What would you do if you were attracted to minors?

[GenericMind]

Bullshit, it's not inbuilt in human nature to be attracted to girls who are 11 or 12, we're naturally attracted to signs of FERTILITY. Most girls start to become fertile at around 13 or 14, so at a push you could say men are naturally attracted to 14+ but even this is a bit ridiculous, it's much more common to be attracted to girls who are 16 and up.

I don't think this statement is biologically accurate. The first signs of puberty in girls can start as early as age 9.

OP have you ever seen a therapist or a licensed sex conselor who's legally bound to have client/patient confidentiality and told them about yourself and asked what you should do?

I'd do this ^

I definitely wouldn't take hormones for it.

 

[Spurs_1882]

Look, you're being quite insulting so i'm not going to pick an argument. This is my last attempt to explain that all I was saying is what I would do in response to his question. And to clarify, I WOULD absolutely take hormones that would take away my femininity and make me lose my breasts and grow a little penis if that's what it took. Since we're talking about loss of sexual outlet I would be willing to deal with loss of sexual identity - with the support of a good therapist. Now you're right, my background isn't in biology but it is in psychology and psychotherapy and you seem to be quite flippant about the relative lack of "real life" solutions and the high rates of suicide in men in the OP's situation. So again, having worked with men in his situation and seeing what inner torment this causes, this is what I, personally, believe I would opt for. Please don't lynch me for having an opinion you happen to disagree with.

I am a guy and I think what you suggest may be a good idea for the guy who started the thread. Of course, it's not ideal, but desperate situations call for desperate measures, and there is no point denying that this sadly sounds like a desperate situation. Ultimately, it's up to him so there's no point arguing about it really.

 

[psood0nym]

Bullshit, it's not inbuilt in human nature to be attracted to girls who are 11 or 12, we're naturally attracted to signs of FERTILITY. Most girls start to become fertile at around 13 or 14, so at a push you could say men are naturally attracted to 14+ but even this is a bit ridiculous, it's much more common to be attracted to girls who are 16 and up.

This is about what I thought. It makes sense that men would be attracted to females who are actually capable of producing children. But about six months ago I was researching links between sexuality and cannibalism to try to make sense of atrocities in Congo for a thread in Philosophy and Spirituality and came across a series of studies that used a device called a penile plethysmograph to measure NORMAL men's responses to nude images of pre-pubescent females. What these studies revealed about the prevalence of pedophilia in the general population blew my mind, and I still don't understand what evolutionary function pedophilia is supposed to serve.

Here's the relevant parts, cut and pasted:

NSFW:

I just came across something that's totally blowing my mind. I was looking to see if I could find any compelling evidence for locating pedophilia in the same essential sexually sadistic dimension I’ve been arguing sexual cannibalism belongs to and I stumbled across this astonishing finding related in the online edition of the New World Encyclopedia:

Others have concluded that at least a quarter of all adult men may have some feelings of sexual arousal in connection with children (Hall et al. 1995, Freund and Costell 1970, Quinsey et al. 1975). Hall's study, for example, found that approximately 30 percent of their sample—consisting of 80 adult males—exhibited sexual arousal to heterosexual pedophilic stimuli that equaled or exceeded their arousal to the adult stimuli. Further studies indicated that even men erotically fixated on adult females are generally prone to react sexually when exposed to nude female children (Freund et al. 1972). A significant proportion (one-third) of undergraduate students who acknowledged sexual attraction to small children also conceded some probability of actually having sex with a child if they could avoid detection and punishment (Briere and Runtz 1989).

