A pederast is a person that has sexual relations with boys. It is something that most regard as highly unethical and is illegal in most countries. A pedophile is a person that is sexually attracted to children which is something considered very perverse by most people but is not something that is illegal. BL 20:33, 12 Oct 2003 (UTC)

I was aware that their was a distinction. There is also generally an age distinction as well. Since the list is of both pedophiles and pederasts, it should probably be moved back to its original title. Drolsi Susej 21:42, 12 Oct 2003 (UTC)

I removed

• Pete Townshend because he was arrested for accessing a child pornography site, he was not charged and the police accepted his explanation that he was doing research for an autobiography becasue he believes he was molested as a child. There does not seem to be an ongoing debate about the matter. See Townshend's statement to the press and Pete Townshend A Pedophile? Legendary guitarist for The Who arrested, released.

Although Townshend was not charged with any crime, he was still added to the sex offender roster and some don't believe that he was innocently researching his autobiography when he bought child porn. Drolsi Susej

I understand, and while some may believe that, the police found no evidence that he had ever downloaded any child pornography and simply seems to have paid to be able to view the site in question -- and he turned his computers over to them, and considering the nature of this page, it seems best to leave him off for now. -- BCorr ¤ Брайен 22:01, 12 Oct 2003 (UTC)

• List of gays, lesbians, and bisexuals from the "also see" section because there is no greater rate of pedophilia among GLBTs -- despite popular perceptions and a few old discredited studies.

BCorr ¤ Брайен 21:10, 12 Oct 2003 (UTC)

It was referenced because it is another list of people by sexual behavior. No link was stated or implied. Drolsi Susej 21:42, 12 Oct 2003 (UTC)

I understand that too. I would argue that being lesbian or gay is not defined by sexual behavior but by sexual orientation, which is very different from sexual activity or behavior, even though that is how it's often portrayed. Thanks, BCorr ¤ Брайен 22:01, 12 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Being a pederast wasn't unethical if you were an upper class man in ancient Greece. So having people like Plato (and probably thousands of other ancient Greeks) on the list is kind of unusual, especially if the list is meant to shame these people (in which case it's not a particularily useful list). Adam Bishop 21:40, 12 Oct 2003 (UTC)

It made more sense before BL changed the name of the list. Drolsi Susej 21:44, 12 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Thing is you can't group them together. Claiming someone to be a pedetrast who isn't is possibly illegal, same thing for pedophiles to I think. But atleast all pedetrasts are also pedophiles. Still doubt this page should exist... BL 21:54, 12 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Even though I've edited it, I do question whether this really belongs in Wikipedia...I'll just keep working on it for now... BCorr ¤ Брайен 22:01, 12 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Does Woody Allen really belong here? BCorr ¤ Брайен 22:20, 12 Oct 2003 (UTC)

This page in its current form is useless and should be deleted. Pedophilia has a very strict clinical definition and it is virtually impossible to determine whether a person is a pedophile without examining them in a clinical setting (there are some who self-identify as pedophiles; that is a different story). Like a person having gay sex in a prison is not necessarily a homosexual, a person having sex with a minor is not necessarily a pedophile -- that is the case if the person has a documented history of being exclusively attracted to prepubescent children. It has been shown that most adult males can be sexually aroused by erotica featuring teenagers, and it is a peculiarity of the United States legal system and media that sex with teens is equated with pedophilia. Aside from that, there is a distinction between pedophilia and ephebophilia.

There are some forms of this page that may be useful:

• List of pedophilia advocates
• List of self-identified pedophiles
• List of people who have had sexual contact with minors

—Eloquence 23:13, Oct 12, 2003 (UTC)

Here, here! -- BCorr ¤ Брайен 02:54, 13 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Almost the exact same thing could be said about List of famous gay, lesbian or bisexual people, which is a list that combines both suspected and confirmed homosexuals and suspected and confirmed bisexuals. It also would've been accurate to say that there is a 'very strict clinical definition' of homosexuality up until a couple of decades ago when it was removed from lists of clinical disorders, saying that does nothing to affect the meaning of the term. The list was also originally titled List of pedophiles and pederasts (a more accurate title IMO), until someone moved it. The list is certainly not useless. Drolsi Susej 04:23, 13 Oct 2003 (UTC)

No, it's no "almost the same". Homosexuality only requires one simple criterion: attraction to the opposite gender. Pedophilia is defined as attraction to prepubescent children, and is easily confused with ephebophilia, clinical or otherwise. In addition, the list above includes bisexuals, so anyone with repeated homosexual contacts during adulthood can, at least according to some definitions, be included without much discussion. Lastly, at least the list above makes some effort to document these people's sexual history on their biography pages, whereas you do not make any such effort.

