Remarks on paedophilia and child sexual abuse
Source: Wikipedia Article on Milo_Yiannopoulos YouTube; retrieved on 2020-04-30
In February 2017, it was announced that Yiannopoulos would address the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC). A conservative website, Reagan Battalion, then posted video of 2015 and 2016 clips of YouTube interviews at the request of a 16-year-old Canadian student who was opposed to Yiannopoulos' CPAC address.
In the interview in a January 2016 episode of the podcast Drunken Peasants, Yiannopoulos stated that sexual relationships between 13-year-old boys and adult men and women can “happen perfectly consensually”, because some 13-year-olds are, in his view, sexually and emotionally mature enough to consent to sex with adults; he spoke favourably both of gay 13-year-old boys having sex with adult men and straight 13-year-old boys having sex with adult women. He used his own experience as an example, saying he was mature enough to be capable of giving consent at a young age. He also stated that “paedophilia is not a sexual attraction to somebody 13 years old, who is sexually mature” but rather that “paedophilia is attraction to children who have not reached puberty.” Later in the interview, after his previous comments received some pushback from the hosts, he stated: “I think the age of consent law is probably about right, that is probably roughly the right age … but there are certainly people who are capable of giving consent at a younger age, I certainly consider myself to be one of them.”
Yiannopoulos subsequently held a press conference, at which he said he had been the victim of child abuse, and that his comments were a way to cope with it. He declined to identify his abusers or discuss the incidents in any detail. He characterised his comments as the “usual blend of British sarcasm, provocation and gallows humour”, and dismissed the allegation that he endorses child molestation. He alleged that the video had been edited to give a misleading impression, and stated, “I will not apologise for dealing with my life experiences in the best way that I can, which is humour. No one can tell me or anyone else who has lived through sexual abuse how to deal with those emotions. But I am sorry to other abuse victims if my own personal way of dealing with what happened to me has hurt you.” In response to the controversy, Simon & Schuster cancelled its plans to publish his autobiography in June 2017. Media outlets reported on 20 February that Breitbart was considering terminating Yiannopoulos' contract as a result of the controversy. Yiannopoulos resigned from Breitbart on 21 February, reportedly under pressure to do so.
Yiannopoulos was later criticized for attending Hollywood “boat parties” and “house parties” in which boys he described as “very young – very young” were sexually abused, but failing to report the abusers to the authorities or to identify them during an appearance on The Joe Rogan Experience. When asked about this by Ryan Lizza of New York magazine, Yiannopoulos said he “didn’t check anyone’s I.D.s.” and that he “had no idea what the ages of any of those people at the parties were.” He stated that when he said “very young” he was assuming that they were sixteen or seventeen. He reiterated that he doesn’t “advocate for any illegal behavior” or excuse it. When, on 10 March, an additional video emerged in which he said on a 2015 episode of Gavin McInnes’s show that child sexual abuse is “really not that big a deal. You can’t let it ruin your life,” Yiannopoulos was criticized for mocking child sexual abuse victims by calling them “whinging selfish brats” for “suddenly” remembering they were abused, and “suddenly” deciding it was a problem, 20 years after the abuse occurred. He also stated that a disproportionate number of paedophiles are homosexual.
Interview with TJ Kirk
Source: Transcript from video < DP #193 | MILO YIANNOPOULOS ON DP! - THE SITUATION! >; YouTube; Streamed live on: 4 January 2016
Transcribed by JUMIMA.
TJ Kirk: If I knew someone around my age that was like ‘I just had sex with a thirteen year old,’ I would be creeped out, honestly.
[Milo Yiannopoulos:] What’s your age?
TJ Kirk: I’m almost 35.
Yiannopoulos: Okay, well I’m talking about 28-year-olds.
Paul: [Sarcastic:] Well that changes everything.
Yiannopoulos: I’m guessing, because I’ve never told this publicly, that you won’t hear that in this video. We’re talking about 13/25, 13/28. These things do happen, perfectly consensually. Often, by the way, it’s the women who suffer in these things, because what normally happens in schools, very often is, it’s an older woman with a younger boy, and the boy is the predator in this situation. The boy is like: ‘Let’s see if I can fuck the gym teacher’ or ‘Let’s see if I can fuck the hot maths teacher.’ And he does. The women fall in love with these nubile young men, these athletic young boys in their prime. And end up having their lives destroyed. Having to move schools, move the country, whatever. I would say, in the situation I described in the Joe Rogan show, I was very definitely the predator on both occasions. You know, as offensive as some people will find that, I don’t much care. That was certainly my experience. I was very much the predator in these situations.
