Thai college teacher and convicted British sex offender dies in Bangkok hospital

[ginocox]

Perhaps we should at least get our terms straight.

I’m not a psychologist and am neither competent nor qualified to diagnose psychological disorders, but like most denizens of Internet message boards, I’m not about to allow a lack of formal credentials to prevent me making outrageous unfounded claims with absolute conviction. I did, however, read a few articles on the topic while researching my latest novel, Presumed Guilty.

Stephen David Grant was charged with fifteen counts of “of adult abuse of position of trust – causing or inciting sexual activity with a child aged 13 to 17.”

According to Wikipedia, “Pedophilia or paedophilia is a psychiatric disorder in which an adult or older adolescent experiences a primary or exclusive sexual attraction to prepubescent children, generally age 11 years or younger.” However, some authorities use thirteen as the upper limit.

It would be unfair and inaccurate to call Grant a pedophile. Assuming his actions were precipitated by an underlying psychological disorder or orientation, it is more likely to have been ephebophilia, a sexual preference for post-pubescent teens.

The term pedophile is often used casually to describe any attraction to individuals younger than twenty-one, but pedophilia, hebephilia and ephebophilia are distinct orientations. As many of us teach English, we should try to use correct terminology.

As the father of two young boys, I am concerned about pedophiles; however, I also recognize that pedophilia is a psychological disorder. Nobody knows what causes it, but it usually manifests around puberty. Most pedophiles begin molesting in their early teens. I’m more concerned that my boys could be molested by an older playmate than by a teacher or priest.

As part of my research, I transferred the sex offender registry for the City of Los Angeles into an Excel spreadsheet and ran some statistics. The numbers are distressing. For example, forty-one percent were black and forty-two percent were Hispanic. Either L.A. minorities are much more likely to commit sex offenses or they’re more likely to wind up on the registry due to some form of systematic discrimination. If it’s discrimination, the number of offenders is much higher than the registry would suggest.

Apparently Grant was only thirty-seven. Judging by his photograph, he was a bit stocky, but not morbidly obese. It seems a bit young to drop dead.

[lostinisaan]

When I applied for my retirement visa I had to produce a document from the police regarding any criminal record. Each time I go to Pattaya I generally use the same hotel and each time they copy my passport even though they have seen me many times. Each time I transfer money from my fixed account to my savings account at the Bangkok bank I invariably us the same branch and I have been doing this transfer for 10 years they copy my passport. I guess I must look like a terrorist and all those others who never have to comply just have an innocent looking face.

Nope, you're really wrong. Do you see ghosts at night, as well?

It's an Immigration law that all foreigners' passports have to be photocopied, bank transactions should have a sort of security and I see nothing wrong when they want to make a copy of my passport.

Have you got something to hide? I mean, something like a dead body under your bed?

[MyFriend You]

discovered the sordid background after speaking to Grant’s mother!

Your son was dead...dead...was it necessary to defame him after he is dead...

I do not understand the need to "spill the beans" by family members...if baffles me...

Some peoples family members are their worst character assassins...

I'm glad she did, and yes it was necessary, at least it will show the Thai's that backgriound checks should be mandatory

Who give a rats @$$ if he is defamed afer he is dead.................??

[anto]

>>especially in this 'sexually odd' climate in Thailand....<<

Can you explain that further ?

[fish fingers]

Mr Glickman obviously doesn't want to take responsibility for employing a nonce does he?

Easy to work under a false name at that school.. I'm sure parents feel horrified to know that no background checks take place, inspite of being able to.

I guess the excuse is they aren't legally required...

[Neeranam]

Most people recognize that when adult males choose to spend all their time with young children(under the guise of educator or in a Mike Jackson way) that there are issues. More surprising would be to read that one of them was not a sex offender.

Especially well qualified ones who chose schools rather than universities or colleges.

[GanDoonToonPet]

Well, he was convicted of 'child abuse' in the UK & was dismissed from a prominent school in Pattaya for the same. I wonder why he wasn't required to undergo an ICPC check for his new school as the (new) policy dictates? Perhaps he obtained his work visa at the Thai consulate in Vientiane, where applicants are only asked to produce a Thai police clearance certificate?

The whole system is a mess, with incompetence, apathy & corruption at the heart! Even if 'western style' checks are put in place, legal teachers are a drop in the ocean. Most work illegally on tourist, marriage or retirement visas or by proxy through language centres.

