I am not familiar with tags and the implications of their use. It was a good-faith effort to pick relevant topics. If there’s a problem with them that can be explained, I’ll certainly consider editing.
Is the reason you don’t want it on the site really that it is off-topic? Could you formulate some criterion on the basis of which it is more off-topic than many posts in the open thread? Might it be more honest to say that it is a topic of negative value? On the verge of being a forbidden topic?
I am not familiar with tags and the implications of their use.
Oh, bollocks. Look at those four tags up there. You chose to type them. You chose to put them there, all in a row, so that people and search engines might more easily find everything here tagged with them. That there is anything on LessWrong so tagged is a disgrace. That is, I believe, why you chose them, because at this point, I think you’re just a troll. You wander in out of nowhere intent only on talking about being a (supposedly) non-practising pedophile. WTF does that have to do with LessWrong? Rationality can be applied to any topic, but that does not make every topic relevant to rationality.
Might it be more honest to say that it is a topic of negative value? On the verge of being a forbidden topic?
Of course it’s a topic of negative value. Of course it’s on the verge of being a forbidden topic. You know this perfectly well, several people have said it, I linked to one, and now I’m saying it explicitly. So cut out this passive-aggressive crap. You know exactly what is wrong with your posts here. That is why you are posting them. Or as you might put it:
Is the reason you want to post this really that it is on-topic? Could you formulate some criterion on the basis of which it is more on-topic than many posts in the open thread? Might it be more honest to say that it is a topic you want LessWrong to become visibly associated with to its discredit? On the verge of trolling?
Way back in the day, I read soc.motss on Usenet, and every now and then a NAMBLAoid would wander in posting the same sort of stuff as you just have, and on being responded to as you might expect, histrionically whining “Look! Look! I’m being oppressed! Come and see the violence inherent in the system!” They got short shrift there and I hope you get shorter shrift here.
Maybe I’m naive, but I’m no troll. People here pride themselves on open-mindedness, so I hoped for a better reception.
Maybe it will help to say that I am opposed to efforts to make adult-child sex more accepted in society, unlike NAMBLA. (Maybe it won’t.)
I have certain thoughts in my head. If I express the existence of those thoughts in public, I am subject to severe discrimination. It does have much in common with a thought crime. If I post here about this situation, If I read the reaction right, it is to many people entirely unwelcome—almost a meta-thought crime.
I’d happily remove the tags if I someone can tell me how. I thought there would be other posts with similar tags, so I thought they would be helpful.
The idea that topics come up here only because they make important points related to rationality seems entirely unclear. The whole idea of cryogenic preservation is popular here just because it’s popular here, as far as I can tell. If one said its discussion should be limited only to aspects that made important points about rationality, there wouldn’t be much said.
Pedophilia exists and it is a societal issue. I am genuinely interested in rational perspectives on it, and I tried to explore one issue in those terms to the best of my ability. Yes, there were assertions; I hoped that if people found them questionable, they would say so, so the assertions could be debated.
I made a post on the Open thread, as suggested, dealing with the meta-issue of whether pedophilia was a forbidden topic here or should be. I can’t see it any more; maybe it’s been downvoted into oblivion.
Is there an ad hominem aspect going on here? If I vigorously denied being a pedophile but raised the same issues, would the reaction be the same? I don’t know, though I have seen other people posting on the general subject who did not incur wrath.
I have certain thoughts in my head. If I express the existence of those thoughts in public, I am subject to severe discrimination.
Just so you know — everyone has this, to some degree or other; although severe forms are associated with particular mental illnesses.
They’re called intrusive thoughts and they occur on a wide variety of topics: chiefly inappropriate sexual behavior, violence (including self-harm), and (among religious people) blasphemy.
Expressing these out loud in public is usually a bad idea for a range of reasons — it may make other people feel scared, unsafe, or hurt; it may just alienate them as friends; it may be interpreted as a threat of criminal violence (or terrorism, these days); it may land you under suicide watch or psychiatric observation. This is not because Intrusive-Thought-Havers are politically oppressed and deprived of freedom of speech. It’s because nobody can tell that you’re just expressing intrusive thoughts and not stating deliberate plans or expressing tendencies to actually carry out those acts.
