Most pedophiles are men. Why?

[Dustin Kesselberg]

I was reading the "Perverted Justice" website and noticed that something like 800 of the perverts they busted were man while only 1 was a woman. Why?Scientific studies have shown that the vast majority of sexual predators are men. Why does anyone think this is? Whenever I go into Chatrooms for instance all I see are people typing "25/m/la young gurlz wanna chat?". I never see "25/f/la young boyz wanna chat?". I never see that.

Why are 99% of pedophiles and sexual predators male?


Discuss.

[richardm]

Women hide their tracks better? I suppose that in general male mammals tend to spread their genes more widely than female ones, so perhaps that leaves their brains wired up differently as regards their need for sex. Or perhaps it's all social conditioning?

[Dustin Kesselberg]

I don't think that's what it is.

[Darat]

...snip...

Why are 99% of pedophiles and sexual predators male?


Discuss.

Can you provide evidence for your claim?

[Kevin_Lowe]

"Why" questions about human behaviour are very difficult to answer.

In this particular case I don't think the answer is going to be separable from the question of why some people are sexual predators and some are not, and we don't have the answer to that question. We know some things about what genetic factors (having a Y chromosome) and environmental factors (being sexually abused) tend to be statistically linked with sexual predation, but we don't know why those links exist.

Biochemical research on one hand and cross-cultural studies of human sexual behaviour on the other could in theory get us better answers.

ETA: I did a fair bit of reading about this topic when the acrimonious thread on paedophilia and age of consent was running, and although I don't have a cite on hand I believe Dustin is basically right that the overwhelming majority of sexual predators are male. I won't vouch for 99% but if I can trust my recall it's over 90% at the very least. That's based on victimisation surveys, not convictions, so it's not likely to be purely an artifact of women "covering their tracks better".

[Dustin Kesselberg]

When I say "99%" it means a "whole lot!".

[Dave1001]

I was reading the "Perverted Justice" website and noticed that something like 800 of the perverts they busted were man while only 1 was a woman. Why?Scientific studies have shown that the vast majority of sexual predators are men. Why does anyone think this is? Whenever I go into Chatrooms for instance all I see are people typing "25/m/la young gurlz wanna chat?". I never see "25/f/la young boyz wanna chat?". I never see that.

Why are 99% of pedophiles and sexual predators male?


Discuss.

Maybe men are more likely to get observed and caught.

[CFLarsen]

When I say "99%" it means a "whole lot!".

Unless you can quantify your claim, it is impossible to discuss it.

[Kevin_Lowe]

As I said earlier, surveys of more-or-less random sets of people have shown that the overwhelming majority of people who claim to have been sexually abused claim to have been sexually abused by males.

Lacking any reason to think they are lying, I tend to believe that it is in fact the case that the overwhelming majority of sexual predators are in fact men.

So due credit to those who asked a good skeptical question, but in this case I believe Dustin's question is not based on a factual error.

Unless you can quantify your claim, it is impossible to discuss it.

I agree that the question cannot be answered sensibly without being refined a great deal further.

[Kevin_Lowe]

double post

[Moochie]

Perhaps a good place to start would be to look at contemporary and historical societies where it was known such activities rarely, if ever, occurred.

Margaret Mead did some interesting studies of human sexuality in "primitive" societies.

M.

[Dustin Kesselberg]

Unless you can quantify your claim, it is impossible to discuss it.


Nonsense. A "vast majority" works just fine.

Why are a vast majority of pedophiles men?

[Iamme]

Easy question.

Girls are exposed from early on, to male frontal nudity. Girls bond with mothers and girls see mom changing diapers of their brothers and get used to this. Boys, as they get older, only get bigger and hair down below...but nothing really new.

But girls change and get breasts and their hips widen. Boys are never allowed to see these breasts. They are kept hidden. They are considered another private part. Girls have 2 private parts and men only have one!

Guys, at about the age of puberty, (some before then) start just dying to want to figure out someHOW how they can grope breasts (because the guy does not have breasts). But they know they can't..they aren't allowed to... so they get Playboy magazines, look at dirty movies, etc.

But for some men, this is not good enough. They want the real thing.

