Sexual Phenomena

Sexual violence has become a topic of intense media scrutiny, thanks to the bravery of survivors coming forward to tell their stories. But, unfortunately, mainstream public spheres too often echo reports in a way that inhibits proper understanding of its causes, placing too much emphasis on individual responsibility or blaming minority cultures. -/- In this powerful and original book, Linda Martín Alcoff aims to correct the misleading language of public debate about rape and sexual violence by showing how complex our (...) experiences of sexual violation can be. Although it is survivors who have galvanized movements like #MeToo, when their words enter the public arena they can be manipulated or interpreted in a way that damages their effectiveness. Rather than assuming that all experiences of sexual violence are universal, we need to be more sensitive to the local and personal contexts – who is speaking and in what circumstances – that affect how activists’ and survivors’ protests will be received and understood. -/- Alcoff has written a book that will revolutionize the way we think about rape, finally putting the survivor center stage. (shrink)

Sexual harassment is the violation of a person’s personal integrity and wellbeing and is an incident that often occurs in a workplace context. While it was mainly associated with situations in a traditional employment workplace, it has also been reported in organizations that consist of non-traditional or mixed employment relationships such as educational institutions. Sexual harassment in a university setting worldwide is quite pervasive. In 2006, the American Association of University Women found that 62% of female and 61% of male (...) college students had experience being sexually harassed at their university. In Japan, sexual harassment of students by teachers is so prevalent it has been given its own acronym--SHOC, for "Sexual Harassment on Campus”. A research in Japan by the Women’s Studies Education Network showed that about 15% of undergraduates, about 34% of graduate students, and about 36% of the teaching staff had experienced some forms of sexual harassment. This paper presents a discussion about the understanding of employees in institutions of higher learning about the issue of sexual harassment. Understanding and being aware about sexual harassment help staff of universities to seek appropriate intervention when they are faced with sexual harassment issues. The study on which this paper is based briefly surveys the understanding about sexual harassment amongst staff members in two universities in Malaysia. A total of 224 male and female staffs of Universiti Sains Malaysia and Universiti Malaysia Sabah answered a short survey given to them at the beginning of training programmes on sexual harassment. The results show that staffs have a relatively high understanding about incidents of sexual harassment. The research indicates that there is a substantial number of incidents of sexual harassment on campuses and victims of sexual harassment tend to be female. Staff’s experiences of sexual harassment also correlate with their understanding and awareness of sexual harassment. (shrink)

The aim of the study was to explore the experiences of homosexual men connected with the formation of their sexual orientation in adolescence. A comparative study of 27 young adult homosexual men and 28 heterosexual men of similar age used a categorised interview questionnaire consisting of two parts: the first with questions regarding sexual dreams, fantasies and erotic encounters; the second with questions on family and social circumstances. The study yielded an abundance of interesting data on the psychological circumstances of (...) homosexual men during the formation of sexual orientation and its awareness as well as differences and similarities in that area between homosexual and heterosexual men. For instance, it revealed experience patterns concerning the formation of sexual identity and personal attitudes toward one’s sexual orientation characteristic of homosexual persons. The study verified the main hypothesis that mental-internal experiences precede behavioural-external ones both in homosexual and heterosexual persons. (shrink)

In view of the social normalization of homosexuality and the painful awakening to the reality that a not-negligible percentage of priests, especially in the Western world, is homosexually oriented, the question of why this orientation is irreconcilable with ordination has become more urgent. The decisive arguments are theological and have to do with the prospective priest’s full manhood. These arguments are in harmony with modern psychological insights into homosexuality as a personality defect that blocks the person’s growing to mature manhood. (...) It is argued that only after having demonstrably overcomehomosexual tendencies should a candidate be admitted to the seminary. (shrink)

