The idea of male-male affection, intimacy, sex, and love as a condition -- first called "homosexuality" and then called "sexual orientation" -- is a function of an historical process we call heterosexualization.

Heterosexualization

1. eliminates same-gender environments and replaces them with mixed-gender environments;

2. creates and then imposes upon men a false definition of masculinity, in which "real men" are constrained to be, both affectionally and sexually, exclusively heterosexual; and

3. medicalizes and ghettoizes same-sex affection, intimacy, sex, and love; while dictating that all same-sex sexual expression be played out within the heterosexual paradigm of male and (pseudo-)female -- thus, the gay male categories of top/bottom, active/passive, dominant/submissive, butch/bitch.

Crucial to this process is the denigration, curtailment, and dismissal both of the male's natural male aggression; and of his natural male attraction.

Under heterosexualization, the male is steadily divorced from contact with other males, and forced into constant contact with females; while the two key attributes of Natural Masculinity, male aggression and male attraction, are forbidden him.

Heterosexualization is most widespread in the industrialized and post-industrialized West -- the US, UK, EU, Canada and Australia;

and is accomplished, as I said, through the destruction of all-male spaces; the forced mixing of the sexes, particularly in adolescence; and the identifying of masculinity with exclusive "heterosexuality."

In reality, it is both normal and natural for masculine-identified men to have sex with other masculine-identified men.

Under heterosexualization, however, masculine men who acknowledge their same-sex feelings and desires are shunted off into a ghettoized "gay" space which is dominated by effeminized males.

In such a space, masculine-identified men are often accused of being "straight-acting"; and come under immense pressure to assume more effeminate behaviors, including anal penetration and promiscuity.

We should be clear that absent heterosexualization, there would be no homosexuals.

Nor would there be heterosexuals.

As one of our Warriors has said,

Male-male sex is isolated only because in the West, its spaces and its customs are completely heterosexualised (i.e. made mixed gender with pressures to be heterosexual). But heterosexual spaces are themselves unnatural --- and it was only through financial and technological power brought by industrialisation that the western society could create such an artificial unnatural heterosexual environment.

Let's look at this in more depth.

As I said, the terms "homosexuality" and "homosexual" were coined 140 years ago in an effort -- a successful effort -- to turn what had been an activity -- sex between men -- into a disease -- "homosexuality."

What that meant was that just as, in the 19th century, there were people who were "tubercular," and who suffered from the disease called "tuberculosis"; so now there were to be males who were said to be "homosexual," and who would be said to suffer from the disease called "homosexuality."

That was a tremendous shift in the way human beings thought about sex.

Again, it turned what had been an activity -- sex between guys -- into a condition, a medical condition, an illness, a disease, for which doctors would then seek a cure.

And this shift, which was a "paradigm shift," a significant change in cultural norms, coincided with the historical process we call heterosexualization:

the destruction of same-gender spaces and relationships, and their conversion to almost exclusively mixed-gender spaces and relationships.

And this too was a tremendous shift in the way people lived.

For example, John Ibson, chair of American Studies at Cal State Fullerton, notes, in his excellent Picturing Men: A Century of Male Relationships in Everyday American Photography, that in the late nineteenth century, more than 40 percent of all men over the age of fifteen -- were not married:

A bachelor subculture, with enclaves of singleness flourishing in street-corner gangs, boardingschools, the YMCA, rooming houses, colleges, the workplace, lodges, saloons, pool halls, and sporting events, was another manifestation of gender segregation, of particular importance in the late nineteenth century when bachelors were so numerous -- more than 40 percent of all men over the age of fifteen in the United States. Recent research has shown that the large number of single men was not linked to a shortage of marriageable women or to economic uncertainties as much as to the fact that many men simply preferred bachelorhood.

[emphasis mine]

40 percent -- quite a statistic!

And in a footnote, Professor Ibson tells us how the figures shifted as what we call heterosexualization proceeded apace:

Of American men fifteen and older, 42 percent were bachelors in 1890, 33 percent in 1940, and only 25 percent in 1950.

That's heterosexualization, and it's not a figment of anyone's imagination -- it's right there in the stats.