The men who look at themselves in the mirror and figure no GROWN woman would want them, and perhaps have felt this way for their entire life, then have no choice but to try to go after young girls, because with young girls they feel that they 'have a chance' with them. They aren't as intimidated with young girls because they don't have those intimidating breasts that can cause some shy men to literally choke on their saliva...so they probably go after little girls and get to check out what is down below (something they weren't allowed to see much of either, while growing up) and then probably pretend in their minds that the little girl has breasts, perhaps. I could go into all kinds of psychological theory as to why this is so, but you get the picture.

[ReFLeX]

Nonsense. A "vast majority" works just fine.

Why are a vast majority of pedophiles men?
Save everyone else's speculation, this question has too big a scope to be answered by any single field of study.

ETA: For example, we have some idea why men are more likely to be promiscuous, but not necessarily why they would be going after children.

[Soapy Sam]

Unless you can quantify your claim, it is impossible to discuss it.

Claus- you are discussing it.

Let's put the claim this way. "It appears that the overwhelming majority of pedophiles are men. Discuss"

I suspect the reasons are many and include genetics and society.
Here's one trivial factor. A tue story observed by me.

A four year old girl enters a church hall with her mother . The mother , who is on a church committee, is pounced on by several people who need to discuss finances. Bored, the girl wanders away and is picked up by an elderly lady (about 75) who sits the kid in her lap and starts asking her questions and generally keeping her amused.

After a minute, this lady is also called to the discussion and passes the kid to her husband ( over 80 , father of three, grandfather of five and great grandfather of one), who treats the kid exactly as his wife had, whereupon the mother rushes over and "rescues " the kid from the somewhat bemused gentleman.

What's going on here? How much of paedophilia is a perception problem?

[ReFLeX]

Easy question.

Girls are exposed from early on, to male frontal nudity. Girls bond with mothers and girls see mom changing diapers of their brothers and get used to this. Boys, as they get older, only get bigger and hair down below...but nothing really new.

But girls change and get breasts and their hips widen. Boys are never allowed to see these breasts. They are kept hidden. They are considered another private part. Girls have 2 private parts and men only have one!

Guys, at about the age of puberty, (some before then) start just dying to want to figure out someHOW how they can grope breasts (because the guy does not have breasts). But they know they can't..they aren't allowed to... so they get Playboy magazines, look at dirty movies, etc.

But for some men, this is not good enough. They want the real thing.

The men who look at themselves in the mirror and figure no GROWN woman would want them, and perhaps have felt this way for their entire life, then have no choice but to try to go after young girls, because with young girls they feel that they 'have a chance' with them. I could go into all kinds of psychological theory as to why this is so, but you get the picture.

You have no evidence that "girls are exposed to male frontal nudity early on." The opposite is actually true in the media, male frontal nudity is very rare, but there is a ton of female nudity. And that's not because of your made-up idea but because men have been shown to be generally incapable of arousal by the same sex, unlike women.
Whose psychological theory supports this?

[Roboramma]

Perhaps a good place to start would be to look at contemporary and historical societies where it was known such activities rarely, if ever, occurred.
Are there, or were there, any such societies?

[CFLarsen]

Nonsense. A "vast majority" works just fine.

Why are a vast majority of pedophiles men?

Let's see some numbers, buddy.

[CFLarsen]

Claus- you are discussing it.

Let's put the claim this way. "It appears that the overwhelming majority of pedophiles are men. Discuss"

"Appears" is not good enough.

[ReFLeX]

What's going on here? How much of paedophilia is a perception problem?
Here's the only article I could find that gives some numbers in the time I have.
10 myths about Priestly Pedophilia (http://www.catholiceducation.org/articles/facts/fm0011.html)
In 1994, the National Opinion Research Center showed that the second most common form of child sexual abuse involved women abusing boys. For every three male abusers, there's one female abuser. Statistics on female sex offenders are more difficult to obtain because the crime is more hidden (Interview with Dr. Richard Cross, "A Question of Character," National Opinion Research Center; cf. Carnes). Also, their most frequent victims (boys) are less likely to report sexual abuse, especially when the abuser is a woman (O'Leary, "Child Sexual Abuse").Based on the last part, there may be a misperception as to how many pedophiles are women, but it's hard to know with only the given 3 to 1 ratio.

[Soapy Sam]

Perhaps a good place to start would be to look at contemporary and historical societies where it was known such activities rarely, if ever, occurred.

