Links for January 28, 2013

Happy New Years!

Here's the first link roundup of 2013

Roxane Gay - Surviving "Django"

Rebecca Carroll - 'Django Unchained': Quentin Tarantino's Misappropriation of the N-Word

Meghan Murphy @ Rabble - "It's not about you: Naomi Wolf and Caitlin Moran's self-centered feminism"

Lindy West @ Jezebel: Do, Make, Be, Barf: The Year in Goop

Feminist Current - "Revenge porn is about porn"

Feminist Current - Free Speech in Pornland

Toronto coffee shop presentation video: Anti-Capitalism and Feminism 

Bhaskar Sunkara - Why the ideas of Karl Marx are more relevant than ever in the 21st century

Rage Against the Manchine - "An open letter to Bang-On custom t-shirts"
BBC News - Why did men stop wearing high heels?"

Sandra Lee Bartky - Foucault, Femininity and The Modernization of Patriarchal Power

Michael Laxer - The externalized enemy: Conspiracy theories and the left

Alaina McConnell - Inside China's Grueling Toy Factories

Media Co-op - What if natives stop subsidizing Canada? 

Womanist Musings - Problems with at-home stomach pump

Weary Wednesdays: Pole-Dancing Fitness Class For Kids

Trends! Don’t you just love them? There is always some new idea, product or activity that is promoted and popularized through mass media. These trends, however, are almost always aimed at women and the majority of them revolve around physical appearance and/or how to better perform one's social roles. While the pressure on maintaining a particular physique may be on the rise in younger men and boys, the majority of the pressure is placed on women and girls. These trends are reinforced through various mediums including but not limited to: websites, magazines, television, film, advertising, and books.

From how to stop one’s skin from wrinkling, drying, flaking, sweating, sagging –to how to lose 2 pounds a day before your big day! All the way to strip aerobics fitness DVDs, the neo-burlesque movement, 50 shades of grey, vampire stalker movies, anti-aging products, celebrity-endorsed diets, and "body shapers" aka. suction undies. 

It is likely that all of these fads are connected to one another as women are sold the same idea with each one; that our physical appearance is paramount in defining our value as people. The companies behind these trends inform us that it is empowering to be within the male gaze, to put all of our energy into arousing heterosexual male desire, to be detached from our whole selves rather than be respected for our minds, our ideas and our actions. 

This, they say, is power for women.

Marketers and their focus groups inform us, and the rest of the society, that our bodies need to be sculpted, surgically altered, constrained, whitened, waxed, and objectified. Porn culture, or the the normalization and infiltration of porn into everyday life, has lead to activities such as stripping/pole-dancing, lap-dancing, and burlesque becoming popular within the dominant culture and among some middle to upper-middle class women.

However, due to today’s limitless marketing as well as the ubiquitous presence of mass media and social networking, children are taking up some of these trends themselves. 

Pole-dancing fitness classes gained popularity with adults several years ago; some were even setting up poles in their homes and attending stripping aerobics classes, granted they had the funds to do so.  Now some fitness instructors have been inspired to start up pole-dancing fitness classes for children as young as five. 

Yup! You read right, children's pole-dancing classes. The class circulating through the media is being offered on Vancouver Island in British Columbia. It costs about $70 per one hour class and explicitly intended for children. Unlike "spinning classes" which usually refer to riding a stationary bicycle, this pole-dancing class is euphemistically named “Little Spinners” and involves nothing sexual, according to the instructor. In fact, owner Kristy Craig claims that it is a great workout for kids. 

Photo from National Post - I altered the photo to protect the identity of the child.

Nonetheless, according to the Toronto Sun, Craig is shocked by all of the negative attention that her classes have received. She told the media that she teaches gymnastics moves but instead of a horizontal bar, she uses a vertical pole. "It’s nothing new,” Craig said, remarking that pole-dancing competitions are already offered in Russia and the U.K. “People need to really look into it before jumping to any conclusions about what I’m offering.” She argues that pole-dancing has "evolved" into a sport just like any other. “For competitions they actually have rules and regulations that there can be nothing sexual, or any article of clothing removed, and in some you aren’t allowed to wear high heels,” she adds. “The sexuality is being taken out of it. It’s highlighting the gymnastic, athletic and circus acrobatics aspect.”

Another supporter of Craig’s classes, Tammy Morris owner of Tantra Fitness, told the National Post in regards to sexualization that “they have no association with it or think there is anything wrong or bad about it. That’s an adult putting that on them.” In 2010, her Vancouver fitness studio roused public anger when she offered classes to children, predominantly girls, as young as nine and private classes to those as young as five. Morris defends these pole-dancing classes, claiming that the children “love it” and it is not problematic as the girls do not learn how to strip or grind.

