Left-wing website Salon, which is a website widely considered to be such a joke that it has its own parody account, has a gag-inducing post that defends pedophilia.
The post, written by Todd Nickerson, a moderator for the Virtuous Pedophiles forum, details his life as a pedophile and how he advocates getting rid of age-of-consent laws.
Nickerson launches his crusade by saying, “My name is Todd Nickerson, and I’m a pedophile. Does that surprise you? Yeah, not many of us are willing to share our story, for good reason. To confess a sexual attraction to children is to lay claim to the most reviled status on the planet, one that effectively ends any chance you have of living a normal life.”
“Yet, I’m not the monster you think me to be,” Nickerson continues. “I’ve never touched a child sexually in my life and never will, nor do I use child pornography.”
Nickerson adds that not all pedophiles are child molesters, and many “suffer in silence.”
The pedophile claims that his attraction to young children began when he himself was molested as a child. He was molested by a man he calls “Hans,” an acquaintance of his aunt and uncle. Nickerson was in his front yard with Hans, and Nickerson was enjoying the fact that Hans had taken a liking to him since Nickerson was born with deformities and felt inferior. Then the molestation occurred.
“I’m not the monster you think me to be,”
Todd Nickerson
“For long minutes we simply enjoyed each other’s company,” Nickerson wrote. “Then, out of the blue, Hans slipped a hand into my shorts, even though we were only about 30 feet from the poorly paved country road that meandered through this stretch of country. This went on for several minutes. I was confused but not frightened or troubled. The only thing I could think to say while this was happening was ‘Peepee,’ continuing the English lesson with my pet name for my genitalia even in the midst of my own abuse. Hans chortled and repeated the word: ‘Peepee.'”
Nickerson told his grandmother what had happened, and she told him to keep it a secret and to never see Hans again. Nickerson has never seen him again but he writes that the incident is “seared” into his brain.
Feelings of inferiority and inadequacy are also a cause of pedophilia, according to Nickerson, as he talks about dealing with anxiety and depression, especially at the thought having to “grow up” and “be normal.” Nickerson recalls a moment when he was 11 and heard a story on the radio about a child that was sexually abused.
“My dad said to his friend something like, ‘They should take people like that and place weights on top of their genitals until they smash,'” Nickerson writes. “Pretty horrific imagery for an 11-year-old to process, and I couldn’t help but sympathize with the abuser. After all, I could recall my own molestation perfectly, and I hardly felt it warranted that kind of response.”
Nickerson ended up being outed as pedophile, losing his job at Lowe’s; he currently makes barely enough from food stamps and freelance graphic design work. Nickerson talks about how he stumbled upon Virtuous Pedophiles, also known as VirPed, which allows a forum for pedophiles to discuss their attraction for young children. He claims that the site has been endorsed by NPR, The New York Times, Toronto Star, The Atlantic and of course, Salon.
“There are still holdouts, people who believe that pedophilic feelings should be crammed down into the most subterranean recesses of ourselves, never to be discussed in the open, but these folks are going the way of the dodo bird,” Nickerson writes. “Anyway, we’ve tried that. Take it from someone who has firsthand experience: it not only doesn’t work, it tends to make things far worse.”
This is not the first time that Salon has provided sympathy for pedophiles. In June 2012, Salon published a piece titled “Meet Pedophiles Who Mean Well” and another called “Our Approach to Pedophilia Isn’t Working.”
Naturally, people are not happy with Salon’s piece:
These people are monsters. Now Salon is trying to mainstream pedophilia. Is there no limit to their depravity? https://t.co/uOqZ5MqUXb
— Dana Loesch (@DLoesch) September 21, 2015
First a story on our troops punished for defending boys from Afghan molesters, next @Salon defending pedophilia. Disgusting.
— Dana Loesch (@DLoesch) September 21, 2015
Child predation is a monstrous, barbaric, and grotesque act, it is *not* an orientation. A spot in hell for those who mainstream it.
— Dana Loesch (@DLoesch) September 21, 2015
Dan Joseph at MRC TV wrote, “Salon seems to be attempting to normalize pedophilia. If the idea that being a pedophile is okay and more and more of them being outing themselves, what kind of snowball effect could this lead to? I can’t imagine that anything good can come of it.”