Margaret Mead did some interesting studies of human sexuality in "primitive" societies.

M.

Moochie- You are aware that Mead's studies in Samoa have been utterly discredited?

Here's the only article I could find that gives some numbers in the time I have.
10 myths about Priestly Pedophilia (http://www.catholiceducation.org/articles/facts/fm0011.html)Based on the last part, there may be a misperception as to how many pedophiles are women, but it's hard to know with only the given 3 to 1 ratio.

That's an interesting link, Reflex.

[Roboramma]

Why are a vast majority of pedophiles men? Good question. I think that as many have suggested the answer is likely to be complex. But I'll tell you my own impression.

Men are more driven by sex. There are sound evolutionary reasons for this. A man doesn't have to invest as much in his offspring as does a woman, and so is less selective of his sexual partners (though perhaps as selective of his long-term mate).
If a man can impregnate someone else's mate without that someone else knowing about it, he's managed to do what the kukoo bird does - his child is likely to be given resources, but at no cost to him. We see this sort of thing happening in birds all the time, and I find it likely that there are similar forces at play in human biology and evolution.
Because of all this there tends to be more competition amoung men for mates than amoung women. The guy who has more sex with more women will tend to leave more offspring.
Of course there are other factors at play. Being a good father, careing for your children, educating them to the necessities of life, etc. all pay off. The problem amoung men is that they are less certain than women that the child who they are devoting resources to is their own. (also, because the woman has already devoted resources to her offspring at birth, the man can get away with letting her continue to devote more than he does, while he goes off and woos the girl down the street).
And this, I suggest, leads to men

Even if you don't like my above argument, it seems hard to attack the idea that men are more driven by sex (that doesn't mean they like it more, gain more pleasure from it, or anything, just that searching for new and more sexual partners is the driving force of more of their behaviors) than women.

When for whatever reason, sexual attraction and arrousal moves toward young children, it seems that this is again more likely to drive male behavior than female behavior.
Women may be as likely to be sexually attracted to young children as men, but less likely to act upon that attraction.

Similarly, men tend to be more violent than women. As such, violent pedophilia should also be more common amoung men than women.

One more factor to add to my list of speculations:
Men are fertile for longer than women. While both men and women decline in fertility as they age, only women go through menopause. Older women are much less likely to become pregnant, carry the child to term, and survive childbirth. If she dies, she can't support her (and the man's) offspring, and the child will likely die (at least in the environment in which we evolved). If a man has sex with such a woman, he has much less to gain (reproductively speaking) than he does with a younger, but fertile, women. Thus, it pays older men to be attracted to younger women more than it pays older women to pay attention to younger men.
Particularly because women go through the dangers of childbirth, when they get older, sex is dangerous. There comes a point where the chance of having one more child (who may not survive anyway) is not worth the risk of dying and no longer being able to help support her surviving offspring (including grandchildren).

This suggests that men should be attracted to young but fertile women (which I think is true), but it's possible that this sometimes gets perverted to drive the attaction simply to younger and younger girls.

As I said, mostly idle speculation. Take from the above what you will.

[JamesDillon]

Good question. I think that as many have suggested the answer is likely to be complex. But I'll tell you my own impression....As I said, mostly idle speculation. Take from the above what you will.

Sounds about right to me, or at least, what I would guess in my own idle speculation.

[Ryokan]

Remember also that child offenders are not neccesarily pedophiles.

In fact, most of them are not. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedophilia#Occurrence_in_child_sex_offenders)

A perpetrator of child sexual abuse is, despite all medical definitions, commonly assumed to be a pedophile, and referred to as such; however, there may be other motivations for the crime (such as stress, marital problems, or the unavailability of an adult partner), much as adult rape can have non-sexual reasons. Thus, child sexual abuse alone may or may not be an indicator that its perpetrator is a pedophile; most perpetrators of it are in fact not primarily interested in children.

The Wikipeda source. (http://www.missingkids.com/en_US/publications/NC70.pdf)

You might as well ask why most rapists are men.

[Cuddles]

Of course there are other factors at play. Being a good father, careing for your children, educating them to the necessities of life, etc. all pay off. The problem amoung men is that they are less certain than women that the child who they are devoting resources to is their own. (also, because the woman has already devoted resources to her offspring at birth, the man can get away with letting her continue to devote more than he does, while he goes off and woos the girl down the street).