Discusses the American Psychiatric Association’s well-known removal of homosexuality from its list of mental disorders. Argues that this was done because ofpolitical pressures, the overall influence of the sexual revolution, and problematic humanitarian motives. Asserts that now homosexuals who seek treatment for their condition are often denied help by psychologists and psychiatrists.All three great pioneers of psychiatry—Freud, Jung and Adler—saw homosexuality as disordered. Yet today, homosexuality is not to be found in the psychiatric manual of mental disorders.Were these three great (...) pioneers just reflecting the ignorance and prejudice of their times? Is this radical shift due to our modern-day enlightened, sophisticatedattitude? Has there been any new research to account for this shift of opinion?Submits that no new psychological or sociological research justifies this shift. Research did not settle the question. Research simply stopped, and it is politics that has silenced the professional dialogue. Now, the only studies on homosexuality are from an advocacy perspective.Militant gay advocates working in a small but forceful network have caused apathy and confusion within our society. They insist that acceptance of the homosexual as a person cannot occur without endorsement of the homosexual condition. Intellectual circles too—who are self-conscious about sounding intolerant—proclaim homosexuality as normal, yet it is still not so for the average person for whom it “just doesn’t seem right.”. (shrink)

The concept of genetic influence is often misunderstood, especially within the debate over homosexuality. Some Catholic writers and many homosexualactivists and academics mistakenly believe that whether homosexuality is genetically influenced is related to its moral status and malleability. Here I tryto defuse this aspect of the debate by providing a precise defmition of genetic influence, reviewing its implications, and demonstrating its irrelevance to moral and therapeutic issues related to homosexuality. The Church does not compromise any aspect of its teaching by (...) conceding that homosexuality may have a genetic component, but it must beware of deterministic interpretations of such research. (shrink)

Sexual harassment is often understood as a subjective notion that asks the woman if she has been victimized. This paper argues that we need not ask women if they are victims by conceptualizing sexual harassment as an objective notion that holds the perpetrator accountable for his actions. In making my case, I will apply an objective conception of sexual harassment to the U.S. Supreme Court case Meritor Savings Bank v. Vinson by drawing on the feminist view of sexual harassment given (...) by Anita Superson and the role of equality and autonomy as motivated by Ronald Dworkin and James Griffin, respectively. (shrink)

It is often taken for granted that there exists a more or less “natural” link between left-wing politics and the progressive social movements referred to as “cultural”, such as feminist, ecological or LGBT struggles. This article argues that if an alliance between the Left and the LGBTQ movement is to be real and operational, it must be worked out, rather than presupposed, via a thorough rethinking of the political as such, of its axioms, goals and ethical frameworks. The authors see (...) a parallel between the dissatisfaction that recent grassroots left-wing movements feel towards more established parties and institutions, and the dissatisfaction that a new wave of queer activism feels towards more traditional policies of mainstream LGBT organizations. Much of this dissatisfaction can be derived, in both cases, from the perceived neoliberalization of the political and social spheres and the subsequent cooptation of leftist / queer politics and activism to the neoliberal, or even neoconservative, agenda. This moment of shared dissatisfaction should be used creatively to devise common strategies, rather than maintain the artificial and disadvantageous division between the so-called “economic” and “cultural” lefts. Regrettably, at the moment there is very little understanding of queerness on the Left, just as there is little dedication to countering the disastrous effects of capitalism among LGBT activists. The New Left and the queer movement have much to learn and gain from each other, but to make this happen new leftists must rethink the political through the sexual, whereas the queer movement must rethink the sexual through the economic, to put it simply. The article ends with an outline of a new comprehensive ethical and political model from which an anti-exclusionary and pro-social ethics could be derived as a common ground for a workable queer and left alliance. (shrink)

Grzegorz Musiał’s late work is exemplary of the Modernist coupling of desire and death, which German Ritz linked to the way that homosexual sensibility has been encoded in Polish literary Modernism. This reading of Musiał is paradoxical at heart, as the writer’s literary output must also be ridden with tensions, because his clinging to a bygone aesthetic in order to render homosexual desire seems quaint in an era in which the idea of gay emancipation is widespread. Musiał’s literary alter ego, (...) who is realized as a fictional character and as the speaker in his poems, is a hybrid of an erudite homosexual male equipped with the classical sensibility and a devout Catholic, whose appreciation and outright enjoyment of church ritual is almost camp. Musiał attempts to pit this literary dummy against the usually younger homosexual men who, like a mob of the living dead, populate the underground world of night clubs and anonymous sex. (shrink)

