does this make me a hebephile?

Maligan12 wrote:I feel that the word hebephile is still useful for a preferential desire for pubescent children.

It can be useful, and one should feel free to use it if it proves conducive to a stable, healthy sense of personal identity. However, it wasn't coined for salubrious forms of utility; it was coined to pathologise biologically valid attraction and make a name for the professional who coined it. I remain sceptical on the matter of whether attraction to fully grown adults is somehow more 'natural' than attraction to adolescents. Purely to play devil's advocate, why not label attraction to adolescents as normal, and then have discrete categories for those preferentially attracted to prepubescent/post-adolescent (paedophile, teleiophile) and scrap the hebephilia/ephebophilia nonsense?

ctithe wrote:

Maligan12 wrote:I feel that the word hebephile is still useful for a preferential desire for pubescent children.

It can be useful, and one should feel free to use it if it proves conducive to a stable, healthy sense of personal identity. However, it wasn't coined for salubrious forms of utility; it was coined to pathologise biologically valid attraction and make a name for the professional who coined it. I remain sceptical on the matter of whether attraction to fully grown adults is somehow more 'natural' than attraction to adolescents. Purely to play devil's advocate, why not label attraction to adolescents as normal, and then have discrete categories for those preferentially attracted to prepubescent/post-adolescent (paedophile, teleiophile) and scrap the hebephilia/ephebophilia nonsense?

The only useful term really is paedophile in its original meaning, that is a preference for pre-pubescent children. The fact they decided to classify someone who might have the odd attraction to a pubescent/post pubescent as someone who is mentally ill is disturbing. That fetishes are in a manual of mental illness is also grotesque.

The current version of the DSM or whatever that toilet roll is called, defines paedohebaphilia, I believe. The intention of this, from what I can gather, is to be able to commit child sex offenders to mental institions indefinitely.

Unnatural and pathological have been confused with illegal.

Homosexuality was once classified as a mental illness. It was (to my best recollection) removed from the DSM gradually, with the intermediate step being that it remained a mental illness if you were distressed by it or had acted on it. See any parallels? Nowadays, if you're gay and distressed about your sexuality you would not be deemed to be suffering 'homosexual disorder' but rather anxiety, depression, stress, etc. related to your sexuality. So it strikes me as bizarre that if you are attracted to prepubescent children and distressed by your attraction, then you're deemed to be suffering 'paedophilic disorder' rather than anxiety, depression, stress, etc. related to your sexuality. This criticism has also been levelled by professionals within the psychiatric establishment.

The attempts to include hebephilic attraction as part of an overarching paedohebephilic disorder were disturbing. Medical categories do not need to dovetail with legal categories, or bow to social norms. Science should not be swayed by public sentiment. Otherwise we'd still be insisting upon the geocentric universe.

ctithe wrote:Homosexuality was once classified as a mental illness. It was (to my best recollection) removed from the DSM gradually, with the intermediate step being that it remained a mental illness if you were distressed by it or had acted on it. See any parallels? Nowadays, if you're gay and distressed about your sexuality you would not be deemed to be suffering 'homosexual disorder' but rather anxiety, depression, stress, etc. related to your sexuality. So it strikes me as bizarre that if you are attracted to prepubescent children and distressed by your attraction, then you're deemed to be suffering 'paedophilic disorder' rather than anxiety, depression, stress, etc. related to your sexuality. This criticism has also been levelled by professionals within the psychiatric establishment.

The attempts to include hebephilic attraction as part of an overarching paedohebephilic disorder were disturbing. Medical categories do not need to dovetail with legal categories, or bow to social norms. Science should not be swayed by public sentiment. Otherwise we'd still be insisting upon the geocentric universe.

Psychiatry can hardly call itself a science. Public opinion is going in a terrible direction. News establishments have been reporting that Prince Andrew might have once had sex with a 17 yr old and that this is paedophilia. For a start, it is high time that word was put back in its place, it keeps getting stretched and stretched. When it reaches 21 I'm gonna be in real big trouble!!