Here’s the abstract of Hall et al. (1995):

Sexual arousal and arousability to pedophilic stimuli in a community sample of normal men

Self-reported and physiological sexual arousal to adult and pedophilic stimuli were examined among 80 men drawn from a community sample of volunteers. Over ¼ of the current subjects self-reported pedophilic interest or exhibited penile arousal to pedophilic stimuli that equalled or exceeded arousal to adult stimuli. The hypothesis that arousal to pedophilic stimuli is a function of general sexual arousability factors was supported in that pedophilic and adult heterosexual arousal were positively correlated, particularly in the physiological data. Subjects who were highly arousable, insofar as they were unable to voluntarily and completely inhibit their sexual arousal, were more sexually aroused by all stimuli than were subjects who were able to inhibit their sexual arousal. Thus, arousal to pedophilic stimuli does not necessarily correspond with pedophilic behavior

I doubt I’m the only one who has never heard of these physiological findings. I attempted to find a study that replicated Hall’s findings and found 23 that cited it but none that made an attempt to replicate it. I assume this means it’s not disputed and/or that replications have confirmed the findings and they simply haven’t been published in journals accessible to Google Scholar. Of course, it looks like Hall's study was itself a replication of the findings of those two earlier studies in the 1970s. In other words, there's really strong evidence their conclusions are true.

How the hell could we have never heard of findings that indicate almost 1 out of every 3 (30 percent) adult men have a sexual response to female children that is equal to or greater than their response to adult women? This basically implies that if you’re not a pedophile yourself you almost certainly have or have had a close relationship with one (and probably never suspected a thing). That seems really relevant and like something we should know, doesn't it? I feel really naïve.

Am I wrong in thinking this is totally at odds with prevailing attitudes, assumptions and popular discussions of pedophilia? If true it changes a whole hell of a lot. Since I assume most of these ~ 30 percent of all men don’t actually act on their urges, our society must contain a massive portion of people who are doubtlessly deeply frustrated in addition to the stress of having something very insistent that they don’t control demonized (I don’t think I’m wrong in thinking that our culture demonizes not just child molestation – which is understandable of course – but also the pedophilic mind state in itself; if this weren’t the case then why wouldn’t more men publicly admit to what physiological measures and self-reports of these study's anonymous men indicate)?

From a subsequent post:

NSFW:

I finally read the full text of “Sexual arousal and arousability to pedophilic stimuli in a community sample of normal men,” the abstract of which I quoted from earlier. It turns out that its finding that greater than one quarter of a community sample of normal men respond physiologically (as measured by a penile plethysmograph) to sexual prepubescent female materials to a degree equivalent to or greater than their response to sexual adult female materials is actually the less surprising of two major findings. The 26.25 percent figure was for reactions to auditory stimuli (a narrated sexual story) involving prepubescent girls who both consented to sex and indicated they were enjoying the sex. However, for “frontal nude” photo slides of girls ... .

Twenty-six subjects exhibited sexual arousal to the child slides that equaled or exceeded their arousal to the adult slides.

Twenty-six out of 80, that’s 32.5 percent, nearly one-third of the participants! The study reports that this conclusion is in line with findings from previous smaller studies:

In recent studies, 12 to 32.7 percent of community and college samples of men reported sexual attraction to children (Briere & Runtz, 1989; Haywood, Grossman, & Cavanaugh, 1990) or exhibited penile response to pedophilic stimuli (Barbaree & Marshall, 1989; Fedora et al., 1992; Frenzel & Lang, 1989; Freund & Watson, 1991). Thus, arousal to pedophilic stimuli does not necessarily correspond with pedophilic behavior (Hall, 1990; Schouten & Simon, 1992)

Sweet god! Interestingly:

Many men who have molested children do not exhibit pedophilic patterns of arousal, particularly incest offenders (Barbaree & Marshall, 1989)) and those who are able to inhibit their arousal (Hall et al., 1988). Variables other than arousal to pedophilic stimuli may motivate many child molesters, including deviant cognitions, affective dyscontrol, and developmentally related personality problems (Hall & Hirschman, 1992). Thus, arousal to pedophilic stimuli may motivate some, but not all, sexually aggressive acts against children, and a sizable minority of men who do not report engaging in pedophilic behavior exhibit sexual arousal to pedophilic stimuli.

The study also noted a strong positive correlation between arousability to adult stimuli with arousability to pedophilic stimuli. In other words, the hornier a man is generally the more likely he will have a strong sexual response to pedophilic situations. This suggests these two reactions are tied together and that heterosexual “pedophilia” is part of normal heterosexual male sexuality. Holy fuck!

