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Vice Blog

LONDON - AN INTERVIEW WITH EUROPE'S MOST FAMOUS PEDOPHILES

Finding the ideal flatmate is as tough as finding the perfect partner. Some people are born messy, others can't help but be loud. And then there are those who, in spite of their inherently sweet nature and amicability, still wreck your head for no good reason. Ricardo and Martin are perfect flatmates. They live together in a small terraced house in Leiden in the Netherlands. They like Walt Disney, Star Wars and Macaulay Culkin movies circa 1989. You see, Martin Uttenbogaard (36) and Ricardo Hunefeld (22) are pedophiles. Ricardo outed himself on YouTube, and Martin ran for government on a reduce the age of consent campaign which bombed like a hot snot. Consequently they're about as recognizable and welcome in mainland Europe as Josef Fritzl. They invited me around for tea and biscuits just before Christmas.

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Vice: So it's Christmas next week, the time of year that kids from all over the world look forward to. What'll you guys be doing?
Martin: We want to invent, no invite some people over here and have dinner.

Those other people will be pedophiles?
Yes.

Do you mostly hang out with other pedophiles?
Sometimes we go to a movie together. It's nice to be friends but you can't be friends with all of them.
Ricardo: It's hard because we're too famous.
Martin: I used to go to the swimming pool with other pedophiles but they don't want me to come anymore in case I'm recognized. There's also a meeting of pedophiles called International Boy Love Day. It's twice a year when the moon or the sun is in a certain place but we are not allowed to go there because people are afraid that we'll get recognized.

Will you spend time with your own families over the holiday?
I have only contact with my two brothers, my sister, and my parents.

And what about their kids?
I don't have contact with other parts of the family. If they have a family celebration I'm not invited.
Ricardo: My family don't have any contact with me. But that's OK.

How did you two chaps meet?
Through the internet, via a forum. There are pedophile forums and we recognize each other from the nicknames.

How open are you about being paedophiles?
There are no boundaries to us being open.

Okay but Martin is a vegetarian and can tell the world he doesn't eat meat without fear of retribution. Is it the same with you being a pedophile?
It's the same.

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Is it not dangerous for you as well-known pedophile?
Martin: People from the extreme right put flyers all over the neighbouhood. I got bricks through my windows and very angry people at the door. They were scary times. It felt like I was trapped in my house. People shouted they were going to kill me. You'd call the police but they always came after 15 minutes.

What about the police, are they on your side?
Most of them are OK. But the real problem is that it always takes a long time for them to come and the police station isn't very far. I have a camera and I film what is happening so I can tell the police what the people who throw rocks look like.

Have any of them actually got through the door?
There is a boy who's 16 who still comes and kicks at the door; kids when they see me run away or shout names but it's nearly a year since my windows were last smashed. People shout at me from car windows or sometimes in the supermarket, but it's not as bad as it was when I was in the middle of the election campaign.

What do you do for a living, Ricardo?
Ricardo: I was a streetmaker.

Sweetmaker? Like sweets?
No, streets. Bricks. I made streets and then I was fired for being a pedophile. So your boss found out you were a paedophile, was this after you made the YouTube flick?
My boss knew it half a year before I lost my job and it was no problem. But with his girlfriend it was a problem. She found out when I went on YouTube. I went to court and the judge said that I was illegally fired so technically I'm still working for my boss but he doesn't pay me. And I couldn't get welfare either because they said I was still employed. Once I get money I can go look for other work.

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Do you really think you'll get another job?
No.

Why on earth did you make the video?
I wanted to be honest. I don't like secrets. What was the reaction on YouTube, did you get any support from other pedos?
From some, but it was more hate mail.

Were you scared shitless?
Yeah, very.

When did you realise you were paedophiles?
When I was 13.
Martin: When I was 12. I realized I was interested in younger boys but also older men, but I didn't find older men attractive. I liked to be found attractive by older men and fantasized about that.
Ricardo: When I was 13 I always fantasised about boys who were 5 years younger than me.