A developmental theory of erotic/romantic attraction is presented that provides the same basic account for opposite-sex and same-sex desire in both men and women. It proposes that biological variables, such as genes, prenatal hormones, and brain neuroanatomy, do not code for sexual orientation per se but for childhood temperaments that influence a child's preferences for sex-typical or sex-atypical activities and peers. These preferences lead children to feel different from opposite-or same-sex peers — to perceive them as dissimilar, unfamiliar, and exotic. (...) This, in turn, produces heightened nonspecific autonomic arousal that subsequently gets eroticized to that same class of dissimilar peers: Exotic becomes erotic. Specific mechanisms for effecting this transformation are proposed. The theory claims to accommodate both the empirical evidence of the biological essen-. (shrink)

C.M. Concepcion's review of “Pornography: An Uncivil Liberty?” fundamentally misconstrues the position defended in that article. This paper examines possible sources of this misconstrual, focusing critical attention on the narrowly crafted, morally loaded notion of “pornography” that figures centrally in the original argument under review. Pornography is not a category of speech that can be characterized as having one crucial meaning or message, nor is the message of pornography easily identifiable in instances of pornographic speech. This raises the problem of (...) interpretive privilege, which haunts many of the antipornography arguments being offered in the contemporary debate, including the author's own earlier argument. (shrink)

Among human beings, sexual pursuit takes many forms. Some forms, like courtship, are morally innocuous. Other forms, like rape, are categorically immoral. Still other forms are provisionally immoral. Such forms of sexual pursuit involve a wrongful element sufficient to render them wrongful on balance provided that this wrongful element is not counterbalanced by even more important competing moral considerations. Here my focus is a particular form of provisionally immoral sexual pursuit, unsavory sexual seduction , or unsavory seduction for short.

In recent years there have been substantial changes in approaches to how genders are made and what functions genders fulfill. Most of the scholarly focus in this area has been in the areas of feminist, gay, and lesbian studies, and heterosexual masculinity - which tended to be defined by lack and absence - has not received the critical and scholarly attention these other areas have received. _Heterosexual Masculinities _rethinks a psychoanalytic tradition that has long thought of masculinity as a sort (...) of brittle defense against femininity, softness, and emotionality. Reflecting current trends in psychoanalytic thinking, this book seeks to understand heterosexual masculinity as fluid, multiple, and emergent. The contributors to this insightful volume take new perspectives on relations between men, men’s positions as fathers in relation to their sons and daughters, the clinical encounter with heterosexual men, the social contexts of masculinity, and the multiplicity of heterosexual masculine subjectivities. What to a previous generation would have appeared as pathological or defensive, we now encounter as forms of masculine subjectivity that include wishes for intimacy, receptivity, and surrender, alongside ambition and the pleasures of "phallic narcissism.". (shrink)

____Disorienting Sexuality__ exposes the biases against gay men and lesbians in psychoanalytic theory and practice. In the introduction, Domenici and Lesser draw a brief history of anti-homosexual sentiment in psychoanalysis. The book then moves into essays written by lesbian and gay psychoanalysts seeking to have a voice in the reshaping of psychoanalytic theories of sexuality. The second section is devoted to presenting different theoretical perspectives for understanding both homosexuality and heterosexuality. ____Disorienting Sexuality__ concludes with the personal narratives of gay and (...) lesbian psychoanalysts. (shrink)

In this book, Anthony R. D'Augelli and Charlotte J. Patterson bring together top experts to offer a comprehensive overview of what we have discovered--and what we still need to learn--about lesbian, gay, and bisexual identities.