I think another of the study’s findings is relevant to understanding the psychology of pedophilic rapes and cannibalism in Congo. Namely, that the versions of the auditory sexual story about girls which stated that the girl in the story did NOT consent to the sex and abhorred what was happening to her, on average, resulted in a physiological response that was no different from a contrast condition (a non-sexual story about talking to a girl who is “under 12” in a supermarket). This helps to explain how so many men can have these sexual reactions yet child rape still isn't rampant.

Here's the link to the page where these posts appear if you're looking for context.

 

[Altered Perception]

I don’t think I’m wrong in thinking that our culture demonizes not just child molestation – which is understandable of course – but also the pedophilic mind state in itself; if this weren’t the case then why wouldn’t more men publicly admit to what physiological measures and self-reports of these study's anonymous men indicate)?

This is true, our culture is in a state of mass hysteria when it comes to this sensitive topic. Recently I came across a video on youtube where a self confessed pedophile appeared on the news to inform people about others like himself who don't act on these feeling but he still got slaughtered for it....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nFeBx1Tx99M&feature=related

They later found him and gave him a court order to stay 30 ft away from any children's area but when he was asked for another interview there happened to be a UCLA child care centre nearby during his interview so then he was arrested even though he hadn't done anything wrong...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F8Tjb6XyG-Q&feature=related

Later the same pedophile appeared on a talk show and everyone boo'd as he came out, they wouldn't even let him sit on the stage chair, he was treated like an animal, no one cared whether he wasn't acting on his feeling, just the fact that he was a pedophile was enough for treating him like shit....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R6KKidbOGr0&feature=related

 

[rickolasnice]

Bullshit, it's not inbuilt in human nature to be attracted to girls who are 11 or 12, we're naturally attracted to signs of FERTILITY. Most girls start to become fertile at around 13 or 14, so at a push you could say men are naturally attracted to 14+ but even this is a bit ridiculous, it's much more common to be attracted to girls who are 16 and up.

Yeah that's what i was getting at.. but alot of girls start puberty at 11 so..

 

[rickolasnice]

it's much more common to be attracted to girls who are 16 and up.

Because of society or because of natural instinct?

 

[Altered Perception]

Bullshit, it's not inbuilt in human nature to be attracted to girls who are 11 or 12, we're naturally attracted to signs of FERTILITY.

Thats not true, we were all pedophiles once.... just think back to when you were 9 years old and that cute girl in pony tails in your school grade shared her lunch with you and held your hand making you blush.

 

[EA-1475]

OP, your issue is a bit too heavy for SLR. SLR is great for "is my gf cheating?" or "should I take him back?" stuff but for your problem, you should probably find a someone who knows what they are talking about.

If you haven't done anything illegal, you should be able to speak with a professional no problem. However, an exception to doctor-patient privledge is that if you HAVE abused a child they MUST report it.

This may sound crazy but another option is to talk to a priest. For one, you will have Confessional Priviledge (anything you say can not be used against you). They also might be able to get you in touch with a support group. After all the child sex scandals of the last 10 years, I'm sure the Catholic Church has SOMETHING in place for people struggling with issues like yours.
Going the church route might not be as good as talking to a medical professional but it is probably a lot safer. Unlike your doctor, a priest is not keeping detailed records of everything everyone says in the confession booth. If you are accused of something in the future, your doctor can be forced by court order to release your records.

But before you do any of the above, you may consider talking with an attorney. A lot of the legal rules of due process and burden of proof go out the window when children are involved. If you get accused of abusing a child, you almost have to prove your innocence. So before you say anything to anyone, educate yourself on what can and can not be used against you and under what circumstance.

Don't take my word for anything. I'm just a guy on the internet.

 

[Monkeybizness]

Am I the only one thinking of the children! I cant...!

You have a SERIOUS problem seek help! Weather it be professional or through a religious group

These urges become obsessions

 

[insanit_e]

Just putting it out there that i really don't have much idea of what i'm talking about, i could be completely wrong, but these are my two ideas...