So if neither of you were attracted to older men as kids, don't you think pedophilia is a bit one-sided?
No, it's both sided.
Martin: A lot of boys and girls learn that it's not good to have a relationship with older people and that affects it. People in the 80s had those relationships more than now, and boys liked it, just kept it secret. Boys and girls learn it's dangerous to have sex with older people because they're too young to make a judgement on the situation and physically they're too young for sex.
I don't think you can do be too young. Everything you like, no matter what age you are, you don't stop liking as you get older. It's only indoctrination that makes people not like things or feel embarrassed by them. Like if a very young child is masturbated by a granddad, people only have problems with that when they are older because it's taboo. You never have people complaining because they were on their grandfather's lap or he hugged me. It's only when people make it a taboo.

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Being hugged by your granddad and being wanked by your granddad are very different things?
It's only a taboo when you make it a taboo. And then people have mental problems, even though they liked it a lot when it was happening. They grow up and have mental problems because they think it was wrong. Okay, for the sake of continuity lets assume you're right and it is all just taboo, how do you know when a child is ready for sex?
Ricardo: It's just like a healthy sexual relationship. You have to talk about it.
In my opinion the way society treats sexuality is the problem because children know what they like and dislike. They have their own opinion when they go to supermarkets, so why not with sexuality? If that's the case you'd have far less rape. Parents suppress children and control them when I believe most people are horny about their own children.
Martin: But we weren't talking about incest.
Ricardo: So? That's what I think… But friendship must come in the first place, then sex can come after that.

But you can get kids to do anything, they'd run to the shops in exchange for a piece of fluff. You can manipulate them because they look up to adults and they're stupid. How can you really know that having anal sex with a kid is what they want?
If he says, "I'm ready," then OK.
Martin: When you know a child and a child knows you, and you both know that you want that then you can start experimenting. It's no good when you hurt the child of course, but if you don't that's OK.

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On your web site it says you want to reduce the age of consent to 12. Why stop there? Why not 8 or 6 or 4 years of age?
In the end we want to abolish the age of consent totally but that's only when sexual taboos have been abolished. At 6 years of age you think it's nice to be touched on the genitals but when you are older you think it's a bad thing and you feel it was wrong. Society has to change first.

Do you think it will change?
Ricardo: I don't think so.

So your situation is pretty much hopeless?
Martin: I have a different opinion. He is very skeptical, but I think it will change when people think about child sexuality as a positive thing. Right now they see it as a bad thing. When they see it as not damaging their life, then it will be possible. What benefits do you think a child can get from a sexual relationship with an adult?
I think there are a lot. They learn not to be afraid of strangers. Most strangers aren't bad guys. the traffic is much more dangerous than the chance people will do something to you. People are now afraid to hug children, especially men. People only know their parents or children, not adults who are on an emotional level with them. They say that all pedophiles rape children but that's not the case.

But having sex with a kid makes you a rapist.
Ricardo: I don't agree.
Martin: I think sexuality is a positive thing, but there are a lot of problems with people who think we spend all day standing by football fields staring at children playing.

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Do you ever do that?
Ricardo: No. On your website there's a lot of pedophile short stories that revolve around precocious kids tricking adults into sex. Are seductive kids the cause of pedophilia?
It is very common.
Martin: When you meet a boy it's very common that he tries something once they realize you are open to it, even if they are straight it's very common that they want to experiment. Then you have to turn them down. It happened to me with a 12-year-old and I had to turn him down and the sad thing is that as he gets older he could think that he did something wrong.

You're both into boys. What does the gay community think of you?
There used to be a brotherhood. But every time the gays got more rights the pedophiles got less. The gay community is afraid of the link between the two communities. A lot of older gay people aren't against us as they were oppressed like us but the young gay people hate pedophiles. They forget they were suppressed before as a group. Do you think they're hypocrites?
They say pedophilia is so bad but if they see a 15-year-old boy walking by and he looks good they all want to have a sexual relationship with him. You probably can't say this to me while I'm recording but are you either of you in a relationship with a kid at the moment?
We are not active. I think nowadays when you have a sex with a young child you can bring the child a lot of problems. The child isn't allowed to talk about it and if they do you can go to prison. They indoctrinate the child and the police ask them what happens and that's all damaging to the child.
Ricardo: I have contact with a little boy but there's no sex. It's only playing football.

