This will likely be highly controversial and a bad strategy for me, but screw it I will post it anyway.
After LGBT…is the next letter to be added to the alphabet soup a P?
That is ridiculous. Yes, pedophilia is a sexual orientation that the person does not choose (like LGB), but that is where the similarities end.
Pedophiles acting out their desires on little children will never be accepted by society, because children cannot give consent. I actually agree that a pedophile who has not abused any children isn't a monster. Their situation is very unfortunate, and I actually feel bad for them that life has dealt them such a crappy deal. That is because they did not and could not choose their orientation (similar to how homosexuals cannot choose their orientation). Just think: considering how despised pedophiles are by society, if they actually could choose their orientation, why the hell wouldn't they change it to something that is acceptable to society?
What they can choose, however, is what actions they do in response to their unchangeable orientation and desires. Any pedophile who actually acts on their desires is a monster that deserves society's hatred and should be punished to the full extent of the law. But I don't think it is fair to hate a pedophile who has done a good job controlling their urges and has never abused children. That said, I totally understand not trusting them around your kids, because that is just playing with fire.
Finally, I want to end this comment with a hypothetical philosophical question, which further shows the huge disparity between pedophilia and LGB (and many other sexual orientations). What if in the future there existed some technology that actually rewired a person's brain so that they remained the exact same person except that their sexual orientation was changed to something else? I think there comes some point where the technology is deemed safe and reliable enough that society can morally demand that pedophiles use the machine to change their sexual orientation to something less problematic to society (assuming they didn't just voluntarily do it themselves long ago to make their life easier). However, I do not think it would be moral for society to demand the same of homosexuals, bisexuals, pansexuals, asexuals, etc., because their actions do not harm others (assuming their sexual acts are all with consenting adults of course).
Arhag, I wish the world was like you say... But there are some truly shameful beliefs out there. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islam_and_children#Marriage
What are the chances that Salon are trying to condition people to not get mad about the inevitable sharia courts in the USA with all the immigration and refugees coming in? I think they're pretty good...
That is a valid point. Perhaps it was too strong of a statement for me to say "Pedophiles acting out their desires on little children will never be accepted by society" considering that there exists large subsets of global society in the present day who apparently tolerate it. : (
But I still stand by the statement that it is very unlikely that western society will ever tolerate sexual abuse of children in their own jurisdiction. At least, I hope so.
I think this is bordering on conspiracy theory and I don't agree that it is what is actually happening in this case. But I sure do have a problem with the fact that many so-called liberals seem to no longer stand up for liberal principles for the sake of political correctness. And though I would describe myself as a descriptive and meta-ethical moral relativist, I am certainly not a normative moral relativist, and I think it is a very bad idea to give leeway to proselytization of dangerous ideas through self-censorship of counter-arguments simply because those dangerous ideas are held by a person who is a member of an underprivileged or disadvantaged group.
If western civilization keep on embracing moral relativism, without any standards to objectively define right from wrong...I dont think its that far fetch 10 or 15 years down the road. Especially when news outlet have resident pedophiles.
Pretty much near 0. Seriously, the fear of sharia law emerging in the west is just silly. Even in (most countries with a muslim majority it's not practiced)[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Application_of_sharia_law_by_country#Sharia_in_the_world]
There is over 100 sharia courts in the UK and many more underground.
That's more like mediation for those who want it, in civil cases, without means to enforce their rulings. Not to be mixed up with cut off limbs and stonings.