Homosexuality without cant

PERSONAL COLUMN SIMON RAVEN

A few years ago there was a whole clutch of films about male homosexuality. Each of them was advertised as a 'deeply sensitive, responsible [etc, etc] study of this explosive, forbidden [etc, etc] subject.' In each case the homosexual hero was represented as being racked by moral guilt and a sense of social alienation. There were long and lachrymose scenes in which grown men wailed that they were oh so lonely, that they craved for under- standing of their 'problem,' that they would sacrifice an arm or a leg if only they could be cured of their `illness' and settle down to raise a family in a dear little semi-detached. If I remember rightly, one hero turned out to be 'incurable' and put his head in the oven; while two more went through some process of brain- washing and emerged with ghastly grins to totter into the arms of the girls who had been `waiting and hoping.'

• It would appear, then, that these films had a certain set of assumptions in common— assumptions intended to make them acceptable • to the censor and saleable to a supposedly normal public: 1. Practising homosexuals (with certain excep- tions, such as blackmailers) are for the most part decent men who have had some unfortu- nate childhood experience (e.g., the stranger in the park).

2. They pass lives of total misery and never have a single moment of sexual pleasure which isn't paid for by ten hours of frenetic remorse and a hecatomb of broken crockery.

3. They have no sense of humour at all— indeed, in their situation such a thing would be plainly blasphemous.

4. Almost all of them want to be cured and dream only of the pram in the hall.

5. Those who cannot be cured should be regarded with condescending pity.

6. The unregenerate few who do not even try to be cured—those, that is, who make the best of their predicament and positively contrive to enjoy themselves—are beneath contempt and as near criminal as makes no odds.

These, then, were the assumptions which it was deemed necessary to parade if censors and audiences were to stomach films about homo- sexuality. Now, the interesting thing is to notice how much the whole matter is over- simplified on the one hand and over-compli- cated on the other. In order to simplify, there is no attempt to indicate that a man can be a practising bisexual, capable, that is, of taking on both his own sex and the other con- currently; and there is no discussion (under- standably, perhaps) of the great variety of sexual methods and dispositions involved, which range from outright sodomy, active or passive (and in either case very rare), to mere mutual masturbation.

Even more notable than these simplifications, however, are the superfluous complexities which are introduced: the refinements of moral agony, the hysterical search for psychological solutions, and, above all, the everlasting insis- tence that all homosexuals were originally the victims of some searing and traumatic per- sonal calamity.

All this, of course, serves only to hide the real issues under mountains • of hypocritical verbiage. And yet what one has to realise is that both the simplifications and the com- plexities do correspond very closely to the views held by the more educated sections of the general public—the sections at which these films were aimed. It is just this combination of prac- tical ignorance and theoretically enlightened cant which prevails whenever the subject gets an airing, whether in the quality press or the House of Commons. What is worse, the glutinous attitudes which professional do- gooders adopt CConsider the suffering and humiliation of these unhappy men') are often encouraged by homosexuals themselves, of the mealier kind, who enjoy posing as tragic figures. It is time to set the record straight, to reduce the whole affair to the essential truths which underlie it; and with this purpose in mind I wish to advance a few concrete ob- servations which are based on my own per- sonal reading and experience.

'All virile societies,' writes Mary McCarthy a propos the Florentines, 'see boys as objects of desire.' And there you have it in one. Men will find younger men physically pleasing, not because of some terrible occur- rence years ago in the woodshed, but because young males, like young femaleg, just are physically pleasing. They have beautiful faces, clear skins, delectable flesh and well-shaped limbs. They are a pleasure to look at, as every- one admits; they are also a pleasure to touch, when legitimate occasion presents; presumably, therefore, they are a pleasure to take to bed.

The above is a straightforward statement of an attitude that has been common to many young males in many times and places. (It was certainly my own.) Men today, women tomorrow : men as long as one's friends re- main young and appetising, women when one gets a little older and wants to settle down. So come one's twenty-fifth summer, kiss the men goodbye, and away to the women, of whom one has already, of course, had some experience. Or, if one decides that men really suit one best after all (so much less demand- ing) by all means stay with them—though from now on the ranks of one's coevals will grow thinner and tattier, and if one resorts to one's juniors there will be problems (of dignity not least) which it will take much charm, intelli- gence and money to overcome.

But (it will be urged), however much such attitudes may appeal to myself, what warrant have I for claiming that they are also common among young men at large? Well I must admit that it would be truer to say that they were common enough but are so only in non- Christian countries. Let me compromise by suggesting that they are attitudes often to be found among healthy young men who are not inhibited by religions or social factors. When Christianity arose, inhibition arose . . . and hence all our troubles..

A pagan boy of good family (whether of Minoan Crete, fifth century Athens, Hellenis- tic Asia or Imperial Rome) would be care- fully watched until he was about sixteen, lest he be troubled by bullies or pimps; there- after he would have various male lovers (if he wanted to), and while so doing he would enjoy public approval, or at any rate tolerance, pro- vided he did not pick on boys much younger than himself or allow himself to be picked on by men much older; finally he would go to a wife (with or without a few fond looks backward).

A sensible and practical system—but Chris- tianity was having none of it, because the Christian God required that sex should only take place within marriage and with a view to procreation. This not only ruled out homo- sexuality on moral grounds, but also, by in- sisting on the obligatory connection between sex and begetting, stigmatised homosexual pro- ceedings as unnatural because sterile. Although this view was not unknown among pagans, it took Christianity to bring it into prominence; and prominent it has ever since remained in Christian countries. The prohibition was abso- lute. So what now of the blithe young men of whom I have posited that they amuse them- selves equally happily with either sex, as cir- cumstance and the inclination of the moment may direct?

The answer is that such young men have gone on, over the centuries, behaving in the same old way (how not, since the delights have remained as obvious as ever?), but that strong elements of guilt and circumspection have been introduced. These have tended to make the subject and practice of homosexuality far more obsessive, both for spectators and participants. A feeling has grown up that even some small homosexual incident, since it constitutes a grave moral and social trespass, commits a person to making a definite and defiant stand. 'You're one of us now,' or, from the other side of the fence, 'You're one of them.' From being a casual and commonplace distraction, or at worst a mild misdemeanour, homosexuality has become a form of outlawry, and as such is far more liable to become a permanent or pathological condition than it was when still a simple matter of personal preference. Hence all the portentous nonsense on the cinema screen, the breast-beating of parliamentarians, and the querulous, self-pitying old queens.

But in truth the time is now right to get rid of this abominable and ridiculous super- structure. The charge of being `unnatural' (i.e., of cheating-nature of new offspring) is quite beside any possible point; indeed, if the rate of increase of the population is to be the arbiter, the more people who turn homosexual the better. Although some may mutter about harmful physical habits, the only homosexual practice which could conceivably do bodily harm is that of sodomy or buggery—which is far less common between male and male than it is between male and female. The very young must, of course, be protected against exploita- tion; for the rest, however, there is not one rational argument against treating homo- sexuality as what, precisely, it is and always has been—neither a disease, a crime, nor a martyidom, but merely an alternative means of sexual gratiacation, having a substankial minority appeal