[Suttisan]

Thailand's top recruitment agency provides background checks for Thais, so they do have them here, English teachers from overseas should have to provide a criminal background check from their home country as a standard requirement, it beggers belief that stricter measures were not brought in after the John Mark Karr situation all those years ago. Another reason not to send your kids to school here.

[GanDoonToonPet]

Not a good day for Brits:

UK paedophile busted in Chiang Mai on abuse, porn charges

...reported today in a newspaper we aren't allowed to mention.

[Bluespunk]

Most people recognize that when adult males choose to spend all their time with young children(under the guise of educator or in a Mike Jackson way) that there are issues. More surprising would be to read that one of them was not a sex offender.

Clueless uniformed nonsense. There is no basis in truth or reality regarding your post except in the recess of your own turgid thinking.

Clearly you know nothing about teaching.

Edited September 1, 2015 by Bluespunk

[callaway]

As I recall, the certificate provided by the UK cost the best part of 5000 baht including postage, hense the problem

Thai schools were told to be on the lookout for British national pedos applying for teaching jobs. I guess that admonition didn't stick long.

A whole $160. It is not a bank breaking amount. If it saves one kid from these animals then it is worth all teachers having to supply it. Sorry but unfortunately the good guys get caught up in this because of one piece of sh#t among their profession. Its all about the kids though. Protection for them.

[casualbiker]

As I recall, the certificate provided by the UK cost the best part of 5000 baht including postage, hense the problem

Thai schools were told to be on the lookout for British national pedos applying for teaching jobs. I guess that admonition didn't stick long.

A whole $160. It is not a bank breaking amount. If it saves one kid from these animals then it is worth all teachers having to supply it. Sorry but unfortunately the good guys get caught up in this because of one piece of sh#t among their profession. Its all about the kids though. Protection for them.

I agree about criminal record checks for teachers. As long as it's across the board for ALL nationality's.

Teachers from the UK shouldn't be penalised because the UK has an extremely effective sexual abuse and criminal register.

These days if you're on the Register you have to get permission to exit the UK and the receiving country are informed!

[lildragon]

I work in TEFL in Thailand and my does it attract some absolute freaks. Yet they are continually hired because the authorities say they give a sh*t but only when they are shown up and embarrassed. Perverts, alcoholics and criminals will keep coming in droves when they should be back seeking help/in prison in their own countries.

[casualbiker]

I work in TEFL in Thailand and my does it attract some absolute freaks. Yet they are continually hired because the authorities say they give a sh*t but only when they are shown up and embarrassed. Perverts, alcoholics and criminals will keep coming in droves when they should be back seeking help/in prison in their own countries.

I also work in TEFL teaching and honestly I haven't seen many "absolute freaks" as you put it.. Sure a few with different social skills but freaks. No.

Actually, sorry just remembered one. Great guy, currently a cross dresser in Australia. Good teacher though. Ohh and a few alcoholic's who always turned up for work and put in a days work without reeking of alcohol.

Edited September 1, 2015 by casualbiker

[lildragon]

I work in TEFL in Thailand and my does it attract some absolute freaks. Yet they are continually hired because the authorities say they give a sh*t but only when they are shown up and embarrassed. Perverts, alcoholics and criminals will keep coming in droves when they should be back seeking help/in prison in their own countries.

I also work in TEFL teaching and honestly I haven't seen many "absolute freaks" as you put it.. Sure a few with different social skills but freaks. No.

Lucky you then. It must of been my old school then. Seems my old agency would hire anyone if it meant they got their placement payment.

Edited September 1, 2015 by lildragon

[casualbiker]

I amended my post slightly. Agencies will always tend to be desperate. Unfortunately!

[GanDoonToonPet]

He's been listed on this site since 2009, along with the details of his conviction in the UK. It took me less than 10 minutes to find this!

