(October 26, 2016 at 2:17 am)robvalue Wrote: Let's pretend you have a friend, and you're a parent. You've known this friend a long time. You trust them, and you believe they are a good person.
One day they confide in you that they are a paedophile. They have sexual urges towards young children. They say they haven't ever acted on them, nor do they intend to, and you believe they are sincere. They just want your understanding and support, and they ask that you keep this confidential.
How do you react? For example:
1) Do you keep it confidential?
a) No, tell as many people as possible
b) No, tell a select few
c) No, tell a select few but ask them to be sympathetic
d) Yes
2) Will you still be their friend?
a) No, cut all contact
b) Yes, but distance yourself
c) Yes
3) If yes to the above, will it change the contact you allow with your children?
a) Yes, cut all contact
b) Yes, only supervised contact
c) No
4) Will you support them?
a) No, don't want to hear anything about it
b) Yes, as long as they keep it vague
c) Yes, let them say whatever they need to
Sexual impulses aren't really under anyone's control. As a guy, I want to see lots of boobs. It's annoying. I don't gain anything from this. It's just biology. If I went around telling everyone who's tits I wanted to see, that'd create some problems. Hey, I'd like to see your wife's tits! And your daughters! And maybe your sisters while we're at it! And tit-seeing is pretty benign. There's plenty of other stuff men would like to do to women. Joe, I have this fantasy about ass-raping your wife while you're tied up in the corner! Joe's probably not going to like that.
The point being, wanting to have sex with kids is a bad break. I don't think the urge itself iis wrong though. Moralizing biology is pretty sketchy. And I think when you tell someone something about themselves they can't control is bad, that's a recipe for disaster. I think the message should be that the impulses aren't as common as most, but they are natural. But at the same time, they aren't allowed to act upon them in our country.
That being said, sharing that information has consequences, as people are protective of their children obviously. So my problem with a paedophile telling me they're a paedophile (while I have a kid), is that it's a dick move on their part. They should talk to a therapist about it instead, because they should know how uncomfortable it would make me given that I have a kid.
To answer the question, I think I'd say d, c, b, a (until I no longer have a kid, at which point it would be c) depending on original friendship, of course. Cutting losses on fringe friend is obviously an option.
