The online magazine Salon has tried to normalize pedophilia before. And now they are at it again. This time, they have once again brought back Todd Nickerson, an admitted pedophile who claims he has “never touched a child,” is trying yet again to justify his attraction to children through an interview on Salon.

This pedophile is not a monster. Todd Nickerson on attraction, love and a life of loneliness https://t.co/jCkvTbLOZP

— Salon (@Salon) May 17, 2016

Nickerson, now 43, says he has never abused a child and never will. He is involved in a website called “Virtuous Pedophiles” that provides an online discussion forum for people that are attracted to children but do not want to act on it.

“My purpose is to go out and educate people, allowing people like myself to come out and be open,” he said. “Society makes it harder by persecuting us because a lot of us become fatalistic.”

“We start to think it doesn’t matter what we do or say they’re going to hate us anyway.”

If you can stomach it, he gave an interview on video.

Yes, Todd Nickerson, you are a monster. Anyone who believes that a five year old girl is making a pass at him is a monster (which is part of Nickerson’s story). Anyone who sees children as sexual objects and expects to be pitied for it is a monster.

Can you imagine @Salon publishing a sympathetic article about a racist who isn't a monster because he restrains himself from lynching?

— ryuge (@0ryuge) May 17, 2016

And for someone who swears that he’d never touch a child, he admits on other websites that the only thing keeping him from doing so is the law.

In his Salon piece, Nickerson states unequivocally that it is wrong for a pedophile to act on his urges. But the detailed worldview outlined in his internet forum history says otherwise. Really, the only villains in Nickerson’s story are society and parents. Without these harmful influences, children could finally act on their urges to engage in relationships with pedophiles.

So what if society does change? What if we do become more sympathetic to pedophilia? Nickerson is clear:

Once again, I’ve always maintained that, if we lived in a different, more sex-positive society and it were legal to do so, I WOULD engage in sex play with a child that I loved if she wanted it and initiated it. I will never deny that.

That’s just what he does end up denying in his piece for Salon.

So, Todd Nickerson is an admitted pedophile who would sexually abuse children if he could only find a legal way to do it. And he asks for pity because people call him a monster.

Nickerson’s perversions aside, what on earth is the purpose of Salon giving him a platform yet again? This is a company that has never turned a profit, and has only survived by getting cash handouts from its board members. Subscription services on the site have failed to raise enough revenue to keep it out of the red (though their most recent spin was “hey, we lost LESS money than last year!”). There are really only a couple of reasons why Salon would keep bringing Nickerson back and promoting his “Virtuous Pedophilia.”

Either 1) they are determined to drive up their views with “shock journalism,” which might lead to more clicks, which allows them to show those numbers to advertisers, to keep revenue flowing, or 2) the view of Salon is that pedophilies should be pitied, and perhaps given greater leeway, since they are so deeply misunderstood. Maybe they think pedophilia should be legal.

@Salon and it pisses me off to no end that Salon is pedaling the "not all pedophiles" crap and trying to make us sympathize with them.

— Patty Politics (@youngblackcon) May 17, 2016

imagine being this desperate for clicks https://t.co/Vvr1XeMzoK

— RavenKingSage (@RK_Sage) May 17, 2016

So, which is it, Salon? Desperate for clicks, or do you actually champion Todd Nickerson as a poor, misunderstood man who just longs to have sex with five year olds? It has to be one or the other, and both are despicable.