October 2009 Mirfield teacher Stephen Grant jailed for sex offences A TEACHER who tricked boys into sending him indecent images of themselves by pretending to be a promiscuous teenage girl has been jailed for 18 months. Pervert Stephen Grant, 31, also a former town councillor in Mirfield, admitted his crimes in a confession box and was told by a priest to give himself up. RE teacher Grant gave the impression the girl was a fictitious niece of his called Charlotte who needed a boyfriend when, in reality, he was the person at the other end of the line making sexual suggestions. Speaking at Leeds Crown Court, Michael Smith, prosecuting, said that Grant had befriended former GCSE boys at a West Yorkshire school and it never crossed their mind the 19-year-old girl talking “dirty” to them through a chatroom was anything other than a member of the opposite sex. Some of the teenagers went along with the request to send sexually explicit pictures of their private parts, although others refused in spite of the make-believe girl promising to send pictures back of herself. One 16-year-old was sent pictures purporting to come from the girl showing her involved in sexual acts in return for his performing a sexual act in front of a webcam. Because he then regretted what he had done, he stopped contact with her, only to receive persistent text messages asking why he was no longer in touch. When vile Grant was arrested he denied any sexual gratification involved, blaming a specific physical interest. Dermot Hughes, for Grant, said he was a “troubled soul” who was now seen as a social leper. The offences were in fact juvenile and amateurish and, however disturbing for the youths and families involved, they were also rooted in fantasy, showing he needed help, Mr Hughes said. Grant, of Mirfield, had admitted eight charges of inciting children to sexual activity while in a position of trust between December 2007 and July 2008. Passing sentence yesterday, the Recorder of Leeds Judge Peter Collier QC, said: “The direct victims of your offences were six male pupils from the school you taught at. “You were by virtue of your role as a teacher in a position of trust. More than that you had a reputation as a caring teacher who pupils felt they could trust”. He added: “You engaged in sexually explicit conversations with them and encouraged them to send you pictures “In return you sent them sexually explicit pictures including moving pictures taken from the internet.” Giving Grant credit for his guilty plea the judge said: “When this all came to light you made a full and frank confession to the police. “You were in a position of power and you misled and betrayed the victims you were supposed to protect.” The judge jailed Grant for 18 months, banned him from working with children and made a 10-year sexual offences prevention order against him. He will also be put on the sex offenders’ register.

http://theukdatabase.com/2012/09/17/stephen-grant-mirfield/

Edited September 1, 2015 by GanDoonToonPet

[easybullet3]

how old was he?

if he was teaching, why did he die so young?

why is there no reporting of why he had an early death? surely thats a story too.

[outsider]

"How he managed to land a job at a top private school in Thailand even though a British court had banned him from contact with children is not sitting well with Thai Authorities."

Well, this is Thailand, isn't it?

[Baerboxer]

"How he managed to land a job at a top private school in Thailand even though a British court had banned him from contact with children is not sitting well with Thai Authorities."

Well, this is Thailand, isn't it?

Assumption are a powerful school/university. It's surprising that they seemingly didn't do any background checks, or take up references from past employers.

It says Grant was told by a priest to give himself up in the UK in 2009. Another good Catholic boy then. Perhaps explains why Assumption didn't look too hard.

[ginocox]

While many would consider Grant a vile pervert, calling him “Pervert Stephen Grant” and “vile Grant” hardly qualifies as objective reporting.

Paraphrasing the barrister’s remarks, while directly quoting the judge, also gives the report a slight bias against Grant.

Reporters should let the facts speak for themselves. I am constantly annoyed, particularly with CNN.com, for trying to amp interest in stories by calling incidents or images shocking or disturbing. I want Jack Webb to step in as Joe Friday and say, “Just the facts, ma’am.”

Edited September 2, 2015 by ginocox

[connda]

Wages are low, standards are low in more than one way, what do you expect? If you pay well, including being able afford background checks, money that is made is funneled back into improving programs and hiring top notch staff, well, stuff like this just less likely to happen. Don't ya'll think?

[Yunla]

Perhaps we should at least get our terms straight.

I’m not a psychologist and am neither competent nor qualified to diagnose psychological disorders, but like most denizens of Internet message boards, I’m not about to allow a lack of formal credentials to prevent me making outrageous unfounded claims with absolute conviction. I did, however, read a few articles on the topic while researching my latest novel, Presumed Guilty.

Stephen David Grant was charged with fifteen counts of “of adult abuse of position of trust – causing or inciting sexual activity with a child aged 13 to 17.”

According to Wikipedia, “Pedophilia or paedophilia is a psychiatric disorder in which an adult or older adolescent experiences a primary or exclusive sexual attraction to prepubescent children, generally age 11 years or younger.” However, some authorities use thirteen as the upper limit.

It would be unfair and inaccurate to call Grant a pedophile. Assuming his actions were precipitated by an underlying psychological disorder or orientation, it is more likely to have been ephebophilia, a sexual preference for post-pubescent teens.