Firstly, from what i understand (this is where i could be wrong), people who are attracted to minors were often abused themselves at a similar age to those they are attracted to. Is there a chance you were abused, and have been suppressing/blocking it out to the point where you (perhaps) don't even remember it (which is common) ? If so, by beginning to understand yourself more, and deal with your problems, you might actually find these sexual desires alleviated somewhat, obviously over the course of many years and probably a lot of councelling/therapy etc...

The other thing is that what you speak of is a sexual desire, but you also talk about being a hopeless romantic for the one you love. Although you may be sexually attracted to boys of this age, could you really (assuming you are considerably older) imagine having a relationship with an 11 or 12 year old, having deep conversations, sharing a life together... you know what i mean? Love goes far beyond a sexual desire, could you actually be in an intimate emotional relationship with someone of this age?

Perhaps you should try dating somebody of your age, and just seeing how it goes... you might find that you enjoy it more than you think you will?

Best of luck...

 

[KamMoye]

This is about what I thought. It makes sense that men would be attracted to females who are actually capable of producing children. But about six months ago I was researching links between sexuality and cannibalism to try to make sense of atrocities in Congo for a thread in Philosophy and Spirituality and came across a series of studies that used a device called a penile plethysmograph to measure NORMAL men's responses to nude images of pre-pubescent females. What these studies revealed about the prevalence of pedophilia in the general population blew my mind, and I still don't understand what evolutionary function pedophilia is supposed to serve.

Here's the relevant parts, cut and pasted:

NSFW:

I just came across something that's totally blowing my mind. I was looking to see if I could find any compelling evidence for locating pedophilia in the same essential sexually sadistic dimension I’ve been arguing sexual cannibalism belongs to and I stumbled across this astonishing finding related in the online edition of the New World Encyclopedia:

Here’s the abstract of Hall et al. (1995):

I doubt I’m the only one who has never heard of these physiological findings. I attempted to find a study that replicated Hall’s findings and found 23 that cited it but none that made an attempt to replicate it. I assume this means it’s not disputed and/or that replications have confirmed the findings and they simply haven’t been published in journals accessible to Google Scholar. Of course, it looks like Hall's study was itself a replication of the findings of those two earlier studies in the 1970s. In other words, there's really strong evidence their conclusions are true.

How the hell could we have never heard of findings that indicate almost 1 out of every 3 (30 percent) adult men have a sexual response to female children that is equal to or greater than their response to adult women? This basically implies that if you’re not a pedophile yourself you almost certainly have or have had a close relationship with one (and probably never suspected a thing). That seems really relevant and like something we should know, doesn't it? I feel really naïve.

Am I wrong in thinking this is totally at odds with prevailing attitudes, assumptions and popular discussions of pedophilia? If true it changes a whole hell of a lot. Since I assume most of these ~ 30 percent of all men don’t actually act on their urges, our society must contain a massive portion of people who are doubtlessly deeply frustrated in addition to the stress of having something very insistent that they don’t control demonized (I don’t think I’m wrong in thinking that our culture demonizes not just child molestation – which is understandable of course – but also the pedophilic mind state in itself; if this weren’t the case then why wouldn’t more men publicly admit to what physiological measures and self-reports of these study's anonymous men indicate)?

From a subsequent post:

NSFW:

I finally read the full text of “Sexual arousal and arousability to pedophilic stimuli in a community sample of normal men,” the abstract of which I quoted from earlier. It turns out that its finding that greater than one quarter of a community sample of normal men respond physiologically (as measured by a penile plethysmograph) to sexual prepubescent female materials to a degree equivalent to or greater than their response to sexual adult female materials is actually the less surprising of two major findings. The 26.25 percent figure was for reactions to auditory stimuli (a narrated sexual story) involving prepubescent girls who both consented to sex and indicated they were enjoying the sex. However, for “frontal nude” photo slides of girls ... .

Twenty-six out of 80, that’s 32.5 percent, nearly one-third of the participants! The study reports that this conclusion is in line with findings from previous smaller studies:

Sweet god! Interestingly:

The study also noted a strong positive correlation between arousability to adult stimuli with arousability to pedophilic stimuli. In other words, the hornier a man is generally the more likely he will have a strong sexual response to pedophilic situations. This suggests these two reactions are tied together and that heterosexual “pedophilia” is part of normal heterosexual male sexuality. Holy fuck!

