Can we choose and change what we desire?

“Biology was the beginning, and biology was the end.”

         

           That quote from The Other Side of Desire struck me in a particular way. After looking at multiple pedophiles this is what James Cantor had concluded upon any changes in human’s sexual preference. This makes me wonder if we born with a sexual preference. This book, by Daniel Bergner, explores the different groups of thoughts and beliefs on this subject, like Roy, who was arrested for sexually abusing his stepdaughter. He showed us that he would have never even thought of sexual encounters with a young girl until his second wife pointed out her daughter’s changing body. Does this mean we are set off by certain stimuli into what we are supposed to be? Or on the other hand, as Gilbert Herdt’s observations of the Sambian tribe’s boys in Papua New Guinea show, do we have erotic phases of life? The boys of the tribe go from homosexuality into heterosexuality. Is our sexuality always changing? Can we control it? I know people even today that still consider homosexuality a phase. The advantage of this book is that Bergner does not push an opinion on the reader but is able to show all valid views on this controversial topic.

            One of the scariest parts of this book for me was that most men are attracted to female adolescents, which is normal Patrick Liddle claims. The difference between pedophiles and average civilians is that the latter acts on it on their desires. But, in their defense it is hard to never get something you want so badly. Like in Bergner’s earlier chapter exploring the man with the foot fetish and his succumbing to buying a prostitute to live out his fantasy. I also thought that it must be even harder for someone with illegalized desires when you are being provoked, which I thought Roy was being by his stepdaughter. Why would she instant message her step dad and flirt with him? She also put on bathing suits, shook her butt at him, played obviously sexual games, and told him she was a “bad girl.” Obviously, men want what they cannot have and the mystery of it all entices them even more. It really makes you think about your own experiences with your parents/adults and what can be perceived as sexual, when it is really not… or is. There were so many times as a child I would have never known what a sexual move was and was not.

            It is sad because I do not think Roy would have ended up the way he did if it was not for his stepdaughter. There were obviously patients being treated with Roy that needed to be medicated to have no sexual urges at all to get away from their desires, but I do not think Roy was one of them. The fact that Paul Fedoroff, who believes pedophilia is linked to something gone wrong during puberty, can take a human back to pre-pubescent times and reprogram them to ‘normal’ desire is amazing. The gradual increase of hormones back into the system helps reset and develop appropriate desires. Technology and medicine today is amazing. We are starting to understand how we are who we are, but we also are starting to uncover more things wrong with us, like our attraction to horses or children.

Ashley Burger

Images from Google