The diverse historical, cultural, and physiological influences that determine sexual orientation are the focus of this fascinating work by one of the foremost investigators of human sexuality. Drawing on case studies from his sexology clinic, the author explores such topics as prenatal and postnatal history, gender differentiation in childhood, and postpubertal hormonal theories. In so doing, he addresses the many enigmas of sexual orientation: What makes some children grow up to be homosexual, while others become heterosexual or bisexual? To what (...) degree is gender identity determined before birth? How do the concepts of masculine and feminine become differentiated during childhood? What do we know about the relationship between hormones and homosexuality in adulthood? A unique feature of this book is the follow-up reporting on Money's long-term studies that began over three decades ago. The studies are brought together here for comparison with one another--and with the work of others--and their full significance is systematically evaluated. Also explored here is his pioneering concepts of lovemaps, the pathways of individual sexual and erotic development, and the factors that may shape overall healthy or pathological orientation, paraphilia, and gender transposition in childhood, adolescence, and maturity. Written in accessible language for researchers and clinicians, this authoritative work is both thought-provoking and informative as it explores timely questions of sexual orientation. (shrink)

The aim of this study is to investigate Iranian psychotherapists’ behaviors and beliefs toward sexual orientation and gender identity. The sample consisted of 358 Iranian psychotherapists, of whom 29.3% were male and 67% were female. Results from the chi-square analyses showed that more male participants reported accepting homosexual clients and treating them as having a pathological disorder than their female counterparts; and licensed respondents reported engaging more in accepting only male or female clients, accepting more homosexual and transgender clients for (...) treatment, and treating them as having a pathological disorder when compared with their unlicensed counterparts. Furthermore supervised respondents reported accepting more homosexual clients than their unsupervised counterparts. However results from the multivariate analysis of variance has indicated that the female participants reported “accepting homosexuals or transgender clients for treatment” more often than the male participants; unsupervised participants reported “accepting homosexual or transgender clients for treatment” and “treating homosexuality per se as a pathological disorder” more often than their supervised counterparts. (shrink)

A consideration of the many ethical issues raised by human sexuality, including homosexuality, marriage and divorce, and family life. It is written for students of AS and A2 courses in religious studies, general studies, philosophy or ethics.

Suggests a Scriptures-based approach to the ethical issues of human sexual behavior, and uses it to examine the Church's attitude towards homosexuals.

Sue O'Sullivan's collection of writing charts a quarter century of feminist engagement: from her ambivalence towards motherhood and marriage in the 1960s and 70s to butch/femme and queer in the 1980s and 90s; from birth control and PMT to HIV/AIDS and eroticism. Teasing out the contradictory layers which make up lesbian chic, political correctness and transsexuality, O'Sullivan moves on to take sides in the continuing debates around pornography and censorship.

In the LESBIAN AND GAY STUDIES series this work draws on literary and cultural theory to demonstrate the ways in which lesbian identities are ascribed and resisted. It looks at the identity models of the hero, the flaneur and the lesbian outlaw as well as lesbian 'space' both materially and imaginatively.

First Published in 2002. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

First Published in 1997. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

With Dangerous Sexualities, Frank Mort takes a look at how our ideas of health and disease are linked to moral and immoral notions of sex.

In this book students will be able to follow the story of how sociology has come to engage with lesbian and gay issues from the 1950s to the present.

The Split Britches theatre company have led the way in innovative and challenging lesbian performance for the last decade. Split Britches: Lesbian Practice/Feminist Performance is a long awaited celebration of the theatre and writing of Lois Weaver, Peggy Shaw and Deborah Margolin, who make up this outstanding troupe. This unique anthology comes complete with: * seven of Split Britches' best loved performance texts * a critical, historical introduction by Sue-Ellen Case * programme notes to accompany each of the plays * (...) a range of stunning photographic illustrations The publication of the Split Britches play texts, collected here for the first time, provides invaluable access to these celebrated performance pieces for both the student and contemporary arts audience. (shrink)