Interestingly, on Craig's company's website she features almost only photographs of adult women and adult classes. From the main webpage, which features an advertisement for pink glittery 9 inch stilettos, one would think that the studio was exclusively for adults. Some of the classes listed on the website have names like "Sexy Flexy," "Babes on Bikes," and "Bunny Bootcamp." And yet, all of these classes appear on a posted weekly schedule alongside a class for children.

So, where does the sexualization start and stop? Are there a few days of the week for "Sexy Flexy" classes that are adult-only and one other day of the week that is for a non-sexualized sport class for kids? These are all taught by the same instructor and yet are both, apparently, different. How does one shift from a consciously sexualized pole-dancing class for adults one day to a "this is a serious sport in Russia" class for kids the next day? Why is the class not sexualized when the kids are doing it? Is it because it doesn't have porn-inspired name like "Bunny Bootcamp" which, I'm sure, would have never been considered for the title of the kid's class.

What seems to be missing from the conversation, however, is the realization that everything that circulates in our culture–all activities and all of what we see in the media–have been constructed within a specific society; in a highly pornified and highly misogynistic social environment that is driven by money and dominated by rich white men. 

These classes, despite the Craig’s assertions, are products of a patriarchal, misogynistic industry that thrives on the bodies of women and girls. The sex industry is a daily reality for many women around the world, often as a means of survival and yet, it is becoming a popular fitness trend among privileged women who can afford 120$ pole-dancing classes. 

If fitness and children’s well-being are really the goals of these classes then why not encourage these children to join a sport, go swimming, or explore the outdoors? Why is a sexualized class that costs 70$ an hour better than playing tag or throwing a ball around?

Critical thought is essential when it comes to these issues and all of the messages that we receive through patriarchal popular media. Children are cannot think critically about their activities and the world around them in the same way that adults can. This is why we have an age of consent and why we don’t leave life-altering decisions up to children who have had limited life experience and cognitive development. As adults, as a larger community, we need to step back and question the growing commercialization of childhood and of children. We need to start questioning why children are being so sexualized in the media and why it is being normalized. This normalization impacts children's lives and the way they explore and understand their world. 

Sexual Harassment and a Culture of Misogyny In the RCMP Pt. 3: Cpl. Brown's S&M Photos

Trigger Warning: Violence against women and sexualized violence

The RCMP tries to portray itself as a noble, courageous, and moral institution that upholds “the rule of law” and strives to “serve and protect” all citizens, but this is an illusion as the previous posts confirm. However, recently there has been even more controversy facing the force. When RCMP Cpl. Jim Brown’s photos were found on a bondage/sadomasochism website, many began to question his ability to appropriately oversee an investigation on murdered and missing women.

Once the images of the corporal were made public, many Canadians were disturbed to find an officer featured online in photos that fetishize violence against women. One photo shows Brown posing next to a woman bound in saranwrap and another displays him stepping on the back of a woman with his mountie boots. The narrative under the saranwrap photo was reiterated by Dr. Mike Webster, “He comes upon a woman on the street. He stalks her, he captures her, he takes her somewhere, it’s a private location, he wraps her in cellophane … he puts his feet on her, he cuts her, she bleeds.” 

Cpl. Jim Brown image found on AM980

The website even featured a photo of Cpl. Brown holding a butcher knife to a naked woman’s throat.  According to the National Post, “The narrative of the still photographs, posted on an S&M website, progresses from an apparent street scene of the woman walking past Brown sitting on a wall; he overpowers her; he hog-ties her, he imprisons her in a cage, he threatens her with a large butcher knife and he slashes her.”

Hilla Kerner, a worker at the the Vancouver Rape Relief and Women’s Shelter told the Vancouver Sun “It is absurd to think that his [Cpl. Brown] personal, private behaviour has nothing to do with his professional role as a police officer.” 

But those coming to Brown’s defense believe that his private life is based on individual choice and utterly detached from his public life. Psychology professor,  Del Paulhus (I know, I know it does look a lot like phallus) affirms that folks who are sadomasochists or those who “practice” bondage in their “home” life do not neccesarily behave that way in their careers or public lives. “In particular, the S&M community seems to be a group of people who are normal in every respect, except for their interest in sadistic and/or masochistic activities.” However, many that know that this is not entirely true, as several ex-BDSM aficionados have recently spoken out about sexual assault and a lack of real consent in some S&M circles. 

