Was Allen Ginsberg A Pedophile?
By Bob Small
There have been a number of accusations — such as this Substack article — that Allen Ginsberg was a pedophile.
Ginsberg was a celebrated Beat poet. He died in 1997.
There is no evidence of “a smoking gun” such as someone coming forth with a claim that Ginsberg raped him while a child.
Everything is circumstantial.
Let’s start with Ginsberg’s explanation for joining NAMBLA which stands for North American Man/Boy Love Association and is an advocacy group for pedophilia.
“I joined NAMBLA in defense of free speech,” he said in an essay. “. . .NAMBLA’s a forum for reform of those laws which members deem oppressive, (it is) a discussion society not a sex club. “
And then there are the accusations by writer Andrea Dworkin — who went from being an admirer of Ginsberg to wanting him dead.
“He was exceptionally aggressive about his right to fuck children and his constant pursuit of underage boys,” she said. “I did everything I could to avoid Allen and to avoid conflict.”
In defense of Ginsberg, a lot of academic and literary celebrities who weren’t pedophiles were speaking in support of pedophiliac rights five decades ago.
Among the signers of a 1977 petition that called for sex between adults and children to be decriminalized were Michael Foucalt, Jaques Derrida, Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir.
In my senior year of high school my eighth period English Teacher, invited us to stay for a short post-class session on “Modern American Poets”. Ginsberg was the first one, followed by Lawrence Ferlinghetti, etc.
Over the years, I met Ginsburg at seminars and poetry readings, and though I never was able to present him at any of our Reading Series, I did present his husband, Peter Orlovsky, at The Painted Bride Arts Center.
I said all that to say all this — as a Philly poet, now deceased, would say– I don’t believe, a quarter of a century after his death, that we have any real proof of his pedophilia.
I do hope I’m right.
Some other websites to peruse:
Who We Are · NAMBLA
The Legacy Of Allen Ginsberg: Poet To Pedophile – Cosmoetica
Is there any proof that Allen Ginsberg was a pedophile?
‘I’m a pedophile, but not a monster’: Man writes confronting essay …
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