This article explores the possibility of a `homosexual hermeneutic' by which the great literary works of the western canon can be taught. This `interpretative methodology' is based in the author's own individuation process as gay. The author details his personal journey from engulfment in heteronormativity to the first crisis of his homosexual adolescence whereby he suffers a severe illness and learns, with the help of a teacher, to apprehend the homosexuality hidden in Virgil, Shakespeare, Milton, Spenser and so on. Psychological (...) problems caused by co-dependency, homophobia and postmodernism eventually lead the author to embark on a gay-centered analysis wherein he learns how to descend into the inner world of internalized homophobia to encounter the `double' of the transformational psyche. This homosexual death-and-rebirth motif is discussed as ubiquitously present in literature, informing the individuation not just of gay-identified individuals but of all those who seek self-knowledge. (shrink)

For more than ten years the collective set of critical post-structuralist positions labelled 'queer theory' hasbeen deployed to show that sexual identity&emdash;and particularly hetero and homo sexualsubjectivities&emdash;are produced through discursive knowledges; contingent and historical. Suchwork has usefully opened paths for the examination of racial, ethnic and gendered tensions within theethnic-minority grouping that is the lesbian/gay community. What might be considered thelargest contribution of queer theory to the field of lesbian/gay politics has been the ways in which it canbe deployed for (...) the examination of lesbian/gay subjects as they are subjectivelyperformed in accord with various discourses of sexuality and subjectivity, thus prompting examinations ofhow these discourses are governed by the cultural construct hetero/homo binary. Nevertheless, much ofthis work is ignored in the praxis of lesbian/gay politics which continues to assert and reassert thehetero/homo binary as 'sexual truth'. (shrink)

The way a society speaks about its different groups and sub-groups determines its general behavior toward them. Discriminated minorities oftentimes suffer from humiliating descriptions, and part of their project to change societal attitudes will evolve around the attempt to redescribe themselves in terms more acceptable to them. ;Advancing from these considerations, I examine the rhetoric of the emerging discourse of homosexuality between 1880 and 1920. During this time period the homosexual was invented as a new personality type, a being almost (...) totally determined in all of his expressions by his sexual desire. Different professions like law, medicine, sociology, psychiatry, literature, and philosophy attempted to define this novel species. And they all converged in one aspect, namely in their rhetorical attitude. The writings of people like Nietzsche, Krafft-Ebing, Proust, Symonds, Gide, and Mann share the common feature of diagnosing a vital and important difference between the homosexual person and her heterosexual fellow citizen. This rhetoric of emphasizing the dividing features between desires I call maximalism. The invention of the homosexual as a person occurred under the reign of maximalizing ways of writing. It was, however, widely disputed where exactly the relevant difference between homosexuals and heterosexuals was to be located, whether in anatomico-biological variations, in an overabundance or lack of masculine determinants, in psychological dispositions, or an exceeding portion of courage, intelligence, and creativity. Equally problematic was the valuation of this difference. But one thing was easily agreed upon: the description of the homosexual had to follow a maximalizing pattern. ;I trace this pattern from its first precursory appearance in the Marquis de Sade to its breakdown in the psychoanalytic texts by Sigmund Freud. The shattering of this mode of thinking, though, has not been final, since in some of the rhetoric of "Queer Studies" it has reemerged. Family resemblances often appear most striking when one looks back past the parents. Our contemporaries bear their grandparents' smile. (shrink)