But I digress

Paulhus’s public/private theory suggests that we are all to believe that Cpl. Brown’s private activities (though they were published online by Brown) have no influence whatsoever on his ability to successfully and responsibly investigate a serial murder case involving 49 women.

Feminists are familiar with this notion that the public and private spheres of one's life are disconnected and detached. We argue, however, that they are connected and very intimately so. It does not take much brain power to understand how domestic battery and marital rape are not merely "private" matters, for instance. Feminists have long argued that this notion of a public/private divide is harmful to women as a class and further perpetuates a culture of misogyny, where violence against women is considered "a family matter" or a "private affair." Nevertheless, as per-usual under patriarchy, Cpl. Brown’s job will remain secure and he will continue to inhabit a place of authority despite this blatant conflict of interest. 

Cpl. Brown’s fetishizing of violence against women when placed alongside the workplace sexual harassment, rapes, verbal abuse, “fat parades,” and porn consumption, it is suffice to suggest that the RCMP is very anti-woman work environment.

But, what now?

How can the RCMP change when the misogyny is so deeply embedded as a part of the “culture?” What hope should we have, if any, in real change when the RCMP simply blames the women reporting abuse?

Cpl. Galliford’s courage to come forward with what she endured in the RCMP has inspired many other women to come forward, but what will be next for future female officers? For the missing and murdered women all over the country? The workplace harassment coupled with the violent photos of a male corporal merely makes a joke out of violence against women. This type of behaviour in the RCMP perpetuates a culture that views misogyny and violence against women as sexy, fun, and harmless. It pushes domestic violence, rape, and femicide into the private sphere and further discourages women from reporting abuse or safely escaping male violence. 

We must ask ourselves if a mere reformation of an institution that was founded on male-supremacy, colonialism, power, punishment, and social control is enough to put an end to a culture of misogyny.

Links - March 26, 2012

Links - March 26, 2012



The F-Word: "Why my body doesn’t exist for your viewing pleasure: An open letter to Ian Brown and friends"


The F-Word: "Safer strolls: A new, progressive way to blame the victim?"


Qvaken: "Advertising! Part 11: Killing Us Softly 4 and Silencing, Humiliating and Dominating Women


RATM: "Porn Part 11: The Difference Between Huffing Dong and Flipping Burgers"


Womon on a Journey: "Support Women's Right To Sexual Autonomy"


IBTP: "Nude Revolutionaries"


Stella Marr: "Call Girl Undercover "The Sneaky Language of the Pro Sex Work Lobby"


Stella Marr: "An Ex-Hooker's Letter to Her Younger Self"


Ariel Levy: "Chapter 4 Womyn to Bois"


The Irish Examiner: "The Harsh Realities of Being raped for a living"


Secret Diary of a Dublin Call Girl: "Non-Escort sex"

Women's Views on News: "Men's Rights Activists Named as Hate Group"

Smashethep: "On the "Cotton Ceiling," Rape Culture, and Feministe"

Porn Culture and Children: CBC Documentary "Sex't Up Kids"

Tonight CBC television will feature a documentary called "Sex't Up" which looks at the growing sexualization of girl-children, the increase in young boy's access to hardcore pornography, and how it is all impacting young people's notions of sex and sexuality as well as their self-esteem, and self-worth.



One of the previews for the documentary summed it up pretty well. Featured was a mother and her daughter, watching of Katy Perry's "California Girls" music video. During the video, the mother said to her daughter, "how often do you see Bono humping cotton candy, half naked, in order to sell his music?"

I chuckled loudly, but realized how pathetically accurate this mother was. Why are women and girls taught that the only way they can get ahead in life or gain any respect is through performing sexuality - through appearing to be nothing more than a one-dimensional caricature of sexiness. Men can gain respect without gyrating, humping or taking their clothes off...

But I digress...

CBC's website provides some statistics from the film:

Pre-teen clothing market is worth an estimated 150 billion dollars a year.
A survey of 15 major pre-teen clothing sites found that 1/3 of apparel was considered 'sexualized'.
A recent survey showed that 22% of teenage girls report anal sex in the last 60 days.
It's estimated that 70-80% of teenage boys watch pornography.
Another survey showed that 1/3 of admits to sending a naked or near naked picture to their 'crush'

The documentary will be speaking to young children and teens about their own experiences navigating porn culture. So please, please check out this documentary tonight as it is airing on Doc Zone at 9 pm Eastern and Pacific time.