It doesn’t seem to me to be a good idea to make your intrusive thoughts part of your identity — and especially not to politically identify with them. Being a member of the Oppressed Subculture Of Them What Have Intrusive Thoughts About Boinking Little Kids (OSOTWHITABLK) seems like a much worse position to be in, identity-wise, than being an ordinary human being who, like pretty much all other ordinary human beings, sometimes has intrusive thoughts.
Thanks for taking the time to lay out this position. It is quite interesting.
My sentence “If I express the existence of those thoughts in public, I am subject to severe discrimination.” wasn’t entirely clear. I do not mean on the bus or even at a cocktail party. I meant public to contrast with private (never told to anyone). I cannot tell close friends or family either. That’s a good way to lose close friends and family.
There are mental illnesses where intrusive thoughts are a symptom and treatment is to try to avoid having them. I know there are many celibate pedophiles who think of their attraction in roughly those terms, though on the whole I don’t think it is the most healthy approach.
My preferred model of the good emotional life is to entertain whatever thoughts come, realizing that thoughts can by themselves never be evil or immoral. It is good to discuss them with close friends. What is immoral or immoral is the actions one takes after considering all thoughts. I am not ashamed of my pedophilic thoughts and do not try to suppress them. My therapist has no problem with them either.
If what you have are truly rare unwanted thoughts that quickly disappear, then keeping them to yourself seems fine. But for thoughts that recur and remain, your list of comparable conditions is instructive. I think people who are very sad will often complain of suicidal feelings to their close friends, and it is appropriate as a way of working through the depression. It also may be helpful to work out with another person just how serious they are rather than keeping that conversation closed in your own depressed mind. Most adults will talk to their friends about who they are attracted to and might even spin a detailed fantasy or two. As for anger towards other people or “the system”, it seems helpful to discuss that as well with others, and perhaps think through the bad consequences that would follow from acting on rage.
There are a great many things you might not say to avoid upsetting those around you. Budding liberals may not want to express their views in a conservative house. Gay people can certainly cause a lot of pain when they come out. But in the right circumstances those are necessary—being true to yourself even if the revelations disturb others. It’s true that when a gay person comes out, it might be prelude to finding a satisfying relationship—though that can be done while in the closet too. It does not serve that function for celibate pedophiles, of course. But I think many gay people can relate to the idea that they want to be known for who they are. Pedophilia to me and many others feels far more like an important part of self than a mere series of intrusive thoughts. And your “boinking” characterization is a largely inaccurate stereotype. Among the pedophiles I associate with, complex romantic feelings are far more common than fantasies of specific carnal acts—and romantic fantasies cannot be ethically acted upon either.
Of course it would be more personally comfortable to keep my thoughts to myself and not rock the boat. That’s true whenever a person has a controversial opinion.
The following comment is very possibly presumptuous to the point of being amateur psychoanalysis. If so, I apologize for any offense. I will say up front that my intention in writing it is primarily to reduce the likelihood of you abusing any children; and only secondarily to help you feel any better.
It seems from your writing that you treat “being a pedophile” as part of your identity. You use identity-politics vocabulary such as “discrimination”, and comparison to being liberal-identified in a conservative-identified household, and to gay sexual orientation which is also a well-known identity.
It is my hypothesis that this identification is a bad idea from the standpoint of preventing sexual abuse of children.
I was trying to present a different view: rather than thinking of yourself as “a pedophile”, you might think of yourself as “someone who sometimes has thoughts about sexual acts with young children.”
Or, to be a wee bit judgmental, “someone who is afflicted with intrusive thoughts about sexual acts with young children.”
Your post’s title could be translated out of identity-speak as, “A large proportion of people who have thoughts about sexual acts with young children do not act on those thoughts.” Which seems obviously true — and also sounds a heck of a lot better for the kids’ well-being than anything about “celibate pedophiles”.
It also means that people who notice that they have intrusive thoughts of this nature should not draw the conclusion, “Aha! These thoughts mean that I must adopt a ‘pedophile’ identity!” — just as a person who has intrusive thoughts about slitting irritating people’s throats shouldn’t infer “Aha! These thoughts mean I must adopt a ‘psychopath’ identity!”, and a person who has intrusive thoughts about jumping off bridges (but is not depressed and does not make any suicide attempts) shouldn’t infer that they are “a suicidal person”.
I’m not just saying, “Have you tried not being a pedophile?” Rather, I’m saying, “There are lots of ways that you could model yourself. Given that you actively don’t want to hurt children, it seems that the ‘intrusive thoughts’ model (or just the ‘thoughts’ model) may well be more effective than the ‘identity’ model, as a matter of instrumental rationality.”
