On the Iatrogenic Nature of the Child Sexual Abuse Discourse

Abstract

In the last decades of the twentieth century there was an unprecedented surge of anxieties and alarm over erotic experiences involving minors and adults, which has continued as a social and scientific discourse in which these relationships invariably are seen as abusive, harmful, and criminal. In this paper, the fundamental characteristics of this discourse, whose basis and pertinence are questioned, are analyzed for their possible iatrogenic effects; i.e., those induced by professional intervention, in four key areas of social reality: the erotic dimension of human beings, individual responsibility, the use of penal law as a mechanism of social control, and fostering better relations between the sexes and generations. Critical reflection on the social and professional handling of the problem includes the undesirable effects which such treatment may be producing.

Hebephilia as Mental Disorder? A Historical, Cross-Cultural, Sociological, Cross-Species, Non-Clinical Empirical, and Evolutionary Review

“…But they are sufficiently diverse and numerous to show that coercion, trauma, and harm do not inhere in male homosexual hebephilicinteractionsandsomuststemfromothersources.Aside fromaggravatingfactors(e.g.,force),importantcandidates,characteristicintheWestbutnotinmanyothercultures,include:sharply negative attitudes about immature sexuality and a traditional unease with sex in general (Ford & Beach, 1951),which can foster reactions of anxiety or shock to hebephilic approaches or encounters, especially if the youth is sexually naïve (Constantine, 1981); the opprobrium and disgust traditionally associated with the homosexual aspect of this behavior (Crompton, 2003); actual or anticipated severe negative reactions by significant others (Baurmann, 1983); and the post-1970s narrative that all forms of adult-minor sex are uniquely abusive and injurious, which can lead to nocebo reactions (Clancy, 2009), iatrogenic harm (Malón, 2009), and perceived harm via effort after meaning (Pope & Hudson, 1995).…”

“…This transformation occurred virtually overnight, as Jenkins (1998) documented, too quickly for science to have weighed in. It occurred under the influence of sexual victimology, which posed as a science but was based in political advocacy related to gender issues (Angelides,2004(Angelides, ,2005Clancy,2009;Jenkins,1998Jenkins, ,2006Malón, 2009Malón, , 2010Malón, , 2011Money, 1979). Sexual victimology's theories and claims, often ideological in nature and extravagant, were quickly absorbed into mainstream mental health thinking.…”

Contesting the Dominant Discourse of Child Sexual Abuse: Sexual Subjects, Agency, and Ethics

“…If Hardi recognized his experience as CSA, he is immediately "hailed" or positioned as the victim or the survivor-with its discursive meanings that enable and constrain his ways of being a sexual subject. A victim subject position, for instance, necessitates a sense of helplessness, a devastated condition, a need to be healed, a call for external support and help (Jordan 2013;Lamb 1999;Malón 2009;Oellerich 2002). The survivor position offers a better sense of agency, but that agency is built around the specific experience of sexual abuse.…”

The Role of Androphilia in the Psychosexual Development of Boys

“…Ethnographically, in cultures where such interactions are not pathologized, willing participation apparently is nearly 100%. The question then becomes: In this ongoing clash between, on one hand, the intrinsic, universal, ubiquitous, and apparently benign or even beneficial sexually androphilic nature of boys, and on the other hand, Western extrinsic, ethnocentric, inconsistent, restrictive, and potentially iatrogenic "moralities" (Malón, 2009b), which should take precedence?…”

“…Should not science at long last free itself from "magical powers," ethnocentric superstitions, and narrow-minded taboos that cannot be shown to have any basis in fact, and which may well exacerbate (Malón, 2009b), rather than ameliorate, these afflictions that burden young males? Crittenden (1996) proposed that consensual sexual relationships between children and older persons be "considered more as a common variant of human behavior than abnormal behavior" (p. 166), and it would seem that the time has arrived to part company with the failed pseudoscientific myths of victimology (Malón, 2009a) and the child sex abuse industry (Dineen, 2001), and to replace them with a model of boyhood psychosexual developmental motivations and behaviors that is built upon honest and unbiased empirical observations, truth, and reality-a genuinely scientific paradigm that accurately reflects, and properly serves, the fundamental qualities and needs of boys.…”