And in one of Dawkins' books (probably The Selfish Gene) he gives example of animals where the male cares for the children, and in some cases even incubates the eggs (fish are strange). In these cases the females are much more likely to be promiscuous, which supports your post pretty well.

[Soapy Sam]

Men are more driven by sex. There are sound evolutionary reasons for this. A man doesn't have to invest as much in his offspring as does a woman, and so is less selective of his sexual partners (though perhaps as selective of his long-term mate).
If a man can impregnate someone else's mate without that someone else knowing about it, he's managed to do what the kukoo bird does - his child is likely to be given resources, but at no cost to him. We see this sort of thing happening in birds all the time, and I find it likely that there are similar forces at play in human biology and evolution.

I do too. But-

One of the easiest ways for a modern man to have lots of kids at no cost to himself has (for two decades) been by acting as a sperm donor to an assisted fertility clinic. In the UK, sperm from one donor may be used up to ten times. As the system was run by individual clinics it would be simple to donate at several under assumed names, increasing potential fatherhood enormously.

It's easy- (About two minutes once a week for 4-6 weeks, typically.
It's free- in fact they may even pay you.
It's fun- If you agree that masturbation is fun , as the majority of people do. (I except Claus , who no doubt wants to see some numbers).;)

Yet such clinics have historically struggled to get donors.

In some cases, this may be fear that eventually the cuckoo will come home to roost, but anonymity was guaranteed in Britain for many years, yet still there were never enough donors.

This on it's own hardly disproves the argument you summarise in your post, but it bothers me just the same.

[Dave1001]

I do too. But-

One of the easiest ways for a modern man to have lots of kids at no cost to himself has (for two decades) been by acting as a sperm donor to an assisted fertility clinic. In the UK, sperm from one donor may be used up to ten times. As the system was run by individual clinics it would be simple to donate at several under assumed names, increasing potential fatherhood enormously.

It's easy- (About two minutes once a week for 4-6 weeks, typically.
It's free- in fact they may even pay you.
It's fun- If you agree that masturbation is fun , as the majority of people do. (I except Claus , who no doubt wants to see some numbers).;)

Yet such clinics have historically struggled to get donors.

In some cases, this may be fear that eventually the cuckoo will come home to roost, but anonymity was guaranteed in Britain for many years, yet still there were never enough donors.

This on it's own hardly disproves the argument you summarise in your post, but it bothers me just the same.

Excellent point. There are many such points one can make. Human behavior regarding reproduction isn't as easily reducible as is often described.

[JamesDillon]

I do too. But-

One of the easiest ways for a modern man to have lots of kids at no cost to himself has (for two decades) been by acting as a sperm donor to an assisted fertility clinic. In the UK, sperm from one donor may be used up to ten times. As the system was run by individual clinics it would be simple to donate at several under assumed names, increasing potential fatherhood enormously.

It's easy- (About two minutes once a week for 4-6 weeks, typically.
It's free- in fact they may even pay you.
It's fun- If you agree that masturbation is fun , as the majority of people do. (I except Claus , who no doubt wants to see some numbers).;)

Yet such clinics have historically struggled to get donors.

In some cases, this may be fear that eventually the cuckoo will come home to roost, but anonymity was guaranteed in Britain for many years, yet still there were never enough donors.

This on it's own hardly disproves the argument you summarise in your post, but it bothers me just the same.

True, but it's not as if the genes are capable of thinking rationally about these things. The urge for sex (arguably) exists so strongly because it has worked very well in facilitating successful reproduction for many millennia. If social conditions were to remain the same for several thousand years, perhaps we'd start seeing men with a powerful lust toward clear plastic cups. The fact that we haven't seen that after a generation or two doesn't really undermine Roboramma's evolutionary argument, though.

[Cuddles]

I do too. But-

One of the easiest ways for a modern man to have lots of kids at no cost to himself has (for two decades) been by acting as a sperm donor to an assisted fertility clinic. In the UK, sperm from one donor may be used up to ten times. As the system was run by individual clinics it would be simple to donate at several under assumed names, increasing potential fatherhood enormously.