I think another of the study’s findings is relevant to understanding the psychology of pedophilic rapes and cannibalism in Congo. Namely, that the versions of the auditory sexual story about girls which stated that the girl in the story did NOT consent to the sex and abhorred what was happening to her, on average, resulted in a physiological response that was no different from a contrast condition (a non-sexual story about talking to a girl who is “under 12” in a supermarket). This helps to explain how so many men can have these sexual reactions yet child rape still isn't rampant.

Here's the link to the page where these posts appear if you're looking for context.

amazing post

i am quite curious at what sort of evolutionary benefit this results in

before i read this post i was going to come in and post at my utter confusion at the whole thing. we know so little about it yet that doesn't stop us from being so confident in our abuse.

tbh OP we can't tell you what to do because we as a society don't KNOW what to do. honestly i'm amazed you haven't killed yourself over this conundrum. being yourself may result in severe consequences while suppressing yourself will inevitably result in severe consequences. and some of the "alternatives" (like the hormonal thing) seem equivalent to lying to yourself, like a homosexual undergoing coaching / therapy to learn to like girls.

 

[psood0nym]

^My best guess is that by sexually assaulting a child in the hunter-gatherer context the pedophile gains power over them as an adult within the tribe, thereby gaining both social, and in the case of females, also potential reproductive advantage due to their influential presence in the psyche of the child. That's pure conjecture, but that's my best guess.

I agree that the innocent pedophile is a truly tragic figure in our society. Those who control their behavior deserve our empathy.

 

[Matsuo Munefusa.]

I agree that the innocent pedophile is a truly tragic figure in our society. Those who control their behavior deserve our empathy.

very well said, my friend.

Its important to note that the relation between suicide and depression in the innocent pedophile and how we treat her is reciprocal.

 

[ech0s85]

this is one of those things that makes me love all my problems.

good luck OP.

 

[Pander Bear]

sleep with 18 year olds who look like theyre 14-- problem solved. The hetero male world has been doing this for quite some time now to scant ill effect.

 

[exarkann]

psood0nym, don't forget, just because one finds teens or younger attractive doesn't mean that they find adults unattractive. it just means that they have to limit who they get sexy with, same as eveyone else(as in, no one gets to fully express their sexuality).

 

[shahab6]

sleep with 18 year olds who look like theyre 14-- problem solved. The hetero male world has been doing this for quite some time now to scant ill effect.

exactly. Like we all want to sleep with super models, but we can't so we settle with average person.
That’s what u should do,theres a lot of 18 to 24 that look under age.


trust me everyone is limited in some way mostly male, female's are only limited if they're ugly. But you get my point.

but if you're obsessed with this idea, you should either take antidepressant, or what I mentioned earlier.
This is not a big problem, it just means you're limited in sex, sex is not even a big deal in life, think about it in a 24 hours a day, sex is only 15mins in your day. I think your problem is your obsessed with this, and you think about it all the time..

and if Obsession is your case, there are a lot of good medications out there for that, which will allow you to get on with your day.
and to focus on other important things, such as work, hobby, new friendships, self-improvement, new ideas, drugs, etc..

 

[thomas2laylum]

Let's just say I used to have some unhealthy sexualty, and this really really help.
.

randy?

OP maybe something happened during adolescense? it cant be random that it just sort of stuck to that age; perhaps something happened around then

 

[ch00n]

A lot of drugs seem to kill your sexual desire as a side effect, some SSRIs and opiates, if I'm not mistaken. Take some of those long-term.

Better than chemical castration, better than going to jail for breaking the law.

 

[Chazra]

I've had the opposite problem, minors attracted to me and me attracted to men in their early 30's.

it sucked being a teen girl who was interested in men in their late 20's/early 30's. then being in my 20's and being chased by boys who werent legal yet or jsut barrely legal...

now that i am 30 i'm attracted to men in their 30's still, so at least i could grow into the age group i liked.

must suck to have the opposite, hope you find a solution.