Why

THE CAUSE AND CURE OF HOMOSEXUALITY

25c

WHY is a bi-monthly with a surprisingly authoritative approach to most of the subjects it treats in its pages. Naturally it is always glad to sell a copy with things like "The Cause and Cure of Homosexuality" blazing on the cover (Issue No. 7) However, the author, Villiers Gerson, was in no mood to join the lynchers when he set about gathering data for the article. In fact, the author ended up uncertain as to the cause and unwilling to state a positive cure for the "condition." There is a section which refutes the concept that homosexuals always look and act like the opposite sex. There is another on the geniuses who have been great "because of or in spite of" their deviate inclinations. The latter part of the article falls into another attempt to explain "certain types" of homosexuals and we are told of fathers who "rejected" the child and mothers who coddled too much as if no heterosexual was ever re-

jected as a child or coddled or any of the other things that are supposed to invariably make a deviate out of a "normal" person. However Gerson, in spite of his blanket statements on the causes, states that these guesses don't cover all cases and there is much research to be done. One statement (page 87) seems out of place in an otherwise conscientiously objective sketch: "Overt homosexuals also have psychological troubles." The statistics on this comment are not given. We are to assume it's true and to assume that if two men living together have no psychological troubles they're not homosexuals no matter what goes on after curfew. In dealing with the social and legal status of the homosexual, Gerson is again sane and revealing. He describes entrapment and brutality, the pressures of prejudiced society and the isolation stemming therefrom. This is no news to readers of ONE. The readers of WHY, on the other hand, must have finished the article with a distinct sense of having heard real news.

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