It is surely true that in most company, you can’t admit such thoughts without getting a lot of nasty reactions. That is also true for a lot of other sorts of thoughts. Heck, about half of section 8 of the ol’ 1000-question purity test is off limits for almost any conversation, even among friends. That’s independent of whether it makes sense to think of thoughts you don’t intend to act on as part of your identity!
I will say up front that my intention in writing it is primarily to reduce the likelihood of you abusing any children; and only secondarily to help you feel any better.
No offense taken. My priorities are the same as yours. I’ve got the non-offending bit covered completely, but I’ll here take the viewpoint of someone who doesn’t, because it’s interesting. The idea that thinking about something makes you more likely to do it is addressed (as an indirect consequence) in an “open thread” comment I made titled “Assertion: Child porn availability does not increase child sex abuse”. Some thoughts are pleasant. If a person cannot achieve romantic or sexual satisfaction in the real world, spinning some fantasies about it may be about the best one can do. There is no evidence it makes offending against children more likely; it might make it less likely.
It also means that people who notice that they have intrusive thoughts of this nature should not draw the conclusion, “Aha! These thoughts mean that I must adopt a ‘pedophile’ identity!”
When young teens are worried they might be pedophiles, among my initial advice is that it might go away, and I always advise people to think about their attraction to appropriate-age partners and think about that most. I do not engage in recruiting.
Pedophilia is different from homosexuality in one very important way: it is not something that can be followed through ethically to a consummation in the real world. In that sense, homosexuality is just fine and pedophilia is not good. However, they are both sexual orientations. It’s right in the new DSM5: If individuals “report an absence of feelings of guilt, shame, or anxiety about these impulses and are not functionally limited by their paraphilic impulses (according to self-report, objective assessment, or both), and their self-reported and legally recorded histories indicate that they have never acted on their impulses, then these individuals have a pedophilic sexual orientation but not pedophilic disorder.” It’s controversial, but sufficiently mainstream in psychiatry that it made it into the official handbook.
Now, few people (other than heavy-duty social conservatives) would suggest that gay people just stop having those intrusive thoughts. The class of people one is attracted to sexually is just too important to be relegated to “intrusive thoughts”.
Pedophilia is different from homosexuality in one very important way: it is not something that can be followed through ethically to a consummation in the real world.
So the difference is a century or two of cultural drift?
Of course the values of my current culture (slightly distorted in the direction of the preferences of those I most desire affiliation with) is the ideal culture. I merely notice that the moral acceptability of each of those practices has varied drastically over time, including most recently a variation in acceptance of homosexuality.
My preferred model of the good emotional life is to entertain whatever thoughts come, realizing that thoughts can by themselves never be evil or immoral.
That saying contains a long chain of unsupported inferences. Each transition can happen, but each step can easily not happen. The referenced post has to do with habits of discipline, and that’s quite different from the kinds of thoughts I have in mind.
Suppose I’m really mad at my mother and I find myself wishing that she were dead. I can berate myself for having such a terrible thought. But instead I might recognize that such thoughts are natural. If I find myself enjoying the thought and going back to it again and again, I don’t think that’s going to lead me to happiness—though it might well not lead me one iota closer to harming my mother. But just noting that I wished my mother was dead is not something I feel guilty about or vow to never think again. I’d instead focus on why I’m angry at my mother, remember all her good qualities, and think about the situation from her point of view.
When I’m done thinking about it, I might decide to talk with my mother about what she did if I think that might improve the situation, or I might decide to say nothing. When I look back on the incident, it is on the basis of what I actually did that I will judge my morality, not the thoughts I went through to get there.
This is just one example, but hopefully it conveys some sense that we are in a different realm.
In the sexual realm, suppose there’s some celebrity that an ordinary guy finds hot. He freely fantasizes about having sex with her because it’s fun. Is he in danger of getting so obsessed that he starts stalking her and attacks her? No. It might happen and it will make the news, but from personal experience we know he’s a rare and disturbed exception. If a pedophile does it, you might conclude that many or most pedophiles are in danger of doing that because you don’t know all the celibate pedophiles who don’t.
My sentence “If I express the existence of those thoughts in public, I am subject to severe discrimination.” wasn’t entirely clear. I do not mean on the bus or even at a cocktail party. I meant public to contrast with private (never told to anyone). I cannot tell close friends or family either. That’s a good way to lose close friends and family.