It's easy- (About two minutes once a week for 4-6 weeks, typically.
It's free- in fact they may even pay you.
It's fun- If you agree that masturbation is fun , as the majority of people do. (I except Claus , who no doubt wants to see some numbers).;)

Yet such clinics have historically struggled to get donors.

In some cases, this may be fear that eventually the cuckoo will come home to roost, but anonymity was guaranteed in Britain for many years, yet still there were never enough donors.

This on it's own hardly disproves the argument you summarise in your post, but it bothers me just the same.

But what drives humans now is what was needed to drive them millions of years ago. Sex. Maybe if we wait a few hundred thousand years, sperm banks will be the normal method of reproduction and all men will feel the urge to donate, but at the moment there is nothing in our genetic programming that would recognise sperm donation as father children.

[Roboramma]

This on it's own hardly disproves the argument you summarise in your post, but it bothers me just the same.

I see your point, and I don't want to come off as suggesting that the issue is really simple, obviously it isn't, but...

I'm not trying to suggest that evolution selected for individuals that wanted to maximize their reproduction. Obviously it didn't. I, for instance, have no intention of ever having children, and while it's not that common, there are plenty of other people like me.
What I think was selected for was brains that tend to do things that tend to increase reproduction.
For instance, brains that experience pleasure during sex. Or brains that experience attraction to certain stimuli.
It doesn't even have to go that far. What might have been selected for is brains that pick up on certain cues in the environment and become attracted to that, which in this case doesn't necessarily have to be young, fertile, women, but would have tended to be in the environment in which we evolved, which for evolution is the same thing.
Similarly young children may develop incest aversion to their siblings by developing an aversion toward any young child that they live in close association with during a particular time period of their early life (don't remember exactly when that is). This will tend to be their siblings, and we could even have shorthand that says that we evolved to have an aversion towards sex with our siblings. But alter the environment in certain ways and no such aversion would develop, or one could develop towards competely unrelated individuals. (there may still be a cultural taboo and an aversion because of it, but the "biological" component would disappear.)

That actually makes me wonder (very tentatively) if pedophilia is something that comes about from picking up the wrong cues. This would still allow pedophilia to have existed throughout human prehistory so long as it would infrequent enough.

(of course the above might be better read as "genes that tend to build brains that tend to..." but those sentences would have been unreadable).

Which leads me to one more thing I should point out - I'm speculating mostly about biological reasons for this suggested sex difference. That doesn't mean that I don't think environmental differences might be important, or that some environmental differences that we created couldn't affect the problem in possitive ways.

I'm not saying that any of this is exactly true. I'm only saying that our individual "goals" are completely separate from the "goals" of evolution.

(We can only really talk about such goals in hindsight, and if we want to be accurate, we shouldn't use that word at all. I only use it here in the same way that we often say, "such and such a trait evolved for X". Clearly it didn't evolve for X, but simply because those individuals that tended toward X tended to have more offspring).

Edit: Ah. I see others made the same point far more concisely and just as informatively as I did. Confound you!

[Dragonrock]

Pedophilia refers to being sexualy attracted to prepubesent children. I have no proof, but I get the idea that with some pedophiles it is due to simple emotional confusion.

People generally feel some attraction for children. This attraction is normally just the intention to protect from harm. It is in the best interest of social animals to do something to insure the safety of all tribal offspring, not just those they are directly related to.

Pedophiles might not have the emotional maturity to understand the ingrained emotional pull they feel towards children. Because of this confusion they revert to simple instincts and attach a sexual feeling to what is normally a protective urge.

There may be more male pedophiles because men have stronger sex drives and when they are confused they are more likely to attach sexual urges to something that is not normally sexual.

[Soapy Sam]

But what drives humans now is what was needed to drive them millions of years ago. Sex. Maybe if we wait a few hundred thousand years, sperm banks will be the normal method of reproduction and all men will feel the urge to donate, but at the moment there is nothing in our genetic programming that would recognise sperm donation as father children.

Granted.
Or masturbation. I doubt it was critical on the Pliocene savannah either, yet there it is, the most common human sexual behavior .

My point is really what Dave1001 highlighted. Human sexual behaviour cannot be simplistically rationalised. Women's sexual behaviour may or may not be about reproduction; men's is about pleasure, whatever their genes might "want".
Look at the gay community. Young gay men in open gay tolerant society(at least pre AIDS) have far higher rates of sexual activity than heterosexuals of the same age. Why?
Because they don't have to talk a woman into sex. They only had to talk another man into it -which in an actual homosexual club or bar is likely to be a damn sight easier .
It has been well said that young gay men behave sexually like all young men , but more so! Reproduction does not enter the equation.