*** If you want to watch the film online, it is now available streaming here ***

Links - February 19, 2012

Links - February 19, 2012 


the F-Word: Connecting the dots: Pornography, the VPD, and violence against women


the F-Word: the Pink and Blue Project


IBTP:  BeeDeeEssEm insiders have unpopular revelation


IBTP: Spinster aunt prattles on about pornography


IBTP: No. 2 Science Information

Skeptifem: Pit nutters to brown people: you have so much in common with dogs


Qvaken: Advertising! Part 5: Killing Us Softly 4 and Breasts And Breast Enhancement Surgery

Rage Against the Manchine: Porn Part 10: The Rutting Dogs of Capitalism 

Anti-Porn Men Project: Emma winter edition: The dream of being a porn star – Part I: The road to porn

Illusions of Power through the Status Quo

found here 

In the past few weeks, my gaze has been overwhelmed by an increase in patriarchal propaganda. Whether it be mural-sized advertisements for pharmaceutical drugs that sport oiled up gals punching shit with boxing gloves, or posters featuring a woman's torso being smothered in a pink corset reading: Striptease, Sexual Shame, Sex Work - it is clear that everything Ariel Levy wrote about in Female Chauvinist Pigs has been ever-increasing in the West.


“We have to ask ourselves why we are so focused on silent girly-girls in G-strings faking lust. This is not a sign of progress, it's a testament to what's still missing from our understanding of human sexuality with all its complexity and power. We are still so uneasy with the vicissitudes of sex we need to surround ourselves with caricatures of female hotness to safely conjure up the concept of 'sexy.' When you think about it, it's kind of pathetic.” (Levy, p. 198)

It seems that the whole confidence for cash shtick has really taken off. Usually, yet not surprisingly, these "confidence campaigns" target women. Women can be satisfied and confident about themselves, they say, but it has to be like in the good ole' days, through through our bodies, through our ability to sexually arouse and titillate men - not through our minds, our ideas, or our actions. Now, this consumer-friendly notion of empowerment and self-confidence is being sold as socially progressive and pro-woman - but it is only re-naming (or re-branding!) the status quo. 


“Women's liberation and empowerment are terms feminists started using to talk about casting off the limitations imposed upon women and demanding equality. We have perverted these words. The freedom to be sexually provocative or promiscuous is not enough freedom; it is not the only 'women's issue' worth paying attention to. And we are not even free in the sexual arena. We have simply adopted a new norm, a new role to play: lusty, busty exhibitionist. There are other choices. If we are really going to be sexually liberated, we need to make room for a range of options as wide as the variety of human desire. We need to allow ourselves the freedom to figure out what we internally want from sex instead of mimicking whatever popular culture holds up to us as sexy. That would be liberation" (Levy, p. 200). 


Whether it comes from the billion dollar beauty industry, burlesque revivalist camps, the pornography industry, striptease weight-loss home exercise DVDs, or the comical yet profoundly vain self-help industry - the West is obsessed with promoting false reality and false consciousnesses that favors patriarchy and normalizes it.




Source:
Female Chauvinist Pigs by Ariel Levy, pp. 198 and 200, 2005, Free Press

Andrea Dworkin's Heartbreak: "Prisons"

Here is the entire (short) chapter "Prisons" from Andrea Dworkin's Heartbreak 

Prisons 1

   Perhaps because I came from the pacifist left, I had an intense and abiding hatred for prisons (even though the U. S. prison system was developed by the Quakers). After the publication of Our Blood, I wrote a proposal for a book on prisons. I was struck by the way prisons stayed the same through time and place: the confinement of an individual in bad circumstances with a sadistic edge and including all the prison rites of passage. I was struck by how prisons were the only places in which men were threatened with rape in a way analogous to the female experience. I was struck by the common sadomasochistic structure of the prison experience no matter what the crime or country or historical era. That proposal was rejected by a slew of publishers. I found myself at a dead end.

  But an odd redemption was at hand. I had noticed that in all pornography one also found the prison as leitmotif, the sexualization of confining and beating women, the ubiquitous rape, the dominance and submission of the social world in which women were literally and metaphorically imprisoned. 

   I decided to write on pornography because I could make the same points - show the same inequities - as with prisons. Pornography and prisons were built on cruelty and brutalization; the demeaning of the human body as a form of punishment; the worthlessness of the individual human being; restraint, confinement, tying, whipping, branding, torture, penetration, and kicking as commonplace ordeals. Each was a social construction that could be different but was not; each incorporated and exploited isolation, dominance and submission,humiliation, and dehumanization. In each the effort was to control a human being by attacking human dignity. In each the guilt of the imprisoned provided a license to animalize persons, which in turn led to a recognition of the ways in which animals were misused outside the prison, outside the pornography. Arguably (but not always), those in prison had committed an offense; the offense of women in pornography was in being women. In both prisons and pornography,sadomasochism was a universal dynamic; there was no chance for reciprocity or mutuality or an equality of communication. 

