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In Reply to: Re: Re Catholic Church & Abuse/Joseph posted by Joseph on August 17, 2002 at 18:58:02:
Hi Joseph; Thanks for the post!
An important point to remember in the distinquishing of the finer points of child abuse is that Pedophilia and the slightly different orientation of Ephebophilia are both serious disorders and criminal in nature when acted out on minors. In addition, whether or not these offenders are driven by power, sexual attraction or other reasons, they still are gratifying themselves at the expense of the victim.
Un-acted upon pedophilia and ephebophilia are not actually crimes. When a person who has these disorders acts upon them through various ways and means then they become criminally disordered. It is also important to note that both types often use similar methods to stalk and abuse their victims.
Dr S Berlin, a well known expert in the field,(John Hopkins University, founder of sexual disorders clinic), and a consultant to the Catholic Church notes the following:
Q: People refer to " pedophilia" and "ephebophilia". How do you distinquish these?
A: " People are attracted not only by gender -- male, female -- but also by other factors such as age. The average man refrains from sex with a child not only because he's a moral person but also because a child does not tempt him sexually. The term used to describe an orientation toward pre-pubescent children is "pedophilia" of which there are towo types. One is the exclusive type: the person attracted only to children. The other is the non-exclusive type: there is some attraction to adults. Pedophilia can be same gender attraction--a amn attracted to boys; opposite gender pedophillia -- a man attracted to girls; or bi-sexual pedophilia -- attracted to both boys and girls. Ephebophilia is a condition in which a person a person is attracted not to prepubescent children but to children or adolescents around the time of puberty, basically teenagers."
Taken from "Communications" US Conference of Catholic Bishops. Interview of Dr Berlin in 1997
* end of quote*
The danger of making distinctions for any other purpose than identifying the attributes of the offenders particular type of disorder or target group or is that some apologists within the church may imply that perhaps Ephebophilia is "less" of a crime or not as "horrific" in that an offending priest was attracted to teenagers rather than very young children.
A man who sexually molests a minor who is past puberty is still committing child molestation. In American law, as with Canadian, there are different felony or degree levels of child molestation. To say that a priest who molests a teenager is committing a different type of offence or act is not completely accurate. Although Lions and Leopards are different and may prey on different targets they both are big cats, part of the same species and dangerous to other life in the same way.
In my opinion, gender or age preference as far as target group by individual offenders is not really an important distinction in regards to the moral or criminal issue of child or adolescent sexual abuse. Research and the experiences of abuse victims show that both younger and older victims of sexual abuse can suffer equally.
As a member of the National Organization on Male Sexual Victimization I have talked to many victims of sexual abuse and read a grest deal of research through the organization. What I have observed is that although younger and older victims may suffer in seperate or variant ways, individuals in both groups have been significantly damaged by the criminal abuse they suiffered.
