FACSAFoundation.org Shattering The Silence Tour Documentary Project February 2015 Volume 3 | Page 30
others on the Left, sex by or with children was just another repressive boundary to
be swept away – and some of the most important backing came from academia.
In 1981, a respectable publisher, Batsford, published Perspectives on Paedophilia,
edited by Brian Taylor, a sociology lecturer at Sussex University, to challenge
what Dr Taylor’s introduction called the “prejudice” against child sex.
Disturbingly, the book was aimed at “social workers, community workers,
probation officers and child care workers”.
The public, wrote Dr Taylor, “generally thinks of paedophiles as sick or evil men
who lurk around school playgrounds in the hope of attempting unspecified
beastliness with unsuspecting innocent children”. That, he reassured readers, was
merely a “stereotype”, both “inaccurate and unhelpful”, which flew in the face of
the “empirical realities of paedophile behaviour”. Why, most adult-child sexual
relationships occurred in the family!
The perspectives of most, though not all, the contributors, appeared strongly propae dophile. At least two were members of PIE and at least one, Peter Righton,
(who was, incredibly, director of education at the National Institute for Social
Work) was later convicted of child sex crimes. But from the viewpoint of today,
the fascinating thing about Perspectives on Paedophilia is that at least two of its
contributors are still academically active and influential.
Prof Ken Plummer, left, and former PIE head Tom O'Carroll
Ken Plummer is emeritus professor of sociology at Essex University, where he has
an office and teaches courses, the most recent scheduled for last month. “The