   In prison populations and in pornography, the most aggressive rapist was at the top of the social structure. In prison populations gender was created by who got fucked; so, too, in pornography. It amazed me that in pornography the prison was recreated repeatedly as the sexual environment most conducive to the rape of women.

   The one difference, unbridgeable, intractable, between prisons and pornography was that prisoners were not expected to like being in prison, whereas women were supposed to like each and every abuse suffered in pornography.

1. p. 127-129 in Heartbreak by Andrea Dworkin, Published by Perseus Books Group
Copywrite 2002 Andrea Dworkin

** All of Andrea's published works can be found online, courtesy of radfem.org **

Links - January 24, 2012

Links - January 24, 2012

Nine Deuce The third (and probably last) trans post of my life

Twisty Pinkness ensures replication of patriarchal ideals

Twisty Fairy tale Sunday 

The F-Word The World According to Porn



The F-Word Why Hollywood needs Help




The F-Word On Pornography and the Persistence of Patriarchy 



Metis' Blog on Muslim Feminists Hijab and niqaab and the ban 



Almost Clever To Betray

Links - October 24 2011

Links for October 24, 2011


- Feminist Media Collective: On 'sex positivity' and misunderstandings 


- IBTP: Spinster Aunt was Once Adored by Dude Nation

- No Excuses No Mercy: Hate from Reddit: MRAs in Action

- K Miriam: Branding Feminism

- Z. Bediako:  BLACK OUT! At Occupy Philadelphia


- Almost Clever: Where "Feminisms" Collide


- BallBuster: #occupybaltimore discourages police involvement in sexual assault cases


- Anti-Porn Men: What is Gay Sex? Pornography Tries to Give us the Answer and Fails


- Feminist Media Collective: A lesson in how *not* to be an ally


- Elkballet: Porn Users Explain why Porn is Healthy Part 2

NYC Slutwalk Attracts Anger over Blatantly Racist Sign

**Trigger Warning**

New York Slutwalk has been stirring up some rage after photos of the event surfaced on facebook. 


It all happened after a member uploaded a photograph of a young white woman with an incredibly offensive sign. The sign was the title of a John Lennon song that includes the n-word.

***

Slut Walk NYC - posted on their facebook group. 

** I took it upon myself to disguise the identities of these marchers. It has been made clear that at least some of them are under 18. Although what they did was thoughtless and racist, they also have a right to personal safety. **

The thread developing below the photo itself has proven to be very racist.

 **The bits I find particularly ridiculous will be bold and enlarged.**

Here is what a woman said in defense of the signage:


"This is the title of a song written and performed by John Lennon and Yoko Ono in the 1970s.You have to listen to the whole song to understand it. It is not offensive to anyone other than sexists in its entirety and was a very powerful message, then and now. I can understand how the sign out of this context would be disturbing. But I urge everyone to check out the full lyrics and listen to the song and judge for themselves."


Another woman with "TheBeatles"  listed as her middle-name, jumped in to simply paste the entire lyrics to John Lennon's song. She later admitted in the same thread that it was her sign and she continued to stand by it, claiming it not to be racist. 

Another woman holding the same sign at the NYC Slutwalk March on October 1, 2011

Here are more comments from white women, including the woman holding the sign in the first photograph. 
                           





"There was no disrespect, hurt, pain, or offence intended. I don't think there was one racist person there. I, the one holding the sign, though not the one who made it, would never use that word offensively. The word and it's meaning is wrong, but the sign is true. There is no contest about it. I am probably the least racist person out there. I have never even mistakenly judged someone by the color of their skin. Don't judge before you know what is really going on. I did not make the sign, but still feel wrong and sick. I apologize for being photographed with it and would like to ask for it to be taken down. 
I never thought this experience could make me ashamed or hurt, or even make me cry, but it has. Anyone who has seen photos of me with it please ask for them to be taken down. ____ this is not your fault, I just don't wish to be hated for a word."



The thread goes on and becomes more racist as the backers of the sign continue to comment and dig themselves into an even bigger hole. 




