Silver metallic with black handles. My specific class of ship still had the old analog electro-hydraulic steering wheels instead of the fancy XBox controllers.
You’re the post MVP, imo. I don’t get why this post is upvoted so much. It isn’t a real AMA, and it feels like disaster porn or something
[Edit: I also feel like there’s enough misinformation on the internet already. Those who want to have fun/pretend with something like this, please put a ‘not serious’, ‘made up’ ‘fictional’ or ‘pretend’ flag on it]
You have some valid points, a note about it being humor would be great for those who couldn't figure it out.
But also, many users here are looking for more engagement. This is pretty harmless, and got folks engaged and talking about how we can improve. Net positive imo.
It sounds like we partially overlap in opinion. I think it’s worth noting a bias of mine, that for me Lemmy is an opportunity to make the Web a more person-friendly place again. I don’t think the responsibility should fall to readers to figure things out that aren’t obvious. I think posters should provide useful (non click-baity) titles and outside of just for fun and circlejerk type communities, I think they should flag when they’re being un-serious. AMA is a serious community (as far as I’m aware). The post’s title is a complete falsehood.
I don’t mean to come across as a buzzkill, and I’m sorry if I killed anyone’s buzz.
No buzz was killed 🙂 I certainly agree on the friendliness. I was never a reddit member and so probably don't get the seriousness or levity that may be the accepted norms of communities that came from there. I may well have contributed to some of these challenges that you face (sorry!).
I see folks asking about flares, which I understand to be things like a way to mark a post as humor. For me, that seems like a good step to take with the current posting levels but what do I know haha, I am mostly a forum poster.
Since you asked so nicely, I’ll offer a definition by modifying the Oxford English Dictionary’s definition of pornography. (Square brackets and strikeout are my own)
[Disaster] por·nog·ra·phy | pôrˈnäɡrəfē | noun printed or visual material containing the explicit description or display of [human suffering] sexual organs or activity, intended to stimulate [entertainment] erotic rather than [concern, compassion, or humanitarian assistance] aesthetic or emotional feelings.
I am not OP, but am a submarine veteran that retired 10 years ago. I was a MMC/SS (nuclear) (Machinists Mate Chief, submarine qualified) which means I led a division of approx 14 other mechanics as a middle manager on fas attack (SSN) Submarines.I am willing to answer questions and maybe give a different perspective (different ships, different career path) .
I can’t think of any questions right now because it’s a little bit shocking to see someone openly talking about their pedophilia like this and whle I find it disturbing, I do appreciate the honesty and the willingness to start a conversation on the matter.
While you’re using a throwaway, I’m still somewhat impressed by your courage to do this, and also by everyone else asking legitimate questions.
I’m honestly impressed by the latter too, but I guess that’s the magic of Lemmy. I knew one person who tried to spin the conversation on Reddit, and it didn’t go so well.
I know pedophilia is something many people think exists somewhere in the dark, but that’s more the reason to put it out in the light, as meaningful conversations on the topic are crucial - not only for the acceptance of many of those who did nothing wrong, but also for the safety of children, as stigma around the issue is one of the reasons many of us can’t get help that would be very handy, especially for those (still) on the verge.
I appreciate any feedback, including your one. Hit me up with any questions later should you come up with any!
I only resort to Audacity as last resort as when I export the sound effect via Audacity regardless if it’s wav or mp3, it’s slightly bigger than the original sound effect file.
So, I’m just kind of reading through this here out of intrigue. It’s actually really nice to see how civil and like, chill everyone is being. I can only imagine on a different platform, it would be much easier to get swept up in anger.
My question is kind of specific and I’d understand if you didn’t have an exact answer: I’m going to school soon to become a social worker (may or may not try to specialize in children’s rights) and I was wondering if there was anything you wish social workers would know about pedophiles/pedophilia?
I’m not sure if I can provide an answer good enough since I never got involved in social work circles, but I’ll do my best.
Since, I imagine, they work with cases involving children being molested among other things, they may benefit from knowing many (little over 50%, if I recall correctly) child molesters are not pedophiles and may need a different approach based on whatever led them this way. For example, it would be ineffective to apply a prevention program designed for pedophiles to a person who abused a child due to hypersexuality and kids just being easier to take advantage of, and so on.