TJ Kirk: So Ben (William Berry), - Hold on Milo, one second - Ben, you said you’d be creeped out if someone came to you and said they had sex with a 13-year-old. But what if they said, you know, the 13-year-old, they were the predator.
Ben: They came on to me.
TJ Kirk: They came on to me.
Ben: I mean, it’s really, is it that unbelievable if you have some really horny 13-year-old that like just, like coming at your heart… […]
Yiannopoulos: You know the point about all this stuff is. We get hung up on abuse. This is a controversial point of view, I accept, but we get hung up on this child abuse stuff to the point where we are heavenly policing, even relationships between consenting adults, graduate students and professors at universities. […]
Yiannopoulos: And I think the law is probably about right. That’s probably roughly the right age. I think it’s probably about OK. But there are certainly people who are capable of giving consent at a younger age. I certainly consider myself to be one of them. People who are sexually active younger. I think it particularly happens in the gay world, by the way. And in many cases actually, those relationships with older; this is one of the reasons why I hate the left. This stupid; one size fits all policing of culture. It’s arbitrary in an oppressive idea of consent, which totally destroys the understanding that many of us have: the complexities and subtleties and complicated nature of many relationships. You know, people are messy and complex. In the homosexual world, particularly, some of those relationships between younger boys and older men, the sort of coming of age relationships, the relationships in which those older men have helped those young boys to discover who they are, and give them security and safety, and provide them with love and a reliable rock, where they can’t with their parents. Some of those relationships are some of the most…
Paul: It sounds like catholic priests molestation to me.
Yiannopoulos: And you know what, I’m grateful for Father Michael, I wouldn’t give nearly such good head if it wasn’t for him. […]
Yiannopoulos: You’re misunderstanding what pedophilia means. Pedophilia is not a sexual attraction to somebody 13-years old, who is sexually mature. Pedophilia is an attraction to children who have not reached puberty. Pedophilia is an attraction to people who don’t have functioning sex organs yet, who have not gone through puberty, who are too young to be able to understand where their body. That is not what we’re talking about. You don’t understand what pedophilia is, if you think that I’m defending it, because I’m certainly not. […]
Yiannopoulos: I think particularly in the gay world, and outside the catholic church if that’s were some of you wanna go with this; in the gay world some of the most important, enriching and incredibly, you know, life-affirming, important shaping relationships, very often between younger boys and older men; they can be hugely positive experiences for those young boys. They can even save those young boys from desolation, from suicide, from drug addiction. All sort of things, provided that they’re consensual.
TJ Kirk: I’m gonna jump to Milo’s defense a little bit, cause I’ve read stories about people losing their virginities - like gay men losing their virginities - and most of the stories do seem to involve, you know, I was 14 and I was 15 and he was twenty-something and all this stuff, and you know, it does seem more common in that community, so, whatever. […]
Yiannopoulos (1:16:35): You’re wrong in the first place to trust the media on anything, because very very few journalists tell the truth about anything whatsoever. So I don’t know who the journalists you trust are, but the journalists I trust I can count on one hand. [… (1:17:44)] The media lies to you, the majority of journalists of these days are interested in narrative over fact. The media, and I really believe, and this what I have in common with Andrew Breitbart, I genuinely believe the media is the problem and is the root of most of the evil in our popular culture. [… (1:19:05)] One of the reasons that I’m successful, is that I try to do the opposite and I try to tell the truth at least as I see it, and I try to fact-based. What people like about me is that I work from studies and not from emotions and not from, you know, feelings and personal experience. I try to stay with data and facts, and most people find that refreshing. And I also try, you know, I’ve always in my career looked for places where people have been lied about, or where there is an underserved, you know, quiet majority who need somebody to stand up for them, who need a champion, where the powerful elites are lying about. I always thought that the purpose of journalism was to speak truth to power, was to stick it up for the voiceless, I believe that I did that in Gamergate.