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How old is this little boy?
He's 13. Will it become more?
No I don't want more.

What do you talk about when you're playing football?
Everything. He knows everything about me.

Is he gay?
No. He's pure hetero. And do his parents know?
A little. So, a lot of the attraction of being a paedophile is in having friendships with kids, not just sex?
Sexuality is less, friendship is important.

Really?
Martin: Well even with heteros, you have people who only want to fuck and then people who want relationships. I want a relationship. And if sex were allowed I'd only want it if the child was interested. We're not just interested in fucking children.

OK, I'm looking around your room here and I see lots of children's DVDs, toys, stuffed animals and a Millennium Falcon. Are you guys just big kids yourselves?
Ricardo: Pedophiles are on the same level as children. That's why they are more capable of knowing what's going on with children.
Martin: I believe that grown-up people act like grown-ups because they have to. But that's changing because there are more and more grown-up people who are interested in comics and toys. There are a lot of grown-up people who are into Smurfs and dinky cars. Sure, but they don't eat them or get them stuck up their noses, do they?
Ricardo: Maybe secretly they're playing.
Martin: I collected lots of Star Wars as a kid. When I was older I still collected them but don't play with them.

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But it's like your development has stopped if you still play with toys at a certain age.
Yeah, a lot of people say there was something wrong with our youth and that's why we stopped at that level emotionally, but we both had perfectly normal childhoods.
Ricardo: I like Walt Disney movies but that doesn't make me a child.

Me too, but unlike kids, you don't believe in mermaids or singing teacups, do you?
Martin: It's not so black and white. A lot of adults have an inner child.
Ricardo: Adults think children are 100 percent childish and you can't have serious conversation with them, but that's too much.
Martin: I believe every adult has gay feelings and pedophile feelings. It's different from person to person and it can also change during a lifetime a bit. In Greek society it was very common to have sex with children and have a wife. In Greece it was illegal to have sex with children under 12 unless they were a slave. You can say all you want about the golden age of pedophilia in Greece, but they were still rapists according to Greek law.
Yes, but the point I want to make is all those grown-up men, it was very common.

But it was rape. Just because a crime was prevalent in the past is no vindication for it in the present.
But that's not the point. A lot of people had both orientations. There are societies where pedophile relationships are common. Like in Africa. Cholera is common in Africa. Anyway, what do you think of celebrity pedophiles like Michael Jackson and Gary Glitter?
The problem with Michael Jackson is that he doesn't say he's a pedo. So he isn't doing anything good for pedophiles. Gary Glitter's the same. He says he's not a pedophile. And he's advertising going to Vietnam to have sex with children. So even if he is a pedo, then he's not a good example.

Is there a type of pedophile gaydar?
Ricardo: No.
Martin: It's not possible.
Ricardo: Especially not in this time because people are so scared.
Martin: Pedophiles aren't interested in sex with each other so they don't look at each other. Gay people have their way. They talk differently or dress differently. Pedophiles try and look normal. I don't think there are any clues.

Have you seen the Southpark episode about paedophilia?
Yes, I don't remember it so well. Well Cartman's pissed off that all his buddies are immature, so he decides to go online and find some adult friends. He meets a bunch of guys from NAMBLA and long story short, they befriend Cartman and the rest of the Southpark kids, and then try and fuck them.
I've heard something about it but I believe it wasn't allowed in the Netherlands. I saw it but it's not my kind of humor. They make it laughable and that's better than being hysterical but they also make it a bad thing. And they say you want to fuck children over and over.

Do you have a type that you go for?
Ricardo: Blond.
Martin: Not too fat, not too skinny. Heteros have females who are very popular and pedos have the same. We have forums with boys in swimsuits and most pedos have the same tastes.

Are there any celebrity kids that you fancy?
Ricardo: Macaulay Culkin, but he's now older.

He's older than you now.
Martin: I like the boy from Who's The Boss, the youngest boy. He's older than me perhaps. I liked him when he was a boy.

What do you say to people who think the pair of you are monsters?
Well that means we're not human beings. It means you're a good guy and we're totally bad and that's not true. It's better to call some acts monstrous but not the person.

CONOR CREIGHTON