Pedophile advocacy

Pedophile advocacy, pedophilia advocacy, pedophile activism, and pedophilia activism are vague terms, almost always used by opponents of the child sexual liberation movement, that are sometimes used to refer to any non-mainstream opinions about pedosexuality or pedosexual relations. "Pedophile advocacy" is sometimes cited as provocation for blocking a user from wikis such as Wikipedia. There are at least several types of behavior that have led to such accusations:

• Arguing that people should be allowed to engage in the other forms of pedophile advocacy in certain venues;
• Arguing that the laws ostensibly intended to prevent adult-child sex have become so overly broad (e.g. by defining child pornography as visual depictions of sexually explicit conduct involving persons under 18, rather than under, say, 12 or 13; see 18 U.S.C. Sec. 2256) as to waste government resources and unnecessarily restrict freedom;
• Arguing that the laws against adult-child sex have become too punitive (this is the type of argument raised by Reform Sex Offender Laws);
• Arguing that pedophiles should not be stigmatized, as this discourages them from seeking psychological treatment (this is the argument raised by Virtuous Pedophiles and B4U-ACT);
• Arguing that pedophiles who have not acted on their sexual attractions to children should be welcome to participate in society on equal terms as non-pedophiles, so as not to discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation;
• Hypothesizing concerning the evolutionary psychology of sexual attraction of children (rather than regarding it as resulting from a brain defect);
• Arguing that, regardless of whether adult-child sex is harmful or not, it should be allowed because of the self-ownership principle;
• Arguing that claims put forth concerning the harmfulness of adult-child sex have been exaggerated, or that they overgeneralize;
• Arguing that adult-child sex is actually beneficial to at least some children (directly or indirectly).

As a practical matter, on Wikimedia wikis, simply arguing that users should be allowed to give fringe views sympathetic to child sexual liberation their due weight can be grounds for getting kicked off. On the English Wikipedia, this sanction is imposed by the Arbitration Committee pursuant to secretive deliberations. The public is not privy to the rationales behind these decisions, and all on-wiki criticism of the decisions is prohibited (since, per ArbCom instructions noted in block comments, all discussion is to be by mailing list). Since it is not allowed to cite particular cases where the rules, as currently worded, have been a problem, is difficult for proposals to more clearly define what is and isn't pedophile advocacy to get any traction. On wikis that do not have an ArbCom, sanctions for pedophile advocacy are usually imposed by sysops and/or the community.

"Pedophile-talk," "Pedophilia-speak," etc. are similar terms that are basically ad hominem circumstantial attacks. They could be considered bulverism or appeals to motive, or perhaps argumentum ad lapidem.

See also

• Activism
• Public Activism (Options for Closeted BoyLovers)