The term pedophile is often used casually to describe any attraction to individuals younger than twenty-one, but pedophilia, hebephilia and ephebophilia are distinct orientations. As many of us teach English, we should try to use correct terminology.

As the father of two young boys, I am concerned about pedophiles; however, I also recognize that pedophilia is a psychological disorder. Nobody knows what causes it, but it usually manifests around puberty. Most pedophiles begin molesting in their early teens. I’m more concerned that my boys could be molested by an older playmate than by a teacher or priest.

As part of my research, I transferred the sex offender registry for the City of Los Angeles into an Excel spreadsheet and ran some statistics. The numbers are distressing. For example, forty-one percent were black and forty-two percent were Hispanic. Either L.A. minorities are much more likely to commit sex offenses or they’re more likely to wind up on the registry due to some form of systematic discrimination. If it’s discrimination, the number of offenders is much higher than the registry would suggest.

Apparently Grant was only thirty-seven. Judging by his photograph, he was a bit stocky, but not morbidly obese. It seems a bit young to drop dead.

If we assume the worst case scenario in the 13-17 age group, age 13, the wikipedia psychology thing is wide of the mark. A parent has the right to consider their 13 year-old a "child." Children and young adults develop at different rates, both physically and mentally. A 13 year-old could be very mature, or could still remain very child-like. It is not for random strangers, or websites, to say that a 13 year old is no longer a child. It is for the parents to know their own child's maturity, and the legal system is supposed to protect the rights of decent parents to raise their kids according to what is safest for a given child.

I consider sex with age 1 to 15 to be in the immensely broad bracket of "paedophilia", but this has to be handled differently on a case-by-case basis. This is because of two factors. The first is the relative development rates of the individual children, including the possiblity of a child being in some way mentally-handicapped (diagnosed or not) and having an emotional age possibly ten years below their physical age. The second, and extremely important reason, is that the parents have the right to raise their children as children, until such time that the parents consider the child mature. The legal system and wikipedia are completely trumped by the parents' God-given right to wish for their children to remain children until age 16 or older, be that for protecting the sanctuary of the childhood they have spent so long nurturing and protecting, or for cultural/religious reasons.

I did enjoy reading your post, and you make some good points. This is a huge and complex picture, not least because of the huge variations in the attacker profiles. Some attacks on children are brutal violent rapes, some are viewed by the adult as genuine romance, to the point where some old guy brings bunches of roses to a four-year old and thinks it is true love. There are many forms of paedophilia, it is not only complex because of the age-issue, the diverse child-development rates, but because of the different motivations of the adults, which can differ like night and day. That is why I agree with your point about how "casually" the term paedophilia is thrown around in the media, without being qualified by the specific circumstances, which really govern the severity of the crime being labelled.

I also agree completely with the many posters who say that criminal-background checks on all teachers should be mandatory, and enforced with zero-tolerance efficiency. These are young lives, which need to be handled with great care, by normal good-natured adults only.

Edited September 2, 2015 by Yunla

[GanDoonToonPet]

While many would consider Grant a vile pervert, calling him “Pervert Stephen Grant” and “vile Grant” hardly qualifies as objective reporting.

Paraphrasing the barrister’s remarks, while directly quoting the judge, also gives the report a slight bias against Grant.

Reporters should let the facts speak for themselves. I am constantly annoyed, particularly with CNN.com, for trying to amp interest in stories by calling incidents or images shocking or disturbing. I want Jack Webb to step in as Joe Friday and say, “Just the facts, ma’am.”

That is not from a newspaper article. It's from a website that publishes the names / details of people who have been convicted of sex offences against children in the UK & Ireland.

http://theukdatabase.com/

If you search the site for 'Thailand' you'll get some shocking results. I've worked at one school which has previously employed a convicted sex offender during the last 5 years & even applied for jobs at 3 others, only this year.

Plenty of others have skipped bail while awaiting trial for child sex offences & guess where they ended up? Some are still wanted.

[eldragon]

Most people recognize that when adult males choose to spend all their time with young children(under the guise of educator or in a Mike Jackson way) that there are issues. More surprising would be to read that one of them was not a sex offender.

Especially well qualified ones who chose schools rather than universities or colleges.

Yeah, b/c there is zero temptation whilst surrounding yourself with of-age Thai women in short skirts and tight tops all day. Lol.