As early as 1864, Walter Pater began to identify not only a homosexual character but also a homosexual intelligence, what we might call in the terms of current criticism, a queer theory. In his first published essay, Pater struggled with Coleridge, the critical father, from whose writing he tried to elicit the authorizing ideas for such a radical theory. Failing that, Pater turned away from Coleridge and the English critical tradition to Winckelmann and the Germanic. In Winckelmann, Pater found a (...) substitute father and an alternative hermeneutic practice that interpolated feeling into the interpretive function. In Winckelmann's finding of Greek art and in his recognition of the Greek ideal, Pater discovered a legitimating precedent for a homosexual inquiry. Pater individuated as a critic and in his next essays, "Aesthetic Poetry" and "Leonardo da Vinci," and began to conceptualize a homosexual world view. Pater's emergent intelligence came to climax in his overdetermined Mona Lisa reverie, which we can take as the origin of Modern queer theory. As medical science and the law began to categorize the homosexual in 1869, Pater was already subtly theorizing it. ;In 1873 in his Studies in the History of the Renaissance, Pater queered the Renaissance. He perceived the Renaissance to be what Jonathan Goldberg has called a "crucial and potentially disruptive" movement "in the foundations of the modern socio-sexual order." Pater did not just expose and reveal the representation of same-sex desire but uncovered a whole culture of queer desire, including a set of queer ideas, a series of queer intellectual and artistic acts, a queer psychology and a queer historiography. ;Pater conducted into modernity a powerful current of homosexual thought that flowed directly to Freud. From The Interpretation of Dreams on, Freud and psychoanalysis were engaged in a self-reflexive hermeneutic struggle with homosexual desire. While Freud repeatedly pictures the homosexual motif in his dreams, he repeatedly represses it in his interpretations. His homosexual desire is in fundamental conflict with his desire to consolidate the science of psychoanalysis. Freud's inability to interpolate his desire in the interpretive function, however, paradoxically leads to the failure to solve the case of Dora. From Dora, however, Freud learns the hysterical solution, which takes paradox into account. As Dora stands before the Dresden Madonna, Freud stands before the Mona Lisa and conceives the theory of Narcissism. Through the Narcissus trope and in "On Narcissism" Freud incorporates homosexual desire into the body of psychoanalysis and into the mind of the modern, breaking down the artificial opposition of the ego and the id that had structured psychoanalytic theory until then. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:160 BOOK REVIEWS The Vatican and Homosexuality: Reactions to the "Letter to the Bis· hops of the Catholic Church on the Pastoral Care of Homosexual Persons." Edited by JEANNINE GRA.MICK AND PAT FUREY. New York: Crossroad, 1988. Pp. xxi + 226. $14.95 (paper). This book contains the full text of the letter named in its subtitle (from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith [CDF], Oct. 1986), followed (...) by twenty-five commentaries. Sixteen of the authors are professors of theology or other disciplines including biology, his· tory, and social sciences; the remainder are active in various forms of church ministry, social advocacy, or communications. With three ex· ceptions-San Francisco Archbishop John Quinn's article and William H. Shannon's reply, both first published in America, and Dan Grippo's critique, which first appeared in the National Catholic Reporter-all are original contributions. In the editors' introduction, which gives a helpful summary of theological developments during the preceding decade as well as an overview of the hook's contents, "the reader is urged to consider that [CDF] document carefully before proceeding to the other contrihu· tions which critique, analyze, and discuss the implications of the Vati· can letter" (p. xiii). These commentaries, the editors state, "are meant to be a contribution to the lively debate about homosexuality... with full respect for persons and for the nature and mission of the Church and its ministry of teaching " (p. xx). The implied reference here, later made explicit by Shannon (p. 27), is to a remark by Paul VI in a letter to the German episcopate (Aug. 30, 1968) expressing hope that "the lively debate aroused by our encyclical [Humanae Vitae] will lead to a better knowledge of God's will." The present book should indeed help in guiding the whole Church toward "a better knowledge of God's will" in the matter of homo· sexuality. That positive assessment requires some qualification inas· much as " the lively debate " in this hook is heavily one-sided. Only one of the contributions (Benedict Ashley's) offers a strongly positive evaluation of the Vatican letter. Two others (Archbishop Quinn's and James Pollack's) are measured analyses, more intent on promoting amicable understanding than on taking sides. The concluding essay hy J. Giles Milhaven, while critical of the Vatican, is mainly a benign and non-judgmental challenge addressed to gay and lesbian persons, ask· ing them to enlighten the Church as to why sexual activity is important to them. The remaining articles express a more or less strongly nega· tive reaction to the CDF letter, and several of these manifest an attitude BOOK REVIEWS 161 toward the magisterium which falls considerably short of the " respect " called for in the introduction; a few even descend to unsavory ad hominem polemics against the Vatican hierarchy (described as insulated celibates who are power-obsessed, etc.). Nevertheless, many of the adversely critical articles-including some which are objectionable in the ways just noted, as well as others which scrupulously try to be fair to the magisterium-present some very legitimate challenges to the positions advanced in the CDF letter and offer substantial insights which should serve a constructive function in the effort to resolve this most vexing theological and pastoral issue. Some of the best chapters in this book are by women-a particularly noteworthy merit in view of the fact, underlined by Mary C. Segers, that "the Vatican letter succumbs to [the common] tendency to focus on homosexuality as a male phenomenon and to ignore completely the experience of lesbian women" (p. 85). Segers thinks it may be the special aptitude of lesbian feminists, with their " more subtle, rich appreciation of same-sex love," to teach Vatican authorities that " instead of issuing mean-spirited instructions to bishops which reinforce homophobia in the context of society's heightened fears about AIDS, the Church should be in the vanguard of the movement for social justice for all people" (p. 89). I regard Carolyn Osiek's "Rights, Responsibilities, and Homosexuality " (pp. 126-132) as the most penetrating essay in the collection. " The heart of the argument has to do not with Scripture or natural law," she observes, " but with the... (shrink)