It it is any consolation most other people don’t tell their family about the crude details of our sexual desires either. For example I don’t tell people that I really like [redacted].
My preferred model of the good emotional life is to entertain whatever thoughts come, realizing that thoughts can by themselves never be evil or immoral.
Thoughts are known to cause action. That’s why people take care in entertaining and expressing their thoughts.
Well, I suspect that in practice people take care in expressing their thoughts in these sorts of contexts primarily because expressions of thoughts are frequently treated by others as evidence of otherwise-imperceivable actions, which isn’t quite the same thing.
Sam thinks “I’m having this thought. I know that thoughts cause actions, and I don’t wish to act on this thought. Therefore, I will avoid thinking about this thought. Further, I know that expressing thoughts makes those thoughts more likely in the future. Therefore, I will also avoid expressing that thought.”
Pat thinks “I’m having this thought. I know that if I express this thought, my neighbors will assume that I’m acting on this thought. I don’t want them to believe that. Therefore, I will avoid expressing that thought.”
I’m saying that: *Sam and Pat are doing two very different things
your description of why people take care in expressing their thoughts seems to describe Sam
my description seems to describe Pat
I think most of the times people take care in expressing their thoughts, they are behaving more like Pat than Sam.
Gotcha. It’s kinda funny I meant to describe Pat in the first place, didn’t even think about the first one. If you know thoughts cause actions, so will everyone else. They’ll know you have thoughts that cause actions if you express them. I think my comment could convey both of these interpretations.
Ah, gotcha. Sorry, I misunderstood you. I was perhaps primed by reading a bunch of earlier comments from other people that were more explicitly talking about the former.
I wonder if the degree of technological progress envisioned by transhumanists will eventually make the ethical problems posed by this particular sexual orientation a moot point. Just as we will eventually cure aging, and more easily switch genders, we ought to be able to alter development, for example. An adult-aged person could easily assume a childlike body, while retaining the ability to consent in every ethically relevant sense.
On the other hand, we should eventually know enough about neuroscience to make alterations to aspects of attraction and identity. Gays could become straight, straights could become gay, sadism and masochism levels could be adjusted, gender and sex could be flipped arbitrarily… And pedophilia could be added or subtracted.
We could end up with a society of only straight people—or the opposite—depending on our meta-level preferences. In fact, it would also probably be feasible to turn anyone who wants completely asexual—in the extreme case, doing away with sex entirely (presumably with everyone perfectly okay with their new asexual identity).
Given that as possible, what are our meta-level preferences? Should we prefer to peacefully coexist with pedophile/pedomorph couples, and whatever other combination comes up (furries, tentacles, whatever) or should we just cut the crap and settle on something boring like all-asexual or all-straight?
We could end up with a society of only straight people—or the opposite—depending on our meta-level preferences. In fact, it would also probably be feasible to turn anyone who wants completely asexual
Arguably, the opposite of straight is asexual. At least, not wanting sex with anyone is more clearly opposed to wanting sex with members of the opposite sex than wanting sex with members of the same sex (which is what I assume you meant) is. One person can do both of the latter, but not both of the former.
Anyway, as far as meta-preferences go, by the time all of these parameters can be fiddled with at will my preference is that we be primarily concerned with something else, such that your question feels roughly equivalent to “should we prefer to peacefully coexist with people who mix stripes and plaids, and whatever other combination comes up, or should we settle on something boring like all-leaopard-print or all-sequined?”
Maybe I’m naive, but I’m no troll. People here pride themselves on open-mindedness, so I hoped for a better reception.
No, this is just more trolling, using “open-mindedness” and (elsewhere) “thoughtcrime” as Power Words to stun opposition.
I’d happily remove the tags if I someone can tell me how.
I don’t believe you. If you’re smart enough to put them there you’re smart enough to remove them.
I thought there would be other posts with similar tags, so I thought they would be helpful.
I don’t believe you. You could not possibly have thought that there were such other posts, and clicking on those tags shows none.
I made a post on the Open thread, as suggested, dealing with the meta-issue of whether pedophilia was a forbidden topic here or should be. I can’t see it any more; maybe it’s been downvoted into oblivion.
I don’t believe you. It’s still there, and even, extraordinarily, upvoted.
Not much point in addressing the character assassination.
