Anti-contact

Anti-contact, often abbreviated as anti-c or anti c, is an ideological stance in contact discourse. It is most often described as a belief that children and young teenagers or adolescents cannot consent to sexual or romantic relationships with significantly older people, that these older people should not approach them for sexual or romantic relationships, and/or that such sexual or relationships have a high risk of harming the younger party.

Possible variations

The anti-contact ideology is a spectrum, and people have different motivations to identify as anti-contact. Some believe the reason is at least in part connected to the physical and mental development of young people. These anti-cs usually view their contact stance as applicable to any culture and era. Others believe the reason is social, connected to the unequal status of adults and children in society and stigmatization of children’s sexuality. These people might believe contact may become acceptable in some distant future. Some of these people opt to identify instead as "neutral-contact," "pro-contact," or "anti-contact for now, neutral/pro-contact for the future," or opt out of contact labels entirely, feeling as though the currently existing ones are inadequate.

There also exists a significant difference in terms of the age where anti-cs draw a boundary. Moderate anti-cs support 16 as an ideal age of consent, while radicals can go as high as 25, and others' views fall within this range. Americans in this discourse tend to stick to the number 18, being under an assumption that this age is a universal milestone in human development.

Common misconceptions

"No-contact"

Conflation of the terms "NOMAP" and "anti-contact map" has led some people to mistakenly call these parts of the map community "no-contact maps" or "non-contact maps." This wording periodically leads to unfortunate associations with non-contact abuse (abuse without physical touching) or no-contact policy (disengagement from unwanted people, often past abusers).

Interactions with children

Being anti-contact does not imply abstaining from casual social interactions with children or teenagers. For example, looking after young relatives or liking a child's post on social media. Anti-contact maps have the same variety of lifestyles as other people and are not bound by more limitations than someone who is not attracted to underage people.

Legalism

Not all anti-contact people define their ideology through obeying the law. The age of consent is not universal and varies from 12 to 20 depending on the country and the behavior in question. While there are anti-contact people who genuinely believe all laws are morally justified, most think the age of consent needs to be altered in some places. Some anti-contact people believe no state-enforced laws should exist at all, but still believe there should be horizontal attempts to prevent contact, as well as a general consensus on which age gaps would be considered harmful or risky.

Criticism

USA-centrism

Since the bulk of online MAP groups are English-speaking, U.S. views and morals periodically take over the discourse. In this case, they are the source of the conflation of the concepts "child," "teenager," "adolescent," "person below 18," "underage person," and "minor," as well as "age of consent" and "age of majority."

Punitive attitudes

Radical anti-contacts tend to lean on the side of harsh interventions when it comes to protecting children from CSA and do not consider the risks of exposing CSA victims to non-sexual abuse from society. This has led to the entirety of the anti contact movement being stereotyped as pro prison and anti youth liberation.

Prominent groups

One of the most known groups of anti contact maps is an online forum called Virtuous Pedophiles. It was founded by Nick Devin and Ethan Edwards in 2012. The official rules of the forum states that "the discussion in the group takes as its premise that sexual activity between adults and children is wrong", and discussions about legalizing sexual contact between adults and children are prohibited.
Map Support Club, founded by Ender Wiggin aka Enderphile, is a more modern chat alternative that is inclusive of teenage maps.