Same realization can help in noticing more types of behaviors as risk factors.
Also, most pedophiles are extremely hard to spot: we are not staring at kids and licking our lips or something :D We are not all men in our 40’s (in fact, pedophilic thoughts normally arise first during puberty and then last a lifetime), we don’t all wear round glasses and a moustache. In fact, for the most part, there is no need to identify us in the first place since most of us are entirely harmless. And yes, some of the social workers, teachers etc. will undoubtedly be pedophiles, most without any malicious intent.
That’s all I can think of off the back of my head that can be useful. Feel free to ask further questions!
I’m so conflicted. But how would you want society to treat you? And by you, I mean people that haven’t raped, molested or groomed a child, but are struggling with inappropriate feelings towards them?
not OP, but also a pedophile. How would you want society to treat you? I want to be seen as a person like any other. I’ve worked hard to love myself with a very difficult sexuality that society would prefer I kill myself over. I’ve never harmed a kid. I never will. I want society to see that people like me exist.
Just treat me like a normal person, not some monster and immediate danger to everyone below 18.
It would be reasonable to check my stance and I wouldn’t mind if someone asked whether I need (and if I do, whether I already have) any help with it, but other than that, I want to be treated no differently whether someone knows I’m a pedophile or not.
I don’t want to receive threats. I don’t want to be stuck with people talking about how they would murder all pedophiles while having to keep my mouth shut. I want to maintain healthy relationship with my adult partners and friends. That’s, essentially, what I ask of society.
Sitting in front of a screen living in this faraway world of functions and pointers all day every day was making me a weirdo. There were some other factors but that was the big one.
What you’re describing is called SOCE “Sexual Orientation Change Efforts” AKA conversion therapy. It doesn’t work for gay people to try to gradually change the gender of the people they’re attracted to, and it doesn’t work for us to try to age up the people we’re attracted to.
Personally, I’ve tried conversion therapy for my being gay (three months at down in the the American South). That went about as well as you’d expect. Maybe a little better in that I’m not horribly mentally and emotionally scarred, I suppose.
For myself, I do seek out other adults, but I do not engage in age-play. It’s not something I need to do to make sex work for me. I don’t even fantasize about children or anything, I just focus on what I’m doing and what my body is feeling and enjoy sex with my partner.
I’m also not an exclusive pedophile. Exclusive pedophiles have a more difficult time with things, though I know of a few that ended up dating other exclusive pedophiles and they make things work with ageplay and mutual fantasy. There are other exclusives that don’t date at all. It can be very lonely being a pedophile.
I did at earlier stages, but yeah, it doesn’t really work, especially since my attraction to girls which is still my main already goes well into my comfortable adult range, so essentially my only way is to convince myself I’m not interested in younger girls (which is, well, not really working; I can tell myself “yay it works”…until I meet a younger child again)
I do seek relationships with peers of my own age, but I don’t enjoy ageplay; it just doesn’t bring up much the same feelings, and I doubt I can experience this attraction to adults, no matter how much trickery is involved. Some, though, do find some relief in that. There is no single opinion on ageplay among pedophiles.
Children, in my experience, have relatively few boundaries or concern for social space. How do you handle a situation where a child runs up to you, or hugs you, or crawls all over you, etc? Especially if the parents aren’t aware of your preferences, and thus may not see the issue with “kids being kids”.
To draw parallels to my own experiences, I may not want to sexually assault random attractive women, but I don’t typically have them lay on top of me and hang off me non-sexually. It would at least be more temptation, I would assume… Adult women tend to keep a formal distance, because they know that attraction is present and don’t want to encourage it, if they can help it.
Also, if I can add another question on here, what age range are we talking about? Does the pedophile community have identity labels for people who are interested in particular ages? Or is there instead some “golden age” that basically all pedophiles are attracted to, and virtually no one is attracted to kids younger than that, for example.
Hey again, not OP, but also a pedophile. Those are great questions!
For myself, innocently interacting with kids is usually fine, but I am constantly aware of myself. If it ever feels like too much or it’s not fine, I excuse myself and have actually gotten irritable with children if they won’t leave me alone. Teaching kids boundaries with their own bodies sometimes looks like enforcing boundaries with your own body. If Saint says, “That’s enough for me, I’m done tickling/wrestling/playing/whatever” and a kid doesn’t resect that I mean it, they’re going to hear me raise my voice and walk away to enforce my boundary. This is good for me as well as the kid, so that they learn they can and should set redline boundaries for how people interact with them if they ever get uncomfortable.
