CHAPTER II.

THEORIES ABOUT HOMO-SEXUALITY.

Some of the greatest sexologists and psychiatrists of modern times have concerned themselves with the causative factors of homosexuality. So much new material relating to unconscious mental activities has been uncovered in recent years, that many of the older authorities, whose opinions have long carried much weight, are now considered obsolete, at least in respect to homosexual problems.

Krafft-Ebing, for instance, a widely quoted authority, and still a factor through his works in influencing both the profession and laymen, originally conceived homosexuality as the result of a hereditary transmission. This contention has never been fully corroborated by the observations of later investigators.

To this extent only is homosexuality an inherited trait beyond fear of any contradiction: Everybody inherits homosexual _tendencies_.

As we observed in the previous chapter, every child is homosexual in disposition. Therefore, heredity _per se_ does not give us the key to the problem, except possibly in those instances where the hereditary constitution furnishes certain predisposing factors to homosexuality. And this predisposition may be overcome, wholly or in part, in a healthy, constructive environment; or it may be cultivated in the opposite kind of environment.

From this standpoint, heredity may furnish a favorable soil--for almost anything. The crop that is harvested depends upon the seeds that are sown, and the care that is given, or the injuries that are sustained, through environment. Consider for a moment how fertile a breeding ground for the homosexual disposition is the homelife presided over by certain types of nervous and psychopathic parents!

Even more in error is Krafft-Ebing in associating homosexuality with the early habit of masturbation. This is largely confusion of cause and effect. Perhaps all homosexuals are found to have masturbated in childhood--ergo, masturbation is a sign of homosexuality! This explanation, of course, leaves entirely out of consideration the innumerable persons who have masturbated in childhood and have become normal heterosexual adults.

“Nothing is more likely,” states Krafft-Ebing, “than masturbation so to disturb and occasionally thwart all noble emotions at the source as they arise spontaneously out of the sexual feeling. The habit robs the nascent feeling of charm and beauty, leaving behind only the husk of grossly animal craving for sexual gratification. An individual, so thwarted, attains the age of maturity lacking the esthetic, ideal, pure and undefiled longing which leads to the other sex. At the same time, the heat of sensuous passion cools off while the inclination toward the other sex is significantly weakened. Thus, deficiency embraces the morals, the ethics, the phantasy and the disposition of the youthful masturbator as well as his emotional and instinctive life, and holds true of both sexes, occasionally reducing to zero the yearning after the opposite sex, so that in the end masturbation is preferred to every other form of gratification.”

Dr. Stekel has answered this statement very effectively in the following words (from “_Bi-Sexual Love_,” translated by James Van Teslaar, M.D.): “This contention is altogether wrong. I have never seen so many and such pronounced idealists as among masturbators. Young artists, poets and musicians in particular often show, I have found, a strong tendency to masturbation, and this agrees with the pronounced bisexuality of all artists, which has been particularly pointed out by Fliess. The youths of this type are often so delicate and sensitive that they see in the sexual act only animal brutality and hide their own sexuality from the whole world. Among masturbators we find the champions of truth, the over-moralistic preachers, the ethical reformers and dreamers.”

If Krafft-Ebing’s theory of masturbation being an index of homosexuality were true, it might well be set forth as a demonstrable fact, in the hope that this knowledge would be a stepping-stone to constructive results in our understanding of the sexual life. However, in addition to being a fallacious conception, it has the further discredit of probably having wrought great damage to masturbating youths in giving them a false and hopeless impression of their actual situation. If a youth in his effort to overcome masturbation, believes himself, in addition, to be a predestined victim of homosexuality--especially with the prevailing social stigma which that condition carries--the injurious effect may quite conceivably be disastrous.

Magnus Hirschfeld, one of the greatest of contemporary authorities on the sex question in all its phases, is convinced that homosexuality is a normal state, and that genuine homosexuality is always an inborn condition. His views may be summed up in the statement that there is a genuine inborn homosexuality which must not be considered a morbidity. Furthermore, it should not be confused either with bisexuality or with pseudo-sexuality.

Those who look upon homosexuality from the psycho-pathological viewpoint are in agreement to this extent--that the homosexual condition is not a product of degeneration in the ordinary sense, but, rather, a neurosis.

Stekel states emphatically, “_I have never yet found a homosexual who was not a neurotic._”

The relationship of neurosis and homosexuality is set forth by the same authority as follows:

(a) Pronounced physical and mental stigmata of degeneration are relatively rare among homosexual men and women; at any rate such signs are not more frequent in proportion to the total number of homosexuals than among the heterosexuals of both sexes.

