UPDATE Man Faces Minimum 1 Year in Prison for Bringing Manga to Canada On His Laptop

[sapphi_snake]

xcot said:

I'm quite tired right now so I don't really want to get too into this, but i think this is based on faulty logic.

First, your assumption is that paedophilia is a mental illness, which is not necessarily true. I do believe paedophilia is wrong, however for it to be considered a mental illness it has to be considered abnormal. I'm going to avoid the topic of abnormality because it extremely big, but amongst other things, being homosexual used to be classified as a mental illness under the DSM and the ICD. However, in most western societies, homosexuality is accepted and has since been removed from the classifications.There is a very thin line between eccentricity and abnormality, and due to the subjective difference of a social psychological explanation of abnormality, the only true abnormality can be considered biological. Anyway to cut to the chase, to define paedophilia as a mental disorder, there would have to be considerable evidence to suggest a biological/neurological basis for it over a psycholgical one, as is the case with schizophrenia to which you are comparing it. It may be of interest to you though that schizophrenia too may be considered perfectly fine in some societies, notably in amazonian tribes where schizophrenic symptoms are considered a blessing by god. What i'm trying to say is, is that mental disorders are largely a formulation of a culture's beliefs and the contextuality of the actions. I would suggest reading the cognitive model of schizophrenia or the labelling theory for schizophrenia, all of which suggest that apart from the physical basis for the hallucinations, all other symptoms are rationally created.

So for the debate on contextuality, I'll propose a situation. If a person were walking nude down the street or walked nude into a wedding etc, would they have a more unstable mind than a person walking nude down a nude beach? In terms of paedophilia, you are saying that looking at fictional underage girls (lolita) is somehow related in context to actual child molestation or the acquiring and distribution of actual child porn.

For your example of the guy shooting his father over money and the guy shooting him because of voices in his head, it is not clear which one is 'truly' mental. The important thing is to remove the cultural bias from your view, because in an individualistic culture where money and self-empowerment are idealised, then yes perhaps the first case scenario isn't 'mental'. However who is to say that that person wouldn't be considered mental in a society who did not emphasise the importance of money and the raising of one's own status.

Anyway, I don't condone paedophilia and i don't like lolita, but if someone chooses to look at lolita because they are attracted to it and does not pursue paedophillic activities, then they have every right to.

If you have a difference of opinion i'd like to hear it because there are no right or wrong answers, only replies that we can try our best to be objective in. However, i would like your arguement to have more basis than just saying that paedophiles are (don't know how to do italics) mental, and therefore by extension so too are people that enjoy lolita.

Homosexuality is no longer considered a menta disease because research conducted by psychiatrists and psychologists have shown that it does not fit the criteria. Paedophilia still fits the criteria to be considered a mental illness. I'm well aware that lots of things labeled as "mental diseases" are done so because they're considered negative by said culture, and it's really just a way to "naturalize" dominant ideology (for example heterosexuality is "normal" and "natural" and homosexuality is "abnormal" and a "disease", as the dominant category - heterosexuals - wanted people to believe in order to assert and legitimize their dominance).

The problem with your nudist example is that you're describing an act, and not the reason for doing said act. The person walking down the street naked could be doing so for several reasons: protesting against social norms (not crazy), someone stole his clothes (not crazy), the voices in his head told him to walk naked (crazy). I'm not saying that looking at such material is related, but rather that being aroused by such material, is part of the symptomatology of paedophilia. I assume that they could just be attracted to cartoon characters, and not real life children, but I do think that such an individual should be made to visit a psychiatrist just to make sure that he poses no danger. This really isn't punishment. He's not being sent to jail or anything.