A Christian sociologist is warning that a psychologist who put together a deceptive study back in the 1990s that claimed pedophilia was harmless is back again promoting pedophilia with new studies, and unlike the first time, when the psychology community backed away from supporting the psychologist and his study after being heavily criticized, and Congress condemned it, this time there's been little reaction.
The Archives of Sexual Behavior journal published in the past year two studies by psychologist Bruce Rind, both of which claim that "minor-adult sex tends not to be reported as a bad experience, as unwanted, or as one with longstanding negative consequences," Regnerus explained.
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Nearly two decades ago, Rind wrote in a 1998 issue of Psychological Bulletin that the long-term destructive effects of child abuse are overestimated, a claim that both the American Psychological Association and both Houses of Congress rejected publicly.
Today, however, with this newer research "Rind is banking on a more amenable political and scholarly atmosphere in which to conclude comparable things. And from the sound of it—or rather, the utter lack of sound—he has gotten his wish. There has been no congressional concern, no APA scrutiny, just silence," Regnerus said.
With that notable lack of professional and government condemnation, the sociologist believes that Rind's scholarship will likely serve to weaken age of consent laws. He predicts that those who hesitate to embrace Rind's conclusions may soon be considered "out of touch, narrow-minded, or worse, hateful" in broader society as has been the case with things that were once considered inconceivable like same-sex marriage and transgender children.
Link to the Christian Post article
More on the Rind study of 1998 and the backlash to it:
The Leadership Council on the Rind study
Worldnetdaily
Dr. Laura
Washington Times
Wikipedia entry on the Rind study
Stephanie Dallam paper
I read through that 1998 study and it was complete pseudoscience, designed to make child sexual abuse acceptable in the minds of people willing to believe that. For one thing, it was based on different studies of college students, and that excluded people too damaged by abuse to be in college, as well as the possibility that the effects of abuse often mostly show up beyond college, once a person goes out into the world on their own. The study didn't address those concerns at all, but claimed that it was fine to arrive at conclusions about abuse from college student studies because around half of Americans have some college. And that was just one flaw. If I recall correctly, it also just cherry picked the results it wanted from those college studies.
The Leadership Council did excellent analysis of the original study, which despite being criticized and condemned, pedophiles still try to point to as evidence in support of child abuse (I believe there were even attempts to use it in court cases). And if you read what liberals have to say on this today, you find many of these "educated" liberals have started to say that the backlash against Rind's study was just about "uneducated" "narrow-minded" people not understanding and respecting science (link). And pedophilia gets a lot of support in academic circles and universities, where no idea is taboo if it is godless and anti-christian. Academia is mostly a "safe space" for well-educated pedophiles to promote child abuse and get paid well and receive honors for doing so. And in Europe, the Netherlands in particular, pedophilia has already started to gain some acceptance.
Let's pray that people and Christians especially come together to bring attention to and stop these new attempts to make child sexual abuse acceptable.