And the practical effect of the combination of heterosexualization and the development of the concept of "homosexuality" was to isolate and ghettoize Men who engaged in any sort of same-sex affection, intimacy, and love.

Now -- the American Psychiatric Association removed "homosexuality" from its list of mental disorders in 1973.

Which meant that "homosexuality" was no longer a mental illness.

But the concept -- that there was something fundamentally different about "men who had sex with men" -- persisted.

And the result was the categories of sexual orientation --

which I refer to as homosexuality's evil twin.

Because, in their effects, those categories are EVIL, and they're DIRECTLY related to the previous categories of "homosexual" and "homosexuality."

So -- "homosexuality" as a cultural concept was originally a condition -- a sickness -- a diseased way of being;

while "gay" is a "sexual orientation" and also a condition, the idea of which emerged out of "homosexuality," and, which, like the condition known as "homosexuality," is predicated upon the notion that any affection, intimacy, sex, and/or love between Men is a "deviation" from an alleged "heterosexual" norm.

As I said, the concept of "homosexuality" appears as society is beginning to heterosexualize.

While the concept of "sexual orientation" appears as heterosexualization triumphs -- and forces traditional understandings of Masculinity and Femininity underground.

The two poles of "sexual orientation" -- "gay" and "straight" -- work then to drive the male away from his Natural Masculinity:

to divorce Masculinity not only from same-sex love and affection; but also from Aggression -- Fighting Spirit -- Courage -- Virtue -- which is how Masculinity has traditionally been defined and demarcated.

Under heterosexualization, and the categories of sexual orientation, Masculinity is no longer to be defined by Fighting Spirit -- by Courage and Virtue --

but by a single sexual act:

penile-vaginal penetration.

This radical re-definition of "masculinity" is hideously destructive, and many of our modern ills, both male and female, derive directly from it.

So: historically, Masculinity has not been about "sexual orientation" --

but about Fighting Spirit.

And it needs to be again.

Which is why we say in the Alliance

Guys having fantasies about sex with other guys -- or just plain having sex with other guys -- and when I say sex of course I'm talking about Frot Sex -- Phallus-to-Phallus and Shaft-to-Shaft -- is not un-Manly or un-Masculine.

To the contrary.

It's an integral part of being a MAN.

Let's repeat that:

Guys having fantasies about sex with other guys -- or just plain having sex with other guys -- Frot Sex -- Phallus-to-Phallus and Shaft-to-Shaft -- is not un-Manly or un-Masculine.

To the contrary.

It's an integral part of being a MAN.

It makes the Man whole and complete.

That being the case, let's talk about the sorts of confusions and dysphoria which are created among Men by the idea of "homosexuality" and "heterosexuality" as fixed categories and immutable conditions.

Recently I received this letter:

My friend is a retired police officer. I am a university teacher. We are very heterosexual, have female partners and have been involved in two MFM threesomes. During one such encounter, my friend was on top and inside the woman, and I placed my finger in her very wet vagina and gently stroked between his cock and her vagina wall. I noticed I was feeling the head and rim of his hard cock and tracing the length of his shaft as he fucked her. Later, when we got together, he told me how good that felt. We talked about that and admitted we had both fantasized about stroking another man's cock out of curiosity. We talked about it several times, and then one day decided to get together, watch some porn and masturbate together. As we were lying naked on my bed, watching a very sexy video of beautiful young women giving ecstatic men hand jobs, we begin to jack off. I reached over and wrapped my hand around his hard cock and began stroking. It felt very different, but was exciting. He then reached over and stroked me. We both finished ourselves, but it was erotic to watch each other cum. Over the next few weeks we discussed frot after finding this web site. Today we got together again, sat in two chairs side by side, watched a very sexy video and began to masturbate. We stroked each other. Finally, we turned our chairs so we were facing each other. He lifted his legs over my thighs and we scooted toward each other until our balls were pressed together and hard cocks parallel and erect. He wrapped his large hand around both, poured some lube over our now sandwiched together dicks and began to stroke. It felt amazing!

