Dear Fractelle,

I agree with you. There is far less tolerance of male homosexuality than female homosexuality. Possibly because there's less information
about female homosexuality.

The cross-cultural evidence on lesbianism is fragmentary. The reason may lie in the fact that women in most societies have less freedom to experiment and deviate sexually than men, but it may also be the case that lesbian behaviour is typically so discreet that researchers may have interpreted it as mere 'affection' and overlooked its real meaning.

In general, lesbianism does not appear to arouse the strong reactions that male homosexuality sometimes does, and in practice most cultures appear to tolerate or not notice it.

The classic example of this phenomenon was a nineteenth-century British law that forbade male homosexuality but ignored lesbianism - because Queen Victoria refused to believe that women did such things!

Another factor could be that - male homosexuals are more promiscuous as a group than heterosexuals, while relationships involving only women are more stable.

In the first decade or so of gay liberation,
some gay men seemed to initiate their own sexual revolution, reacting to their new freedom by almost celebrating promiscuity. The appearance of AIDS has abruptly chastened that attitude, and encouraged many gay men to revert to more traditional practices of dating and settling down with a single partner.

Lesbians seem to maintain even more stable and enduring relationships than heterosexuals do (Hooker, 1965; Masters and Johnson, 1979; Blumstein and Schwartz, 1985; Ettmore, 1980), which could explain the reason for greater tolerance.

I'm not scared of gays (that's what 'homophobic' translates as), just the diseases that they spread. AIDS, HepC. Ah, the dangers of anal action.

Jack,

Hep C? It's rare for Hep C to be spread via sex. It mostly affects injecting drug users.

Three-quarters of the deaths from AIDS in the twentieth century were in Sub-Saharan Africa, where it is overwhelmingly a heterosexual disease.

Izzo;
It is really quite simple why the majority of people dislike
homosexuals.

First is the old cry Ünclean".
I won't impose why that is so as it needs little imagination.

Second is that it is not natural as it cannot lead to the birth of
new life and that is what sex is fundermentaly about when you get
down to the nitty gritty.

So as a mother you naturally feel put off by homosexual behaviour.

But, Bazz. Izzo is not put off by homosexualtity, even though she is a mother. And, says she, she would still loooooooooooove her children even if the did turn queer. Very confident for a lady who has not yet had to face up to any odd behaviour from her offspring!

Izzo, as so many before her, dudded us by inferring that she was really interested in why other people did not agree with her. She had no such interest, of course; it was all a ploy to enable her express her own views without "offending anyone".

I have little time for people not prepared to state their opinions without first hearing what other people think.

"Second is that it is not natural as it cannot lead to the birth of
new life and that is what sex is fundermentaly about when you get
down to the nitty gritty." (Bazz)

What do we now regard as natural? Perhaps Mother Nature is now reforming her policies since humans are breeding themselves out of existence. Is that "natural?" Are homosexual numbers increasing or is it due to more gays "coming out of the closet?"

Perhaps, in the future, when we are invaded by hordes of environmental refugees, we may think more kindly of the homosexual community who cannot be held accountable for the irresponsible population explosions which are already contributing to this awful dilemma.