This sounds like a paraphilia, one that happens to be illegal. In short, treatment for paraphilia focuses on humanizing and rationalizing the object of your paraphilia. It is similar to the difference between saying "I want to KILL SOMEONE" and actually doing it. You don't because you wouldn't want someone to murder you, the victim is a person just like you, etc.

In this case we just say "We don't do this [sexual behavior with children] because it hurts them." You wouldn't want someone to hurt you, the potential victim is a person just like you and on and on.

We can't police thoughts, if we did, trust me it wouldn't be pretty. What we police are actions. People have a wide variety of weird, every adjusted person out there has some part of their personality they have to keep under strict control. People who can't end up in prison, people that can [control themselves] can live productive lives.

What is scary is what happens when society loosens those rules, then you get normal citizens (*cough* Serbian wars) who turn into violent rapists. They always had that part of their personality in their head, when it became acceptable to behave that way they loosen those controls and think nothing about heading into a school that has been repurposed as a rape house. Rwanda isn't full or violent machete murderers any more than the next country, until (Rwandan genocide) societies rules relax and allow that behavior.