But when I look at the icons below a reply, I see an “edit” icon. That’s my intuition as to how to get to a place where I can remove tags. I don’t see any such icon for a main post.
There is no edit link when I do that, and I have an idea what might be going on. My karma is no longer sufficient to post in the Discussion area, so perhaps it has also removed my ability to edit the post. If so, this isn’t a problem I can solve on my own.
I am not familiar with tags and the implications of their use. It was a good-faith effort to pick relevant topics. If there’s a problem with them that can be explained, I’ll certainly consider editing.
Is the reason you don’t want it on the site really that it is off-topic? Could you formulate some criterion on the basis of which it is more off-topic than many posts in the open thread? Might it be more honest to say that it is a topic of negative value? On the verge of being a forbidden topic?
Oh, bollocks. Look at those four tags up there. You chose to type them. You chose to put them there, all in a row, so that people and search engines might more easily find everything here tagged with them. That there is anything on LessWrong so tagged is a disgrace. That is, I believe, why you chose them, because at this point, I think you’re just a troll. You wander in out of nowhere intent only on talking about being a (supposedly) non-practising pedophile. WTF does that have to do with LessWrong? Rationality can be applied to any topic, but that does not make every topic relevant to rationality.
Of course it’s a topic of negative value. Of course it’s on the verge of being a forbidden topic. You know this perfectly well, several people have said it, I linked to one, and now I’m saying it explicitly. So cut out this passive-aggressive crap. You know exactly what is wrong with your posts here. That is why you are posting them. Or as you might put it:
Is the reason you want to post this really that it is on-topic? Could you formulate some criterion on the basis of which it is more on-topic than many posts in the open thread? Might it be more honest to say that it is a topic you want LessWrong to become visibly associated with to its discredit? On the verge of trolling?
Way back in the day, I read soc.motss on Usenet, and every now and then a NAMBLAoid would wander in posting the same sort of stuff as you just have, and on being responded to as you might expect, histrionically whining “Look! Look! I’m being oppressed! Come and see the violence inherent in the system!” They got short shrift there and I hope you get shorter shrift here.
Maybe I’m naive, but I’m no troll. People here pride themselves on open-mindedness, so I hoped for a better reception.
Maybe it will help to say that I am opposed to efforts to make adult-child sex more accepted in society, unlike NAMBLA. (Maybe it won’t.)
I have certain thoughts in my head. If I express the existence of those thoughts in public, I am subject to severe discrimination. It does have much in common with a thought crime. If I post here about this situation, If I read the reaction right, it is to many people entirely unwelcome—almost a meta-thought crime.
I’d happily remove the tags if I someone can tell me how. I thought there would be other posts with similar tags, so I thought they would be helpful.
The idea that topics come up here only because they make important points related to rationality seems entirely unclear. The whole idea of cryogenic preservation is popular here just because it’s popular here, as far as I can tell. If one said its discussion should be limited only to aspects that made important points about rationality, there wouldn’t be much said.
Pedophilia exists and it is a societal issue. I am genuinely interested in rational perspectives on it, and I tried to explore one issue in those terms to the best of my ability. Yes, there were assertions; I hoped that if people found them questionable, they would say so, so the assertions could be debated.
I made a post on the Open thread, as suggested, dealing with the meta-issue of whether pedophilia was a forbidden topic here or should be. I can’t see it any more; maybe it’s been downvoted into oblivion.
Is there an ad hominem aspect going on here? If I vigorously denied being a pedophile but raised the same issues, would the reaction be the same? I don’t know, though I have seen other people posting on the general subject who did not incur wrath.
Just so you know — everyone has this, to some degree or other; although severe forms are associated with particular mental illnesses.
They’re called intrusive thoughts and they occur on a wide variety of topics: chiefly inappropriate sexual behavior, violence (including self-harm), and (among religious people) blasphemy.
Expressing these out loud in public is usually a bad idea for a range of reasons — it may make other people feel scared, unsafe, or hurt; it may just alienate them as friends; it may be interpreted as a threat of criminal violence (or terrorism, these days); it may land you under suicide watch or psychiatric observation. This is not because Intrusive-Thought-Havers are politically oppressed and deprived of freedom of speech. It’s because nobody can tell that you’re just expressing intrusive thoughts and not stating deliberate plans or expressing tendencies to actually carry out those acts.