If heterosexual men knew that having sex with women would not result in having kids, would they quit?

Sex and having kids have very little to do with each other in human minds.

ETA- Roboramma I agree with much of your post above. The trouble with reading Dawkins is the bastard takes over your mind.

[Bikewer]

Back when I was reading a lot about paraphilia and forensic sexology, the late researcher John Money was rather the preeminent fellow in the field.
He noted that males are fare more prone to paraphila than females; of the 40+ catalogued varieties of paraphila, women only are subject to 7 or 8; males all the rest. Some, such as Transvestism, are exclusively male.

Money's hypothesis had to do with the fact that all human embryos start out female, and those with the male chromosomal set are "masculinized" during development. This process is complex, and involves not only genetic transcription but also hormonal levels in the mother's bloodstream and other factors as well.
As a result, Money said, males are much more prone to transcription errors and other sexual anomalies than are females.
Money also said that one's sexual orientation or "lovemap" (as he called it) was pretty much set by age three in most cases. The "lovemap" is psychological construct of an idealized mating partner.

[Roboramma]

The trouble with reading Dawkins is the bastard takes over your mind.

No kidding!

PS I think I agree with everything I just snipped.

[Almo]

You might as well ask why most rapists are men.

Except there's a very good physical reason why... Sex at least functions regardless of whether or not the woman is aroused. Hard to rape an unaroused male. At least that's what I think.

[CFLarsen]

Except there's a very good physical reason why... Sex at least functions regardless of whether or not the woman is aroused. Hard to rape an unaroused male. At least that's what I think.

Don't bend over.

[calebprime]

Pedophilia refers to being sexualy attracted to prepubesent children. I have no proof, but I get the idea that with some pedophiles it is due to simple emotional confusion.

People generally feel some attraction for children. This attraction is normally just the intention to protect from harm. It is in the best interest of social animals to do something to insure the safety of all tribal offspring, not just those they are directly related to.

Pedophiles might not have the emotional maturity to understand the ingrained emotional pull they feel towards children. Because of this confusion they revert to simple instincts and attach a sexual feeling to what is normally a protective urge.

There may be more male pedophiles because men have stronger sex drives and when they are confused they are more likely to attach sexual urges to something that is not normally sexual.

I'm going with this, as well as a one-word response. Testosterone. At the risk of the savants at the JREF giving me a choice between death or ru-ru.

www.mp3car.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=6858 - 109k

(many funny variations on this joke)

[rustypouch]

Because of sexist double standards.

When women rape teenaged boys, many people make comments about 'lucky guy' or 'I wish I and teachers like that when I was a kid.'

Women are not held as accountable as men in this regard. Think of the recent trend of female teachers raping thier students. Debra Favre comes to mind.

If these women do get convicted, they will face much shorter sentences than men convicted of the same crimes. I have bookmarks on my home computer if anyone wants evidences.

[Crossbow]

Nonsense. A "vast majority" works just fine.

Why are a vast majority of pedophiles men?

Sorry, but I do not think that is true.

I would say that crimes pertaining to female pedophiles are simply not reported as often as are crimes pertaining to male pedophiles, hence the skewed statistics.

[ReFLeX]

Sorry, but I do not think that is true.

I would say that crimes pertaining to female pedophiles are simply not reported as often as are crimes pertaining to male pedophiles, hence the skewed statistics.
Victim surveys provide data that disprove this. It's not "simple," like many amateur psychologists here seem to think.

[calebprime]

Because of sexist double standards.

When women rape teenaged boys, many people make comments about 'lucky guy' or 'I wish I and teachers like that when I was a kid.'

Women are not held as accountable as men in this regard. Think of the recent trend of female teachers raping thier students. Debra Favre comes to mind.

If these women do get convicted, they will face much shorter sentences than men convicted of the same crimes. I have bookmarks on my home computer if anyone wants evidences.

Sorry, but I do not think that is true.

I would say that crimes pertaining to female pedophiles are simply not reported as often as are crimes pertaining to male pedophiles, hence the skewed statistics.

