AN ACTIVIST RESOURCE FOR THE CHILDLOVE COMMUNITY

In JPG format, ready to be downloaded and left in public:

Fact: Pedophilia is an erotic orientation (Freund, 1981), is not associated with pathology (Wilson & Cox, 1983) and attempts to “cure” it have repeatedly failed.

In JPG format, ready to be downloaded and left in public:

Fact: While it’s difficult to determine how many people have pedophilic feelings, some scientific evidence has suggested that 20% of male subjects from a sample of the general public are aroused by children.

Four new ChildLove Posters in JPG format, ready to be downloaded and distributed…

How much do you know - Pedophillia:

Most molesters aren’t pedophiles:

Have you got the facts about pedophilia:

Fact: 20% of men are sexually attracted to children:

Not so long ago I was pointed in the direction of this website: http://www.safet.net/philos.html - The Conscience of Responsible Boylove. Which describes the philosophy of “Responsible Boylove”…

 What responsible boylove is NOT:

Responsible boylove does not include, support, nor in any way condone non-consensual sexual activity. It does not try to excuse or justify such things as attempts to seduce a boy, molestation, or predation in any form. Responsible boylovers are just as appalled by such crimes as anyone else; indeed, perhaps more so, because of the love we have for all boys, and the pain we feel when one of them is molested, raped, or murdered. The public and the media seem to know only one word when there is sexual activity between a boy and an older male, the ugly and pejorative label of “pedophile.” Responsible boylovers do not fit the media profile of “pedophile,” and most reject being identified with it. Responsible boylovers are neither seducers, molesters, predators, nor pedophiles in the current use of that word.

What responsible boylove IS:

Responsible boylove is a relationship between a boy who has a desire for a close and intimate friendship with an older male, and an older boy or man whose love for that boy encompasses enjoyment of the boy’s companionship and a desire to provide a mentoring and nurturing environment, but also includes a definite pedosexual attraction as well. It is, however, mutually agreed by responsible boylovers that any physical expression of this pedosexuality is only acceptable with the understanding, encouragement, and appropriate consent of the boy involved. Even then, under the present barbaric legal system, such consensual sexual activities are considered a criminal act.

Reading over the philosphy, I thought to myself (Aside from the on-going pedophile vs BoyLover debate) aren’t these views that are already pretty much the concensus amongst the ChildLover community anyway?

The point I’m trying to make, is that these are things that responsible people in general would agree upon. Which leads me to ask: why do we need to write it down, and give ourselves a title to say that? Do we really need a manifesto and title to say that we don’t support such a gross violation of human rights as rape?

There are various ways you can distribute pamphlets, Newgon Wiki for example has a nice list of potential places to leave pamphlets, the most important thing to bear in mind while distributing pamphlets is your own personal safety.

Often inner-city places are monitored around the clock (especially at night) with security cameras, the same goes for libraries, try to leave pamphlets in places where you’ll be able to walk away with the pamphlet being the only trace you were ever there.

Be wary of leaving too many pamphlets in one place, if someone hostile finds a wad of pamphlets about pedophilia, they’re likely to throw them all away, so it’s best to scatter them.

If you’re going to leave pamphlets in places in front of people, a good idea is to create dummy pamphlets, perhaps in the form of a leaf of paper folded in half with a picture on the front of it with the actual pamphlet inside. That way the chances are if someone sees the cover of it they’re probably not going to pay as much attention to you, as compared to someone seeing you carrying around a bunch of pamphlets about pedophilia.

A good idea is to carry a handful around in your bag, and drop them when you see the opportunity appear.

There’s plenty of ways to spread the message and each little bit helps.

Based upon and largely inspired by Silence DoGood’s pamphlet “Pedophilia: Myths & Facts,” this pamphlet was intended to be more simplistic, concise and easy to produce on a large scale.

Most of what the pamphlet intends to cover are some very basic misunderstandings the general public has regarding pedophiles:

 Myth: “A Pedophile is a child molester and sex offender”

Fact: Not generally. “Pedophilia” is derived from a Greek word, and literally translated means “lover of children.” In modern English it’s quite simply defined as a sexual attraction to children. People can live as pedophiles while never actually acting on their desires, in fact most molestors are not pedophiles.

Myth: “Pedophiles are violent, and have no self control, and seek control over others”

Fact: While there are some pedophiles who commit atrocious acts, these are by far a minority of pedophiles. In fact some studies have suggested that pedophiles seem “affectionate and gentle.”

