increasingly includes civil commitment up to life, as well as scarlet-letter-like public registries and onerous residence restrictions for released offenders. Advocates and the general public approve, believing that age-gap sex with minors is uniquely injurious, pathological, and criminal. Critics argue that public opinion and policy have been shaped by moral panic, consisting of unfounded assumptions and invalid science being uncritically promoted by ideology, media sensationalism, and political pandering. This talk critically examines the basic assumptions and does so using a multi-perspective approach (empirical, historical, cross-cultural, cross-species) to overcome the biases inherent in traditional clinical-forensic reports. Non-clinical empirical reviews of age-gap sex involving minors show claims of intense, pervasive injuriousness to be highly exaggerated. Historical and cross-cultural reviews show that adult-adolescent sexual relations have been common and frequently socially integrated in other times and places, indicating that present-day Western conceptualizations are socially constructed to reflect current social and economic arrangements rather than expressions of a priori truths. Analogous relations in primates are commonplace, non-pathological, and not infrequently functional, contradicting implicit assumptions of a biologically-based "trauma response" in humans. It is concluded that, though age-gap sex involving minors is a significant mismatch for contemporary culture—and this talk therefore does not endorse it— attitudes and social policy concerning it have been driven by an upward-spiraling moral panic, which itself is immoral in its excessive adverse consequences for individuals and society.
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"The individual can ...": Objectifying consent;
Thymos;
4(2), 103-112,
Oct 01 2010
The issue of age of consent for sexual activities has been bedevilled by the absence of any objective standards or criteria for what is meant by or involved in 'consent'. Despite this absence-or because of it-the social and political response has been to reach for blanket prohibitions on sexual activity by persons under particular ages-ages which have settled in the mid- to late teens.
At the same time, the percentages of persons aged 15 and under who are sexually active in our societies indicate that young people are regularly consenting to sexual activities. Consent to sexual activity has also been a concern in relation to the lives of the cognitively or mentally impaired.
In an attempt to clarify issues surrounding consent there, a significant proposal in regard to objectifying standards for consent was reported by Carrie Hill Kennedy, in her article "Assessing Competency to Consent to Sexual Activity in the Cognitively Impaired Population" (Journal of Forensic Neuropsychology 1:3, 1999), where she developed a two-part scale for ability to consent, including twelve criteria involving knowledge and five criteria involving personal assertiveness and safety. Kennedy herself has maintained that there is no relevance for her research as applied to minors: adults have sexual rights, minors do not.
However, it would seem clear that there is a certain relevance-if not in the use of a similar scale for assessing the competence of a particular minor to consent, then in generally comparing the age at which children attain the developmental level comparable with that implied by Kennedy's five Safety standards, and using that information to critique the present, obviously unrealistic ages of consent. In relation to the Knowledge scale, the importance of sexual education becomes still clearer.
The issue of age of consent for sexual activities has been bedevilled by the absence of any objective standards or criteria for what is meant by or involved in 'consent'. Despite this absence-or because of it-the social and political response has been to reach for blanket prohibitions on sexual activity by persons under particular ages-ages which have settled in the mid- to late teens.
At the same time, the percentages of persons aged 15 and under who are sexually active in our societies indicate that young people are regularly consenting to sexual activities. Consent to sexual activity has also been a concern in relation to the lives of the cognitively or mentally impaired.
In an attempt to clarify issues surrounding consent there, a significant proposal in regard to objectifying standards for consent was reported by Carrie Hill Kennedy, in her article "Assessing Competency to Consent to Sexual Activity in the Cognitively Impaired Population" (Journal of Forensic Neuropsychology 1:3, 1999), where she developed a two-part scale for ability to consent, including twelve criteria involving knowledge and five criteria involving personal assertiveness and safety. Kennedy herself has maintained that there is no relevance for her research as applied to minors: adults have sexual rights, minors do not.
However, it would seem clear that there is a certain relevance-if not in the use of a similar scale for assessing the competence of a particular minor to consent, then in generally comparing the age at which children attain the developmental level comparable with that implied by Kennedy's five Safety standards, and using that information to critique the present, obviously unrealistic ages of consent. In relation to the Knowledge scale, the importance of sexual education becomes still clearer.
