Pedophilia

As the situation from Penn State unfolds with this coach being accused of sexual assault against young boys, I hear a lot of people out there stating their disgust at this behavior. People are screaming that this guy is a pervert, sick in the head, human disgrace, etc., and I do not necesarily disagree. But the thought that keeps coming back into my head is that this guy is wired to be attracted sexually to boys. It is completely involuntary and he cannot control these most basic animalistic urges. We all have these sexual atttractions but most are wired in a "societally acceptable" manner. We accept urges between men and women and even between same sexes but involuntary sexual urges between a man and a boy in our society cannot be acted upon, predominantly because of the inability of the minor to consent to the behavior. But what of this man who hasn't voluntarily decided to be attracted to boys, but is just pre-wired that way.

Why would some of us be created hard wired to be attracted to children? If we are created in the image of god and by god why would he create some of us to have one of our most powerful animalistic urges, the urge to be sexual, targeted towards children? You can answer that we all are created with certain desires that are off limits and it is our mission to overcome these desires with our gift of free choice. Married men are attracted sexually to other women. A man may be attracted sexually to a cousin or other relative in his family that is off limits. But, we control these involuntary urges, these animalistic desires of our hard wiring because we know that although the attraction can be all consuming we must supress acting on them. But why be created with such a strong sexual urge yet one that cannot be acted upon? It is truly a curse.

On a similar, but contrary note, we may be entirely repulsed by certain realtions. For instance, the idea of a homosexual relationship to me is repulsive and for the homosexual a man-woman relationship may be similarly repulsive. Certainly, sexual realtions with a young boy to me is repulsive whereas to another may be all consuming. Why would I be repulsed by sexual relations with a sister or mother even though she is more attractive than someone else who I cannot get out of my mind? There is something hard wired into us that controls to whom we are attracted and to whom we are not attracted and this cannot be modified. Why would god do that? It seems to be an almost impossible test for human beings. When we are sexually attracted to someone it can entirely consume our thoughts yet we are charged with self-control of these most powerful desires.

In no way do I condone the behavior of this presumed pedophile but in some way I think that his behaviors are generated by a faulty hard wiring in his brain that promotes an attraction to young boys that he cannot control. He does not have the strength to overcome these involuntary urges that he must know are damaging yet justifies their implementation. He is born with a curse that he must curb this desire throughout his life. I suppose we are all born with certain animalistic, involuntary urges that test us daily our ability to overcome them. Some are tested more than others and I think this attraction to young boys is an almost unfair test for many to endure.