A Review of Academic Use of the Term "Minor Attracted Persons"

And we can only unpack that if we accept that sex can be harmful, and that response and consent are not the same thing, and that adults should not be pushing children into exploring sex when they are not yet mentally able to understand and control what is happening.

Indeed. It's baggage that needs to be unpacked very carefully.
Even better if we could prevent it happening.

I remember years ago a man who was involved in a charity supporting survivors of CSA saying that he could see, looking back, that young teenage him had been particularly vulnerable because he was gay and craving male affection, and that of course his body reacted to stimulation (rapists always know about that), but that that did not change the fact that his adult abuser was an abuser who harmed him. And that of course the abuser had no interest in him, just in an available and accessible young body, easily replaceable when it got stale.

Have you actually read the thread?

One female NHS counsellor told me that some children enjoy the experience, ( her phrasing ). If she was trying to explore the shame, guilt & self loathing of a survivor she was pretty clumsy in her phrasing.

There are areas (RTE radio, looking at you, but it's everywhere including on MN) where any criticism of people's sexual behavior seems to be taboo. But there's plenty of judgement and stigmatising around eating habits.

I'm also reminded of a colleague back in the late 80s getting furious with a few of us (mostly but not all women) when we said we didn't intend to go to the latest very violent X-rated movie because we were self censoring and all censorship was wrong.

A random paedophilia apologist coming on the Feminism board and misunderstanding the thread. Strange times.

No, the misunderstanding was on the part of this poster, not the OP. It was cleared up later in the thread. Basically everyone (the academics who wrote the paper, the OP, and this poster) were all criticising the same thing: people sanitising paedophiles by calling them MAPs.

What's reactionary about opposing paedophilia in all its forms?
It's a bit of an odd claim to make on a feminist board but you do you I suppose 😕

I fear you have misunderstood the thread. Nobody was criticising the original article.

I saw a lot of adverts on Reddit for the Stop It Now helpline a few months ago!

(I thought they were on the money with their targeting there.)

Stop It Now is an initiative of the Lucy Faithfull Foundation.
“The Lucy Faithfull Foundation is a UK-wide child protection charity that works to stop child sexual abuse.
We’re here for everyone who needs us.
We protect children by working with people who pose a sexual risk and diverting them from causing harm. We support individuals and families who have been affected by abuse. And we help professionals who work with families to create safer environments for children.
We run the confidential Stop It Now helpline and Shore, a website for teenagers.”

I remember an interview in the Guardian with an employee of the Foundation, who said that the profile of paedophiles had massively changed since the ubiquity of online porn. Men who’d not previously sexualised children started to do it to get a new “hit”, break a new taboo, and some didn’t stop and think about what they were doing and that that meant they were paedophiles.

Really interesting find OP, thank you.

The Mumsnet feminism board not reading the research and instead jumping to reactionary conclusions? How uncommon...

I hope not. Child sexual abuse is much more widely reviled than "transsexualism", as it used to be called, has ever been - in the past, the latter was generally seen as unusual but not unacceptable or for that matter illegal. I think it would be a lot harder to get the public to accept that paedophilia is fine and dandy. Hope so anyway.

Not least, because most people have children/grandchildren/nieces/nephews etc who they want to protect.

''Academics happy to use these terms because it’s part of a wider attitude about how being a “good” or progressive person (especially in left wing circles) means not making ethical or moral judgments on anything, shaming others is always bad and repressive.''

There's also been a change in counselling services over the last few decades, the shift has been in personal standards of behaviour for counsellors. That change seems to be spreading. It may have started as 'we are only human' but its moved to 'we shouldn't judge even if our standards fall short of ideal.'
But standards are needed when you are working with vulnerable or dangerous people.

I think the psychologists and other academics are being taken for fools by very clever sex offenders.

I agree, and I think some people shouldn't be working with sex offenders. Institutions should be screening applicants for risks such as gullibility and naivety, and overseeing them to check they aren't being groomed or coerced.
Convicted offenders are often charming and clever, its how they groom people. Its a power trip and its all part of the game to them. Psychologists should know better than to imagine they are immune from being conned or groomed.

I can’t articulate this well currently but it seems to me that this all fits in with the take over of Queer Theory and post modern ideas about being liberal into academia and the whole champagne socialists/metropolitan elite we’ve been seeing in politics in the last few years.
Academics happy to use these terms because it’s part of a wider attitude about how being a “good” or progressive person (especially in left wing circles) means not making ethical or moral judgments on anything, shaming others is always bad and repressive.

I wonder about that.

'Trans rights' and the made up language around the movement became mainstream and supported in a very short space of time. So it seems actually quite easy to introduce new concepts to the general public who will think and say what academics tell them to think and say.

Agree, Lily. Charitably, some people may just struggle to fathom that bad people exist.

Thanks for this.
It's difficult (emotionally) to read but I'm trying to hear from the other side because my experience tells me that this kind of approach is barking up the wrong tree.
I've been involved with lots of CSA survivor peer support groups, I've worked as a psychatric nurse on wards, in the community, and at a GP clinic. I've heard alot of survivor stories and I've never heard from a victim who was abused by someone who fits the academic idea of a paedophile / MAP. It always involves sadism, the person abusing the child has chosen a child as a victim because fear and confusion and overwhelm in another person turn them on. An adult with severe disabilities would fit the bill just as well.
The idea that it's somewhat like falling in love with a child and wanting to consumate that is something I've only ever read in psychologist's case studies and fiction. Where "grooming" is like chocolates and roses, rather than gradually pushing the boundaries of both the child and other adults who care for her/him (with lots of plausible deniability) so that the child realises no adult is going to do anything to protect them anyway.
I think the psychologists and other academics are being taken for fools by very clever sex offenders. And I think people who write fiction about CSA without knowing what they're talking about are shits.

Interesting article and hopefully read and taken into account by that forensic psychologist throwing all forms of domestic violence into the same bin in order to say men and women are as bad as each other. Can’t remember what his name was but he also had published a paper on ‘map’…

Wouldn't let me edit but the charity mentioned in my previous post offer an online course to help people manage their thoughts and behaviours. WARNING: some of the topics could be distressing.
https://www.stopitnow.org.uk/concerned-about-your-own-thoughts-or-behaviour/help-with-inappropriate-thoughts-or-behaviour/self-help/understanding-the-behaviour/

Paraphilias often coexist with personality disorders.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38740864/

This charity operates a helpline for a range of issues including people concerned about their thoughts towards children.
https://www.stopitnow.org.uk/helpline/

@DeanElderberry I agree with your sentiment but i think paraphilia as a term is helpful because it includes all manner of fetishisms, and to my knowledge is not considered a nicety.

Any paedophile who genuinely understands that their desires are wrong won't be wanting them to be destigmatised or accepted.