An academic who was forced to resign from a criminal justice assistant professorship after defending the “dignity” of “minor attracted people” has now published a paper accusing critics of gender ideology of engaging in a “moral panic.” Allyn Walker, a female-to-male transgender who identifies as non-binary, had once entertained theories about giving pedophiles “high quality child pornography” to stop offending.
Walker’s new paper, titled “Transphobic discourse and moral panic convergence: a content analysis of my hate mail,” was published by the journal Criminology in autumn of 2023 and incorporated outraged e-mails Walker had received as content.
“Recently, new social anxieties about transgender people have begun to emerge, framed as an issue of ‘grooming’—a term typically used in the context of child sexual abuse,” reads the paper’s abstract. “In this way, moral panic about transgender people seems to be merging with oft-repeated social fears about pedophilia.”
Walker first made headlines in November 2021 after she participated in an interview with activist group Prostasia – a registered 503c which has been called “pro-pedophile” for its advocacy towards legalizing child-like sex dolls, and for routinely comparing pedophilia to a sexual orientation.
She was invited by the organization to discuss her book titled “A Long, Dark Shadow: Minor Attracted People and Their Pursuit of Dignity,” in which she features the perspectives of 42 individuals who describe themselves as having pedophilic desires. According to Walker, “a large takeaway from my book was that public stigma against MAPs can inadvertently increase child sexual abuse by discouraging those at risk of offending from seeking help.”
In the interview with Prostasia, Walker stated that she prefers to use the term “minor attracted people” out of consideration for the feelings of those who wish to sexually abuse children, noting “… I think it’s important to use terminology for groups that members of that group want others to use for them.”
She further stated that “MAP advocacy groups like B4U-Act have advocated for use of the term, and they’ve advocated for it primarily because it’s less stigmatizing than other terms like pedophile.” B4U-Act was founded in 2003 by convicted child rapist Michael Melsheimer for the explicit purposes of normalizing pedophilia as a sexuality and distracting from safeguarding efforts.
In Melsheimer’s own words, he wanted to ensure B4U-Act was never associated with the “prevention of offending.” Melsheimer died in 2010, but is considered a respected member of the “boy love community” to this day. Surprisingly, Walker appears to be unaware of B4U-Act’s history and has argued that increased acceptance of individuals with pedophilic desires should be promoted as a strategy to prevent sexual abuse.
“Using a term that communicates who someone is attracted to doesn’t indicate anything about the morality of that attraction,” Walker told Prostasia. “From my perspective, there is no morality or immorality attached to attraction to anyone because no one can control who they’re attracted to at all.”
As news of Walker’s interview went viral, copies of Walker’s PhD dissertation quickly began to circulate, showing Walker had entertained theories regarding allowing pedophiles to access “high quality child pornography” in belief it may reduce offending, stating, “Child pornography as a harm reduction technique has previously been theorized to be a potential strategy for MAPs to maintain abstinence from sexual contact with children.”
In order to argue that outrage over both MAP activism and gender identity ideology constitutes a “moral panic convergence,” Walker’s most recent paper presents a content analysis of 231 letters and e-mails she received after the wider public became aware of her advocacy work on behalf of self-identified pedophiles.
“The information contained in my hate mail can help us further understand anti-queer and anti-transgender attitudes in our current era, as well as how media can blur the boundaries between multiple moral panics, converging them together,” Walker writes, before highlighting some of the most vitriolic examples of e-mails she had received.
Though some messages were littered with anti-gay slurs and vulgar language, referring to Walker as a “pervert,” “pedo,” and a “child molester,” others took a more rational approach. One e-mail, allegedly written by a survivor of sexual abuse, asked for university officials to investigate Walker’s research.
“I would respectfully ask that you look into the university’s relationship with Dr Walker. Dr Walker’s rhetoric, while on the surface is said to have the intention of making it easier to identify and prevent child sexual abuse, I think it is a dangerous blur to a clear moral line of right and wrong,” the e-mail reads.
“I would encourage this research to continue, but I am concerned that Dr Walker’s past life, personal choice to go against the biological nature of our species has biased Dr Walker’s perspective. This bias has caused Dr Walker to normalize a mental state of mind that is not constructive. This research should be conducted from someone who has a track record of mental stability, not from someone who has accepted falsehoods as truth. While I deeply care about individuals, I also deeply am against untruthful ideas.”
According to Walker, “the desire to see my employment end was a major theme within my data.” Critics called for Walker to resign or to have her position in academia terminated: “much of the mail I received containing this theme was from people who indicated that my employment in academia was generally inappropriate.” Indeed, on November 24 2021, Old Dominion University President Brian O. Hemphill released a statement responding to the outcry in which he announced that Walker had been placed on administrative leave.
Walker’s rejection from the world of academia did not last long, however; the following May, the Moore Center for the Prevention of Child Sexual Abuse at Johns Hopkins announced their decision to employ her as a postdoctoral fellow.
While Walker’s views were being lambasted by the media, director of the Moore Center Elizabeth Letourneau published an op-ed in The Washington Post defending her. In the op-ed, Letourneau states she also prefers ‘minor attracted person’ to ‘pedophile.’
The Moore Center for the Prevention of Child Sexual Abuse is affiliated with the John Hopkins medical establishment, which has a long history of endorsing theories related to child sexuality in addition to promoting transsexual surgeries.
John Money, who has been credited with coining the term “gender identity,” was a sexologist and psychologist who founded the Gender Identity Clinic at Johns Hopkins University in 1966 and started an extensive research program on the medical treatment of sexual paraphilias and on “sex reassignment” procedures.
Like many sexologists, Money believed pedophilia was a harmless sexuality which, when practiced “properly,” led to the child suffering no harm. Money’s theories on pedophilia were so sympathetic that, to this day, his work is prominently featured on the website of the North American Man-Boy Love Association (NAMBLA) – one of the longest-established pederast rights groups.
In the 1990s, Money was interviewed by Paidika, a pedophile psychology journal named after the Greek adjective for “boyish,” and has been used by pedophile rights activists to refer to the younger partner in a pederastic relationship.