Again, someone who sexually abuses a minor is not necessarily a pedophile (exclusively attracted to preadolescents -- emphasis on every word), but may simply be acting out of opportunity. The title "pedophiles and pederasts" is redundant -- pedophilia includes pederasty. This does not in any way mitigate the definitional problems of this article.—Eloquence 11:37, Oct 13, 2003 (UTC)

pederast: A man who has sexual relations, especially anal intercourse, with a boy.

paedophile: An adult who is sexually attracted to a child or children

If a man is not sexually attracted to a child or children, but does have sexual relations with a child, then that man is a pederast, but not a paedophile. Hence, moving topic back. Also ditching pointless "famous" qualifier: see wikipedia:list. Martin 17:57, 13 Oct 2003 (UTC)

I've moved many entries and added some to illustrate problems with definitions. Please remember that if you list a person who today has sex with a 13 year old, you're also opening up listings for Biblical and other historic figures in times when the age of consent was 12 or lower. Using legal definitions appropriate to the time is one way to avoid this possibly undesirable consequence. Also need to remember that age of consent varies widely, both in the US and around the world. Is a wife who yesterday was legaly married to a 12 year old with the consent of the parents a pederast? JamesDay 22:08, 14 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Should Jeffrey Dahmer be listed? Pakaran 22:16, 14 Oct 2003 (UTC)

After thinking it over - he had a whole lot of unusual to abnormal tendencies, like the attraction to dead bodies, but I don't think he was specifically attracted to children.

"Gary Glitter, British singer, arrested and convicted for making child pornography in the United Kingdom, he was deported from Cambodia where he was believed to be enjoying the country's lax laws on child prostitution [1], moved to Thailand (another country known for the child sex trade)."

User:JamesDay asked any sign of exclusive interest in pre-pubescent children? User:Drolsi Susej replied yes and added details above. Discusson continues here.

• I see that he's been acquitted of child molestation charges in Britain [2] and has a girlfriend. I see that there were accusations that he molested young boys in Cambodia. Can you reword the description to precisely match what the stories are alleging (as opposedd to certain fact) and move him to the possible list until there's actually some conviction or similar level of high probability that it can be substantiated? Does seem certain that he's interested in child pornography after that conviction but I didn't find any places saying that he'd created it himself. Can you support that with a reference? Given the high legal risk when naming living individuals, really good record keeping seems very prudent for anyone in the "apparent" list. That might reduce the chance of VfD resolving the matter with a delete. I doubt that it will be sufficient, even though the way this is evolving seems to be in a direction which will have some value: using specific cases to examine the differences between certainty and possibility and the varying standards. JamesDay 07:41, 15 Oct 2003 (UTC)

• • Actually in the article I linked to it stated that he had created the pornography himself: "He pleaded guilty to 54 offences of making indecent photographs of children under 16 on the internet". Drolsi Susej 22:38, 15 Oct 2003 (UTC)

• Yes, it said "In 1999, Glitter was sentenced to four months in a British prison for downloading child pornography from the internet. He pleaded guilty to 54 offences of making indecent photographs of children under 16 on the internet". The words downloading and making appear to contradict each other and downloading seems most likely to be what happened. Barring any information to resolve the conflict, that is. It's conceivable that it might be something like screen captures of video. JamesDay 00:14, 16 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Ahh, James, you meet the UK justice system, which considers downloading porn to be equivalent to "making indecent photographs". Martin 23:52, 20 Nov 2003 (UTC)

