Issue date: 1/14/03 Section: Opinion

The North American Man/Boy Love Association (NAMBLA) promotes what it considers to be "mutually consensual" relationships between men and boys as young as 8 years old, according to its Web site, www.NAMBLA.org. Because of NAMBLA's promotion of these selfish relationships in which an older man sexually abuses a boy, the association has come under fire from child welfare activists, and is rightly being sued by the parents of a 10-year-old Massachusetts boy who was murdered by two men, one of whom was allegedly a member of NAMBLA, according to cnn.com. NAMBLA is being defended by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Massachusetts in a suit filed by the parents of Jeffrey Curley.

Curley was leaving his grandmother's home when 25-year-old Charles Jaynes and 21-year-old Salvatore Sicari lured Curley into Jaynes' car with the bait of $50 and a new bicycle, foxnews.com reported. Curley was allegedly taken to a Boston public library, where Jaynes accessed the NAMBLA Web site before taking the boy to Jayne's house in New Hampshire. Foxnews.com also stated that after Curley resisted Jaynes' sexual advances, the 5-foot-9, 250-pound man put a gasoline-soaked rag in the boy's mouth and sat on him until he died. Jaynes then sexually molested the lifeless body of Jeffrey Curley, put him in a concrete-filled Rubbermaid container, and threw him into a Maine river, the Web site reported.

According to the laws of every state in America, any sexual contact of a child younger than 14 -- wanted or unwanted -- is a form of child molestation for which the perpetrator can receive jail time. Anyone advocating sexual contact with children is advocating lawlessness at the expense of children.

NAMBLA believes these are crimes without a victim, but psychologists dating back to Freud have described the ill effects molestation has on children.

The ACLU is defending NAMBLA's right to free speech as it pertains to man-boy relationships because it believes that NAMBLA's rights are protected by the First Amendment. NAMBLA's right to free speech ends when it advocates the sexual molestation of citizens who cannot defend themselves.

Jeffery Curley had no way to defend himself against Charles Jaynes. What is more distressing is that NAMBLA had at one time posted tips on ways for men to seduce young boys. The tips have since been removed from the Web site.

When speech presents a clear and present danger to others, it is no longer protected by the First Amendment. Yelling "Fire!" in a crowded theater or inciting a riot are both unprotected forms of speech, as should be any material inciting the molestation of America's youth.

The ACLU stated in taking this case that it believes it must protect the freedom of speech in controversial cases in order to protect it for all. If that was truly the case, it would not have fought against voluntary public prayer or a moment of silence across the nation. Instead, the ACLU shows how it is nothing more than a political machine working to silence prayer in the name of the First Amendment, while simultaneously working to protect the right to speak about sex between a man and a boy.

According to its Web site, "NAMBLA's goal is to end the extreme oppression of men and boys in mutually consensual relationships." The extreme oppression it is campaigning against is known as the age-of-consent-laws.

Each state has age-of-consent laws to protect its children -- not to oppress them. Age of consent is in place because children are prone to manipulation and need that law to protect them. NAMBLA's deplorable crusade to end age-of-consent laws is in reckless disregard of the safety of children, and advocates only perverted, selfish, sexual cravings. The United States must hold the welfare of children in a higher regard than sexual wishes of adults, and cannot allow NAMBLA's advocacy of child molestation to continue. The case of Curley vs. NAMBLA gives the United States the opportunity to squash a movement seeking to abuse children.

As opening arguments for the Curley case draw near, Americans need to decide for themselves what is more important -- the welfare of children, or the sexual gratification of pedophiles.

Page 1 of 1

Article Tools