Myth: “Pedophilia is an unnatural mental disorder”

Fact: Just as heterosexual people are born sexually attracted to members of the opposite sex and homosexuals are born sexually attracted to members of the same sex, pedophiles are born sexually attracted to children and have no more control over who they find sexually attractive than heterosexuals or homosexuals. Pedophilic behavior has even been observed to occur in the animal kingdom.

Myth: “Pedophiles are only interested in sexual activity with children”

Fact:  While there are some pedophiles which are only interested in sex and use whatever means possible to get it, these people are no more representative of pedophiles in general, than adult-rapists are of heterosexuals. Pedophiles are capable of feeling both romantic love and of having friendships with children, just as most heterosexual adults are towards each other.

Myth: “Pedophiles are rare.”

Fact: While it’s difficult to determine how many people have pedophilic feelings, some scientific evidence has suggested that at least 20% of males can be aroused by children.

Click here to download the pamphlet in high-res JPG format:

Alternatively you can also download Silence DoGood’s original version of the “Myths and Facts” pamphlet in the form of a PNG…

Front:

Back:

Proposals are welcomed either on this blog or where the idea originated.

Some members on newgon.com/forum are in the process of proposing ideas for a flag symbol that would represent the spread of positive information related to adults and minors who are sexually attracted to one another and youth sexuality. The symbol will cover new ground, being the first one created not just to represent a certain creed of pedophile or childlover, but anyone who supports the spread of positive information to others in this struggle. The symbol must also be compatible with the flag format.

We are seeking full accountability during the proposal and election of a symbol for this cause. When proposals are complete, individuals in various communities including this one will be allowed to vote for their favourite ideas. The chosen symbol will be used as the focal point of a new website that will be promoted by peer support websites. This site will act as a portal for distributing traffic to more informational websites, and motivating others towards the cause of distributing this information.

When considering your input, don’t worry about graphical skills; an idea can be built upon by other people more skilled in those areas.

Visit the NEWGON Forums for more.

No matter which ChildLover forum you frequent on the internet, there will always be this underlying point of difference where no one can agree on one specific term that we should use to describe ourselves. Let’s examine what are some of the most commonly used terms and focus on the positives and the drawbacks to each term:

BoyLovers & GirlLovers:

These two terms would have to be the most predominant terms within our community. No matter which forum or website you frequent, there will almost always be people using these terms to describe themselves. Although it sounds like circular logic, I think that reason why more people tend to use these terms while feeling comfortable with them is simply because they are the most dominant terms. They’re used quite broadly to refer to both LittleBoyLovers and LittleGirlLovers while also used by TeenBoyLovers and TeenGirlLovers. I think what makes them feel even more comfortable to most CL’s is because they’re used most commonly by our own community to describe ourselves, that they don’t have any negative, hateful or spiteful or angry or aggressive connotations.

ChildLovers:

This is a term I’ve liked because it encompasses both the qualities of the terms “BoyLover” and “GirlLover,” in one word and goes one step further to being a rallying point for our community in general, rather than exclusively based upon an attraction to one particular gender.

AMAROS (Attraction between Minors and Adults that is Romantic Or Sexual) or AMARSO (plural: amarsi): Adult or Minor Attracted Romantically or Sexually to the Other):

This is a term coined by Lindsay Ashford, however I’ve always stayed clear of it being quite an awkward and clunky neo-logism. I think that terms like this were designed with being more appealing to the public in mind.

MAA (Minor Attracted Adult):

While I like this term better than AMAROS I think the word “Minor” (while encompassing both BoyLovers and GirlLovers) runs contrary to the language we’d commonly use. If you were to take a random sample of people off the street and were to take them into a school yard and ask them what word they’d use to describe the children, they’d say just that: Children.

Pedophile:

Understandably a lot of members of the community feel uncomfortable about using this term to describe themselves due its clinical and legal connotations which they don’t want to invoke when they’re using the word.

Pedosexual:

The beauty of this term is that it shares the common structure with other sexualities, like Heterosexual and Homosexual. Pedosexual sounds parallel with these terms.

What is the reason you choose the word you choose to describe yourself? What qualities do you think the word we should use to describe ourselves should have?

We’re currently a small, oppressed minority within society, the last thing I think we need are more points on which to divide the community. This is why I tend to automatically regard most recommendations for “new words” to call ourselves as bad ideas and stand more in favor of words which focus on being a rallying point for our community, something which unites us, not divides us even further.