Picture included in letter

I then stood up and laid my cock along side his like two straight arrows meeting head to head, then shaft to shaft, and then stroked them together. I used the head of my penis to run around the rim of his head, then against his balls and up and down the shaft. It was obvious we both enjoyed the visual and physical sensations. We took turns experimenting with other positions, stroking and playing. It really did feel good. Finally, seated face to face again, back to the erect shaft to shaft position, both cocks straight up, he stroked us and asked me how close I was to cumming. I told him I was there, and he said he was too. After a few more strokes, with a groan, he released two thick creamy rolls of cum that oozed from his purple cock and onto my swollen head; the added lube from his slick cum and his continued stroking caused me to squirt three long jets of clear cum over his cock and thigh. We cleaned up without saying much, each feeling a little odd, but knew we would do it again.

[emphases mine]

So -- the letter writer begins by saying that he and his male friend are "very heterosexual" -- thus locking themselves into the heterosexual box and cage.

Effectively imprisoning himself and his buddy there.

Nevertheless, their same-sex needs and feelings keep breaking through.

They do a couple of threesomes with a woman.

And then they decide first to mutually masturbate and then rub cocks with each other alone.

Just two guys, jerking off and rubbing cocks.

Like guys have done for hundreds of thousands of years.

But these two guys, UNLIKE MEN for the previous hundreds of thousands of years, are trapped in the category of "heterosexual."

An unnatural and completely artificial category created and constructed, remember, by heterosexualization.

Nevertheless, and to their credit, they jerk off together, and they like it enough that they get together again, after finding our site, for Frot.

This is their description of the experience:

Finally, we turned our chairs so we were facing each other. He lifted his legs over my thighs and we scooted toward each other until our balls were pressed together and hard cocks parallel and erect. He wrapped his large hand around both, poured some lube over our now sandwiched together dicks and began to stroke. It felt amazing! I then stood up and laid my cock along side his like two straight arrows meeting head to head, then shaft to shaft, and then stroked them together. I used the head of my penis to run around the rim of his head, then against his balls and up and down the shaft. It was obvious we both enjoyed the visual and physical sensations. We took turns experimenting with other positions, stroking and playing. It really did feel good. Finally, seated face to face again, back to the erect shaft to shaft position, both cocks straight up, he stroked us and asked me how close I was to cumming. I told him I was there, and he said he was too. After a few more strokes, with a groan, he released two thick creamy rolls of cum that oozed from his purple cock and onto my swollen head; the added lube from his slick cum and his continued stroking caused me to squirt three long jets of clear cum over his cock and thigh.

"our balls were pressed together and hard cocks parallel and erect."

Classic Frot
Manhood-to-Manhood
The Mutual Exaltation of Manhood

One guy puts both rock hard cocks in one fist.

"It felt amazing."

And it does.

It's the purest and indeed only form of mutual and direct genital stimulation that two Men can share.

The two cocks together create a uniquely male synergy -- again, what we call An Exaltation of Manhood -- which is incredibly powerful and which has to be experienced to be understood.

Our guys liked it so much that, as I showed you above, they even took a picture of it:

Guys having fun with their dicks

And this sort of pic is common -- I get a lot of them in my email.

Which tells me -- and which I know from my own life -- that this is an extremely meaningful act for the two Men involved.

Here, for example, is a similar pic of me and my late lover Brett, taken early in our relationship -- ca 1982.

And I'm very grateful to have this pic.

So this juxtaposition and merging of Manhood with Manhood is very meaningful to Men.

It was to me and Brett -- and we can see it is to my anonymous letter writers as well:

Who say:

"It was obvious we both enjoyed the visual and physical sensations. We took turns experimenting with other positions, stroking and playing. It really did feel good."

Soon, they're aching to cum:

he stroked us and asked me how close I was to cumming. I told him I was there, and he said he was too. After a few more strokes, with a groan, he released two thick creamy rolls of cum that oozed from his purple cock and onto my swollen head; the added lube from his slick cum and his continued stroking caused me to squirt three long jets of clear cum over his cock and thigh.

Sounds like a great experience -- right?

Everything about it has been terrific -- "if felt amazing," "it really did feel good," "it was obvious we both enjoyed the visual and physical sensations," they were eager to cum, and they do -- with groans, and shooting copious loads.