(b) On the other hand, we find frequently and not merely as a result of homosexuality, _a greater instability of the nervous system_ (frequently shown in the periodic character of endogenous temperamental instability.)

(c) The family of the homosexual often contains a larger number of nervous persons and such as deviate from the normal sexual type.

This latter observation, of course, tends to give homosexuality an hereditary aspect, which is Hirschfeld’s opinion. But, when analyzed, this may mean that a nervous or neurotic disposition is inherited, which, under certain environmental conditions (the negative attitude of parents, the dominant mother, etc.) leads to a homosexual goal.

Dr. Iwan Bloch, who has world-wide standing as a sexologist, gives the following interesting opinion:

1. The so-called “undifferentiated” stage of the sexual instinct is often eliminated when the instinct becomes directed toward a definite particular sex among heterosexuals or homosexuals before the advent of puberty. Homosexuality shows a definite, clear direction of the sexual instinct towards the same sex long before puberty.

2. A comprehensive theory of homosexuality must also explain the extreme cases, particularly male homosexuality coupled with complete virility.

3. Sexual parts and genital glands cannot determine homosexuality in those possessing typical normal male genitalia and testicles; neither can the brain itself be the determining factor in genuine homosexuality, because homosexuality cannot be rooted out by the strongest conscious and unconscious heterosexual influences brought to bear upon thought and phantasy,--the condition developing in spite of such influences.

4. Since as a predisposition (not as sexual instinct) homosexuality appears long before puberty and before the actual functioning of the respective genital glands, it suggests that in homosexuals some physiologic action pertaining to “sexuality,” but not necessarily related to the functioning of the genital glands, undergoes some subtle change as the result of which the sexual instinct is turned from its goal.

5. The condition suggests chemical changes, alteration in the chemistry of sexual tension, the latter being fairly independent of the activity of the sexual glands proper, as is shown by the fact that it may be preserved among eunuchs and others who undergo castration.

Krafft-Ebing, Hirschfeld and Bloch, as well as many other investigators and writers, have failed to appreciate the psychological factors involved in homosexuality. Every young individual unconsciously patterns its conduct, especially in the matter of its attitudes toward persons of the opposite sex, after some one in the home environment. When the boy, for instance, is raised under conditions which cause him to pattern his actions after the mother-model, to _feel_ himself woman-like, he will unconsciously and automatically imitate feminine ways and adopt woman’s attitudes, in the sexual sphere as well as otherwise.

To illustrate this point, if a boy is brought up by a widowed mother, let us say, in a home environment in which there is no male present, the young boy, impelled to imitate some one in order to establish a standard of conduct, copies his mother’s attitude of physical indifference to women and physical interest in men (if she is a normally constituted woman). If the mother, or other feminine guardian, should be homosexually disposed, i.e., showing a physical interest in women and a physical indifference to men, then, by the same token, the boy would tend to develop a sexual interest in women, and become a normal heterosexual man.

Every young boy’s ambition, normally, is to be like his father; later, it may be to excel the father--but this identification, under the circumstances, is present. Now, the absence of a father in the house, or the presence of a father of weak character, who suffers in comparison with the mother, tends to force the youth to make his ego-ideal identification with the mother, with results that are not conducive to normality in the sexual life.

Under the latter condition, the youth associates the mother with sex domination and personal power--it is a woman-dominated world. Consequently there is also present the attitude, either of wishing to be a woman and rule, or of fleeing from woman when she clashes with his will to power as man.

Anyone who knows the dynamic influence that mental processes, particularly the unconscious ones, have over the physical organism and its far-reaching manifestations, will recognize at once the possibilities that are bound up in this situation.

We see this same principle every day, and in fact apply it (in the opposite manner to obtain the opposite results), when we inculcate manly ideas in the minds of our boys and encourage them to conduct themselves in a manly way, in order to develop in them the attributes of manliness. With girls, we foster the womanly ideal and encourage them in the direction of proper feminine conduct to promote the accredited qualities of womanhood.

We also see evidenced at times the wish to remain a child, and to retain the privileges and attentions of childhood, which apply to neurotic persons. This notably interferes with their development and progress toward adulthood.

Stekel tells us that when a boy acts like a girl, it does not necessarily mean that he has that kind of a _predisposition_. It may only signify his identification with his mother or with a sister, whom he unconsciously accepts as a model to pattern his conduct after.

