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Here's the facts, folks. The issue of "straight or gay/lesbian" has been with us since shortly after the dawn of time. The only thing we "straight" folks have to do is figure out how to deal with it; something they have been telling us since the late 1960s.
At the risk of sounding trite, I know (in a professional sense) any number of gay males and lesbian females. I am proud to count them among my esteemed friends and colleagues and, with most of them, would be honored to have them guarding my back in times of crisis.
Joe, Karen, Tom, and Evelyn, these words are for you. I hope you know that I will always have your backs as well.
-- Nighteyes
Quote:
Originally Posted by TXNGL
Beautiful.
With no offense to Nighteyes, I am going to take this up.
The post is, just as Nighteyes his self/herself said, trite.
We know that there have always been homosexuals. But there is a much more interesting question here (that I have tried to address) of how excepting/encouraging past societies have been of them. The answers vary and are intesting.
It seems that ever time there is a thread, here or anywhere else, about race, color, religion, sexual orientation, etc. there is always the one person or persons who want to come in and quash it with the politically correct thought of the day on the matter. I suppose there is nothing wrong with this except that this is not helpful. You are more or less talking to yourself and the others that already agree, whiles those interested go on.
Again, nothing against Nighteyes who seems like a very decent and caring person, it is just that this doesn't really provide a quality answer to the question asked.
Again, nothing against Nighteyes who seems like a very decent and caring person, it is just that this doesn't really provide a quality answer to the question asked.
No problem, cachibatches, and no umbrage taken. Just read the two to four earlier posts I made. They, I think, provide the quality answer you mentioned.
In a nutshell, though, what I said was that the actual incidence of homosexuality has been pretty steady/constant down through the ages. What has changed is the societies' levels of acceptance, and therefore the degree of openness regarding homosexual orientation.
I think the one thing we can all agree on is that homosexuality is universal: it occurs in every day and age and in every human society. Whether the Neolithic Levant, Chalcolithic Indus Valley, amongst the Incas and Mayans, in the Helenistic Seleucid Empire in Syria, the Renaissance in Florence, Seventeenth Century Siam, or Nineteenth Century Australia ... were was female-female and male-male action going on.
It is interesting to note that the very words "homosexual" and "heterosexual" were not coined until the mid-19th Century. The Austro-Hungarian researcher and human rights campaigner who coined these words Karoly Maria Kertbeny in the 1860's.
I don't think people used to label themselves by sexual orientation. Everyone got married. That doesn't mean they weren't prone to same sex desires or acts.
Most ancient Greeks city states practiced some degree of homosexuality amongst the upper classes. In Sparta, it was strictly banned by the laws of Lycurgus the law giver. The source on that is Xenophon, who, though an Athenian, commanded Spartan troops in battle and sponsored his sons through the agogee. It is confirmed by Plutarch, Plato, etc.
The Thebans were the most encouraging, and even had something like gay marriage for the warrior elite.
Despite what you see in Hollywood and may hear by modern revisionists, the Romans were an extremely conservative people whose cultural norms it was to frown heavily on homosexuality. I don't have a single source for this, all I can say is that I have read 20 of Livy's books, all of the works of Tacitus, Sutoneus, Josephus, Arrian, over half of Plutarch's lives, Precopius, most of the speeches of Cicero and Caesar's two works, and the Lives of the Later Caesars's by an anonymous ancient author, and I can say that whereas I have I seen dozens of references to homosexual acts, not a single one is positive or even neutral. All are condemnations of the "perversions" of guys like Tiberius, Nero, and Caligula. The great Cicero made speeches against Clodius and Cataline in which he accuses them of homosexuality. Tiberius, ironically, brings Aggripina's son up on charges of homosexuality. Otho is described as "preferring sex the unnatural way."
The closest I can come to someone saying something even neutral about the matter is that Trajan "can be forgive" for his relationships with boys since he "harmed no one."
In fact, my personal opinion on why this misconception persists is that the Romans looked down on homosexuality so much that they wren always childishly accusing each other. The bottom line is that it happened amongst the elite, but it was strongly frowned upon by societal norms.
According to Greek authors the Celts practiced homosexuality, although it has been postulated that this is merely a misunderstanding of Celtic male bonding rights.
Love reading up on these old history, in order to understand what we do today, we must understand what we did then..thanks for sharing
Here's the facts, folks. The issue of "straight or gay/lesbian" has been with us since shortly after the dawn of time. The only thing we "straight" folks have to do is figure out how to deal with it; something they have been telling us since the late 1960s.
At the risk of sounding trite, I know (in a professional sense) any number of gay males and lesbian females. I am proud to count them among my esteemed friends and colleagues and, with most of them, would be honored to have them guarding my back in times of crisis.
Joe, Karen, Tom, and Evelyn, these words are for you. I hope you know that I will always have your backs as well.
-- Nighteyes
You sound as if you have a good soul. I bet you Joe, Karen, Tom and Evelyn feel the same way about you!
my opinion, and that is all that it is, concurs with many of you: this is a human trait, that we are born with, or without. The proclivity to be homosexual comes from somewhere that we do not control. However, if we choose to follow that path, then we have made the choice not to suppress our natural tendencies. Good on that person.
my wife and i recently learned that our neighbors across the street have separated because he has come out as a gay man. not surprising to us, but it's a sad development that a married couple is ending. the fact that they have dumb rednecks next door to them, WHO ARE CONSTANTLY WORKING ON CARS, is making us re-think our own neighborhood. We liked the couple. nice people. hate to see a marriage end, but if he is happier, then she will move on and be happier herself.
and people need to stop working on their cars in the damn street.
I wonder how much time those dumb rednecks spend worrying about what their neighbors do?
Through most of history it just was what it was - people were born that way and it was an aspect of their lives.
It wasn't until our current religions started being invented and they incorporated all these rules and had things like homosexuality being bad that most things turned on their heads and suddenly these people were evil and cursed.
I don't think being homosexual was an issue in
Ancient Greece or Rome. Sex was sex.
Correct.
The Series 'Rome" is an excellently researched show to watch, btw.
Judeo-Christians started the 'bad' thing.
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