to wonder why powerful men abusing vulnerable children is newsworthy now?

[PamelaTodd]

I’m not suggesting that the rape and exploitation of children and vulnerable women isn’t reprehensible, but my question is why is this an issue now ?

In the case of Mountbatten, his habits were an open secret. The FBI has a file about him, based on information from people in his social circle. It has been suggested that the Gardai, RUC, IRA and MI5 were all aware of his activities with the Kincora Boys home. But it just didn’t seem to matter to anyone very much.

Epstein doesn't seem to have been discreet, even if his friends all claim an astonishing degree of naïveté and myopia. The news stories being released in the last month aren’t new. They’ve been held in editor’s vaults until now. Why now? Why didn’t any of this matter to us (the public interest) until now?

If anything society is more tolerant than ever of kinks and fetishes, as well as the spectrum of sexual orientation. I can’t find the post now, but there was a mention of paedophiles (or “minor attracted persons”) openly meeting up at one of this year’s pride march.

It seems odd to me that the more buttoned up society of the past would sweep this under the carpet, and our hyper sexualised tolerant society is so shocked. If I’m honest I’m a little bit scared that this is just a step in normalizing it. That we’re supposed to absorb the idea that this sort of thing is so widespread and endemic that there’s nothing we can ever hope to do about it.

There have been attempts before by victims of these (and other injustices) to come forward but they’ve been discredited, or silenced. Why are we listening now? What’s changed?

And what else is locked away in news editors’ values that we should know about?

What that some of the people at pride are going to be peadophiles taking advantage of the access to children?

Specifically, a source for your claim that pedophiles are a big problem at Pride.

source for your claim that pedophiles are a big problem at Pride

I didn't say a big problem, but yes MAPs are and always have been a problem with pride.

You yourself have said they've tried to join.

I have to leave now, which is incredibly frustrating because this thread is maddening and I want to keep at it. Not much to be done, though. Peace out ✌️

this thread is maddening and I want to keep at it.

derail then leave.

Didn't work very well did it.

@CaptainKirksSpookyghost

Here are your exact words, copied and pasted:

so anyway, peadophiles are a big problem at pride.

The fact that pedophiles have tried to use Pride as a means of legitimising their abuse doesn't mean they've succeeded. Pride has strenuously resisted these attempts.

I'm beginning to suspect something actually quite sinister in your insistence on using 'MAP' instead of pedophile. I can't think of a single good reason for why you'd keep insisting on legitimising them? It's very odd and a little concerning.

Anyway, this really was my last post - I have to go.

A person interacting with a child while dressed in fetish gear is not automatically a pedophile. At Pride, fetishists are entitled to be there in their fetish gear. It's not their fault if a kid approaches them and starts interacting with them. It doesn't make them a pedophile.

Getting sexual pleasure from a child interacting with you, while you are in fetish gear does in my opinion make you a pedophile. Most people will distance themselves from children, or at the very least tell them to go away while in sexual situations.

Vasya - isn't your use of "interact" disingenuous in itself?
The pictures show a child stroking a man in fetish gear, and a child hugging a costume penis. Both posed, so not a spur of the moment act by the child without the adult's realisation/intent. To me, that's involving a child in your fetish, which shows questionable intent at best.

Why couldn’t they have done something in the past? They had laws. They had media.

Because people like Epstein had very deep pockets and would have sued, and also had very powerful contacts. The same applied with Savile.

I'm beginning to suspect something actually quite sinister in your insistence on using 'MAP' instead of pedophile. I can't think of a single good reason for why you'd keep insisting on legitimising them? It's very odd and a little concerning.

Awesome now I'm probably the peadophile, while the person being stroked by a child in fetish gear probably isn't.

You couldn't make it up.

@Vasya oof I'm with you. All valid points. That conversation with Captain was painful to read. You're better than me.

The thing is Vasya, you don't know, so it's not a good idea to let me (or anybody else) have close intimate contact with children. That goes a thousand times more if that person is in sexual fetish gear.

It's standard safeguarding.

Because people like Epstein had very deep pockets and would have sued, and also had very powerful contacts. The same applied with Savile

Peadophiles in very high places, with lots of money.
You can pay to cover anything up.
And the BBC were not going to get bad press in the 70's by admitting to a peadophile ring operating from within their ranks, so hushed it all up.

A person interacting with a child while dressed in fetish gear is not automatically a pedophile. At Pride, fetishists are entitled to be there in their fetish gear. It's not their fault if a kid approaches them and starts interacting with them. It doesn't make them a pedophile.

Those men dressed in fetish gear in those pictures don't look like they are discouraging those children at all. They look like they are revelling in the attention!

Amazing how determined one poster can be to make a thread all about him and his hobbyhorse.

@BoomBoomsCousin @dottiedodah the changes in the status and power of women is an interesting point. I hadn’t considered that.

This is an issue now because nothing bigger is going on (apart from climate change hysteria which is slowly superseding #metoo and women’s issues)

In the past we had bigger issues like dying from ISIS terrorists, Ebola, or AIDS, or IRA or in a nuclear war, or another WW with Germany, or Spanish Flu...

If you page through history you see similar phenomenon. The plight of the poor and “discovering” mental illness was big at the height of Victorian prosperity for example.

I don't think most people would consider that Prince Andrew is gay. Most people would consider him a pedophile. There is no correlation between sexual orientation and pedophilia.

I don't think most people would consider that Prince Andrew is gay. Most people would consider him a pedophile.

At the very least he has turned a blind eye while others abused.