Now, along with the racist signage, the NYC Slutwalk facebook group photoalbum also contains a photo of a woman (clearly from a porno) with semen all over her face and lipstick smudged across her mouth. On her forehead is the word "SLUT" and she appears to intoxicated in the photo wit one of her eyes half closed while looking glassy and disconnected. Above her head reads "Max Hardcore" and as many people know, this is the creator of very violent and stomach-churning pornography. Slutwalk NYC may or may not have added this photograph themselves, but it is unlikely that their group album is open to all of the over 2,000 members. If it is open to all members then I will be concerned as to why supporters of the march would post such material. Even more alarming about this photo was its placement next to another photo of a young woman from the march. This woman also had the word "SLUT" scrawled on her forehead. Under this photo, the caption reads "before" and it is oddly placed AFTER the photograph of the semen-drenched woman which bares the caption "after." 
My question is why, if NYC Slutwalk is concerned with women's liberation and creating an inclusive and safe march, would they walk alongside white women carrying a sign with the n-word on it and possibly posting a photo from a violent porn site on their group?  


Disgusting.


For more on the racism at the NYC Slutwalk, please check out these:


Racialicious: Which Women Are What Now? Slutwalk NYC and Failures in Solidarity

Racialicious: Slutwalk, Slurs, and Why Feminism Still Has Race Issues 

The Crunk Feminist Collective: I Saw the Sign but Did We Really Need a Sign?: SlutWalk and Racism
Akiba Solomon from Colorlines.com: More Thoughts on SlutWalk: No Attention is Better Than Bad Attention

Links - September 1, 2011

Husna Haq "As an American Muslim, I am disgusted by the 9/11 coloring book"

Twisty "Ditwuss Award de la semaine: PETA"

Elkballet "Just fantasy?"

Womon on a Journey "'I Hate Girls'"

Bolshevik Chick "Intersectionality (amongst other things) is Bullshit"

The Guardian's Chris McGreal "Abortion law sonogram clause proposal rejected by US judge"

Susan Lazaruk "Glass ceiling persists: Women still a minority in senior management"

Natalie Hill "Global organizing gone awry: why international neo-liberal feminist movements are bad for women and bad for feminism"

Her Circle E-Zine Ten Years Underground: A Photojournalist's Quest to Expose the Sex Trade

Psychology, Pedophilia and Patriarchy - The Three P's of this Post

          ***TRIGGER WARNING FOR SEXUAL ABUSE***

This past May I wrote a blog called "DSM-V Presents "Paraphilic Coercive Disorder" which was basically a jargon-filled name for "Rapist Disorder." In the post, I expressed concern about the DSM V and its impact on victims of rape and violence and this concern has not been lost. There appears to be more controversial buzz surrounding the DSM V and it has left me with a sour gut. This time, however, the proposed revisions for the DSM V have ignited a reaction from a pedophile support group called B4U-ACT. This group is composed of people who claim to be "minor attracted people" rather than pedophiles and who do not actually rape or abuse children. They claim to be attracted to children and do not act out on their "impulses" and assert to help pedophiles avoid physically harming children. They feel the DSM V is being unfair with a proposed revision on pedophilia. 

Before getting started on the article that brought this all to my attention, I took it upon myself to go to the DSM V website and look at the revision list for pedophilia. This is what I found:

Pedohebephilic Disorder

A.    Over a period of at least six months, one or both of the following, as manifested by fantasies, urges, or behaviors:

(1)    recurrent and intense sexual arousal from prepubescent or pubescent children [5]

(2)   equal or greater arousal from such children than from physically mature individuals [6]

B.     One or more of the following signs or symptoms:

(1)   the person has clinically significant distress or impairment in important areas of functioning from sexual attraction to children

(2)   the person has sought sexual stimulation, on separate occasions, from either of the following:

(a)    two or more different children, if both are prepubescent

(b)   three or more different children, if one or more are pubescent [7]

(3)   repeated use of , and greater arousal from, pornography depicting prepubescent or pubescent children than from pornography depicting physically mature persons, for a period of six months or longer [8]

C.     The person is at least age 18 years and at least five years older than the children in Criterion A or Criterion B.

Specify type:

Pedophilic Type—Sexually Attracted to Prepubescent Children (Generally Younger than 11)

Hebephilic Type—Sexually Attracted to Pubescent Children (Generally Age 11 through 14)

Pedohebephilic Type—Sexually Attracted to Both

Specify if:

In Remission (No Distress, Impairment, or Recurring Behavior and in an Uncontrolled Environment): State duration of remission in months: ____

In a Controlled Environment

***

Information obtained from http://www.dsm5.org 

All information belongs to the American Psychological Association, 2010

***

What follows will be the article from the Salon and my commentary added in bold. To read the article uninterrupted by my commentary, see here. 

