ABSTRACT
Paedophilia inherently conserves the feature of being ego-syntonic; in other words, the perversion is not seen by the subject as being something conflictual or blameful. Regarding paedophilia as a modern problem, it is important to underline that what seems to be a new phenomenon, characteristic of our age, is actually the social organisation of paedophilia rather than the underlying mental structure. Paedophilia can be divided into two forms: the structured and the occasional. When the sexual objects are exclusively children or adolescents, we talk of structured paedophilia, which can be either heteroor homosexual. “Romantic” paedophilia is nurtured by the eroticised and idealised figure of a little boy or girl. In “cynical” paedophilia, the underlying fantasy is sadistic: a state of mental excitement is only reached through imagining maltreatment or violence on the child. The main analytic task is to help the patient to neutralise the power of this pathological structure.
