CHAPTER I.

COMPLEXITY OF SEX.

It has been stated that a person normally goes through three stages in the course of his sexual development--which are represented by the following dominant characteristics, in the order given: _Autosexuality_, _Homosexuality_, and _Heterosexuality_.

Each is normal at a certain stage of life. Circumstances, hereditary or environmental, or a combination of both (there is a vast amount of controversy about this phase of the subject), may halt the course of development at either the first or second stage, so that the final evolution of sexual life may never be realized.

This refers to the psychological and emotional aspects of sexual development, rather than the purely physical, as it is the former that sustains the shocks in the difficult process of the individual’s social adjustment.

While there is a great deal of theoretical abstraction in such a broad survey of the sexual life, nevertheless, there are enough concrete facts at hand to make the conclusions as accurate and serviceable as any that are to be obtained within the realm of actual clinical practice. The sexual urge is by no means a simple, direct manifestation, but consists of many partial and often conflicting impulses, with ramifications that extend into every channel and byway of life.

AUTO-SEXUALITY, as the term implies, means that an individual’s sexual interest is turned upon himself. This condition is normal to infants. It also is more pronounced in primitive and savage tribes, and has its analogy, in more practical form, in the lower order of the animal and vegetable world in those species whose individuals are self-sufficient sexually.

These types, which are capable of reproducing their kind without depending for fertilization upon another individual of the same species, are called _hermaphrodites_. This latter term, in its real sense, means combining the sexual organs of the two sexes.

There are some human beings--_variants_--who possess hermaphrodite characteristics, usually combining the more or less completely developed organs of one sex with the rudimentary organs of the opposite sex.

These hermaphrodite characters are not without their significance--namely, the innate bisexuality of man. While in the normal person, the attributes of one sex are dominant, there are always present in latent form some evidences of the opposite sex. This is no new discovery. In fact the concept of bisexuality is very ancient. Traces of it are to be found in Chinese mythology. The classical Greek mind seems to have had a particular interest in speculating about it. The mythical personification of bisexuality in the Hermaphroditos, the narrative of Aristophanes in the Platonic dialogue, and at a later period the suggestion of a Gnostic sect (Theophites) that primitive man was a “man-woman,” are all based on this presentiment. The first divinities were always bisexual, being either women with a penis or men with a female breast.

WHAT BIOLOGY TEACHES US.

Lower down in the biological scale--in fact, at the very bottom--we find the _amoeba_, which represents an auto-sexual, or more accurately, a mono-sexual, form. It has all the potentialities for reproduction within itself. By the process of division, first of its nucleus, and then its whole self, it becomes two new individuals.

A little further up the evolutionary path, we find the _paramoecium_. At one stage of its career it will divide its nucleus first, and then itself (an autosexual act) similar to the _amoeba_. At another stage it will engage in an elementary sexual act by coming ventrally together with another _paramoecium_, exchange one-half of its nucleus for half the nucleus of the other _paramoecium_, through the mouth, and this process is followed by other nuclear changes, and finally each _paramoecium_ divides itself into two new entities.

There is no apparent difference between these primitive little animals. They have no male and female organs, but it is a plausible assumption that the nuclei of each one contains a “male” and “female” portion--something unknown but necessary to procreation. In this instance we have the beginning of bisexuality; but autosexuality is still an essential factor in reproduction.

Somewhat higher up the scale we come across the _hydra_, a multicellular animal. Here, also, autosexuality plays a prominent role. The _hydra_ can, without the aid of another, “bud off” a new living _hydra_. Bisexuality is evidenced, however, in the presence of male and female cells which form in the single _hydra_. These unite with one another to produce a new individual in true bisexual manner. In a sense this creature is a combination of the autosexual, bisexual and hermaphrodite.

Another step up the evolutionary ladder we find the earthworm. Each worm has the organs of the two sexes--the equivalent of testes and ovaries,--properly developed, but each worm needs another worm to induce fertilization. In this instance, we have true hermaphroditism, and bisexuality is definitely established. However, as the two worms are of the same sex--each being male as well as female--they are in that way homosexual, as well, being attracted by worms of similar constitution.

As life grows more complex and we ascend the biological scale, the sexual processes also become more ramified, until in the higher forms of life we find the sexual nature of the individuals of the different genera and species sharply differentiated.

