This is interesting, but I'm not going to get real excited until it involves Heroin-induced Necrophilia.

From Mark Shea, who is dead on, comes this article discussing the American Psychiatric Association's proposal to remove pedophilia from the "psychiatric manual of mental disorders." (Which I assume is the DSM.) The proponents argue:

People whose sexual interests are atypical, culturally forbidden or religiously proscribed should not necessarily be labeled mentally ill, they argued.

Different societies stigmatize different sexual behaviors, and since the existing research could not distinguish people with paraphilias from so-called "normophilics," there is no reason to diagnose paraphilics as either a distinct group or psychologically unhealthy, Moser and Kleinplatz stated.

There is a nice piece of circular reasoning there. "Paraphilics" are not "unhealthy." Yet, we would view anyone with a fixation that could result in criminal sanctions being imposed for acting on the fixation to be "unhealthy." And, since we are not going to decriminalize pedophilia, one would therefore suspect that having pedophile tendencies could easily be classified as being "unhealthy" inasmuch as giving into those urges would result in jail time, social stigmatization, loss of employment, suicide or a host of other evils resulting from being caught in the act.

Unless, of course, society decriminalizes pedophilia.

The point is that - Szaz notwithstanding - social norms and psychological conditions are inevitably interrelated. For example, if I spent my time fixated on the idea that slavery is a proper enterprize and that one class of humanity was racially inferior, I would probably be diagnosed under the DSM-IV as "delusional." Unless, of course, I travelled in time to 1810, in which case I would be "normal." Both diagnoses would be correct, incidentally. What would be different would be the socially constructed world, which has as much reality as the physical world.

The article is right that this is serious stuff. Psychs rely on the DSM as their "bible." Paradoxically, NAMBLA may not be entirely happy; remove "paraphilia" and you won't be able to show pedophilia as a "disability." On the other hand, such an action would also enflame the movement to decriminalize pedophilia. Such a decriminalization would probably be required if their is a strongly defined Right to Privacy since the conduct would be "private" concensual behavior. [I presume it wouldn't be difficult to gin up a test case involving a mature, emancipated fourteen year old, who in all respects was as emotionally mature as a slow sixteen year old. Besides, the argument would go, the concept of "age of consent" is a cultural artifact which varies from culture to culture so as to make it (a) based on religious preceps and (b) unconstitutionally vague.] Also, I guess NAMBLA could eventually argue for constitutional protection for pedophiles since it would seem to be a denial of Equal Protection to extend civil rights protection to one group who defines themselves by their sexual conduct, while denying such protections to other groups who similarly define themselves by their sexual practices. [Actually, come to think of it, California Fair Employment and Housing Act already protects "sexual orientation," so pedophiles would probably be protected at the point that pedophilia became decriminalized, if not sooner.]

About five years ago, I predicted to Penner that we would be having the same discussion about pedophilia in twenty years that we are having about homosexuality today. Penner was skeptical, until I pointed out that no one in 1978 would have believed that there could be a serious discussion about whether homosexuals should be scoutmasters. Back then, the discussion was about discrimination in the workplace and the removal of criminal and social sanctions for homosexuals. But a few scientific studies, a couple of "hard cases" before the judiciary, an expansion of the right to privacy, and the next thing you know, you have the Boy Scouts in Philadelphia becoming agnostic about whether the formation of a boy's character precludes the formation of romantic attachments with his tentmates.

As for the pedophilia issue, it looks like I may have been off by about ten years.