This paper argues that we ought to give more consideration to the ethics of sexual fantasy than previous writers on sex have done so. Alan Soble’s paper on masturbation is a great example of this. Soble begins and closes his paper on masturbation with a quote from Rousseau which states that sexual fantasy is little different from rape. This is confusing, since Soble’s definition of masturbation requires a physical cause, and so it is not clear that Rousseau’s quote implies masturbation (...) as Soble understands it. This leads to Soble misusing Rousseau to argue that masturbation when constructed through pornography may be wrong, when detailed reading of Rousseau’s comment implies the opposite. This paper further takes up part of Rousseau’s neglected quote and develops it to suggest that sexual fantasy itself is sufficient as a definition of masturbation, provided there exists an intention to cause corresponding sexual pleasure. (shrink)

In the past decade the burgeoning field of gay and lesbian studies has been mired in a philosophic and epistemic morass over the question of sexual identity. Known as the essentialist/constructivist debate, there is much agreement among scholars that the debate has outlived its usefulness, but it persists nonetheless to divide gay and lesbian communities, within academia as well as without. ;This question of sexual identity is not without consequences, as the perceived determinants of sexuality inform the social and political (...) question "What is to be done with the sodomite, the homosexual, the gay and lesbian person?" Examining the epistemological models developed in the Nineteenth century to explain first the sodomite, and then the homosexual, I argue that these same models of criminal deviance, medical disorder, and psychological illness circulate still in the modern representation of the gay or lesbian person. ;Central to this debate over sexual identity, is political identification. How the State represents gays and lesbians in policy decisions will have a great impact on the daily lives of millions of gay and lesbian people. From civil rights and employment rights to privacy rights and protection from harassment and violence, the modern State has become both arbiter for, and contributor to the political creation of the gay/lesbian 'other.' ;Examining this process of political identification in the policy texts and political debates in The United States, I focus on the recent controversy over allowing "homosexuals" in the military, demonstrating how the state deploys both essentialist and constructivist strategies, often contradictorily in its construction of the modern gay and lesbian person. ;Finally, I examine the gay community's "flight to essentialism," questioning whether this recent trend is really the most productive and strategic conceptualization of identity. I conclude that although it may prove useful in the short run, it may also open the door to forms of regulation and scrutinization of our intimate lives previously unknown. There is much which suggests that this process of heightened surveillance and control is already underway. (shrink)