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APA Guidelines Ignored in Development of Diagnostic Criteria for Pedohebephilia,
Oct 30 2010
This Letter describes how the proposed DSM-5 criteria for pedohebephilia
have been developed without following four key guidelines specified by the American Psychiatric Association (APA) and to point out significant flaws that have resulted. It also proposes solutions.
The failures described above have resulted in serious flaws
in the proposed diagnostic criteria - Kramer mentions five flaws.
There are significant ethical consequences of the above
failures.
The APA and the paraphilias subworkgroup have an intellectual
and ethical responsibility to promote valid research and
to counter rather than reinforce false stereotypes.
There are steps they can take to fulfill this responsibility - follow five points.
This Letter describes how the proposed DSM-5 criteria for pedohebephilia
have been developed without following four key guidelines specified by the American Psychiatric Association (APA) and to point out significant flaws that have resulted. It also proposes solutions.
The failures described above have resulted in serious flaws
in the proposed diagnostic criteria - Kramer mentions five flaws.
There are significant ethical consequences of the above
failures.
The APA and the paraphilias subworkgroup have an intellectual
and ethical responsibility to promote valid research and
to counter rather than reinforce false stereotypes.
There are steps they can take to fulfill this responsibility - follow five points.
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Inside the Battle to Define Mental Illness,
Dec 27 2010
What the battle over DSM-5 should make clear to all of us—professional and layman alike—is that psychiatric diagnosis will probably always be laden with uncertainty, that the labels doctors give us for our suffering will forever be at least as much the product of negotiations around a conference table as investigations at a lab bench.
Allen Frances, lead editor of the fourth edition of the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (universally known as the DSM-IV), [...] wrote the book on mental illness, confessing that “these concepts are virtually impossible to define precisely with bright lines at the boundaries.”
What the battle over DSM-5 should make clear to all of us—professional and layman alike—is that psychiatric diagnosis will probably always be laden with uncertainty, that the labels doctors give us for our suffering will forever be at least as much the product of negotiations around a conference table as investigations at a lab bench.
Allen Frances, lead editor of the fourth edition of the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (universally known as the DSM-IV), [...] wrote the book on mental illness, confessing that “these concepts are virtually impossible to define precisely with bright lines at the boundaries.”
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The Consequences of Sexual Abuse of Minors;
Chapter, summarized
The Consequences of Sexual Abuse of Minors - On behalf of the Commission for Examination of Sexual Abuse of Minors in the Roman-Catholic Church [* in the Netherlands]; In: Rapport Commissie Deetman, Balans, 2011, Part 2. Summary and conclusions in English by Frans E J Gieles, PhD.
In this essay, sexual abuse is, conform the scientific and juridical mores, defined as "... sexual-genital manipulation of a child below the age of sixteen, by an adult of whom the child is dependent or with whom he or she has a relationship of confidence, with the aim of satisfaction of the sexual need of the first. [...] There is an age difference, and/or a difference in power, by which the child is not able to refuse the sexual contact, which is not consensual."
Research of the later consequences of sexual abuse is done in three phases or generations of research.
The most recent research explores what has appeared to be the most central factor: disturbance of the stress regulation.
There is consensus about harm for the physical and emotional health, especially the attachment and sexuality, even if the consequences are invisible at first sight. They are just like a time bomb, that explodes as soon as, in adulthood, the impact of the events becomes significant.
The Consequences of Sexual Abuse of Minors - On behalf of the Commission for Examination of Sexual Abuse of Minors in the Roman-Catholic Church [* in the Netherlands]; In: Rapport Commissie Deetman, Balans, 2011, Part 2. Summary and conclusions in English by Frans E J Gieles, PhD.
In this essay, sexual abuse is, conform the scientific and juridical mores, defined as "... sexual-genital manipulation of a child below the age of sixteen, by an adult of whom the child is dependent or with whom he or she has a relationship of confidence, with the aim of satisfaction of the sexual need of the first. [...] There is an age difference, and/or a difference in power, by which the child is not able to refuse the sexual contact, which is not consensual."
Research of the later consequences of sexual abuse is done in three phases or generations of research.
The most recent research explores what has appeared to be the most central factor: disturbance of the stress regulation.
