CORRECTION, July 20, 2023: A previous version of this article misstated Noah Berlatsky’s arguments in a piece published by the Prostasia Foundation. He argued that destigmatizing pedophilia or “sexual attraction to minors” would reduce child sexual abuse. The Western Journal apologizes to Mr. Berlatsky, the Prostasia Foundation and our readers.
The author of a recent hit piece published by Bloomberg that questioned the motives of the box office hit “Sound of Freedom,” which highlighted the plight of children trafficked for sex, previously defended pedophilia.
Noah Berlatsky criticized the film on Saturday for relying on what he called “tired Hollywood tropes.”
Among those tropes are that “bad guys are unremittingly evil, and the good guys are sensitive and unfailingly virtuous.”
Berlatsky, who portrayed the film as “controversial,” tried to paint the child sex trade as being more nuanced than it is shown in “Sound of Freedom.”
The smash hit tells the story of former Homeland Security operative Tim Ballard and his fight to save two children from the chains of slavery.
“The film is controversial because the man the movie is about, former Homeland Security operative Tim Ballard, and the actor who plays him, Jim Caviezel, both have links to QAnon,” Berlatsky wrote.
He added, “So, is Sound of Freedom a QAnon dog whistle, or is it just another thriller? The answer is that — whatever the filmmaker’s intentions — it functions as both.”
While he attempted to downplay the dangers of strangers trafficking children for sex, Berlatsky dug deep.
He wrote, “The Counter-Trafficking Data Collaborative, which collects information from around the world, found that 67% of the children who are sexually trafficked are 15 to 17 years old rather than young children. In 41% of the cases, a family member was involved.”
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The writer additionally claimed that some victims of trafficking carry “stories of addiction, disowned LGBTQ+ people and trading sex on the street to survive.”
Berlatsky has previously written articles for a group called the Prostasia Foundation.
The group says its mission combines “zero tolerance of child sexual abuse,” with a “commitment to human and civil rights and sex positivity.”
In one article from 2021, Berlatsky complained about a stigma around pedophiles.
He worried that some are “vilifying” people that an author he once interviewed, Allyn Walker, referred to as “minor-attracted people”. He argued such people should not be ostracized but accepted and offered treatment.
Berlatsky wrote:
“Stigmatizing pedophiles or MAPs makes it harder for pedophiles to seek help, which puts children at risk. And it distracts our attention from the most prevalent forms of child abuse and child sexual abuse, which also puts children at risk. As long as we are focused on stigmatizing pedophiles, we will fail to sufficiently recognize and condemn the actions which harm children.”
As independent reporter Andy Ngo reported the author once tweeted, “Pedophiles are essentially a stigmatized group. Certain people get designated as deviants, people hate them.”
The person who wrote this Bloomberg opinion piece is leftist activist Noah Berlatsky @nberlat. He was the spokesperson for M.A.P. (minor-attracted person) advocacy group, Prostasia. In 2017, he tweeted that pedophiles are a stigmatized group who get designated as deviants for… https://t.co/SGqZ5CEqbB pic.twitter.com/6yq7LGqfgJ
— Andy Ngô ?️? (@MrAndyNgo) July 17, 2023
“Sound of Freedom” had hauled in more than $85 million worldwide in only two weeks and in limited theaters as of Tuesday afternoon.
Bloomberg has not issued a retraction of the Berlatsky hit piece.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.