The ChildLove Resistance blog was formed in the August of 2008 as a resource for the ChildLover Community with the goals of uniting the community to fight for the legalization of consensual, loving and sexual relationships between children and adults.

Hosted by Jay (the administrator of LittleBoyLover.com), the CLResistance Blog hopes to provide up-to-date information about activism-related projects in the ChildLover community, whilest engaging the community and encouraging discussion for methods to bring about social and political change.

An important part of the community depends upon sharing traffic and exchanging links. Working in collaboration with other bloggers who share a similar vision, together we will build a network to generate open discussion and question the way society thinks about ChildLove.

As part two of our profile on the Party for Neighbourly Love, Freedom & Diversity (PNVD), I e-mailed PNVD Secretary Norbert De Jonge some questions regarding PNVD Policy and ChildLove activism in general:

CLResistance: I noticed in your e-mail you mentioned that the PNVD wasn’t formed as a “Pedophile Party.” Considering the founding members involvement with the organization Martijn, how does the PNVD regard the interests of ChildLovers?

Norbert De Jonge: The PNVD indirectly fights for the interests of pedophiles. One of our goals, as described in the statutes, is to break taboos and dogmas in the hope to take away fear and intolerance. As you know, child sexuality and pedophilia are sensitive subjects. We get to engage in debates and discussions about those subjects because we promote changes in our society to allow more sexual freedom for children. Because of our positions, we automatically get to discuss various related subjects as well. This includes the current witch-hunt against pedophiles, the link between pleasure and violence, the extreme punishments for pedosexuals, the subjectivity of the mass media, and so on.

CLResistance: If the PNVD is concerned regarding the issues affecting ChildLovers, what do you think the community needs to be doing in terms of activism?

Norbert De Jonge: I’m assuming that - in this context - by “the community” you’re primarily referring to pedophiles who post on public boards and forums. Generally speaking, they want to do only what’s minimally necessary to keep their own favorite website on-line. If they really want things to change for the better, they need to provide more financial and other resources to support activist projects. Free Spirits for example may get tens of thousands of dollars in gifts every year, but they only promote open communication and stay emphatically away from other forms of activism. That’s not enough to bring about significant change.

CLResistance: Going off track slightly, you’re out as a ChildLover fighting for legislative change, would you recommend that as a path for other ChildLovers concerned with making a change to follow?

Norbert De Jonge: Those things aren’t necessarily related to each other. Coming out as a pedophile is different from coming out publicly, and those fighting for certain legislative changes need not to be (publicly out) pedophiles. Also, the consequences of coming out differ per country. I would say it’s a choice that everyone has to make for themselves. If they choose to come out, I’d advise them to make sure they have a financial buffer. Better yet, complete financial security. Also, they shouldn’t rush the process. They could first talk about their feelings with some personal friends to see how they react.

CLResistance: PNVD policy lists lowering the age of consent to 12. My question is, why not abolish the age of consent altogether?

Norbert De Jonge: We prefer the evolution of society over revolutions. If the age of consent would be lowered to twelve, this would already be a big change in society. Also, before 2002, the age of consent in the Netherlands was twelve under certain conditions, and not that long ago other parties also supported this lower age of consent. In the long run, the PNVD wants to abolish the age of consent. The reason for this is that only abuse, such as forceful contacts, should be punished. If we gain political power, it will be highly unlikely for us to be part of the cabinet. We’ll be part of the opposition in the parliament. In that position we may be able to bring about changes that would lead to a more humane and caring society.

CLResistance: Is the PNVD currently very active? Have you ever considered opening up other branches in other nations? And in closing, how would someone go about getting involved with the PNVD?

Norbert De Jonge:  Yes, we are very active. Just recently, on 26 August, we added the English translation of our party program from 2006 to our website. We’re currently working on finishing the translation of the May 2008 version. We’ve recently been sending letters to organizations trying to get their support, and we’re contacting people in order to raise the 570 public declarations of support we need to field candidates in the next parliamentary election. Our chairman has been on World Have Your Say, a live radio program from BBC World Service, on 20 August. We frequently speak with journalists and we constantly try to get additional adequate people involved with our cause. No, we have not considered setting up branches outside of the Netherlands, since we have enough work on our hands as it is. We welcome people who want to get involved with ourparty to contact us by e-mail, via: info@PNVD.nl

We’d like to thank Norbert De Jonge and the PNVD for sharing the time to answer our questions.