We usually hear pedophilia talked about in terms of mental illness -- if not evil -- but Aug. 17 a motley crew of self-identified "minor-attracted persons" and mental health professionals have gathered in Boston to talk about it as a sexual identity. [This appears to be an example of "identity politics" and its merger with the psychology community] At hand is an issue deeply important to both groups: the revision of the diagnostic criteria for pedophilia.

The sponsor of the event, B4U-ACT, a support group aimed at preventing pedophiles from acting on their attraction to children, hopes to influence the relevant entry in the upcoming revision of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. [I am glad people want to prevent pedophiles from raping kids but why are we viewing pedophilia as some legitimate "condition?" How can we assume that pedophilia is a naturally occuring disorder that some people are just "born" with? We must think critically about such things rather than passing them off as something inevitable or even natural. What does that say about our society? ] Understandably, the idea of pedophiles helping to define their own mental illness has some unnerved. [Obviously! When one thinks about the victims of child sexual abuse and how often they are silenced, one's mind does not then think about the poor pedophiles who don't actually rape kids but likely think about raping children. Why not give a voice to the victims of abuse instead of giving a voice to those who contribute to an oppressive society?] Earlier this week, the Daily Caller wrote about the event in a piece headlined, "Conference aims to normalize pedophilia." It's true that many in the community believe that attraction to pubescent or pre-pubescent children isn't a mental illness at all, but the symposium itself has the stated aim of raising awareness about fundamental problems with the proposed revision to the DSM's entry on pedophilia.

Richard Kramer, director of B4U-ACT, argues that the panel of experts responsible for the revision "represents only the narrow field of sex offender assessment and treatment." He believes it's important to also represent minor-attracted folks  who have not offended and would like to keep it that way: "[The panel] bases its work almost exclusively on assumptions about, and research on, sex offenders, who do not represent minor-attracted people in the general population," he wrote me in an email. "As a result, the DSM includes inaccurate and misleading information and ignores the existence of minor-attracted people who are law-abiding." 

[This proposed "title" of "Minor Attracted People" is incredibly offensive and degrading to the victims of childhood sexual abuse and to those who are exploited to facilitate the "fantasies" of pedophiles who may not physically harm a child. Regardless of whether or not they offend,  these people still consume children in one way or another because they, as adults - as mostly male adults - have that power. They objectify children who do not have the same social power or rights as they do  which is why their "title" for themselves and their "cause" is so harmful.] 

It might seem counterintuitive for non-criminals to fight to be recognized alongside criminals, but B4U-ACT sees this as a way of fighting the stigmatization of attraction to children and the conflation of pedophiles with child molesters. [There should be a stigmatization because children do not have the social power or the life-experience to understand or consent to being an object of a grown man's gaze .] Of course, "pedophile" has become cultural shorthand for "abuser" for good reason: We fear they will act on their attraction to children. An article on the DSM debate in the Harvard Mental Health Letter says the scientific evidence supports that concern: "Several reports have concluded that most people with pedophilic tendencies eventually act on their sexual urges in some way. [Exactly - and more so when they form "support" groups that aim for the general populis to feel sympathetic for their pedophilia. The support group itself merely perpetuates the victim-blaming and victim-silencing tendencies of our patriarchal society ] Typically this involves exposing themselves to children, watching naked children, masturbating in front of children, or touching children's genitals." Kramer and his ilk argue that such scientific wisdom is based on skewed data that looks only at offenders, and that many child molesters are not technically pedophiles (i.e., they offend because of opportunity, not sexual attachment).

Such claims seem rather dubious when visiting a message board like Boy Chat, where it's easy to find men discussing how society just doesn't understand that many "young friends" enjoy having a friendship with a "boy lover." [Again we see that pedophiles have a voice - they also have access to the voices of other pedophiles to assure them that their "way of life" is bona fide]. There are no mentions of sexual activity with children, as such posts are forbidden, and posters are effusive about how they would never think of "hurting" a child -- but one gets the sense that they're operating under a different understanding of "hurt." Most of the discussions focus on feelings of love and tenderness for young boys; it's all very reminiscent of how Michael Jackson would talk about his friendships with children. There are also conversations about how to find a "YF" -- for instance, one man says he is renting a room in his house to a woman with custody of her grandsons. He writes, "The boys have taken to me, naturally, and my landlady loves me. I'm taking it slow, but I've already been trusted to watch the boys ... another night coming this week; an overnight. They're cutie pies." 