But even in the highest form of life, there are the vestigial organs and characters of the opposite sex, so that while the normal human being has a definite sexual category, it is just as truly apparent that no individual is wholly of one sexual character. The most masculine man is not one hundred per cent masculine, nor is the most feminine woman one hundred per cent feminine. The proof of this will be shown as we proceed in our discussion.

The physical bisexual characters--those of the opposite sex being present in rudimentary form--are readily observable. In the male, there are the vestigial breasts and nipples, and other rudimentary features less prominent; and sometimes a general feminine contour of body is noticeable in the male.

The most feminine of women have a growth of colorless hair, called the “lanugo,” corresponding to the male beard. If the woman has a larger proportion of masculine chemistry in her make-up, this hirsute growth may be quite prominent; and in some cases very pronounced, as in the instance of the bearded ladies who exhibit themselves in shows and circuses. Women with a more or less definite masculine cast of figure, movement, manner and voice are commonplace;--as is the opposite phenomenon--effeminate men.

The psychological phases of bisexualism parallel the physical. We might even go farther and state they are more in evidence than the physical, as they are subject to modification by environmental influences to a degree far exceeding the physical.

As was observed in the opening paragraph of this chapter, the individual may suffer a retardation or fixation at any stage of the sexual development, which holds him back into another and more primitive psychical and emotional level, which he has chronologically outgrown.

All infants and small children are autosexual, and evidence a sexual interest in their bodies. Sometimes this is true in only a slight, almost casual, degree; other times it is pronounced, and becomes a problem. There is often a tendency toward automatic masturbation, or other forms of so-called sexual precocity, which may unduly alarm parents. However, it is well for parents to know that these manifestations are not abnormal--unless grossly over-emphasized--but are merely indicative of the passing stage of autosexuality. They will in due course be outgrown and replaced by other manifestations of sexual interest, unless unwise methods of repression are used.

HOMOSEXUALITY means a state in which one is sexually attracted toward members of the same sex. This is normally a primitive characteristic of childhood, which prevails up to the time of adolescence, but which may persist in adult life. Some degree of it does normally hold over in every adult, but it remains in the background of the unconscious, and is sublimated along social lines.

Young boys and young girls usually have little interest in the opposite sex--in fact, are frequently quite scornful of them. On the other hand, they form strong friendships with members of their own sex, and, as is well known, when their sexual interests have not been successfully sublimated, engage in mutual sexual practices and masturbation.

Before the full development of the genital organs, the sexual tendencies are predominantly homosexual, although the influence of the preceding stage (autosexuality) is still considerably in evidence, and there is also present the germ of the succeeding stage of heterosexuality (erotic desires toward members of the opposite sex). If the youth has been reared in a healthy, constructive environment, conducive to proper sublimation of his primitive sexual tendencies, and particularly if his libido is not excessive, he may scarcely be conscious of his homosexual impulses. On the other hand, if he is endowed with an unusually strong hereditary sexual constitution, or if the repression and sublimation have been faulty in his upbringing, the homosexual tendencies may reflect themselves in various ways in his conscious attitudes.

It should be borne in mind that there is no abrupt line of demarcation between these stages of development. They overlap, and some of each of them, even the most primitive and infantile, are carried over in the unconscious mind throughout adult life. In the normal, well-adjusted adult, there are still extant rudiments of the previous stages of the emotional and affective life, just as the body contains vestiges of the bisexual organism, from which it evolved in the early weeks of intrauterine life.

The predominant homosexual element or primitive emotional character asserts itself in various typical forms that are apparent to those informed upon the subject. In this connection, Bousfield states: “Cruelty on the part of boys at school (bullying) is nearly always a sexual manifestation which, like homosexuality, should be only a passing phase, which is later repressed into the unconscious. The monks who denied themselves sexual intercourse, but found pleasure in flogging themselves or others, form an example of the way that sexual energy, when denied its normal course, finds a more primitive outlet. A schoolmaster with repressed and unconscious homosexuality will often be noted for his flogging proclivities, and so forth. Children, more especially boys, are observed to have an instinct of cruelty; for example, they pull the wings off flies. The sport of the chase or of fishing serves to gratify the instinct in adults.”

Prominent in the classification of adolescent homosexual attraction are the school-friendships of girls, which are known variously as “crushes,” “flames,” and “raves.” Elaborate romances are sometimes bound up in these attachments, with their love at first-sight, courtship, love letters, jealousy, and other manifestations of erotic affection. Havelock Ellis states that while these alliances are sometimes sexual, they are often not so--but are full of “psychic erethism.”