Anyway, Thai universities generally pay less than even a government primary or secondary school does, and often times half- if not a third- of what private and international schools pay. And there's absolutely nothing wrong with working with kids. The job needs to be done by someone. The guys you gotta watch out for are the ones pursuing opportunities to be alone with students after hours. Tutoring, volunteering, etc. Not all bad guys, but definitely warning signs.

[NickJ]

The old saying, People get the Goverment they Deserve.......also applies to this.

Vetting a person who applies for a job.

Police volunteers.

Teachers.

Builders/developers

Financial advisors/wealth management.

You dont buy real estate without doing due dilligence, well most people.

[ginocox]

Perhaps we should at least get our terms straight.

I’m not a psychologist and am neither competent nor qualified to diagnose psychological disorders, but like most denizens of Internet message boards, I’m not about to allow a lack of formal credentials to prevent me making outrageous unfounded claims with absolute conviction. I did, however, read a few articles on the topic while researching my latest novel, Presumed Guilty.

Stephen David Grant was charged with fifteen counts of “of adult abuse of position of trust – causing or inciting sexual activity with a child aged 13 to 17.”

According to Wikipedia, “Pedophilia or paedophilia is a psychiatric disorder in which an adult or older adolescent experiences a primary or exclusive sexual attraction to prepubescent children, generally age 11 years or younger.” However, some authorities use thirteen as the upper limit.

It would be unfair and inaccurate to call Grant a pedophile. Assuming his actions were precipitated by an underlying psychological disorder or orientation, it is more likely to have been ephebophilia, a sexual preference for post-pubescent teens.

The term pedophile is often used casually to describe any attraction to individuals younger than twenty-one, but pedophilia, hebephilia and ephebophilia are distinct orientations. As many of us teach English, we should try to use correct terminology.

As the father of two young boys, I am concerned about pedophiles; however, I also recognize that pedophilia is a psychological disorder. Nobody knows what causes it, but it usually manifests around puberty. Most pedophiles begin molesting in their early teens. I’m more concerned that my boys could be molested by an older playmate than by a teacher or priest.

As part of my research, I transferred the sex offender registry for the City of Los Angeles into an Excel spreadsheet and ran some statistics. The numbers are distressing. For example, forty-one percent were black and forty-two percent were Hispanic. Either L.A. minorities are much more likely to commit sex offenses or they’re more likely to wind up on the registry due to some form of systematic discrimination. If it’s discrimination, the number of offenders is much higher than the registry would suggest.

Apparently Grant was only thirty-seven. Judging by his photograph, he was a bit stocky, but not morbidly obese. It seems a bit young to drop dead.

If we assume the worst case scenario in the 13-17 age group, age 13, the wikipedia psychology thing is wide of the mark. A parent has the right to consider their 13 year-old a "child." Children and young adults develop at different rates, both physically and mentally. A 13 year-old could be very mature, or could still remain very child-like. It is not for random strangers, or websites, to say that a 13 year old is no longer a child. It is for the parents to know their own child's maturity, and the legal system is supposed to protect the rights of decent parents to raise their kids according to what is safest for a given child.

I consider sex with age 1 to 15 to be in the immensely broad bracket of "paedophilia", but this has to be handled differently on a case-by-case basis. This is because of two factors. The first is the relative development rates of the individual children, including the possiblity of a child being in some way mentally-handicapped (diagnosed or not) and having an emotional age possibly ten years below their physical age. The second, and extremely important reason, is that the parents have the right to raise their children as children, until such time that the parents consider the child mature. The legal system and wikipedia are completely trumped by the parents' God-given right to wish for their children to remain children until age 16 or older, be that for protecting the sanctuary of the childhood they have spent so long nurturing and protecting, or for cultural/religious reasons.

I did enjoy reading your post, and you make some good points. This is a huge and complex picture, not least because of the huge variations in the attacker profiles. Some attacks on children are brutal violent rapes, some are viewed by the adult as genuine romance, to the point where some old guy brings bunches of roses to a four-year old and thinks it is true love. There are many forms of paedophilia, it is not only complex because of the age-issue, the diverse child-development rates, but because of the different motivations of the adults, which can differ like night and day. That is why I agree with your point about how "casually" the term paedophilia is thrown around in the media, without being qualified by the specific circumstances, which really govern the severity of the crime being labelled.