It is the conviction of Sadger that permanent homosexuality is established through some significant incident which leads to the repression of the mother in her role as helper and teacher. Among such incidents may be death, sudden financial reverses, and consequent neurosis, making sanatorium treatment necessary, inconsiderate persecution of the boy on account of masturbation, and similar psychic shocks. Sadger’s conclusions may be summed up as follows:

(a) The urning is a victim of withdrawal from the mother (the first caretaker or nurse, respectively), in whom he is himself seriously disappointed. He represses the mother by identifying himself completely with her.

(b) The path to homosexuality leads through narcissism--that is, love of self, as one was, or as one may ideally be.

(c) The sexual ideal of the invert includes not only traits of former female and male sexual objectives, but also features of one’s own beloved self.

(d) Being brought up in surroundings exclusively feminine--the father does not count in such circumstances--fosters homosexuality in the male as well as in the female, for reasons that are not sufficiently clear as yet. Moreover, the urning is usually an only child.

(e) Finally, inversion may be fostered by a sort of “latter-day obedience” to the mother’s commands. I have observed not rarely that mothers warn their children against harmless, though warm and friendly contact with the other sex, as something unpermissible and bad and that the teaching thus instilled may unfortunately increase the disposition towards one’s own sex through later obedience.

As Stekel has well stated, in commenting upon Sadger’s conclusions, the first of these is false, because the homosexual is not a victim of withdrawal from the mother, but rather of a fixation upon her. Further, one does not repress a person when one identifies one’s self. Identification is direct love; differentiation means repression. Where homosexuals (male) identify themselves with the mother--as many of them do--there may also be present a repression of the father-ideal.

Alfred Adler, whose conception of the neurosis is based on the hypothesis of “_the male protest_,” also associates homosexuality with this principle. In his opinion, all reactions and protective constructions or fixations of the neurotic are based on the wish to be “_a complete being_,” as he sees it. Homosexuality exemplifies this protest in a singular form. The homosexual’s ambition is (in its unconscious implications): _I want to be a woman!_ This, according to Adler, _is a male protest under the use of female means_. He maintains that the homosexual attempts by this means to enhance his strength of personality. The latter turns away from woman because he fears his inferiority. He fears the sexual partner. Fear, shame, hate and disgust are the inhibitions which drive the homosexual away from the opposite sex.

Adler mentions that the over-valuation of the homosexual partner serves also to raise the neurotic invert in his own estimation. Thus, in neuroses, homosexuality, even when carried into practice, is always found to be a symbol by means of which it is sought to place the individual’s own superiority beyond question. This mechanism is similar to that of a religious psychosis, in which the fancied nearness to God has the significance of an elevation. In a sense, the religious fanatic identifies himself with God, just as the non-religious psychopath may identify himself with Napoleon, Caesar, Alexander the Great, or some other character in history whose personality completely dominated its environment.

_Syphilophobia_ (fear of syphilis) is one of the forms which the fear of women is especially likely to take. The attitude of such phobists is usually as follows: They fear that they will not be able to play a dominating part in regard to women because of some feeling of inferiority, for which they have all sorts of imaginary foundations, at times without conscious motivation. In this manner, following the increasing trend to belittle woman, they arrive at suspicious trains of thought which are to secure them against sexual relations. Sometimes a woman is a riddle, sometimes a criminal person, or a shallow spend-thrift, always thinking of adornment and similar vanities, and sexually insatiable.

The suspicions constantly arise that woman is a crafty and cunning being, bent on evil. This conception is universal and is found in all periods of history. As Adler states, “They emerge in the most sublime and lowest creations of art, have a place in the thoughts and efforts of the wisest, and create in man and in society a constant predisposition which develops suspicious and cautious traits, in order always to keep in touch with the enemy and to be in good time for the defense against knavish attacks. It is an error to think that it is only the man who harbors distrust of the sexual partner. The same trait is found also in the woman, often less distinct in character, when fictions of her own strength put a check to the doubt of her own value, but flashing up most strongly when the feeling of degradation becomes overpowering.”

The detraction of woman, which recurs so constantly in Jewish, Christian and Mohammedan religious writings and usages, undoubtedly has this psychological impulse, behind it. The medieval disputes as to whether woman had a soul, or, indeed, whether she was really a human being at all; the hideous persecution and burning of women as witches and vampires, which was participated in by church, state and populace,--all of these practices had behind them in some degree a neurotic fear of woman as the sexual partner. Man feared his inferiority, and he compensated for that fear by subjecting, and often eliminating, the object of his phobia. By this irrational gesture, he symbolically raised himself to a position of greater security.

