which has had the technology of the atomic age thrust upon it.

During the past 16 years at an ever-accelerating pace the mass media of communication (books, radio, television, performing arts, newspapers, and magazines) have given more and more attention to this aspect of human sex behavior and the problems surrounding it. Probably the publication of the first volume of the Kinsey studies on sex was the initial step in converting homosexuality into a subject fit for factual and respectable discussion.

The Honorable Stanley Mosk, Attorney General of California, in a letter read on National Education Television's hour-long program, "The Rejected," in 1961, said that "the problem of homosexuality is age-old. In ancient Greece and Rome this condition was apparently accepted as a way of life. In this country, the opposite is true. In fact, it is hard to find any subject about which the feelings of society are so strong. With all the revulsion that some people feel about homosexuality it cannot be dismissed by simply ignoring its presence. It is a subject that deserves discussion. We might just as well refuse to discuss alcoholism, or narcotics addiction, as to refuse to discuss this subject. It cannot be swept under the rug. It will not just go away by itself. (We need) to cast light into the area in which the shadows have long been deep." The program on which Mr. Mosk's foregoing statement was heard has played on possibly 40 television stations and is still an active title in the library of programs available from National Education Television. But despite its having been viewed by millions, the viewpoints it tries to erase persist because they, like the shadows, run deeply indeed.

"Breakthrough in the Conspiracy of Silence" was the title of a folder of reprinted newspaper clippings published by the Mattachine Society following its 6th Annual Convention in September 1959 at Denver, Colorado. There for the first time a considerable newspaper coverage was given in two metropolitan newspapers of the organization's annual meeting. Delegates present from New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Chicago were interviewed in the editorial offices of the Denver Post and in the assembly rooms of Hotel Albany where the program was presented. Matter-ofmattachine REVIEW

factly the aims of the Society, which are similar to if not completely parallel to those of a number of other organiza tions, were told; a brief history of the "homophile movement" was given; the name of "Mattachine" was explained; and quotations were taken from a panel of speakers which included spokesmen from psychiatry, law, civil liberties, A few weeks following came a blast in print against Mattachine Society at San Francisco when a man who had at tended the Denver convention "sold" the idea of using the "sex deviate" issue to a politician who wanted to unseat an incumbent for the office of mayor. The city's dailies refused to take the sensational campaign charges that San Francisco was the capital of the nation's homosexuals, but a willing throwaway advertising publication nevertheless spread the charge and the heat was on. Faced with an immediate $1-million slander charge, the candidate still attempted to peddle the nonsense of a homosexual takeover in the Bay metropolis, but the recognized press slashed back at him with deadly cartoons, front page editorials, and a scathing denunciation loaded with facts which disproved the twisted lies he spoke. Two leading dailies, in fact, deplored the campaign so strongly that they asked the candidate to get out of the race. All the while, from early October until election eve, Mattachine was in the news not only every day, but in every edition of two morning and two eve ning newspaper presses. Some of the significant results were these:

1. A deep sense of community level-headedness was noted in San Francisco, once the wild sensationalism of the politicians, police, and press were cleared away and the problem was viewed for what it was, and 2. The searing spotlight of publicity did not cause Mattachine to collapse, but rather the opposite--it stood its ground, reacted responsibly with statements of truth from spokesmen who had faces to put behind their names.

The matter died all too quietly after the election, in which the candidate who painted the smear lost. His opponent won by what observers called the largest majority in several decades.

But sadly, and this is repetition, one result which one