So -- they've shared a really terrific, meaningful, and tremendously pleasurable male-male experience.

They should be ecstatic -- feeling really great -- or at the least, very happy.

BUT -- and it's a big BUT -- at the end of the session, here's what happens:

We cleaned up without saying much, each feeling a little odd, but knew we would do it again.

"each feeling a little odd"

Why, in heaven or on earth, should they feel odd?

They've both had a truly wonderful Masculine and Manly experience.

Yet they feel "a little odd."

WHY?

Here's why:

"We are very heterosexual"

Because they define themselves -- and society defines them -- as "heterosexual"; and because the two categories of "homosexual" and "heterosexual" are supposed to be completely discrete and exclusive of each other --

the two Men "feel a little odd" -- because they've transgressed.

NOT a religious transgression -- they make no mention of that --

BUT A TRANSGRESSION AGAINST THE SECULAR CATEGORIES OF SEXUAL ORIENTATION.

That is to say, a transgression against heterosexualization, the historical force which governs the day-to-day lives of Men and Women -- completely and entirely.

Yet, as our Warrior says, absent heterosexualization, there would be no homosexuals -- and no heterosexuals either.

AND ABSENT THOSE TWO CATEGORIES, WHAT THESE MEN DID WOULD FALL NOT UNDER THE RUBRIC OF A CONDITION -- BUT AN ACT.

WHICH AFTER ALL, IS ALL IT WAS.

It was just an act.

Two guys getting together and rubbing cocks.

And there was nothing odd about it.

Does it tell us anything else about them?

NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO.

NO.

It tells us nothing about them.

It's just an act which the two of them enjoyed, both because it felt great, and because it exalted their mutual Masculinity.

And the categories of sexual orientation, which are supposed to be mutally exclusive, are once again shown to be WRONG.

Now, what we need to understand is that for every couple of guys like my anonymous correspodents who act on their feelings -- there are not hundreds of thousands, but literally MILLIONS of MEN living under heterosexualization and its categories of sexual orientation who WANT TO DO WHAT THEY DID -- but who are afraid to.

Afraid because of what they've been taught about those immutable categories.

Yet -- the system cannot, as it were, have it both ways.

Either "sexual orientation" is correct, in which case these men are not "very heterosexual" but actually "homosexual."

Or I and the MEN of the MAN2MAN Alliance are correct -- that these labels and categories are meaningless, that they are part of an ongoing effort to OPPRESS MEN AND MASCULINITY, and that they need to be discarded IMMEDIATELY.

Which won't be easy, because they utterly dominate our lives.

As we can see in this recent NY Times obit of a memoirist named Lord:

The first [memoir] was "Picasso and Dora: A Personal Memoir" (1993), an exercise in gossip at the highest level. Mr. Lord added his own twist to the complex relationship between artist and muse when, despite his homosexuality, he entered into an affair with Maar. "When with her, one feels at an extraordinary altitude," he recorded in his diary.

The ever omniscient Times says "despite his homosexuality."

What "homosexuality?"

He had affairs with men.

And he had an affair with Picasso's mistress.

And probably other women.

He is, or was, "bi," just like everyone else.

He wasn't "homosexual" and he wasn't "heterosexual."

He was just a guy -- and a person, a human being, complex and variable.

And sex between men, and between men and women, is an activity -- not a condition.

It should never be labeled -- but just described.

The acceptance and promulgation by the "gay community" of those labels -- which was done for political reasons -- so that men who had sex with men and women who had sex with women could be presented as minority groups entitled to civil rights -- has had the effect of trapping millions of people within those labels.

And it's been a dreadful mistake for another reason.

Which is, that under those categories, it's inevitable that one form will be seen as deviant.

And the other as normal.

For example, Sarah Schulman, in a review of Robin Gorna's Vamps, Virgins, and Victims: How Can Women Fight AIDS?, says,

Since heterosexuals [sic] as a group have no internal sense of identity, they simply see their sexual orientation [sic] as neutral, objective, and value-free. ... Heterosexuals would view their sex as Sex, not "Heterosexual Sex."

That's correct.