There is a general consensus within the medical community that pedophilia is a sexual orientation and as such is unlikely to change, so treatment focuses on helping them to suppress their desires through psychotherapy and medication. [Oh, a sexual orientation?  How can anyone say that pedophilia is as sexual orientation, as if pedophilia is a type of "queer lifestyle" or even relevant to sexuality. They are attracted to power - to defeating, colonizing and consuming children.  Pedophilia is not about consensual sexual activity or romantic love. Also,  just because the pedophile is "unlikely to change" doesn't mean that we should be welcoming support groups that defend men's abuses against children,  both in fantasy and acted out on a child! But, who is surprised? The DSM V is now saying that rapists have a "condition" that makes them rape, silencing the voices of rape victims, almost all of which are women. It appears to  all goes back to maintaining power in the hands of men and silencing the victims of male violence] Fred Berlin, director of the Sexual Behavior Consultation Unit at Johns Hopkins and an expert presenter at today's event, compares it to the sort of treatment people with drug addiction or alcoholism go through. 

[Whoopsie Daisy! I guess the pedophile had a "relapse." To0 bad that their relapses include victimizing children] 

"They need to learn to not give in to cravings [Whaddya know! Pedophiles can have "cravings" for children akin to alcoholics craving a bottle of cheap port. Children are things!] which are satisfying and very pleasurable but which their intellect and their conscience and society is telling them they ought not to act on," he told me by phone. "Now, can everybody succeed? No, but there are large numbers of people who experience these attractions and with proper help go on and don't continue to offend.  There is good evidence to show that that's the case."

He says many pedophile activists [What's next, "rapist activists"?  - they don't really rape, they just want to...)] are concerned that the term "has become a stigmatizing pejorative," a way of saying "that somebody is less than human."[Like the way you feel about children?] They're unlikely to get much sympathy from the general public for being stigmatized, but Berlin says it's in society's best interest to resist demonizing them. "The idea is to try to get folks who are sexually attracted to children to come forward and get help before acting so that children are not harmed," he said. [That's great that you want to stop pedophiles from physically victimizing children but when you start saying it is "activism" and making up chat rooms to talk about "loving boys" - you've attempted to create harm, rather than prevent it. These trends towards normalizing men's entitlement to women and children are terribly harmful.] "That's certainly a goal that I would fully support." He adds: "None of us as little children sit down and ask ourselves the question, 'Do I want to grow up to be attracted to men or to women, to boys or to girls?' Nobody sits down, reflects about that and then decides," he argues. "If someone realizes while growing up that they're attracted to pre-pubescent children, it seems to me it is very important for them to know that there are places they can go to get help before they act on those feelings." [What help will they get? What about the notion that "pedophiles cannot change?"]

This debate goes far beyond the push by pedo-activists, raising fundamental questions within the medical community about how we define mental illness. Controversially, the proposed DSM adds hebephilia (attraction to pubescent children) to the entry for pedophilia (attraction to pre-pubescents), creating the hybrid "pedohebephilic disorder." Psychiatry professor Richard Green, founding president of the International Academy of Sex Research, wrote in the Archives of Sexual Behavior, "In several European countries, the age of legal consent to have sex falls within the range proposed for the DSM as signifying mental disorder for the older participant," he writes. "If the general culture is accepting of participation by the younger party [How can we conclude that a child can consent to a sexual relationship with an adult, whether they are 8 or 15 years old, when the power dynamics are so clearly unbalanced?] but psychiatry pathologizes the participation by the older party, then the mental health profession pronounces a moralistic standard and, if successful, becomes an agent of social control." [No, this is absolutley, 100% incorrect. Social control is when grown men feel entitled to access the bodies of women and children (whether through pornography or rape) and in turn create a cultural climate in which women and children are disproportionately victimized. This creates fear that forces women and children to make changes to their lifestyles to avoid victimization. Social control is when a woman cannot walk the streets at night because a man may assault her. Social control is when women and their children around the world are made poor because of the wars that men fight and the economic system that they fight for. Social control is when a man tells the court that the 11 year old child "liked" being raped. Social control is what men have over women and children.]

Few of us in the general public are capable of thinking about pedophiles, or hebephiles, in emotionless, scientific terms -- but, luckily, we aren't the ones charged with treating them, or defining who "they" are.

• Tracy Clark-Flory is a staff writer at Salon. Follow @tracyclarkflory on Twitter. More: Tracy Clark-Flory

If anyone wants to contact the group B4U-ACT or the "pity-a-pedophile" foundation as I like to call it, here is the website. In the meantime, this fuming boner killer is in need of a toke and a few snuggles from her cat.