There is consensus about harm for the physical and emotional health, especially the attachment and sexuality, even if the consequences are invisible at first sight. They are just like a time bomb, that explodes as soon as, in adulthood, the impact of the events becomes significant.
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Critical Dictionary of Sexology
Erwin J. Haeberle
Critical Dictionary of Sexology
This is a work-in-progress. New words and their definitions will be added at irregular intervals as the need arises. Suggestions from our readers are always welcome. If you want to make a suggestion, please contact the author at HaeberleE@web.de.
Erwin J. Haeberle
Critical Dictionary of Sexology
This is a work-in-progress. New words and their definitions will be added at irregular intervals as the need arises. Suggestions from our readers are always welcome. If you want to make a suggestion, please contact the author at HaeberleE@web.de.
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David - A True Story;
60 pps
The following is a story of a great boy - and a great boylover. The story and its author can serve as sorely needed role models to young boylovers who have nowhere else to turn for guidance. - Ipce
What follows this introduction is the true story of a man and a boy’s passionate love for one another. It is meant to provide a small glimpse into just one of many such positive, though precarious and often dangerous, intergenerational friendships. These sometimes romantic friendships have existed throughout recorded, and one would assume unrecorded, history and they continue to exist. For those that strangely pretend to know the consequences of such couplings, without having any real knowledge about boylovers or the boys whose lives we’re sometimes part of, this was written for you, too.
The following is a story of a great boy - and a great boylover. The story and its author can serve as sorely needed role models to young boylovers who have nowhere else to turn for guidance. - Ipce
What follows this introduction is the true story of a man and a boy’s passionate love for one another. It is meant to provide a small glimpse into just one of many such positive, though precarious and often dangerous, intergenerational friendships. These sometimes romantic friendships have existed throughout recorded, and one would assume unrecorded, history and they continue to exist. For those that strangely pretend to know the consequences of such couplings, without having any real knowledge about boylovers or the boys whose lives we’re sometimes part of, this was written for you, too.
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Deviations: A Gayle Rubin Reader;
504 pp
Deviations is the definitive collection of writing by Gayle S. Rubin, a pioneering theorist and activist in feminist, lesbian and gay, queer, and sexuality studies since the 1970s.
Rubin first rose to prominence in 1975 with the publication of “The Traffic in Women,” an essay that had a galvanizing effect on feminist thinking and theory. In another landmark piece, “Thinking Sex,” she examined how certain sexual behaviors are constructed as moral or natural, and others as unnatural.
That essay became one of queer theory’s foundational texts.
Along with such canonical work, Deviations features less well-known but equally insightful writing on many subjects.
This book brings together a canonical collection of her writing, but it is more than a reader: she rewrites the genealogy of sexuality studies, giving us a precise intellectual history of sexuality studies that recognises the pivotal role played by academic homosexuals ...
A must read!
Ipce editor's note: Book included here for downloading.
Deviations is the definitive collection of writing by Gayle S. Rubin, a pioneering theorist and activist in feminist, lesbian and gay, queer, and sexuality studies since the 1970s.
Rubin first rose to prominence in 1975 with the publication of “The Traffic in Women,” an essay that had a galvanizing effect on feminist thinking and theory. In another landmark piece, “Thinking Sex,” she examined how certain sexual behaviors are constructed as moral or natural, and others as unnatural.
That essay became one of queer theory’s foundational texts.
Along with such canonical work, Deviations features less well-known but equally insightful writing on many subjects.
This book brings together a canonical collection of her writing, but it is more than a reader: she rewrites the genealogy of sexuality studies, giving us a precise intellectual history of sexuality studies that recognises the pivotal role played by academic homosexuals ...
A must read!
Ipce editor's note: Book included here for downloading.