It doesn’t seem to me to be a good idea to make your intrusive thoughts part of your identity — and especially not to politically identify with them. Being a member of the Oppressed Subculture Of Them What Have Intrusive Thoughts About Boinking Little Kids (OSOTWHITABLK) seems like a much worse position to be in, identity-wise, than being an ordinary human being who, like pretty much all other ordinary human beings, sometimes has intrusive thoughts.
Thanks for taking the time to lay out this position. It is quite interesting.
My sentence “If I express the existence of those thoughts in public, I am subject to severe discrimination.” wasn’t entirely clear. I do not mean on the bus or even at a cocktail party. I meant public to contrast with private (never told to anyone). I cannot tell close friends or family either. That’s a good way to lose close friends and family.
There are mental illnesses where intrusive thoughts are a symptom and treatment is to try to avoid having them. I know there are many celibate pedophiles who think of their attraction in roughly those terms, though on the whole I don’t think it is the most healthy approach.
My preferred model of the good emotional life is to entertain whatever thoughts come, realizing that thoughts can by themselves never be evil or immoral. It is good to discuss them with close friends. What is immoral or immoral is the actions one takes after considering all thoughts. I am not ashamed of my pedophilic thoughts and do not try to suppress them. My therapist has no problem with them either.
If what you have are truly rare unwanted thoughts that quickly disappear, then keeping them to yourself seems fine. But for thoughts that recur and remain, your list of comparable conditions is instructive. I think people who are very sad will often complain of suicidal feelings to their close friends, and it is appropriate as a way of working through the depression. It also may be helpful to work out with another person just how serious they are rather than keeping that conversation closed in your own depressed mind. Most adults will talk to their friends about who they are attracted to and might even spin a detailed fantasy or two. As for anger towards other people or “the system”, it seems helpful to discuss that as well with others, and perhaps think through the bad consequences that would follow from acting on rage.
There are a great many things you might not say to avoid upsetting those around you. Budding liberals may not want to express their views in a conservative house. Gay people can certainly cause a lot of pain when they come out. But in the right circumstances those are necessary—being true to yourself even if the revelations disturb others. It’s true that when a gay person comes out, it might be prelude to finding a satisfying relationship—though that can be done while in the closet too. It does not serve that function for celibate pedophiles, of course. But I think many gay people can relate to the idea that they want to be known for who they are. Pedophilia to me and many others feels far more like an important part of self than a mere series of intrusive thoughts. And your “boinking” characterization is a largely inaccurate stereotype. Among the pedophiles I associate with, complex romantic feelings are far more common than fantasies of specific carnal acts—and romantic fantasies cannot be ethically acted upon either.
Of course it would be more personally comfortable to keep my thoughts to myself and not rock the boat. That’s true whenever a person has a controversial opinion.
The following comment is very possibly presumptuous to the point of being amateur psychoanalysis. If so, I apologize for any offense. I will say up front that my intention in writing it is primarily to reduce the likelihood of you abusing any children; and only secondarily to help you feel any better.
It seems from your writing that you treat “being a pedophile” as part of your identity. You use identity-politics vocabulary such as “discrimination”, and comparison to being liberal-identified in a conservative-identified household, and to gay sexual orientation which is also a well-known identity.
It is my hypothesis that this identification is a bad idea from the standpoint of preventing sexual abuse of children.
I was trying to present a different view: rather than thinking of yourself as “a pedophile”, you might think of yourself as “someone who sometimes has thoughts about sexual acts with young children.”
Or, to be a wee bit judgmental, “someone who is afflicted with intrusive thoughts about sexual acts with young children.”
Your post’s title could be translated out of identity-speak as, “A large proportion of people who have thoughts about sexual acts with young children do not act on those thoughts.” Which seems obviously true — and also sounds a heck of a lot better for the kids’ well-being than anything about “celibate pedophiles”.
It also means that people who notice that they have intrusive thoughts of this nature should not draw the conclusion, “Aha! These thoughts mean that I must adopt a ‘pedophile’ identity!” — just as a person who has intrusive thoughts about slitting irritating people’s throats shouldn’t infer “Aha! These thoughts mean I must adopt a ‘psychopath’ identity!”, and a person who has intrusive thoughts about jumping off bridges (but is not depressed and does not make any suicide attempts) shouldn’t infer that they are “a suicidal person”.