As to age ranges… there is great variety. Pedophiles are one slice of what are called “chronophilias,” that is, people who are attracted to certain age ranges or Tanner Stages. In ascending order we have infantophilia (infants and babies), nepiophilia (2-4), pedophilia (prepubescent children), hebephilia (pubescent children), ephebophilia (teens, also this one is where attraction spots being a paraphilia as most of the population typically has some sexual interest in teens), teleiophilia (this is the “typical” age that people are attracted to each other something like 18-35), mesophilia (like 35-55?), and gerontophilia (people in their 70s+). There’s another one that I missed in between meso and geronto, I think.
I am a pedophile, but I’m other things too. If we were to look at the ages that I’m attracted to, the bell of the curve would be 6-16, but it doesn’t cut off sharply on either end of the curve, particularly as we get older. I’m attracted to some people in their 20s or even early 30s, and I’ve been attracted to kids in the nepiophile range. Age of attention is a little fuzzy for me also, because I’m at least halfway a cartoonophile. Cartoons are drawn with cutesy proportions and it can be difficult to tell the “age” of a character depicted.
Many people use the term “Minor Attracted Person” or “MAP” because it more broadly encompasses everyone with an attraction to children, not just people attracted to pre-pubescent children.
There are other community labels that we use for those of us that like boys, girls, both, or neither, as well as those of us that exclusively like children, or those of us that like adults too. There are other things, too, but this post has gone on long enough. 😅
I’m aware that some of that probably sounds super gross. It’s not anything that any of us chose to have. This is something that we experience. Imagine if you woke up tomorrow and were suddenly one of these things. It would be pretty difficult. Almost none of us have had an easy experience.
Thank you for your honesty! I’ve asked another followup question to OP on their response to my message which I invite you to answer as well.
But I have a question for you regarding cartoons! So, I have encountered, in my travels, fan art / cartoons based on shows where the characters would be young. Bart Simpson would be a classic example, since he’s supposed to be 10 or something, but there’s a tonne of Simpsons fan art. But they write on the front “all characters depicted are 18”, and more importantly he’ll be drawn with a huge, clearly adult, penis and balls. But otherwise his character design is the same, it’s not some “future” version of the character.
So my question is whether or not art like that – young characters with post-pubescent sexual features – is the sweet spot for you, or if instead that kind of ruins the comic for you because you were looking for a more child-like figure.
And feel free to not answer if you’d rather not, of course. This is the internet, after all!
It’s AMA, so I’ll answer anything honestly (as long as it’s in good faith). I like a pretty broad range of art. Some of it is more cartoonish (I’ve found comics of Bart before that worked for me) some of them are more on the realistic end. I’m also kind of an outlier amongst my pedophile peers because I like hyper features on child characters. Oversized genitals are a turn-on for me. But I do also like “normal” sized genitals. Some of the characters I’ve really liked are Naruto, Hiro Hamada, Aang (and the other Avatar boys), and Tyler Nguyen-Baker from Turning Red.
Then I don’t see the issue too, unless they get too invasive and don’t allow me to have some personal space for a prolonged period of time. I don’t consider it a sexual or romantic experience on their part, and I love to share some warmth with them. They need that care and love and attention, and I’m there to do exactly that. I will allow them to hug, crawl, play with my hair, even kiss in the cheek if that’s their vibe and if they behave this way with others.
Normally this doesn’t overload me, but if it does (like if my deep child crush does it repeatedly) or if the child starts going to inappropriate territory, I can always excuse myself and leave for a while, while processing it and planning ways to calm the child down.
Well, pedophilia refers to attraction to pre-puberty children generally, and more exactly - to children between age of ~4 and puberty. For pedophiles, I’ve heard a saying “7 is heaven, 8 is great, 9 is fine”, and it’s about as golden rang-y as you’ll get. Personal experiences differ a lot, some will prefer the younger range, some the older, I personally would call 9-10 my perfect one.