There has to be an element of homophobia about this. Gay guys start having sex younger and many many gay guys like younger guys (twinks). After the law was equalled to 16 for both orientations a concept of 16 - 18 yr olds being sexual "children" emerged, and in the past few years this has begun to be considered paedophilia by the general public (reads white neoconservatives).

cumulusjames wrote:Psychiatry can hardly call itself a science.

I disagree with this and I feel psychiatry can play an important role in helping people (including paraphiles) when they are in a difficult place psychologically, not to imply that a paraphilia necessarily can or should be "cured".

Institutions can be corrupted by dogma but by nurturing critical thinking we can help people not to abused by harmful norms which will, with a bit of luck, then leak into these institutions.

-- Tue Jan 06, 2015 5:49 pm --

It seems to me that a majority of people are attracted to features seen predominately in adults.

Although youth is valued, most men seem to dwell on the curvaceousness of women and although a agree that many men have a soft spot for smaller breasts or a petite body, the womanishness of the body can still play a part so that many men who prefer delicate, petite bodies will still be preferential teleiophiles.

Maligan12 wrote:

cumulusjames wrote:Psychiatry can hardly call itself a science.

I disagree with this and I feel psychiatry can play an important role in helping people (including paraphiles) when they are in a difficult place psychologically, not to imply that a paraphilia necessarily can or should be "cured".

Institutions can be corrupted by dogma but by nurturing critical thinking we can help people not to abused by harmful norms which will, with a bit of luck, then leak into these institutions.

I did not say psychiatry was not useful. I have been quite dependant on it for many years. It is just not a science, nothing about it is testable or repeatable, or provable. The different types of therapy are without a doubt highly effective, mindfulness CBT being one the best.

My label is bipolar. But I just as well fit the criteria for borderline personality disorder, schizo affective disorder and aspergers. It is well known that literally everyone can look at the DSM and find that they meet the criteria for at least one mental disorder. This is born out of the pharmaceutical industry, who benefit to the tune of trillions of dollars by selling drugs. The pharmaceutical industry, particularly with respect to psychotropics, torture the ###$ out of their data until the get the results they want. This leads to a mental health industry based on wholly stupid ideas (I do not include therapy in that, I mean the diagnostic side). No link between depression and serotonin has ever been demonstrated. If you have a headache and you take an aspirin and you feel better, it does not follow that your headache was caused by a lack of aspirin.

There are agendas behind pathologising sexuality and "personality disorders". What might those agendas be? Whose interests do they serve?

No problem at all bud, my only sexual proposal came from a 14 year old girl when I was 17, when she told me her age upfront I ignored her thereafter, but my cock was rock solid, she was touching me, coming close etc, if I had known it was a normal age gap (several people afterwards said I wouldn't have got into trouble) I would have ploughed her field repeately

I am 25 now and I would not feel bad getting turned on by a teenage girl of 14 because I know that is within my "arousal zone" from that experience from when I was 17 and I sure as hell ain't changed! Teenage girls are horny as hell, you have to be careful though because although they want it, it is not worth getting into trouble for.

But yeah, you are just a normal red blooded male.

ParanoidMan wrote:Teenage girls are horny as hell, you have to be careful though because although they want it, it is not worth getting into trouble for.

But yeah, you are just a normal red blooded male.

Are you sure you're not just an incredibly handsome man or there isn't some bias in the sample you've experienced?

My point was that this girl was incredibly horny and had loads of sex according to her and her friends. She was definitely in puberty and she wore her thong above her leggings FFS, she was just so sexual. That is the only 14 year old girl I knew of and she was definitely attractive. But in general I don't know. I didn't want her to get me into trouble so I declined but I was definitely up for it. Since then people have told me that I missed an opportunity and wouldn't have got into trouble for a three year age gap but what worried me was I was over the age of consent (16) and she was under it so I didn't want to risk it. But yeah, that is what I go on.

Grrr. I envy you so much.