I also agree completely with the many posters who say that criminal-background checks on all teachers should be mandatory, and enforced with zero-tolerance efficiency. These are young lives, which need to be handled with great care, by normal good-natured adults only.

Let’s clarify a few items.

First, the age brackets were not defined by Wikipedia, but by the American Psychiatric Association (APA) in it’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5), the purpose of which is to offer a common language and standard criteria for the classification of mental disorders, so that no clinical psychiatrists use an age range or other criterion that is different than that used by others.

Second, according to another post, Grant was apparently never accused of having sex with children. Apparently he impersonated a fictitious teenage girl over the Internet in order to entice six of his students to send him images and/or videos of themselves in the nude or masturbating.

Third, pedophilia is a psychological disorder that meets certain criteria established by APA. I don’t know if emotional age and intellectual development are part of the criteria. The distinction between pedophilia, hebephilia, ephebophilia and other forms of chronophilia and paraphilia may not be significant to parents, but are important to diagnosis and efforts to treat patients. The age of the victim and the difference in ages between the victim and the assailant are also considered in determining penalties. Child molestation is a criminal act which may be precipitated by pedophilia, hebephilia, sadism or some other psychological disorder. While I’m not an expert, I’m not sure I would call Jesse Timmendequas a pedophile, even though he molested at least three children. He obviously has many psychological issues, but I think of him as a sort of dimwitted Hannibal Lecter. Like Clarice Starling, I’m not sure what he is.

My original point was that that Grant did not meet the clinical definition of a pedophile and seemed more like an ephebophile. I think the distinction is important and I believe we do both the English language and the public a disservice if we lump different psychopathologies together. I would not have considered Grant an immediate threat to either of my young sons. The elder is four, the younger is five months old. However, I would consider a pedophile an immediate potential threat.

Society tends to envision pedophiles as dirty old men. Over half the registered sex offenders in Los Angeles are fifty or older. But pedophiles don’t reach their fiftieth birthday and abruptly lose interest in age-appropriate relationships and decide to start viewing kiddie porn and molesting eight-year-old boys. Pedophiles begin molesting around the age of puberty by enticing younger children to disrobe and engage in sexual acts. We should caution our children to avoid dirty old men attempting to entice them into their cars with Walnettos, but we should also caution them against older boys who may want them to disrobe or to touch their private parts.

[MiKT]

discovered the sordid background after speaking to Grant’s mother!

Your son was dead...dead...was it necessary to defame him after he is dead...

I do not understand the need to "spill the beans" by family members...if baffles me...

Some peoples family members are their worst character assassins...

I find this a very sick post. His mother was very brave and absolutly correct in bringing this up. Don't you think the kids at this school deserve a chance to see if they have been pestered by this person who had been banned by British courts from contact with children. Do you really think he managed to control himsel here?

[Yunla]

Let’s clarify a few items.

First, the age brackets were not defined by Wikipedia, but by the American Psychiatric Association (APA) in it’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5), the purpose of which is to offer a common language and standard criteria for the classification of mental disorders, so that no clinical psychiatrists use an age range or other criterion that is different than that used by others.

Second, according to another post, Grant was apparently never accused of having sex with children. Apparently he impersonated a fictitious teenage girl over the Internet in order to entice six of his students to send him images and/or videos of themselves in the nude or masturbating.

Third, pedophilia is a psychological disorder that meets certain criteria established by APA. I don’t know if emotional age and intellectual development are part of the criteria. The distinction between pedophilia, hebephilia, ephebophilia and other forms of chronophilia and paraphilia may not be significant to parents, but are important to diagnosis and efforts to treat patients. The age of the victim and the difference in ages between the victim and the assailant are also considered in determining penalties. Child molestation is a criminal act which may be precipitated by pedophilia, hebephilia, sadism or some other psychological disorder. While I’m not an expert, I’m not sure I would call Jesse Timmendequas a pedophile, even though he molested at least three children. He obviously has many psychological issues, but I think of him as a sort of dimwitted Hannibal Lecter. Like Clarice Starling, I’m not sure what he is.

My original point was that that Grant did not meet the clinical definition of a pedophile and seemed more like an ephebophile. I think the distinction is important and I believe we do both the English language and the public a disservice if we lump different psychopathologies together. I would not have considered Grant an immediate threat to either of my young sons. The elder is four, the younger is five months old. However, I would consider a pedophile an immediate potential threat.