There are other terms related to other age ranges in minors, like infantophilia/nepiophilia (up to about 4 years old; often considered as part of pedophilia, but has distinct features), hebephilia (attraction to children going through puberty), and ephebophilia (attraction to post-puberty minors, i.e. ~15-17).
Ephebophilia is straight up super common, especially in males, and most ephebophiles don’t consider this as something off - after all, 18 years old is a legal boundary, not natural one, and 17yo person barely differs from 18yo.
In any way, should you academically define pedophilia, you already only look at the range from 0(4) to about 12.
Thank you for your honest and straightforward answer!
I imagine you’re more sensitive to it, as someone in the community, but do you ever hear someone talking about their attraction to a 4 year old (for example, as someone outside your range) and think “that’s so weird, I just don’t get it”? Basically, I’m asking if you ever feel towards them the way that most people would feel towards you? (at least in terms of confusion, ignoring the hate). Or is it closer to feeling more like a preference, where you’re more like “I guess I could see it, but it’s just not for me”, the way some guys might not find some celebrity attractive that other guys do find attractive.
Speaking of “deep child crush”, I have a more direct question which could get into uncomfortable territory, so please feel free to not answer this one if it feels too invasive.
People who are into adults tend to have sexual or sexualized characteristics that they focus on. The classics would be “boobs” or “butts” or “legs” for people attracted to women (though of course there can be others), and “hands” or “butts” again or “forearms / shoulders /muscles” or “voice” or “hair” or “height” for women (though of course there can be others).
Many of those are post-pubescent features, probably not by accident. So, what features do pedophiles find attractive in kids? What separates some random kid from a crush?
Mostly “that’s so weird”, but then “my attractions feel equally weird for others”, so I end up not being weirded out, but I certainly can’t comprehend it.
I’m not sure I can point out a single feature of a child I’d find attractive; it’s firstly behavioural factors (I love children that open up to me, and I feel and notice the trust and bonding effort they put into relationships with me), and only then physical features (voice, face, body size, arms, feet, and general body proportions; genitalia as well). The answer will significantly differ between pedophiles, though, with some prioritizing some other factors. I know many pedophiles that are into boys are absolutely obsessed with butts, for example, and while I can relate to how they feel, this is far from the first thing I’d look for in my boy crush, for example.
Not many people put others well being in front of their own. So even if you are mentally ill, you’re still a better person than many :) and don’t you dare ever believe anyone telling you the opposite
I wish you lots of love and strength to live following the right path and I’m sure you’ll find happiness ;* (surrounding yourself with good people is also very helpful)
-Fellow mentally ill person
Edit: For anyone else passing by that is feeling disgust/replusion or anything else negative towards op/that other commenter please keep in mind that those 2 are just some poor guys struggling because of their mind and are obviously suffering. They didn’t hurt anyone and I believe they probably won’t either. So maybe show them some compassion instead, yes?
Hey! I’m not OP, but I am also a pedophile. Thank you so much! I do want to just point out that while we may be mentally ill in some ways (chronic depression for me), pedophilia isn’t one. It’s simply our sexuality. The DSM does list pedophilic disorder, which is if our attractions cause us distress, but that’s not the case for me anymore.
I really appreciate your input, though! Thanks! I wish you the best!
Thanks so much, and I’m not offended. A lot of people think it’s a mental illness. Two friends were totally shocked when I said I didn’t need therapy for it. “WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU DON’T NEED THERAPY? MAYBE THERE’S SOME WAY TO REATTACH YOUR ATTRACTIONS TO SOMETHING NORMAL!” Conversion therapy doesn’t work for gay people or for pedophiles.
Anyway, I really appreciate you. You stay strong too!
Thank you! I wish you all the best with whatever is happening with your own mind. You can always share, too, if you’ll ever want to, and I’ll be happy to help you with what I can.
The change of pedophilia to pedophilic disorder Saint talks about happened long ago in the US (since the DSM-V update in 2013), but only recently came to other countries in WHO’s ICD-11, so for most of the world, it’s actually a very recent change - no wonder most people don’t know that yet :)
However, my country decided to straight up reject entire ICD-11 and stick with outdated ICD-10 because of that change (and also because of delisting trans individuals). They just literally ignored entire medical progress of the past 30 years because hurr durr pedophiles no longer sick. So, the reception of the changes is still…complicated.
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