Wait, what?
In a recent interview with the Times magazine, Richard Dawkins attempted to defend what he called “mild pedophilia,” which, he says, he personally experienced as a young child and does not believe causes “lasting harm.”
Dawkins went on to say that one of his former school masters “pulled me on his knee and put his hand inside my shorts,” and that to condemn this “mild touching up” as sexual abuse today would somehow be unfair.
“I am very conscious that you can’t condemn people of an earlier era by the standards of ours. Just as we don’t look back at the 18th and 19th centuries and condemn people for racism in the same way as we would condemn a modern person for racism, I look back a few decades to my childhood and see things like caning, like mild pedophilia, and can’t find it in me to condemn it by the same standards as I or anyone would today,” he said.
This is actually not a new stand, as Dawkins has previously said that sexual abuse “covers a wide spectrum of sins, and I suspect that research would show belief in hell to be more traumatic than the sort of mild feeling-up that I suffered”.
And in a hilarious sidenote, Dawkins retweeted the following message in support of his pedophilia comments:
@BobWorsley @RichardDawkins exactly. if you don't scream "burn the witch!" Then you're an apologist
— richard latham (@rickeaikea) September 10, 2013
Oh the irony, it burns!
Good old Dicky Dawkins, taking yet another step to being the archtypal embarrassing drunk uncle.
Link: Richard Dawkins defends “mild pedophilia,” says it does not cause “lasting harm”
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