Think of it this way: if they are 1% of the population that’s 3.4 million in the US, 4.9 million in the EU. So easily several tens of millions globally assuming that and the internet is global and this site we can assume didn’t have but a fraction of all pedophiles as users.
(As a depressing aside I would guess the number of people but especially adult men who are not interested in pre-pubescent children but would absolutely have sex with a 15 year old if given the opportunity is much, much higher than 1% of the population.)
The idea of protecting children in of itself is a recent idea (in capitalism, pre-capitalist societies being a bit different) brought about by labor rights movements. After all 125 years ago children were commonly found in work-houses and factories doing dangerous jobs for long brutal hours and in that situation well if you think that’s okay or have accepted it you’re not likely to raise a fuss about sexual exploitation involving them either. Even as short a time ago as immediately post WW2 tons of children worked very long hours on farms.
anecdotal but i’d say 1% is probably a pretty stark underestimate. i’ve known dozens of victims in my lifetime alone, and those are just the ones willing to talk (to me) about it. if you include the ones who were over 13 when they were abused it might well crack 100. even if you account for how trauma survivors sometimes seem to have a knack for finding one another it’s still fucking bleak beyond measure.
I have to agree from my own anecdotal experiences as well. I think it’s not something we can solve by -just- trying to catch/lock them all up because there are so many. I think it’s something we really only solve with socialism with doing away with the capitalist family dynamic, with community, with healthcare (including identifying early those pre-disposed and medicating and monitoring), with changing the culture, the superstructure. Not to say it’ll solve it of course but I think that’s the only way we begin to really put a major dent in it which is again just another example of how only liberation from capitalism can bring about other kinds of liberation and lessening/abolition of forms of exploitation.
My own view, perhaps controversial, is that pedophilia is not a “real” mental condition, but is in fact entirely produced by the norms of cisheteropatriarchy. Thus as Earth enters socialism and progresses towards communism, and more and more vestiges of patriarchy are dismantled, the whole phenomenon of pedophilia will eventually quite literally be driven to extinction as a sort of “habitat destruction” leaves the phenomenon with no chance to reproduce.
Think of it this way: if they are 1% of the population that’s 3.4 million in the US, 4.9 million in the EU. So easily several tens of millions globally assuming that and the internet is global and this site we can assume didn’t have but a fraction of all pedophiles as users.
(As a depressing aside I would guess the number of people but especially adult men who are not interested in pre-pubescent children but would absolutely have sex with a 15 year old if given the opportunity is much, much higher than 1% of the population.)
The idea of protecting children in of itself is a recent idea (in capitalism, pre-capitalist societies being a bit different) brought about by labor rights movements. After all 125 years ago children were commonly found in work-houses and factories doing dangerous jobs for long brutal hours and in that situation well if you think that’s okay or have accepted it you’re not likely to raise a fuss about sexual exploitation involving them either. Even as short a time ago as immediately post WW2 tons of children worked very long hours on farms.
anecdotal but i’d say 1% is probably a pretty stark underestimate. i’ve known dozens of victims in my lifetime alone, and those are just the ones willing to talk (to me) about it. if you include the ones who were over 13 when they were abused it might well crack 100. even if you account for how trauma survivors sometimes seem to have a knack for finding one another it’s still fucking bleak beyond measure.
I have to agree from my own anecdotal experiences as well. I think it’s not something we can solve by -just- trying to catch/lock them all up because there are so many. I think it’s something we really only solve with socialism with doing away with the capitalist family dynamic, with community, with healthcare (including identifying early those pre-disposed and medicating and monitoring), with changing the culture, the superstructure. Not to say it’ll solve it of course but I think that’s the only way we begin to really put a major dent in it which is again just another example of how only liberation from capitalism can bring about other kinds of liberation and lessening/abolition of forms of exploitation.
My own view, perhaps controversial, is that pedophilia is not a “real” mental condition, but is in fact entirely produced by the norms of cisheteropatriarchy. Thus as Earth enters socialism and progresses towards communism, and more and more vestiges of patriarchy are dismantled, the whole phenomenon of pedophilia will eventually quite literally be driven to extinction as a sort of “habitat destruction” leaves the phenomenon with no chance to reproduce.