[Base] [Index]

Partizipation of the Child in a Sexual Relation

The "common premise" that children resist sexual advances from adults and have to be forced to make sex is simply nonsense. Many children participate. Most researchers, often people with obvious bias against child/adult sex, agree on this point. Virkkunen has even used the notion participating victim to describe this fact.

The initiation of sex in pedosexual relations we consider separately. Here some scientific results about participation:



Gerbener 1966

[1966] One of the most shocking discoveries of this research was the attitude of the children, which was not only encouraging but downright provocative.

(Brongersma, p.135)


Kwast 1968,p.123

[1968,p.123] Deeper investigation makes the distinction between offender and victim almost indistinguishable, and in certain cases this blurring is so extreme that the labels become almost interchangable.

(Brongersma, p.135)


Brongersma 1990,p. 134f

Legislation against child molestation was based on the premise of the innocent child being seduced by an evil adult.

In the meantime, however, the gradual crumbling of the myth of the "pure", asexual child has helped us become aware that children are erotically attractive creatures, and not infrequently act like determined little seducers (Albrecht, Bender & Blau, Kerscher, Lafon et al., Landis, Lempp, Rossman, Sandfort).

Virkkunen, certainly not a proponent of paedophilia, said that in over 64 % of the cases he investigated the child himself had helped precipitate, or at least contributed to, the seduction, as, for instance, by making repeated visits to the adult partner ( Virkkunen, p. 128, cf. Powell & Chalkley, pp. 71, 73 ).

Under the pressure of police questioning, the child often minimizes his own part in initiating the sexual activities, and the questioning officer is inclined not to challenge it. The figures, then, are clearly distorted to the disadvantage of the adult. Nevertheless Gebhard ( 1965, p. 821), whose subjects were prisoners sentenced for sexual offenses and thus a sample likely to include some of the worse cases (all of which distorts the statistics even more), came up with the figures shown in this table:

             Boys of 0-11 years    Boys of 12-15 years
---------------------------------------------------------
Encouraging      52.3 %                70.3 %
Passive           6.8 %                11.0 %
Mixed             0.0 %                 2.2 %
Resistant        40.9 %                16.5 %

(Brongersma, p.134f)