From Wikipedia:Votes for deletion

• List of famous pedophiles
  • Delete. See Talk:List of famous pedophiles#Should be deleted in its present form.—Eloquence 02:12, Oct 13, 2003 (UTC)
  • Delete. Another one of these lists whose creation motivation is suspect. RickK 02:52, 13 Oct 2003 (UTC)
  • Delete. -- I've been trying to help with this one but I also am suspicious about the motivation... -- BCorr ¤ Брайен 03:51, 13 Oct 2003 (UTC)
  • Keep. It is a valid list with useful information. Note that the page was originally titled List of pedophiles and pederasts. -- Drolsi Susej 04:24, 13 Oct 2003 (UTC)
    • This user is the primary author of this page.—Eloquence
  • Delete. Talk page has it right, pedophilia as a classification is very troublesome. Not the same issues as gay, lesbian, bisexual. Fuzheado 06:32, 13 Oct 2003 (UTC)
  • Delete, unless an effort is made to ensure that nobody (alive or dead) appears on the list without scrupulous documentation of the sources which lead to the classification. Otherwise, next will be List of murderers featuring such "debated murderers" as OJ Simpson, Bomber Harris and George W Bush. Onebyone 10:36, 13 Oct 2003 (UTC)
    • Agree with the above Raul654 11:48, 13 Oct 2003 (UTC)
  • Delete. Highly dodgy, tasteless and inaccurate page. FearÉIREANN 20:38, 13 Oct 2003 (UTC)
  • Delete. Agree with Jtdirl. -- Cyan 21:34, 13 Oct 2003 (UTC)
  • Note: I've improved the list. Drolsi Susej 21:49, 13 Oct 2003 (UTC)
  • Yet another list that could be construed to serve no other purpose than defamation and trolling. It would perhaps not be wrong to mention single persons as pedophiles in appropriate places (if conclusive evidence is provided), but this list is (guess what?) unencyclopedic. Delete. Kosebamse 22:24, 13 Oct 2003 (UTC)
  • Keep a list. We have lists for all the occupations and hundreds of different groups of people. Donnie Ng 23:17, 13 Oct 2003 (UTC)
  • Delete. Apart from the tastelessness of it, the risk that someone will name someone incorrectly (innocently or not) and leave themselves and Wikipedia wide open to a libel action must approach 100%. Do we have an article on British libel law? :) Arwel 23:35, 13 Oct 2003 (UTC)
    • There is a disclaimer and the article List of famous gay, lesbian or bisexual people would seem to be open to the same problems, yet it has existed on wikipedia since 2001. Drolsi Susej 00:17, 14 Oct 2003 (UTC)
  • Ouch! I support all the articles on all the gays and lesbians, and other sexual orientations . . . but this? Most of these are based on accusation. Do we need a bunch of fights over whether all (or most) of the people fit on the list? Publicly gay or not gay, on the hand . . . we can take what the people said and it still isn't that bad if they are called gay or straight. Wiwaxia 02:11, 14 Oct 2003 (UTC)
  • Delete. Wikipedia is not the "Book of Lists" nor is it The Smoking Gun Ark30inf 02:42, 14 Oct 2003 (UTC)
  • Keep. Wartortle 16:45, 14 Oct 2003 (UTC)
  • Keep. I would like to note that we list other orientations like homosexuals, despite problems with historical definition - e.g. in ancient Greece, a man who was involved with another man was not necessarily homosexual, or even unusual, and today in prisons in for example the US a man who has active sex is not homosexual, where one who has passive sex is. So why is there a need for concern over historical views on pedophilia? How is that fundamentally different from a list of gays, jews, whites, or for that matter blind people? Note that I am *not* equating any of those to pedophiles, but just having a list is not a bad thing. Pakaran 01:04, 15 Oct 2003 (UTC)
  • A list of pederasts could be useful, especially for historical persons. A list of pedophiles, or ephebophiles, is more difficult, since those are defined by attraction rather than behaviour. But even that could work if people identify their attractions, which is how the LGBT list works. It might help to check with NAMBLA to see if they've managed to compile anything sensible along those lines.
    In short, listing "suspected pedophiles" is probably pointless, whereas listing "open pedophiles", "open ephebophiles", "open pederasts", and "debated pederasts" should work, if well managed. -- Toby Bartels 05:21, 15 Oct 2003 (UTC)
  • Keep. It is better named simply List of pedophiles. The current content is crap but I don't see no reason not to have such a list. -- Taku
  • whether a pedophile is the same thing as a child molester, whether there is anything wrong with being a pedophile, particularly a 'non-practising' pedophile, whether self identifying as a pedophile is common, these are all questions that could be addressed on the page relating to the term itself. as for a list of 'pedophiles', i think the motivation of the page is largely dependent on this encompassing definition. it seems as pointless to list 'all' pedophiles as to list all left handed people. the list is necessarily incomplete and innaccurate. the title shld include the qualifier 'some', as in 'some famous ~', some self-described ~', 'some canonised ~', etc.

Since some people have opposed deleting the page, I have moved and edited it in the only way that makes sense. Please do not edit this page if you do not understand what pedophilia is; see above. Thank you.—Eloquence 22:25, Oct 15, 2003 (UTC)

It seems that someone here at least has some sense about this whole thing-- I was going to suggest removing Davis -- being a murderer and all. In fact Id like to see someone update the list of lists pages so that they can all be pruned, and then deleted.

But regarding the sole admitted pedophile on the list-- Ginsberg - according to some of the reading ive done, it was not exactly clear that he wasnt just giving political voice to NAMBLA, (out of what he sometimes admitted was a politically foolish choice of battles.) rather than being himself 'exclusively interested' in molesting kids. He did have homosexual relationships-- like with Bill Burroughs (who fell in love with him --not the other way around)--and though sometimes these relationships were with younger teenagers, Im not exactly clear that he fits the *definition* at the top, either. So the list of one might be a list of none. ^O^ -戴&#30505sv 22:40, 15 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Now that there is an article boylovers and girllovers, I suggest moving the content of this article there and rewriting the list as text. The difference would be that ephebophilies can also be included. --Moon light shadow 09:38, 26 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Wow. Pretty obvious all admins here are male. really terrible understanding of pedophilia, pederasty and surrounding issues. Please research before amending such articles, and have some respect for victims. - nighthawk — Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.223.97.197 (talk) 18:34, 14 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]