I’m not just saying, “Have you tried not being a pedophile?” Rather, I’m saying, “There are lots of ways that you could model yourself. Given that you actively don’t want to hurt children, it seems that the ‘intrusive thoughts’ model (or just the ‘thoughts’ model) may well be more effective than the ‘identity’ model, as a matter of instrumental rationality.”
It is surely true that in most company, you can’t admit such thoughts without getting a lot of nasty reactions. That is also true for a lot of other sorts of thoughts. Heck, about half of section 8 of the ol’ 1000-question purity test is off limits for almost any conversation, even among friends. That’s independent of whether it makes sense to think of thoughts you don’t intend to act on as part of your identity!
No offense taken. My priorities are the same as yours. I’ve got the non-offending bit covered completely, but I’ll here take the viewpoint of someone who doesn’t, because it’s interesting. The idea that thinking about something makes you more likely to do it is addressed (as an indirect consequence) in an “open thread” comment I made titled “Assertion: Child porn availability does not increase child sex abuse”. Some thoughts are pleasant. If a person cannot achieve romantic or sexual satisfaction in the real world, spinning some fantasies about it may be about the best one can do. There is no evidence it makes offending against children more likely; it might make it less likely.
When young teens are worried they might be pedophiles, among my initial advice is that it might go away, and I always advise people to think about their attraction to appropriate-age partners and think about that most. I do not engage in recruiting.
Pedophilia is different from homosexuality in one very important way: it is not something that can be followed through ethically to a consummation in the real world. In that sense, homosexuality is just fine and pedophilia is not good. However, they are both sexual orientations. It’s right in the new DSM5: If individuals “report an absence of feelings of guilt, shame, or anxiety about these impulses and are not functionally limited by their paraphilic impulses (according to self-report, objective assessment, or both), and their self-reported and legally recorded histories indicate that they have never acted on their impulses, then these individuals have a pedophilic sexual orientation but not pedophilic disorder.” It’s controversial, but sufficiently mainstream in psychiatry that it made it into the official handbook.
Now, few people (other than heavy-duty social conservatives) would suggest that gay people just stop having those intrusive thoughts. The class of people one is attracted to sexually is just too important to be relegated to “intrusive thoughts”.
So the difference is a century or two of cultural drift?
I’m reluctant to say what might possibly happen in the future, especially a century or two from now.
But I do not see a path to its happening, and I do not want it to happen.
Of course the values of my current culture (slightly distorted in the direction of the preferences of those I most desire affiliation with) is the ideal culture. I merely notice that the moral acceptability of each of those practices has varied drastically over time, including most recently a variation in acceptance of homosexuality.
PC poo-pooing of this phrase aside, the quoted phrase is actually a good summary of your point and good advise.
(Worth noting since it has appeared in consecutive comments: The word that goes here is ‘advice’. ‘Advise’ is what you do by giving ‘advice’.)
I don’t agree; it’s on the wrong meta-level.
That’s a relief. If it was professional psychoanalysis I’d be more concerned.
This is really really bad advise.
Watch your thoughts, for they become words.
Watch your words, for they become actions.
Watch your actions, for they become habits.
Watch your habits, for they become your character.
Watch your character, for it becomes your destiny.
That saying contains a long chain of unsupported inferences. Each transition can happen, but each step can easily not happen. The referenced post has to do with habits of discipline, and that’s quite different from the kinds of thoughts I have in mind.
Suppose I’m really mad at my mother and I find myself wishing that she were dead. I can berate myself for having such a terrible thought. But instead I might recognize that such thoughts are natural. If I find myself enjoying the thought and going back to it again and again, I don’t think that’s going to lead me to happiness—though it might well not lead me one iota closer to harming my mother. But just noting that I wished my mother was dead is not something I feel guilty about or vow to never think again. I’d instead focus on why I’m angry at my mother, remember all her good qualities, and think about the situation from her point of view.
When I’m done thinking about it, I might decide to talk with my mother about what she did if I think that might improve the situation, or I might decide to say nothing. When I look back on the incident, it is on the basis of what I actually did that I will judge my morality, not the thoughts I went through to get there.
This is just one example, but hopefully it conveys some sense that we are in a different realm.
In the sexual realm, suppose there’s some celebrity that an ordinary guy finds hot. He freely fantasizes about having sex with her because it’s fun. Is he in danger of getting so obsessed that he starts stalking her and attacks her? No. It might happen and it will make the news, but from personal experience we know he’s a rare and disturbed exception. If a pedophile does it, you might conclude that many or most pedophiles are in danger of doing that because you don’t know all the celibate pedophiles who don’t.