"heterosexuals [sic] as a group ... simply see their sexual orientation [sic] as neutral, objective, and value-free"

Inevitably, in a dyadic situation such as this one, in which a huge majority is assumed to dwarf a tiny minority, one group's acts are normative and taken for granted; the other's are deviant and always to some degree suspect.

The "gay leadership" has of course struggled to make sex between men and sex between women appear as "normal" as sex between men and women.

But the only true way that can be accomplished is by destroying the categories themselves, at which point the "gay leadership" would no longer have any reason to exist.

There was, after all, no "gay leadership" in ancient Greece.

Given how common sex between Men was in ancient Greece, why not?

Here's what the great classicist KJ Dover, who, in 1978, literally wrote the book on Greek Homosexuality, says in his preface to the Cambridge Greek and Latin Classics 1980 edition of Plato's Symposium:

Wherever and whenever the homosexual [sic] ethos of the Greek world originated, the simple answer to the question 'Why were the Athenians of Plato's time so fond of homosexual [sic] relations?' is "Because their fathers and grandfathers were'.

Obviously, I disagree with Dover's use of the term "homosexual."

"Same-sex" or "male-male" would be a far better and far more accurate descriptor.

Because, remember, the Men involved in those "relations" -- which were acutally passionate love affairs -- almost always married later in life or were already married.

As Dover says:

[The Greeks] did not consider homosexual [sic] relations incompatible with concurrent heterosexual [sic] relations or with marriage...

And that's the end of the discussion.

There was no "gay leadership" in ancient Greece because the categories of "gay" and "homosexual" did not exist.

It was taken for granted that guys would have sex with other guys -- before marriage to a woman or while married to a woman.

It was not a transgression, religiously or otherwise, to do so.

SEX BETWEEN MEN was an ACT -- NOT A CONDITION.

Falling in love with a guy did not make you "homosexual"; marrying a woman did not make you "heterosexual."

BOTH WERE SIMPLY THINGS GUYS DID.

DID.

DID.

They were not a condition.

They were acts, and that's all they were.

They were, no doubt, important to the actors, but they had no implications for other aspects of their lives.

NO IMPLICATIONS!!!!!!!

NONE!!!!!!!

And if we change Dover's language just a bit, what we see is this:

Wherever and whenever the emphasis on same-sex love -- that is, Eros -- in the Greek world originated, the simple answer to the question 'Why were the Athenians of Plato's time so fond of male-male relations?' is "Because their fathers and grandfathers were'.

In other words, the reasons were cultural.

This was not about genetics or bad parenting or exotic family structures;

nor was this about something called "situational homosexuality," which is theorized to occur when guys don't have access to women -- and which in my view -- and I'm correct -- does NOT exist.

And, in point of fact, Greek Men had lots of access to women, including, at Athens, women of free birth, slaves, prostitutes, and concubines.

Sparta was notorious for what classicist Michael Grant describes as its "homosexual ethos"; yet it was equally notorious for the "sexual looseness" of its women.

Well, and again, you can't have it both ways.

If Spartan Men were turning to each other, it wasn't because their women weren't available.

In short, this was not about -- a shortage of women.

Rather, guys were understood to be openly, passionately, and virtually universally into other guys -- "because their fathers and grandfathers were."

Like nude male athletics --

and in particular nude male Fight Sport --

it was part of the warp and woof of their culture:

It had NOTHING to do with "sexual minorities," "identity politics," etc.

It was just Life.

And what we can see, is that in such a culture, in which there was no divine prohibition against Men Loving Men, in which, to the contrary, the Gods themselves had male lovers -- such Love was, as I said, virtually universal.

Zeus and his wife Hera on Olympos
Zeus' male lover Ganymedes stands between them

And it will be again.

Let's repeat that:

In such a culture as that of the ancient Greeks, in which there was no divine prohibition against Men Loving Men, in which, to the contrary, the Gods themselves had male lovers -- such Love was virtually universal.

And it will be again.

So -- to return to the "we are very heterosexual" letter --

let's suppose that instead of these guys thinking of themselves as "very heterosexual" -- they thought of themselves as being "very into touch football."

And suppose I ran a website for guys into basketball.

