Helmut Kentler

Helmut Kentler (2 July 1928 – 9 July 2008) was a German psychologist, sexologist, pedophile and professor of social education at the University of Hannover.

From 1953 to 1954, he trained as an interpreter in English and French.

Afterwards, he studied psychology, medicine, education and philosophy in Switzerland and Freiburg, Germany.

During his studies, he participated in a field trial with young workers, which he documented and reflected on later in his 1959 book, Youth Work in the Industrial World.

From the late 1960s until the early 1990s, with the authorization and financial support of the Berlin Senate, Kentler placed neglected youth as foster children in the homes of single pedophile fathers with the ostensible purpose of resocializing them, while explicitly encouraging sexual contact between them.

This project was later dubbed the "Kentler Experiment" or the "Kentler Project."

Kentler later changed his mind on pedophiles having sexual contact with children, and described pedophilia as a "sexual disorder".

After graduating from high school, Kentler wanted to study theology to become a pastor.

His father insisted he undertake technical vocational training.

Kentler completed an apprenticeship as a locksmith at the Lokomotivfabrik Henschel in Kassel and subsequently studied electrical engineering at the RWTH Aachen.

After the death of his father, he withdrew from his studies in Aachen.

In 1960 he passed the main diploma examination for psychology.

After completing his studies he initially worked as a youth education officer at the Evangelische Akademie Arnoldshain.

Kentler was one of the advocates of "emancipatory" youth work and is considered a representative of sexual education of the 1960s and 1970s.

In his work as a court expert and expert on child and adolescent sexuality, he achieved recognition in professional circles.

This was a new concept for church educational work in the 1960s.

In addition to his professional duties, he worked in various fields of pedagogical practice in an advisory and teaching capacity.

In a model experiment at the end of the 1960s, Kentler placed several neglected 13 to 15-year-old boys he considered "secondary mental defectives" with pedophiles he knew, claiming this would reintegrate them into society and allow them to grow into mature adults.

Due to the criminal offense associated with it, he made this public only after its statute of limitations had expired more than a decade later.

Kentler claimed that the experiment would help the children to regain social stability through exposure to pedophiles.

He was aware that the adults would most likely perform sexual acts on the minors.

Afterwards, he worked from 1962 to 1965 as a research assistant and "first pedagogue" in the Studienzentrum Josefstal (protestant youth work) at Neuhaus am Schliersee.

The theory of emancipatory youth work, which he played a decisive role in developing, made him known nationwide.

The following year he was assistant to Klaus Mollenhauer at the PH Berlin.

Afterwards, he became head of the Department for Social Pedagogy and Adult Education at the Pedagogical Centre Berlin and from 1967 to 1974 departmental director there.

From 1970 to 1974, he sat on the pedagogical advisory board of the first Wohngemeinschaft for Trebegänger and runaway Fürsorge children at Maxdorfer Steig, sponsored by the Berlin Senate.

During the student riots in Berlin, Kentler was temporarily active as a "psychological consultant for police issues".

The sexual liberation movement of Berlin students in communes and shared flats resulted in his advocacy for emancipatory sexual education in the home.

In 1975, he received his doctorate in Hanover with the dissertation Parents learn sexual education, which also appeared as a book and reached a total circulation of 30,000 copies by the 1990s.

This was reflected scientifically in his dissertation in 1975, rendering him an expert in sexual education for the course of his professional life.

In 1976, he was appointed as a university lecturer for the training of vocational school teachers for special education at the University of Hanover, where he taught until his retirement in 1996.

From 1979 to 1982 he was president of the German Society for Social-Scientific Sexual Research; later he was on the advisory board of the Humanistische Union.

He was also a member of the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Sexualforschung.

For Helmut Kentler, theory and practice were tightly knit throughout his life.

His development of a theory of emancipatory youth work grew out of his work with adolescents and young adults during his studies and the five years he spent working in church educational institutions.

He implemented group pedagogy and teamwork in theory and practice as a trusting and respectful cooperation of pedagogues with different professional competencies, and attempted to gain insight into psychosocial connections for learning and emancipation processes for young people and adults.

At a factional hearing of the FDP in 1981 Kentler reported: "These people only endured these moronic boys because they were in love and infatuated with them."

In it, he still explicitly proclaimed his Christian faith (according to Rüdiger Lautmann in his 2008 obituary on Kentler for the Humanistische Union); in later publications, this was no longer the case.

The scandal was publicly debated in 2015 and the Senate Youth Administration commissioned the political scientist Teresa Nentwig of the University of Göttingen to investigate the incident and forward her findings to the relevant authorities.

Kentler eventually changed his mind on pedophiles having sexual contact with children, and described pedophilia as a "sexual disorder".