Paraphilias and the Internet
Al Cooper · 2013
According to the DSM-IV, the primary characteristic of a paraphilic disorder is that the afflicted individual experiences intense, recurrent erotically arousing fantasies and urges of an aberrant nature. In the case of the paraphilic disorder of pedophilia, those sexualized urges are about children; in exhibitionism, about public genital exposure; in transvestitic fetishism, about dressing in clothing of the opposite gender; and in paraphilic coercive disorder, about raping others. The Internet&s;s "triple-A engine" of accessibility, affordability, and assumed anonymity (Cooper, 1998) allows for exploration of many sorts of paraphilic desires with little sense of embarrassment and often with the illusion of personal security.