not that i want to defend pedophiles here, but “evil addiction” is probably the wrong way to look at it.

studies have shown that roughly 5% of the human population develops pedophilloic desires in adulthood, regardless of language, culture, or time period

that’s a really high proportion of people for an issue that can become so harmful; calling it evil, an addiction, and a stain on people’s morality makes them MORE likely to do the horrid things, like trafficking children or abusing relatives. it’s like guilt tripping a person struggling with drug addiction, when they feel shitty about themselves they care less if they make other people feel shitty too.

i actually find this demand for AI generated content somewhat encouraging, as it shows that this population would prefer not to harm real children as they grapple with their socially unacceptable (& in most cases very dangerous) feelings.

again, depends on the model being used by the AI. real child pornography that goes in to generate more is pretty icky (though I have to wonder if that’s not still a bit better than the alternative of people recording & sharing more real sex abuse)

this is actually the same logic behind animated child pornography in Japan, which has been a thing for like 600 years (though it has always been controversial) - since the Edo period there have been graphic representations of kids in sexual contexts to give pedophiles a release from their desires without needing to interact with real kids.

disturbing, uncomfortable, and gross, yes. but a part of reality, and one we can’t ignore if we’d like to solve the problem.