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Glossary of Inappropriate Scientific and Professional Terms
Sexological research and training are often hampered by traditional terms that contain hidden value judgements or are even openly ideological. Originally, they were part of semantic strategies by which various religious, legal, medical, and pedagogic "experts" tried to impose their professional interests or moral convictions upon the general public. In addition, there are many imprecise and misleading terms still current in our field, so that it is often extremely difficult to describe sexual matters in an objective way. In any case, today the following terms should be avoided:
Sexological research and training are often hampered by traditional terms that contain hidden value judgements or are even openly ideological. Originally, they were part of semantic strategies by which various religious, legal, medical, and pedagogic "experts" tried to impose their professional interests or moral convictions upon the general public. In addition, there are many imprecise and misleading terms still current in our field, so that it is often extremely difficult to describe sexual matters in an objective way. In any case, today the following terms should be avoided:
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Michael Jackson’s Dangerous Liaisons - Review;
Archives of Sexual Behavior
This is an unusual book, especially for review in an academic journal. Its subject is pop icon Michael Jackson, one of the most famous, talented, and financially successful entertainers of all time — and also one of the strangest. Specifically, the book focuses on Jackson’s interest in children, and whether that interest was sexual in nature. The author, Tom O’Carroll (under the pseudonym ‘‘Carl Toms’’), is himself an unapologetic pedophile, and his pedophilia has influenced both his insight into Jackson and his aspirations for the book. [... ... ...]
This book is fascinating, challenging, and discomfiting. Anyone wanting to understand Michael Jackson will need to read it. [...] It certainly illuminates the most controversial aspect of Jackson’s life, one that was surely important to Jackson. [..]
Dangerous Liaisons is also worth reading for the challenges it raises regarding pedophilic relationships and their consequences. I suspect O’Carroll believes that this is a suitable tribute to Michael Jackson’s unfinished life.
This is an unusual book, especially for review in an academic journal. Its subject is pop icon Michael Jackson, one of the most famous, talented, and financially successful entertainers of all time — and also one of the strangest. Specifically, the book focuses on Jackson’s interest in children, and whether that interest was sexual in nature. The author, Tom O’Carroll (under the pseudonym ‘‘Carl Toms’’), is himself an unapologetic pedophile, and his pedophilia has influenced both his insight into Jackson and his aspirations for the book. [... ... ...]
This book is fascinating, challenging, and discomfiting. Anyone wanting to understand Michael Jackson will need to read it. [...] It certainly illuminates the most controversial aspect of Jackson’s life, one that was surely important to Jackson. [..]
Dangerous Liaisons is also worth reading for the challenges it raises regarding pedophilic relationships and their consequences. I suspect O’Carroll believes that this is a suitable tribute to Michael Jackson’s unfinished life.
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Of Goode and evil - Review of "Paedophiles in Society: Reflecting on Sexuality, Abuse and Hope" By Sarah D. Goode
Sociologist Sarah Goode’s latest book is not primarily a work of research within her discipline; rather, it takes us on an ambitious grand tour in a bid to situate paedophilia historically and cross-culturally.
“We have got ourselves into a pickle sexually”, she says, proposing a way out of it that many will regard as both bold and humane. As will be seen, I beg to differ.
The new book can be read independently. It should be noted, though, that only the first volume considers the harm that is intrinsic, or is allegedly so, to every adult-child sexual contact, no matter how loving and non-coercive it might be. This is a crucial issue, to which I shall return.
Goode begins the Preface to Paedophiles in Society with the large claim that this will be unlike “any other book you may have read on paedophiles, or adult sexual attraction to children, or child protection”; instead of focusing on medical, forensic, psychological, psychiatric, legal or criminological aspects, it promises to be “a book about ordinariness, about culture and society around us”.
It is not, in fact, unique in this regard as it follows several such works
Sociologist Sarah Goode’s latest book is not primarily a work of research within her discipline; rather, it takes us on an ambitious grand tour in a bid to situate paedophilia historically and cross-culturally.
“We have got ourselves into a pickle sexually”, she says, proposing a way out of it that many will regard as both bold and humane. As will be seen, I beg to differ.
The new book can be read independently. It should be noted, though, that only the first volume considers the harm that is intrinsic, or is allegedly so, to every adult-child sexual contact, no matter how loving and non-coercive it might be. This is a crucial issue, to which I shall return.
Goode begins the Preface to Paedophiles in Society with the large claim that this will be unlike “any other book you may have read on paedophiles, or adult sexual attraction to children, or child protection”; instead of focusing on medical, forensic, psychological, psychiatric, legal or criminological aspects, it promises to be “a book about ordinariness, about culture and society around us”.
It is not, in fact, unique in this regard as it follows several such works