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<\/figure>\n\n\n\nIt isn\u2019t difficult to parse this. We\u2019re people just like you. We have varied interests just like you. We work. We have families. We have friends. Sometimes, they know we\u2019re a minor-attracted person. Sometimes they don\u2019t, and with the current political backlash against one therapist saying that we deserve support, who would blame us for staying quiet? But the threat here is not us. It\u2019s the GOP and their continued insistence that everything they don\u2019t like is a threat to the family. That\u2019s the nature of their existence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Great Orifice Party<\/p>\n\n\n\n
They try to sell you on the idea that abortions are going to ruin the family, when in reality unsafe medical procedures are far more likely to do that. They try to convince you that LGBTQ+ people are all groomers, even though it is transparently obvious that they are deliberately lying to drive wedges between groups of people. That is what they\u2019re good at, after all, driving wedges where they don\u2019t need to exist. So what do they do in order to accomplish this?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
They deliberately try to hijack the idea of minor-attracted people to mean \u2018someone who abuses children\u2019 when this is not only a lie, it is deliberately harmful not only to efforts to prevent sexual violence, but also to the very idea of family and the children they say they want to protect. Most minor-attracted people realize their attractions at age 14. Inferring that these teenagers are rapists is wrong. They haven\u2019t even discovered a career or who they are yet, and now they have to face being attracted to children in a world that will stomp all over them if they even try to seek help. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
But to even say these things, with the modern-day GOP, is to say that reality isn\u2019t reality. That\u2019s because they think groups of people are all a monolith and if it\u2019s something they don\u2019t agree with, it\u2019s bad and must be stopped at all costs, whether that\u2019s diversity and inclusion of minorities of any kind, critical race theory, science and objective reality, or even sane gun policies. Let\u2019s face it, the modern GOP has a huge glaring issue with sexual violence as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
They want you focused on minor-attracted people, not Matt Gaetz, a politician who is accused of sexually assaulting young girls, or the numerous Republican politicians who don\u2019t even think a 10-year-old rape survivor deserves an abortion. They definitely don\u2019t want you focused on a current Supreme Court Justice who was credibly accused of raping multiple women. No, they don\u2019t want you focused on the bombastic personalities like Carlson Tucker who is on record saying minors are hot, among other things. They want you focused on this mythical group called the left, the woke, who\u2019s a threat to every value you hold dear. The left supports pedophiles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What Is A Pedophile?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Well, guess what? That means people attracted to children, nothing more. We\u2019re brought up by society believing that it means someone who abuses children. But that isn\u2019t what it is. A pedophile is simply someone with an attraction. They can be good, bad, or anything in between. They can make good choices or bad choices or both. Sure, they can abuse kids, but most don\u2019t. A pedophile is just a term for people attracted to prepubescent children. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Okay, Why MAP?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Minor-attracted people is a term coined by researchers and minor-attracted people themselves, and it is a term that simply umbrellas all people attracted to children – pubescent, prepubescent, and postpubescent – in a way that is not normative for their age bracket. This could be a 40-year-old attracted to someone who is 16, or someone who is 13 years old attracted to someone who is 5. It includes a wide group of people. This is intentional, since minor-attracted people are not a monolith. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
It wasn\u2019t at all created to \u2018soften\u2019 the word pedophile. It was to create nuance where many people seem to not want to hear the nuance, or outright disregard it as Ted Cruz did by saying that \u201cThe woke Left is now openly defending pedophilia.\u201d Ted Cruz knows full well that minor-attracted people are not the same thing as people who sexually abuse children, or else he\u2019d use a specific term like child molester or child rapist or even sex abuse. No, he uses pedophilia to intentionally divert the issue people are focused on. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Ted Cruz probably also knows – as evidenced by saying \u201dand it\u2019s usually a he\u201d – that most victim\/survivors never come forward not because they weren\u2019t hurt, but because they only want the abuse to stop and don\u2019t want severe consequences for their abuser. They just want to heal in peace. I know because in addition to being a minor-attracted person, I\u2019m also a victim of sexual violence and the last thing I want is my own mother in prison. Ted Cruz has likely heard from many survivor-led organizations and initiatives that attempt to get him to back sound public policy. Cruz and his staff are undoubtedly not new to advocates telling them the facts and asking Cruz to support sane legislation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But again, they want you focused on this other outrageous thing over here\u2026 that we exist and we\u2019re tired of being harmed by these attitudes. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
What Do Minor-Attracted People Want?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We want support and to live lives free from harassment. We want people to understand that we\u2019re not automatically a rapist for having an attraction that we didn\u2019t choose and most of us don\u2019t want. We want people to understand that we\u2019re unequivocally in agreement that child sexual abuse is bad and shouldn\u2019t happen. We want people to understand that while some minor-attracted people and people with no attraction to children quibble over what child sexual abuse is, most of us have zero interest in harming a child. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
We want to be able to be ourselves without losing jobs or relationships (with our peers thank you very much, not people we\u2019re attracted to). We want to be able to ask people for what we need without being judged or harassed or reported to the police. If we need to say, \u201cI\u2019m a minor-attracted person and I\u2019m not comfortable with this, I need to leave,\u201d we should be able to do that the same way anyone with any mental health struggle should be able to ask for what they need. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
We just want to live our lives in peace and not have to explain every single time there\u2019s a media storm that no, we don\u2019t all abuse children and yes, we\u2019re just as against child sexual abuse as you are. Is that really too much to ask for?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Minor-attracted people are hated because we exist and are misunderstood. Humanity traditionally does poorly when they don\u2019t understand something, and who can blame them for questioning an unknown variable? However, when smart people say sane things that don\u2019t fit the popular narrative, it would behoove us to listen, because it makes an unknown and potentially…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2087,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\n