I leave it someone else to do the Googling, etc. here. I'll bet each of you the price of a pineapple if you can support this. I suspect we HEAR about the female teachers because of the "man bites dog" effect in the media. It's news because it's rarer. Yes, sexism. No, not here.

[ReFLeX]

Because of sexist double standards.

When women rape teenaged boys, many people make comments about 'lucky guy' or 'I wish I and teachers like that when I was a kid.'

Women are not held as accountable as men in this regard. Think of the recent trend of female teachers raping thier students. Debra Favre comes to mind.

If these women do get convicted, they will face much shorter sentences than men convicted of the same crimes. I have bookmarks on my home computer if anyone wants evidences.
Do you have an explanation for the numbers, not just the social perception?

[CFLarsen]

Does anyone have numbers?

[Ryokan]

Except there's a very good physical reason why... Sex at least functions regardless of whether or not the woman is aroused. Hard to rape an unaroused male. At least that's what I think.

Yes.

Why are most child offenders male? Why are most rapists male? I believe both questions have similiar, if not the same, answer.

But I see that most people ignore my post anyway. Ah well.

[HarryKeogh]

Does anyone have numbers?

Yes. Men have two (2) balls. Woman have zero (0) balls. That's why men are likely to be pedophiles. And rapists. And killers. And jock strap purchasers.

[Iamme]

You have no evidence that "girls are exposed to male frontal nudity early on." The opposite is actually true in the media, male frontal nudity is very rare, but there is a ton of female nudity. And that's not because of your made-up idea but because men have been shown to be generally incapable of arousal by the same sex, unlike women.
Whose psychological theory supports this?

Well, I gave my theory...you gave yours. So let's read on and see what others say.

[calebprime]

Yes.

Why are most child offenders male? Why are most rapists male? I believe both questions have similiar, if not the same, answer.

But I see that most people ignore my post anyway. Ah well.

I read your post and thought it about it, a little. I read the Wiki entry. I looked for the word in a couple of older dictionaries, and interestingly enough, it doesn't occur in these. (1979, 1976) I think I understand that we use the term too broadly. In the OP, I assumed the subject was "genuine" pedophiles. But I still don't have a clue what your "similar answers" are going to be. Please inform. Sincerely. I'm curious what you mean. I can't intuit what difference the definition makes, in this case, to the male vs. female issue....

[Ryokan]

But I still don't have a clue what your "similar answers" are going to be. Please inform. Sincerely. I'm curious what you mean. I can't intuit what difference the definition makes, in this case, to the male vs. female issue....

My main point (which was easily missed, I know) was that lumping pedophiles together with situational child offenders will just get us on the wrong track to answer the question of why more men than women are child offenders. The motives are different.

Men rape more than women do; I don't think anyone is going to dispute that even if I don't have any cold and hard evidence to back it up. But we're setting up a barrier, saying that raping a woman/man and raping a child is different.

For the pedophile, it is different, granted.

But for the situational offender, who is in the majority when it comes to child abuse, it's not. The motive is different from the pedophile. It's just another rape.

ETA : To make it even clearer: Men rape children more than women simply because men rape more than women.

[Bikewer]

From a sexology site:

"No hard data are available on the prevalence of paraphilias in the general population. People with these disorders tend not to regard themselves as ill, and usually come to the attention of mental health professionals only when their behavior has brought them into conflict with sexual partners or the law. Judging from the large commercial market in paraphilic pornography and paraphernalia, the prevalence in the community is believed to be far higher than that indicated by statistics from clinical facilities. Males are far more prone to paraphilias than females. For cases in which sexual masochism has developed to the point of paraphilia, for example, the sex ratio is estimated to be 20 males for each female. Many other paraphilias are practically never diagnosed in females. Ref 93 There appears to be no difference in the prevalence of paraphilias among homosexuals and heterosexuals."

As I mentioned before, the incidence of paraphila in general is much higher amongst males. Pedophilia is a catalogued type of paraphilia.

[fuelair]

I was reading the "Perverted Justice" website and noticed that something like 800 of the perverts they busted were man while only 1 was a woman. Why?Scientific studies have shown that the vast majority of sexual predators are men. Why does anyone think this is? Whenever I go into Chatrooms for instance all I see are people typing "25/m/la young gurlz wanna chat?". I never see "25/f/la young boyz wanna chat?". I never see that.

