Template:From the Gay Community/News

• ‘Named persons’: child protection at its most dystopian - Discussion of the new act which will mean that, from birth, each child in Scotland will have a specific state-appointed professional, a ‘named person’, to oversee their interests, and, in particular, to oversee their safety. (Stuart Waiton - spiked, UK)

• The war on paedos: grooming the public’s fears - For some time now, paedophilia has been serving as a metaphor for the dread and self-loathing that dominates the imagination of Western elite culture. (Frank Furedi - spiked, UK)

• Cyril Smith: no justice for dead men - The moral crusade against child abuse invents its own truth. (Tim Black - spiked, UK)

• Second top judge faces probe over 'defence' of paedophiles after links with controversial campaign group are exposed - “As a barrister, Mr Thornton criticised the prosecution of the Paedophile Information Exchange (PIE) after its leader was jailed.” ( The Daily Mail, UK)

• What PIE and the NSPCC have in common - Both believe in saving children from their parents. (Frank Furedi - spiked, UK) See: Paedophile Information Exchange.

• The NCCL was right to affiliate with PIE - If civil liberties groups won't defend free speech for the unpopular, what's the point of them? (Brendan O’Neill - spiked, UK)

• German politician Edathy rejects child porn allegation - Sebastian Edathy the politician who last year presented the German parliament's acclaimed report on bungled police probes into a neo-Nazi murder spree has denied a media allegation of possessing child pornography. ( Deutsche Welle)

• Labour’s paedo problems: no reason to gloat - Harman and pals are discovering the cost of putting the past on trial. (Tim Black - spiked, UK)

• Jesse Ryan Loskarn, former Lamar Alexander aide, dead in suicide - Jesse Ryan Loskarn, a former aide to Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) who faced charges of possessing and distributing child pornography, hanged himself and died Thursday in a Maryland home, his family and police officials said Friday. (washingtonpost.com) Article related to Azov Films Prosecutions.

• Is pedophilia a sexual orientation? - Dr. James Cantor of CAMH has shown pedophilia is like a sexual orientation — a deep attraction that cannot change. Now, pedophiles who have never molested children are seeking social acceptance. (Toronto Star)

In Other News

• Was I a Teenage Sexual Predator? - Account of teenages exploits with older men. (Mark S. King - HuffPost )

• Keep the emotion police out of family life - The dangers behind the NSPCC’s campaign to criminalise ‘emotional abuse’.(Frank Furedi - spiked, UK)

• White supremacists sentenced to life in prison for murdering sex offender, wife - Moodys targeted Charles Parker because he was a registered sex offender, and Jeremy Moody admitted to authorities that he had planned to kill another registered sex offender before being caught.(TIM KIMZEY - BlueRidgeNow.com)

• Clifford is a creep, but what’s that got to do with Savile? - The first celebrity to be hanged from Yewtree is unlikely to be the last. (Mick Hume - spiked, UK)

• Victims of child pornography can be paid for their losses, but within limits, high court says - The justices said in a 5-4 ruling that a 1994 federal law gives victims the right to seek restitution from offenders, but only to the extent that the victim’s losses are tied to the offenders’ actions.” (Mark Sherman, Daily Journal) (See: Voodoo Molestation and US Law)

• Is ‘eat your peas!’ emotional abuse? - How the language of child protection can be used to undermine adult authority. (Dennis Hayes - spiked, UK)

• How Covert Agents Infiltrate the Internet to Manipulate, Deceive, and Destroy Reputations - One of the many pressing stories that remains to be told from the Snowden archive is how western intelligence agencies are attempting to manipulate and control online discourse with extreme tactics of deception and reputation-destruction. (The Intercept)

• Scotland: Every Child to Have “State Guardian” From Birth - Every child in Scotland is to be assigned a “state minder” from birth under draconian new proposals that would enable the government to spy on families under the justification of preventing “child abuse”. ( PrisonPlanet.com)

• Capitol Punishment: The Troubling Consequences of Federal Child Pornography Laws - The legislative scheme underlying current child pornography laws in the U.S. goes much further than addressing the actual harm caused by viewing or possessing such images. ( The Huffington Post)

• Our misguided child porn laws do little to protect children - The legal treatment of people caught with child pornography is so harsh that they can end up serving longer sentences than people who actually abuse children. (The Washington Post)

Art and Entertainment

• 'X-Men' director Bryan Singer targeted in teen sex abuse lawsuit - A lawyer who filed a teen sex abuse lawsuit against "X-Men" director Bryan Singer said three more "Hollywood types" will be targeted in similar suits soon. (Los Angeles (CNN))

• Australia bans award-winning Swedish film Children's Island over child porn concerns - Censors have refused classification for a 30-year-old award-winning Swedish film (aka Barnens ö), in effect banning it, after an application by the Australian Federal Police. (The Sydney Morning Herald, Au)

Books and reviews

• Perv: The Sexual Deviant in All of Us by Jesse Bering – review (The Guardian UK) - We cannot choose who we are sexually attracted to – so stop judging.