It it is any consolation most other people don’t tell their family about the crude details of our sexual desires either. For example I don’t tell people that I really like [redacted].
Thoughts are known to cause action. That’s why people take care in entertaining and expressing their thoughts.
Well, I suspect that in practice people take care in expressing their thoughts in these sorts of contexts primarily because expressions of thoughts are frequently treated by others as evidence of otherwise-imperceivable actions, which isn’t quite the same thing.
I’m not sure I get what you’re saying.
Consider two people, Sam and Pat.
Sam thinks “I’m having this thought. I know that thoughts cause actions, and I don’t wish to act on this thought. Therefore, I will avoid thinking about this thought. Further, I know that expressing thoughts makes those thoughts more likely in the future. Therefore, I will also avoid expressing that thought.”
Pat thinks “I’m having this thought. I know that if I express this thought, my neighbors will assume that I’m acting on this thought. I don’t want them to believe that. Therefore, I will avoid expressing that thought.”
I’m saying that:
*Sam and Pat are doing two very different things
your description of why people take care in expressing their thoughts seems to describe Sam
my description seems to describe Pat
I think most of the times people take care in expressing their thoughts, they are behaving more like Pat than Sam.
Gotcha. It’s kinda funny I meant to describe Pat in the first place, didn’t even think about the first one. If you know thoughts cause actions, so will everyone else. They’ll know you have thoughts that cause actions if you express them. I think my comment could convey both of these interpretations.
Ah, gotcha. Sorry, I misunderstood you.
I was perhaps primed by reading a bunch of earlier comments from other people that were more explicitly talking about the former.
I wonder if the degree of technological progress envisioned by transhumanists will eventually make the ethical problems posed by this particular sexual orientation a moot point. Just as we will eventually cure aging, and more easily switch genders, we ought to be able to alter development, for example. An adult-aged person could easily assume a childlike body, while retaining the ability to consent in every ethically relevant sense.
On the other hand, we should eventually know enough about neuroscience to make alterations to aspects of attraction and identity. Gays could become straight, straights could become gay, sadism and masochism levels could be adjusted, gender and sex could be flipped arbitrarily… And pedophilia could be added or subtracted.
We could end up with a society of only straight people—or the opposite—depending on our meta-level preferences. In fact, it would also probably be feasible to turn anyone who wants completely asexual—in the extreme case, doing away with sex entirely (presumably with everyone perfectly okay with their new asexual identity).
Given that as possible, what are our meta-level preferences? Should we prefer to peacefully coexist with pedophile/pedomorph couples, and whatever other combination comes up (furries, tentacles, whatever) or should we just cut the crap and settle on something boring like all-asexual or all-straight?
Arguably, the opposite of straight is asexual. At least, not wanting sex with anyone is more clearly opposed to wanting sex with members of the opposite sex than wanting sex with members of the same sex (which is what I assume you meant) is. One person can do both of the latter, but not both of the former.
Anyway, as far as meta-preferences go, by the time all of these parameters can be fiddled with at will my preference is that we be primarily concerned with something else, such that your question feels roughly equivalent to “should we prefer to peacefully coexist with people who mix stripes and plaids, and whatever other combination comes up, or should we settle on something boring like all-leaopard-print or all-sequined?”
No, this is just more trolling, using “open-mindedness” and (elsewhere) “thoughtcrime” as Power Words to stun opposition.
I don’t believe you. If you’re smart enough to put them there you’re smart enough to remove them.
I don’t believe you. You could not possibly have thought that there were such other posts, and clicking on those tags shows none.
I don’t believe you. It’s still there, and even, extraordinarily, upvoted.
Not much point in addressing the character assassination.
But when I look at the icons below a reply, I see an “edit” icon. That’s my intuition as to how to get to a place where I can remove tags. I don’t see any such icon for a main post.
Go to http://lesswrong.com/user/JoshElders/submitted/ and then look under the post at the various icons… there will be an edit link, probably going to http://lesswrong.com/edit/it3 -- you can then change tags, or even withdraw the post by submitting it back to your drafts.
There is no edit link when I do that, and I have an idea what might be going on. My karma is no longer sufficient to post in the Discussion area, so perhaps it has also removed my ability to edit the post. If so, this isn’t a problem I can solve on my own.
Not the only one, which is why he linked to Vilian_Bur’s comment.