possibly integration into American life: the immigrants so anxious to abandon their European culture which was to them a stigma; the Jews, who found in their Talmudic codes a reinforcement of sexual repudiation; the Negroes, freed from slavery and desirous of appearing "good" and "moral" and "pure" in the sense that these words were being used and misused; and the Catholics, who succeeded in wresting the leadership from the puritan Protestants in the antisexual culture.

It was in this milieu that sex became the unmentionable subject in nineteenth century America. Birth control information dared not be disseminated through the mails; and the education of young people in things sexual consisted in the main of long sermons by ignorant hypocrites who warned that masturbation would lead to insanity.

A revolutionary change has taken place in America during the decades since the First World War. American thinking has begun to catch up with American practice. The activities which were indulged in so frequently by men and women, never admitted, always frowned upon, seldom discussed or written about, now became topics of open conversation. No longer did people suffer great shock when they learned the elementary facts of life.

Thus, the changing social scene made it possible for leadership to arise that would provide the scientific data, in psychological and sociological areas, to substantiate the amorphous ideas beginning to formulate in the minds of the people, and at the same time such leadership could capture the imagination of large segments of the population. For America has been a land where the masses move slowly, seldom more than passingly alert to an issue, and always seeking to designate the responsibility in the hands of a hero, a movement, a leader. As Gunnar Myrdal reported:

The idea of leadership pervades American thought and collective action. The demand for "intelligent leadership" is raised in all political camps, social and professional groups, and, indeed, in every collective activity centered around any interest or purpose. If an ordinary American faces a situation which he recognizes as a "problem" without having any specific views as to how to "solve" it, he tends to resort to two general recommendations: one, traditionally, is "education"; the other is "leadership." The demand for leadership... is a result less of a conscious ideological principle than of a pragmatic approach to those activities which require the cooperation of many individuals. Until a few years ago, this need for leadership, so acutely felt by all those striving to break through the morass of misinformation, hypocrisy, and censorship, was left unanswered. Then the report of Kinsey and his associates was published. This book, bombshell that it was in the complacent scene of puri-

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