Why are 99% of pedophiles and sexual predators male?


Discuss.

We don't know, I guess someone with direct experience need to tell us. Feel free.

[ReFLeX]

Well, I gave my theory...you gave yours. So let's read on and see what others say.
I didn't give a theory. I disputed yours, with studies that I'm well familiar with. I was asking you which research supports your ideas.

And if you hadn't noticed, most everyone else is completely guessing.

[Dogdoctor]

Possible reasons (just guesses and may not be true)
1) Females are more psychologically motivated for sex than males thus not requiring physical contact as much
2) Young boys are horny and wouldn't be as likely to complain or suffer mental problems from sex.
3) A young boy would not be likely to perform sexually (get an erection) where if the male is the abuser there is no need for the abused to get erect.

[rustypouch]

Sorry, I was out tonight, but here are some links showing pedophiles are not 99% male:

http://worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=47895

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/crime_file/story/396087p-335733c.html

http://www.canadiancrc.com/articles/MovingF_Female_perpetrators_Child_sexual_abuse_JUL 94.htm

Also note that of they few cases that were convicted, the sentence was minimal compared to what a man in a similar situation would have recieved.

And if you think there is no bias, read the first paragraph of this one:

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=52044

[Dustin Kesselberg]

We don't know, I guess someone with direct experience need to tell us. Feel free.



I rarely comprehend your nonsensical posts but it almost seems like you're implying I’m a 'pedophile'.


:confused:

[calebprime]

thanks for elaboration, all.

and as the Penultimate Amazing one has said: numbers, anyone?

The post I quoted the first time around, while speculative, gets to something interesting to me--the seemingly paradoxical behavior of some pedophiles (and even some serial killers, such as Dennis Nilsen) who show a strange tenderness toward their victims. But this is further muddying the discussion....

[casebro]

In answer to the OP, what could be simpler? Heterosexual women want sex with big penis's, and they wouldn't get satisfaction from prepubescent male children. Men want 'tight' parts, which are avilable from children. This is appropriate to the definition of pediofilia being "sex with prepubescent children". Sex with nubile 15 year olds isn't pediofilia, that's only 'statutory rape'.

This theory doesn't hold for homosexual perpetrators, but they are less common. The link above involving the NY preschooler sounds like a foriegn object or a finger might have been used, not conventional "hetero sex". That woman probably has the power issues of the usual male rapist- "it's not about sex, it's about power" cliche.

[Checkmite]

Did somebody ask for numbers?

Here's a short-ish (http://www.ipt-forensics.com/journal/volume2/j2_4_1.htm) article which collates and briefly examines data from a few different studies on female perpertrators of child sexual abuse.

Finkelhor and Russell (1984) report that such studies indicate sexual contact between children and older women is a distinct minority of child-adult sexual contacts. They conclude that "The data collated from a variety of studies seem to support clearly the presumption that most sexual offenses against children are perpetrated by males" (p.177). They believe the best estimates put female perpetrators of sexual abuse at about 20% for male children and 5% for female children. They note, despite ample opportunities for sexual abuse, remarkably few mothers seem to take advantage of them and conclude that the literature "leads fairly persuasively to the conclusion that the traditional view about child molestation as a primarily male deviation is essentially correct. Women do not use children for their own direct sexual gratification very frequently" (p.181).

[Yahzi]

Why are 99% of pedophiles and sexual predators male?
Why are the vast majority of criminals male?

Could it be for the same reason that the vast majority of warriors, fighters, hunters, and other professions that require more testosterone than sense are male?

Women got babies, and we got violence. Stop dissin' on us for trying to make the best of our pathetic franchise.

:D

[Souldweller]

I have also studied the matter of paedophilia at great length, because I wrote a novel , hoping to win a literary prize (although no word on that yet...). Anyway, what you are also missing is that most of the reported cases of child abuse is done by "predominantly heteresexual males" (ie, that they feel attracted, and even have female companionships, wifes, girlfriends, etc.) mostly on small boys, and that in abou 75% of cases (or even higher, I think) the abuser is a close relative of the abused child, or friend or relative of the child' parents. I can't remember who said it in this thread, but it is correct to say that most paedophiles, are not child abusers, they keep to themselves.