Karl Heinrich Ulrichs (1825-1895), a brilliant and learned man and able legal official of Hanover, Germany, for many years expounded and defended homosexual love. He was himself an invert, and made many attempts to secure a revision of the legal position of the sexual invert in Germany.

Ulrichs formulated an elaborate classification of human types, with an interesting nomenclature, which despite its elaborateness has been found serviceable.

Among males, he classifies the normal man as the “Dioning,” and the invert as the “Urning.”[1] Urnings are subdivided into several groups. First, those who are thoroughly manly in appearance and mental habit and character (“Mannlings”) and who tend to love softer and younger specimens of their own sex; second, those who are effeminate in appearance and cast of mind (“Weiblings”), who love rougher and older men; third, those who are of medium type (“Zwischen Urnings”) and love young men.

[1] From _Uranos_, heaven; his idea being that the Uranian love was of a higher order than the normal attachment.

Then there are “Urano-Dionings,” who have the capacity of love in both directions, that is, for women and for men. These are generally of a manly type.

Besides these there are some sub-species, such as the “Uraniaster,” who is a normal man who has acquired the urning habit; and the “Virilized Urning,” who is an Urning who has gotten the normal habit, although, according to Ulrichs’ classification, this is not really natural to him.

A better conception of the whole arrangement may be obtained from the following table:

{ (a) Normal Man or Dioning--called { Uraniaster when he acquires { Urning tendencies. { { 1. Mannling. The { { 2. Zwischen-Urning. Human { (b) Urning { 3. Weibling. Male { { 4. Also called Virilized { { Urning when he { { acquires the normal { { habit. { (c) Urano-dioning.

Edward Carpenter states that if we add to this a corresponding table for the female, we shall have an idea of the complication of Ulrichs’ system! Yet, complex as it is, and whatever criticisms we may make upon it, we must allow that it does not exceed the complexity of the real facts of Nature.

As we observe from the foregoing, there are many and conflicting ideas regarding homosexuality, but I believe no concept of this phenomenon is so satisfactory as that based on psychoanalytical data, as developed from the teachings of Freud.

Taking into consideration the findings of all the analysts, it seems to me that Stekel’s conception of the problem, summarized as follows, is pre-eminently the most logical and valid:

“All persons originally are bisexual in their predisposition. There is no exception to this rule. Normal persons show a distinct bisexual period up to the age of puberty. The heterosexual then represses his homosexuality. He also sublimates a portion of his homosexual cravings in friendship, nationalism, social endeavors, gatherings, etc. If this sublimation fails him he becomes neurotic, since no person overcomes completely his homosexual tendencies. Everyone carries within himself the predisposition to neurosis. The stronger the repression, the stronger is also the neurotic reaction which may be powerful enough in its extreme form to lead to paranoia. If the heterosexuality is repressed, homosexuality comes to the forefront. In the case of the homosexual, the repressed and incompletely conquered heterosexuality furnishes the disposition toward neurosis. The more thoroughly his heterosexuality is sublimated the more completely the homosexual presents the picture of a normal healthy person. He then resembles the normal heterosexual. But like the normal heterosexual individual, even the ‘male hero’ type displays a permanent latent disposition to neurosis.

“The process of sublimation is more difficult in the case of the normal homosexual than in the case of the normal heterosexual. That is why this type is extremely rare and why a thorough analysis always discloses typical neurotic reactions. The neurotic reactions of expression are anxiety, fear, shame, disgust and hatred. The heterosexual is inspired with disgust at any homosexual act. That proves his affectively determined negative attitude. For disgust is but the obverse of attraction. The homosexual manifests the same feeling of disgust for woman, showing him to be a neurotic. (Or else he hates woman). For the normal homosexual--if there be such a type--would be indifferent towards woman. These generalizations already show that the healthy person must act as a bisexual being.”

My only criticism of Stekel’s ideas is to call attention to the fact that, being a medical psychologist, his whole experience has been practically with those types whose neurotic tendencies have been emphasized. There are and have been a great many inverts who have not only enjoyed average mental and physical health--but have been versatile and productive in their accomplishments. Chapter V is devoted to the achievements of the better types of inverts. Many have been brilliantly endowed, have attained outstanding success in the arts and sciences, and even in the military field, as well as in other spheres of activity.