Society tends to envision pedophiles as dirty old men. Over half the registered sex offenders in Los Angeles are fifty or older. But pedophiles don’t reach their fiftieth birthday and abruptly lose interest in age-appropriate relationships and decide to start viewing kiddie porn and molesting eight-year-old boys. Pedophiles begin molesting around the age of puberty by enticing younger children to disrobe and engage in sexual acts. We should caution our children to avoid dirty old men attempting to entice them into their cars with Walnettos, but we should also caution them against older boys who may want them to disrobe or to touch their private parts.

Thankyou for your reply. I understand your point about the person in the OP, and infact this is exactly what I was saying in my post, about how all paedophilia cases need to be treated on a case-by-case basis, because the nature of the offences varies so much. I blame the media for basically turning the word paedophilia into a term that researchers fear to use, and feel they have to endlessly circumnavigate it. I think far better is to retain this term, but to only apply it alongside case specifics that clearly highlight the actual seriousness of any crimes committed. The physical and emotional age of each individual child is extremely important, both for the law, and for the treatment of young persons in their unique situations.

On APA etc. we actually know less than 10% about the human brain. Experts in the field have described our knowledge about the brain as "the tip of an iceberg." For this reason alone, all researchers are pioneers in this field, and I choose to call paedophilia what I believe is appropriate ; sexual attraction to / sexual abuse of any 1 to 15 year old. This is my definition that I use in my research, and I never tried to bulldozer this onto other people's work, which is what I take issue with some of the online quackademia "studies" over.

I have been researching paedophilia since the early 1990s, also researching adult rape, although my main study has been paedophilia. I have interviewed many hundreds of survivors of paedophilia, and have many cassette-tape interviews, which shows my age at least. At survivor conferences, I have stood on stage and spoken about my own childhood age 4~11, in the context of my research. I only talk about my interview research when I have direct permission from those I interview. I only talk about my own experiences if it is in direct context of sexual violence towards young children. Extreme violence does not apply to all paedophile cases, and needs to be isolated as a subgroup. I am only interested in recording the actual facts, not to wrap it all up neatly into some one-click convenient type of theory. I don't think that this is possible, at all.

My problem with many of the major branded names in this field, is what we call Lunchtimers, ie. "well we solved this whole problem, and just in time for lunch!" Infact, after twenty years researching this subject, I can confirm that far from finding a simple descriptive model that everyone can use I have only found a vast spectrum of overlapping mental disorders and violent subcultures, organised groups, "romantic" paedophiles, and everything inbetween. They can never be filed into any easy-to-use system, and the only way to deal with paedophilia is on an individual case-by-case basis. There is no easy way to actually categorise a spectrum of this magnitude, and there is no elegant "labelling system" that neatly wraps the whole thing up, as we see some of the branded experts claiming.

I think you and I actually agree on the core point, relating to the OP, which is that case-by-case he is not the same as other people categorised as paedophile. That doesn't make the term paedophile invalid, only that it should always be presented alongside the case specifics. Being sexually attracted to children is paedophilia, regardless of sending texts or photos or whatever. Then we can debate what age childhood stops, the puberty factor and how little puberty actually means in cases of mental or emotional unreadiness. These are things for which the State can set a minimum age, but parents can choose to set a higher age for their own reasons. This is the complexity we are dealing with.

I especially agree with you about the dangers of throwing accusations of paedophilia around, the harm it causes to the lives of innocent adults, and the pitchfork/bonfire effect it can have on local communities. A subject of this size needs to be dealt with carefully, by qualified police and doctors, and each case needs to be a stand-alone proposition. This is a huge complex task, with no easy quick-fix solutions. What is far easier to navigate, is the strict regulating of persons who are already convicted as dangerous paedophiles, preventing them working not only as teachers but in all other jobs where they could have access to children.

[billd766]

Most people recognize that when adult males choose to spend all their time with young children(under the guise of educator or in a Mike Jackson way) that there are issues. More surprising would be to read that one of them was not a sex offender.

Sadly all of my teachers from primary or secondary school from 50 or 60 years ago are no longer alive.

Many of them had been teachers for 40 or 50 years and would have taken great exception to your words.

As they are no longer around, I will stand up for them.

Your post is an over generalised piece of rubbish and is a slur on the majority of male teachers today.

And, NO, most people do NOT accept or recognise that when adult males choose to spend all their time with young children(under the guise of educator or in a Mike Jackson way) that there are issues. They actually trust teachers, male or female.