From Der Kreis, November 1956

LET US BE PROUD!

Some Reflections on the Subject of Homosexuality

by L. W.

Whenever the subject of homosexuality comes up, the usual attitude is one of hostility. This stems from a persistent misunderstanding of human nature, acting as if it still felt obliged to wage war with a part of itself. Whenever he meets this attitude, the homosexual goes on the defensive. By doing so and it happens more often than any of us realizes he plays an inevitably losing game. Whatever his specific reaction may be, all too often he shows a lack of awareness of his own worth as a homosexual. He does not realize that he represents a constructive element within society. From his assumption of this attitude there comes a loss of naturalness which can be seen in all his relationships with the world around him.

There is no denying that we homosexuals are often forced to lie; a world which feels inimica! to us cannot expect that we will frankly admit to being as we are. We have to resort to warlike strategy because they make war on us! That, however. is not a solution. We need to learn to affirm ourselves, whatever the price required, in order 22

not to violate our own personality, whose naturalness and frankness ought always to be regarded as one of its beauties. I think it obvious that we would be greatly helped if we could feel solidarity with each other and would lean for support on institutions like "The Circle." But it is necessary to realize that we in no way need be ashamed of what we are.

The homosexual man loves another male. Now the love of a man for a man, independent of any strictly sexual connotation (although the impulse may come from a sexual basis) is a necessity for all social life.

In primitive societies, where the group had to struggle against a still all-powerful selfishness, homosexuality permitted social life to extend outward beyond the limit of the family circle. Homosexuals spread their influence by the mere fact of their existence and this influence was necessary to the building of groups larger than those of immediate family. This is a fact which ought to be recognized. Cortez, the great Spanish conquistador, found homosexuality generally wide-spread when he mattachine REVIEW

arrived in Mexico. It was the same in the cities where the themselves up. Hebrews' set Moses, when he banned homosexuality, did not intend to set himself up in opposition to any proper behavior of mankind, but was simply taking action against a practice which might quickly have drowned his people in the population he thought it his mission to occupy, to supplant, yes, even to exterminate.

It is obvious that homosexuality now does not need to strive for the eminent role it had in antiquity. Thanks to the progress has cohesiveness that social are not commade, all men pelled to practice it. Homosexuals themselves would not want them to. But homosexuality remains no less firmly inscribed in human nature and necessary to the very existence of the peaceful human community For those people in whom this leaning is strong enough to dictate the choice of sexual object, it only expresses the excess of a quality which, in the past, made possible the building up of huand even in man communities our own day it is what still makes social life possible.

It has been said that homoto an sexuality may be due organic cause; in that case, the individual homosexual would be biologically determined. It has also been said that homosexuality is the result of mental complexes; psychologically, that is, the homosexual would be a of that symptoms possessor could be set in a reverse direction. It has even been said that means the homosexuality is a individual has of freeing himself when he feels satiated with the

way he has been living; socially the homosexual would be seeking a new way of adapting. But what does all that signify' Are these things the causes or the consequences of homosexuality? Let us grant that it may be a question of causes, though I don't think this is generally the case. Would we then have to admit that it would be necessary to prescribe remedies, root out complexes, or transplant the individual to another social setting? Would it not rather be nature herself who alone should have the right to lead these individuals toward a proper means of not reproducing their own not kind? In a In a word, would a homosexuality then become natural means of racial, or familial, selection?

If this is so, it ought to be welcomed by all those who are overly fearful of introducing into their family strain any variant that does not correspond to the usually expected norm. Homosexuality would then be seen as a natural and free variety of eugenics, the only truly human one.

It may be, then, that along with chastity homosexuality is the only human legitimate means of birth control a contemporary problem if there ever was one!

These reflections on homosexuality seem to have some value They ought, in any case, to help us to realize that, far from being justified, the hostility that we meet makes little sense, however much it may claim to do so. Moreover, we will not fail to proclaim that, by being as we are, we serve society. Far from being ashamed of ourselves and 23