Some will ask, reasonably enough, what I have been doing lately. I confess that I have been spending a lot of time on Facebook, which can be addictive. The silver lining is that I have reconnected with some old friends through that means.
In addition, I have started work on a book-length project--actually something I laid aside twenty years ago to write other things, some of which are posted on Blogger. This project attempts a comprehensive conspectus of all the motifs or memes which have been used to disparage same-sex behavior. One might have that though that this rubbish had now been retired to the ash heap of history, where it belongs. But the memes keep recurring, zombie-like. Anyway, here is the outline:
Homonegative Memes
RELIGIOUS AND PHILOSOPHICAL
Unnatural
Sex is for procreation only
“God made Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve” (heterosexual pairing is implicit in the Creation story)
Abomination (to’ebah; of uncertain meaning)
Homosexual acts are inherently sinful (“God hates fags”)--Leviticus prohibition; Pauline critique
Diabolically inspired
Heresy (and buggery)
Medieval death of Sodomites legend
Not to be mentioned (apophasis); taboo
Provokes earthquakes and other disasters; cf. Sodom story
Threat to the survival of the human race (Philo)
BIOLOGICAL
A purely human vice--animals don’t do it
Bestial
Argument from design (penis fits vagina)
Pathological (the disease model)
Spreads other diseases (e.g. STDs; AIDS)
Results from hormonal imbalance or other constitutional factors
A Darwinian anomaly
SOCIAL
“Against the law,” plain and simple--Roman law; common law; sharia law
Associated with other types of criminality
Faggot-burning legend
Decadence (destroyed ancient Rome)
Maintaining social cohesion requires outgroups to be stigmatized (Durkheim)
Equated with child abuse and pedophilia
Usury and debasement of sterling coin of nature (cf, Lombards in England)
Foreign importation (ethnophaullism)
Not indigenous to the healthy Third World--a vice of the decadent West
Gynecophobia (flight from women, denying natural complementarity) and simple indifference to female charms (privative argument); fear of the vagina
Aristocratic vice
Promiscuity
Conspiracy (the “homintern”)
Recruiting imperative
Homosexuals demand “special rights”
Gay marriage a threat to “true” marriage
Threat to unit cohesion in the military
Inherently repellent--causes disgust in normal people
PERSONAL AND PSYCHOLOGICAL
Abnormal
Inversion and effeminacy
A mere preference
Acting out and exhibitionism (as in gay-pride parades)
Close-binding mother
Failure to assume duty to procreate and raise children
Gay marriage a threat to “true” marriage
Abjection and lack of self-respect
Grudge gathering (“victimology 101”)
Self-indulgent and hedonistic
Perversion
Mental disorder leading to poor functioning
Immaturity
Gerbil legend
In addition, I have started work on a book-length project--actually something I laid aside twenty years ago to write other things, some of which are posted on Blogger. This project attempts a comprehensive conspectus of all the motifs or memes which have been used to disparage same-sex behavior. One might have that though that this rubbish had now been retired to the ash heap of history, where it belongs. But the memes keep recurring, zombie-like. Anyway, here is the outline:
Homonegative Memes
RELIGIOUS AND PHILOSOPHICAL
Unnatural
Sex is for procreation only
“God made Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve” (heterosexual pairing is implicit in the Creation story)
Abomination (to’ebah; of uncertain meaning)
Homosexual acts are inherently sinful (“God hates fags”)--Leviticus prohibition; Pauline critique
Diabolically inspired
Heresy (and buggery)
Medieval death of Sodomites legend
Not to be mentioned (apophasis); taboo
Provokes earthquakes and other disasters; cf. Sodom story
Threat to the survival of the human race (Philo)
BIOLOGICAL
A purely human vice--animals don’t do it
Bestial
Argument from design (penis fits vagina)
Pathological (the disease model)
Spreads other diseases (e.g. STDs; AIDS)
Results from hormonal imbalance or other constitutional factors
A Darwinian anomaly
SOCIAL
“Against the law,” plain and simple--Roman law; common law; sharia law
Associated with other types of criminality
Faggot-burning legend
Decadence (destroyed ancient Rome)
Maintaining social cohesion requires outgroups to be stigmatized (Durkheim)
Equated with child abuse and pedophilia
Usury and debasement of sterling coin of nature (cf, Lombards in England)
Foreign importation (ethnophaullism)
Not indigenous to the healthy Third World--a vice of the decadent West
Gynecophobia (flight from women, denying natural complementarity) and simple indifference to female charms (privative argument); fear of the vagina
Aristocratic vice
Promiscuity
Conspiracy (the “homintern”)
Recruiting imperative
Homosexuals demand “special rights”
Gay marriage a threat to “true” marriage
Threat to unit cohesion in the military
Inherently repellent--causes disgust in normal people
PERSONAL AND PSYCHOLOGICAL
Abnormal
Inversion and effeminacy
A mere preference
Acting out and exhibitionism (as in gay-pride parades)
Close-binding mother
Failure to assume duty to procreate and raise children
Gay marriage a threat to “true” marriage
Abjection and lack of self-respect
Grudge gathering (“victimology 101”)
Self-indulgent and hedonistic
Perversion
Mental disorder leading to poor functioning
Immaturity
Gerbil legend
posted by Dyneslines at 4:26 PM
2 Comments:
I hope you won't deliver on that threat – a task for a pedant that won't offer new insights. Only political correctness, especially if the adjective “homophobic” will play a role in it. The interesting question is which function the suppression of sexual behaviour (masturbation, zoophilia, homosexuality, polygamy, prostitution etc.) had in a specific society. Understanding homosexuality as the fate of a tiny minority and not as an option of the majority won't help answering these questions. Why not a more personal book about the America in which you grew up, about the researchers and activists with whom you have collaborated? :)
I have in fact published my Memoirs at homolexis.blogspot.com.
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