And suppose they wrote me to say, We're very into touch football, but recently we've gotten into basketball as well.

WOULD THAT HAVE ANY IMPLICATION FOR ANY OTHER ASPECT OF THEIR LIVES?

NO!!!!!!

Of course not.

And if they were very into karate, and had started training in mixed martial arts?

Would that have any implications?

NO!!!!!!!

Those are just things guys do.

And no one would look for far-reaching implications, if a guy who was into one sport took up another.

Nor would he and his buddy have reason to "feel odd" about it.

The problem is not guys having sex with guys.

The problem is the category.

Guys have sex with guys.

Always have, always will.

And if you're a guy, that's all you have to know about it.

Having sex with a guy has NO IMPLICATIONS outside the act itself.

It's just an act.

IT IS NOT A CONDITION.

If you have any question about that -- please don't hesitate to write:

bill@man2manalliance.org

Finally:

Because we Men of the Alliance don't accept the categories of sexual orientation, we tend, in our writings, to put quotation marks around words such as "gay," "straight," "homosexual," "heterosexual," and "bi."

We understand that most people in our society *self*-identify as "gay" or "straight."

That is to say, that forced by heterosexualization and its categories of sexual orientation to choose, they put themselves into one or another of its two boxes.

However, that doesn't mean that the boxes have any validity.

They don't.

We nonetheless acknowledge the reality of that forced self-identification by referring to people as "gay-identified" or "straight-identified."

But, and understanding the historical and cross-cultural realities of men having sex with men -- we refer to ourselves simply as Men.

Because that's what we are, and we believe very strongly that we don't need any other identifier.

We're Men.

Not "gay men," not "straight men," and not something in-between "gay" and "straight," but MEN.

Again, we believe that Man is the only identifier that any Man needs, and we strongly encourage Men who wish to join the Alliance to identify -- as Men, and Men only.

And we point out once again that our present system of categorization based on sexual orientation is an historical accident;

that in ancient Greece and other ancient cultures, a Man was not categorized on the sole basis of the gender of the person he happened to be having sex with at the moment.

A Man was a Man based primarily on his Virtue -- what the Greeks called Areté; which as a practical matter was often seen, particularly in Warrior Cultures, as his Valour or Fighting Spirit.

Again, it was, most often, the Man's Willingness to Fight, and to Fight for those matters which in his society were viewed as matters of principle, which most clearly defined him as a Man.

In addition, among the Greeks, anal penetration, promiscuity, and effeminacy were strongly proscribed -- forbidden -- in male-male relationships.

Which means, that if we were living in ancient Greece, there would be no need for The Man2Man Alliance.

But we aren't living in ancient Greece, and The Man2Man Alliance has come into existence in order to help Men re-discover the values of Virtuous Virility: of a Manly culture which respects the attributes of true Masculinity and Manhood --

and what one of our Warriors refers to as Our Nobility as Men.

And "Nobility" is a good word.

In the Alliance, we believe that Men are meant to be both Noble and Good.

Beautiful and Brave.

Which is why we speak of "Brave Beauty."

Because Beauty isn't beautiful unless it's Brave.

Plato believed that "between the moral and the physical cosmos there is perfect harmony."

We agree.

And we believe that:

Phallus Against Phallus

Manhood Against Manhood

Man Against Man

is morally harmonious because it honors the physical, phallic reality of male sexuality.

It's harmonious because it honors and exalts Masculinity and both the physical hallmark of Masculinity -- Phallus -- and the spiritual hallmark of Masculinity -- Fighting Spirit.

Phallus and Fighting.

We invite all Men to join with us in re-discovering the Brave and Moral Beauty -- of being a Man.

Bill Weintraub

December 9, 2009

© All material Copyright 2009 by Bill Weintraub. All rights reserved.

Suggested Further Reading:

straight, but...

Warriorhood and Male Intimacy

a sick society that forces men to repress their natural, wholesome feelings of love for each other

AGOGE III: The Longing for Masculinity

AGOGE IV: Excellence, Honor, and the Molding of Men

AGOGE VI: The Strife of Valour: Austerity and Equality at Sparta

AGOGE VII: Two Spearmen

Staying Strong and Masculine