This post is directed at pedophiles who have some attraction to adults and would like to have a relationship with an adult. (I'll focus on men attracted to women, but all other gender combinations are also possible).
Perhaps you were never all the deeply distressed by your pedophilia. Perhaps you were but have worked through it. In any case, you're now at a place where you understand that it isn't something you chose and isn't something you can change, but you know you'll never act on it. And all that together makes you a good person.
But it also might make you a lonely person. What are the options for an adult partner? For some, there is just no attraction at all. For others, there is some -- maybe enough.
Several Virtuous Pedophiles members are happily married with children and no fears of abusing anyone. Their lives are greatly enriched. In some cases, their wives just don't know about the pedophilia. In others, the wives found out accidentally and have come to accept the situation. In others, the man came to feel differently about his pedophilia and just had to come out to her, and the relationship survived. But to be fair, the wives in these last two cases typically went through a lot of pain to get to that place.
So what can a pedophile do who wants an adult partner?
One honorable thing to do is just to mention early on when dating that you do have a sexual attraction to children. Most women will put an end to things, but a few maybe won't. Sometimes open-minded women end up on a site like Virtuous Pedophiles. Pedophile/pedophile matches have been made there. But my hunch is that this won't be a promising approach for very many pedophiles.
Another option is to keep a secret. People have different notions of openness in relationships. In some it is understood that they won't discuss the past and might be keeping secrets from each other if those secrets don't affect their shared future. I think pedophilia could qualify if a man is clear that he will never abuse a child.
In other relationships it might be understood that no big secrets exist, and in that case a man who says to himself, "I'm a pedophile, and I'm going to marry this woman and keep it a secret from her" has a big ethical problem, in my view. I'm not aware of any of the married men at Virtuous Pedophiles who saw things that clearly. They might have felt some unusual attractions but not have put the label on themselves. They might just manage not to think about it in any systematic way (see <Comfortably Numb>). There's a lot of murkiness. In all cases that take this path it seems there is going to be some inner turmoil.
Is there a way to know you are a pedophile, be honest with yourself, keep a secret, and ethically get into a relationship where it is understood that there are no big secrets?
I think it might be possible, and the key is to think of your pedophilia as a small secret rather than a big secret. If you are anguished about your pedophilia, if you spend lots of time in online pedophile forums, or if you spend lots of time looking at or looking for pictures of attractive kids, it's hard to see it as a small secret. (If you feel significant temptation to offend against a child, it's definitely not a small secret!)
But if you are comfortable with yourself, quit the online forums, and only fantasize about a kid briefly now and then, maybe it could become just a little secret.
Some other kinds of sexual history and sexual preference could be honorably kept secret. If you're an ordinary guy and some woman broke your heart 10 years before and you still think about her, you might not reveal that. If D cup breasts really turn you on a whole lot but your partner has B cups, there's no need to mention that. You don't need to say which actresses or singers you find really sexy. If you're happy to watch women's figure skating, you don't have to reveal that it's the figures rather than the skating that you find most intriguing. So with that as context, why would you as a pedophile need to admit that you find kids sexier than adult women?
To fully meet my ethical standards, you should also have considerable confidence that you'll be able to keep your attractions a secret indefinitely. In <my last post>, I wrote of the dozens of women who have written to Virtuous Pedophiles, distressed to find their boyfriend was a pedophile. The most frequent path of discovery is finding pictures of kids on his phone. You should make sure that's not going to happen with you.
Just how positive do you have to be that your attraction to children will not adversely affect your relationship and that you can keep the secret? I don't think 100% confidence is necessary. Consider all the other uncertainties that come when a couple commits to each other. We all know the divorce rate is high, and when divorce happens there were often risk factors that you could identify in advance.
I recently read a biography of Thomas Jefferson. His long-term relationship with his slave Sally Hemings has been of intense interest over the years. I learned that Sally was at least 3/4 white, and thus their joint children were 7/8 white. When emancipated at age 21, at least two of them moved far away and lived as white people and were never "outed". Was it ethical for them to keep this a secret from their spouses? If discovered, it could have had dire consequences for them and their children. Yet I am sympathetic. They suffered from unjust discrimination and were entitled to do their best to escape the consequences. The situation with celibate pedophiles seems entirely parallel to me.
What I am raising here is one possibility for a rather restricted set of circumstances. Many pedophiles will feel that they could not possibly get into a relationship without revealing their attraction in advance. Many will decide they could not keep a secret. Many will feel that hiding a pedophilic identity is being untrue to themselves. And a great many just don't feel sufficient attraction to an adult for this to be a live possibility at all. But those who fit the case I have described might consider it.
I touched on some of these issues in <this earlier post>.
No comments