structural:reformatting, linguistic:voice_change
Association with NAMBLA

Ginsberg was a supporter and member of the North American Man/Boy Love Association (NAMBLA), a pedophilia and pederasty advocacy organization in the United States that works to abolish age of consent laws and legalize sexual relations between adults and children. Saying that he joined the organization "in defense of free speech", Ginsberg stated: "Attacks on NAMBLA stink of politics, witchhunting for profit, humorlessness, vanity, anger and ignorance... I'm a member of NAMBLA because I love boys too—everybody does, who has a little humanity". In 1994, Ginsberg appeared in a documentary on NAMBLA called Chicken Hawk: Men Who Love Boys (playing on the gay male slang term ' chickenhawk '), in which he read a "graphic ode to youth". He read his poem "Sweet Boy, Gimme Yr Ass" from the book Mind Breaths.

In her 2002 book Heartbreak, Andrea Dworkin claimed Ginsberg had ulterior motives for allying with NAMBLA. In reference to his onetime friend Dworkin, Ginsberg stated:

I've known Andrea since she was a student. I had a conversation with her when I said I've had many young affairs, 16, 17, or 18. I said, 'What are you going to do, send me to jail?' And she said, 'You should be shot.' The problem is, she was molested when she was young, and she hasn't recovered from the trauma, and she's taking it out on ordinary lovers.