We need more kink-shaming

If someone had told you a few years ago that in the future USA Today would publish an article expressing sympathy for paedophiles, you’d have thought them mad. This most middle-market of newspapers, landing on the doorsteps of decent folk up and down the Land of the Free every morning, shedding a tear of empathy for paedoes? Get real. Not going to happen. Ever. Well, welcome to 2022 folks, where wokeness has dragged us so far down the putrid well of moral relativism that now even family newspapers are wondering out loud if perhaps we have been a tad harsh on people who find children sexually attractive.

I wish I was making this up. But it’s there in black-and-white for all to see. ‘What the public keeps getting wrong about paedophilia’, said the USA Today headline. Stupid public! The article opens as follows: ‘Paedophilia is viewed as among the most horrifying social ills. But…’ But! That’s probably when the reporter should have stopped writing. It’s at that moment they should have shut down their Mac and ventured out for a long walk to ponder how their career brought them to a situation where they’re saying ‘But’ to the long-held belief that paedos are sickos. ‘But’, the piece says, ‘scientists who study the sexual disorder say it is also among the most misunderstood’. Apparently, boffins have discovered that you can be born a paedophile, just like you can be born gay. ‘Paedophilia is likely determined in the womb’, we’re told. How long before paedos start marching behind the banner ‘Born this way’? ‘Don’t hate me, I can’t help lusting after toddlers, I was born like this.’

So that’s one of the things the ignorant public gets wrong about paedophiles, apparently. You prejudiced idiots think paedos are perverts who create and indulge their perverted fantasies through illicit associations and the sharing of warped ideas and images, when in truth they were born with this predilection for kids, much as they were born with blue eyes or fair hair. ‘The evidence suggests it is inborn. It’s neurological’, one expert tells USA Today. And if it’s inborn, if it can’t be helped, then we shouldn’t be too tough on paedos, right? Yes, brace yourselves, USA Today hints at this very point. Perhaps it is time we started ‘destigmatising paedophilia’, it suggests.

There is ‘controversy over “destigmatising paedophilia”’, USA Today says – no shit! – but perhaps it’s time we had that conversation. It tells readers there is ‘growing support in the field’ for the proposal that paedophilia should be destigmatised and that paedos should now be referred to as ‘minor-attracted people’. Apparently this would encourage more paedophiles to seek help and therapy. At the moment they’re too ashamed to say, ‘I’m a paedophile, I need help’, so maybe we should allow them to say: ‘I’m a minor-attracted person. I was born like this. I would like some assistance to make sure I never act on my inborn sexual impulses.’

I’m going to put my neck on the line here and say that if you’re a paedophile, if you sexually desire children, then you should feel ashamed. You should be consumed by shame, in fact. There should be a stigma attached to paedophilia! I can’t believe it is necessary to write that sentence. A stigma is a mark of disgrace. And adults who fantasise about sex with children are a disgrace. They are a disgrace to themselves, to their families, and to society. The very notion of ‘destigmatising paedophilia’ speaks to the relativistic rot we now find ourselves in, where our willingness to make moral judgements has been so throttled by decades of anything-goes, everything-is-valid bullshit that we can’t even bring ourselves to say: ‘Paedophilia is bad. Paedophiles are not good people.’