Roasting Sacred Cows

Hans Gilde writes: "Pedophilia has been a big topic in the UK lately, there have been riots, beatings and vandalism resulting from [pedophile witchhunts]. In an attempt "to ask hard questions about the way society and the media deal with its most difficult problems" and point out "that famous people have a habit of denouncing things without knowing much about them", a comedian in the UK produced a TV show, described in an article in the NY Times, in which he actually got a member of Parliament to say the following, on the air, in all seriousness: "Using an area of the Internet the size of Ireland, pedophiles can make your keyboard release toxic vapors that can make you more suggestible."" This show is frankly hilarious, and the reaction to it is even better. You probably want to see the show, eh? It's available in .avi or Real and DivX.

Comments

Strongly disagree!

[mwillems]

Fwiw, I strongly disagree. On two points: I think that there is a taboo on discussing it, and I think there is a lot to discuss.

• It is very much a taboo. Even a show about it raises moral objections from the masses. A murderer gets complimented in jail; a pedophile gets murdered. My simple reply (in which btw I said I though pedophilia was distasteful!) elicited a "you sick fuck child rapist" response. Need I say more?
• There is a LOT to discuss. Is it indeed harmful? To whom? Can we minimise its incidenmce? Can we minimise its harm? Why are some people pedophiles? HOw can we minimise any harm caused? How should released pedophiles return to society? What therapies work best? Is the Internet bad for allwoing free communication? Should the Internet be banned becuase it contains child sex pictures? Is the harm partly or wholly culturally caused? I could go on for a while - and all these questions are taboo, as they generally just receive reactions like that one response to my post I saw that just saud "you sick fuck child rapist". That was a typical reponse not to a pedophile but to someone merely responding to a post ABOUT the subject! And that is what we should fix, and that is what the show no doubt hopes to achieve.

Michael