From: fields@zip.eecs.umich.edu (Matthew Fields)
Newsgroups: alt.sexual.abuse.recovery
Subject: abuse and paedophilia
Date: 5 Apr 92 14:35:43 GMT
Article-I.D.: zip.1992Apr5.143543.19249
Organization: University of Michigan EECS Dept., Ann Arbor

Hi, Chris.

We keep hearing from you of a category called paedophilia which is
supposed to be disjoint from sexual abuse.  In the experience and common
usage of this term (see your OED), paedophilia is a strict subset of
sexual abuse.  If this is not how you are using the term, would you please
explain how you are using it.

"I merely attempted to point out that some children _are capable of
very mature behavior."  The claim we were hearing was that these children
were IN FACT making adult decisions, not manifesting behaviour which,
if interpreted in adult terms, would appear very mature.  This makes it
sound like we're getting at a behaviour/cognition bit.

And now a bit from the literature, quoted without permission (have mercy
on me, Knopf)---a scene which nobody here would call paedophilia, which
illustrates what I've been saying all along.  This is a bit longish but
relatively harmless.  For those who aren't interested in this thread,
hit "j" and "n" now.



----quote----

It's amazing what happens to a young mind when it begins to fantasize
about things sexual.  Always it starts with what you have "heard"
about sex---or, more usually, overheard picking it up in snatches from
older people's conversations, or getting it third-hand from another
boy who was lucky enough to be within earshot of such grownup male
ego-flexing.  But however it comes, its always titilating, inviting,
mysterious, and wonderful-- right?  Through the ages, little boys
everywhere have tuned in on men talking about some amorous experience
with a woman, and that experience was always terrific.  She was
fabulous---and he really pounded her into the ground!  And on the
other side of that coin, if it's a woman talking and you overhear
that, it's pretty much the same: how terrific this guy was, or how
terrific he thought he might have been, whereas it was she who really
did most of the work.

But the unmistakeable conclusion is that "pleasure" is derived from
this kind of involvement, and such deliciousness falling on tender
ears creates anticipation.  You say, "Gee, I'd like to get some of
that."  And you begin thinking of how you're going to _get_ "some of
that."  Then, with the whole experience lying ahead of you, and your
fantasies running wild, you say, "All right, boy, I'm going to get it
on with somebody. I'm ready."  So you devise an approach to the
girls--you feel them out, trying within your little nine-year-old set
of experiences to figure which one is going to be the most propitous,
the most ready, the one who is going to receive your forays most graciously.
  The ones who aren't going to loud-talk you too quickly.  The ones
who, if they turn you down, are going to turn you down with as much
consideration for your feelings as possible.  And once those
prerequisites have been taken into account, you lock in on one
particular chick and start making your moves.  You become so drunk
with the fantasy image of yourself exploring the naked body of a young
girl that your heart begins to pound in your head and your blood races
as you think what it must be like to look at an exposed vagina.  You
ain't really ever seen one of them exposed---right there staring back
at you.


My dearest friend on Cat Island was Fritz Campbell, a boy all the
girls in the village found striking.  At nine years old, with
curiosity at fever pitch, he and I decided that the time had come for
us to have a face-to-face with a nine- or ten-year-old vagina.  Having
heard that the girls were more likely to show their little "thingies"
to a boy they loved, we set out to explore a list of ways to make them
all fall in love with us forever and ever.  Naturally, on the top of
that list were the voodoo rituals--magical recipes and potions,
rumored to be the best ways to cast spells on the little ladies.
First we would capture two frogs, kill them, put their bodies in two
matchboxes, and put the matchboxes in an ant's nest.  We would go back
a week later and find only the bones of the frogs---and if among the
bones of the frogs we found a couple of bones looking like the letter
V, each of us would take one such bone and write the name of the
intended girl and our own name on a piece of paper, then obtain a
strand of hair from the head of that girl and a strand of hair from
our own head.  We would wrap these individual strands of hair around
the opposite branches of the V, and with the names written on the
piece of paper, deposit them in the matchbox and bury it at least a
foot underground.  I never knew what forces were supposed to conspire
in this little buried mixture, but the girl was expected to be smitten
with feelings of love and affection for the person whos hair is
mingled with hers there in the earth.

Right? It never worked for me--it just caused the death of a lot of
frogs.  We also recited magical incantations and various other
utterances that were supposed to make the girls just go crazy for us,
but--nothing happened.  Fritz may have gotten a peek or two, but for
me? Blank.

Then when I was nine and a half, I got lucky and struck gold.  Or one
could say that it took six months for the magic and voodoo to really
do their stuff for me.  Anyway, my first experience with a girl was
somewhat more than a face-to-face.  At nine and a half years old, I
had never had an erection, but according to my information, one good
peek at a vagina would correct that situation.  She was eleven, her
name was Lurlene, and she was as curious as I was, which made her an
ideal candidate for experimentation.  Moreover, of all the girls in
the village, she sent out the clearest signals.  Plus she was one of
the few girls I was really at ease with.  And she, in turn, with me.
But the most important advantage was that she was a member of the
Thurston family.  Her brother was married to my sister, and to my mind
it seemed that everything would be more appropriate if we kept it all
in the family.  So with all the signs indicated go, I planned her
seduction.

There was an old house built of limestone that had gone into complete
disrepair, and it was so situated in the woods that the likelyhood of
discovery was minimal.  Having enticed her into the most remote corner
of this old, broken-down, abandoned house, I nervously began to test,
in real life, some of the fantasy images I had conjured up about
seduction and discovery.  I sent a cautious hand up under her dress,
moving slowly, slowly, slowly, and then I stopped at midthigh and shot
her a glance to check her reaction.  She smiled her permission and I
continued on, delighted and flushed with expectancy.  I remember
feeling a strong curiousity--- a little nervous and plenty
scared--since I waited to be overwhelmed by that most important of all
feelings, sexual desire.  According to my information, it should be
grabbing hold of me just now.  My hand finally reached its
destination, an I was a bit surprised to find that there wasn't any
hair in the region, as my information had led me to believe there
would be--I was told to be ready for hair and some dampness in the
area.  My fingers checked around for moisture and found none, which
could only mean that she wasn't quite ready--yet.  So there I was up
under this child's dress, having to improvise for a few moments until
Desire grabbed us both and made her damp and moist under there and me
swell up with a powerful erection.  And then, according to my
information, I was supposed to make penetration into whatever I found
up there.

But I wasn't in a condition to penetrate anything.  I continued to
improvise and ad lib.  According to my information, the breasts were a
very sensitive area, and I immediately went to work up there with the
other hand.  They were just beginning to peak out like little buds,
and I did what I imagined to be the proper things.  A little stroking,
some gentle rubbing--then the blowing of a couple of hot breaths...I
knew what genital contact was, because I had seen chickens doing it
and animals doing it, and I understood that people did the same thing.
We were now standing up trying to make contact, and obviously nothing
was ever going to happen, because without an erection I just couldn't
stuff my little dingaling into this child, whose receiver wasn't
really ready to receive anything either.  We were, it seemed, doomed
from the start.  But I liked the experience, and I think what I liked
about it was the closeness of the two people and the trust in the
exchange between us.

----Sidney Poitier, "This Life"--------

Now, THAT's not paedophilia, and illustrates graphically how these kids
were quite ready for what happened but wouldn't have been ready for sex
with an adult.