PEN-L message, Re: the next wedge issue

In a message dated 11/21/03 11:44:27 AM Pacific Standard Time, gadfly@xxxxxxxxxxxx writes:

i have snipped out all the hand-waving (why, some of my best friends are
gay! in fact some of them hit on me!) arguments. i want to hear the
factual basis (outside of the anecdotal evidence that is given) of the
far-reaching statements made above. i want further elucidation of the
inferences drawn: for instance, what were these interviews? what were
the variables considered for correlation? what levels of heterosexual
behaviour was/is "connected" to sex abuse? what is the causal
underpinning of the "observed" correlation between homosexuality and
child abuse? what is the biological basis of the "learned behaviour"
theory. if there is one, does that exclude "heterosexual behaviour"?
claims of the decay and degeneracy of society beg the question.
establish first that such decay is happening.

is [reduction to] marxist or property/class relations the axiomatic
system of this list? if it is, then i question such a system of logic.
if not, then be sure that the proofs requested are derived from more
self-evident axioms.

I don't have close homosexual friends - except my younger brother who died of AIDS, because of my lifestyle and my inferences are to alert one to the high level of politics that characterize my life. Who elected you to anything in life? I am political with an acute political sense of maneuver.

1. The question of a social movement is complex and all social movement take place in definite context. Generally, I approach this from the materialist conception of history. No social movement is reducible to the framework of its emergence . . . period. Nor have I ever advocated such. There has taken place a social movement in America of industrial workers that was generated on the basis of changes in the material power of production. This social movement that was generated on the basis of the material power of production, does not require me proving its existence. This movement of industrial workers arose followed a line of trajectory roughly corresponding to the industrial curve - reached its zenith and began decay.

The Women Movement is a social movement that emerged and evolved from the division of labor in society but is not reducible to the division labor in society. What have been the context of its evolution and the changing shape of its class forms is the mode of production in material life. Here it is simply a question of ones belief system of theory framework of historical narrative. If one has a different theory framework I cannot prove to them why the property relations within a mode of production give rise and shape to historically evolved human social intercourse. One accepts the theory framework or one does not.

Homosexuality is not a social movement and will never be a social movement. Homosexuals are not exploited and oppressed on the basis of the configuration of the material power of production - the property relations, and this is obvious. People who are homosexual are exploited and oppressed n the basis of gender, nationality and economic status. Male Anglo-American homosexuals and say male African American homosexuals are subject to different class and national factors. Apparently this is not obvious. The latter is subject to second class citizenship status and sex or sexual intimacy is irrelevant to this fact of life.

2. I have absolutely no intention of trying to prove to anyone the obvious social and economic decay in society. Every statistic on the life of the peoples of America proves this. The growth of poverty, destitution and the intense polarization of wealth and poverty has reached monstrous proportions.

3. Allow one to back into the question. "What levels of heterosexual behavior was/is "connected" to sex abuse?" posed the question entirely incorrect because it is not learned behavior as such.

By heterosexual behavior is meant the spontaneous impulse of species propagation. One may learn technique but one does not learn heterosexual behavior as such. There is much sex abuse amongst heterosexuals. The biological basis is spontaneous reproduction not very different from a cat or dog. On this basis there is no such thing as heterosexual behavior other than species reproduction.

Homosexuality is learned behavior. One does not learn to reproduce as such. This is rather obvious. Society evolves rituals and traditions to ensure survival of species. Homosexuality is not a biological impulse. Sex is a spontaneous biological impulse, even if one concedes that there can exist a genetic disposition toward homosexuality. One has to learn not to have sex as reproduction with the opposite species, once the survival imperative is ritualized and made an institution.

What consenting adults do in their secual intimacy is their business, but reproduction - heterosexual behavior, is not learned behavior or we would not exist. :-)

Let's think out process logic so we understand what juncture of history we are at and how to win a political fight. Homosexuality is not a thing in itself but exist in relationship to spontaneous heterosexual behavior - species reproduction as the fundamental condition of history. History is involved and the traditions and rituals that guard survival. How do we know this? Historical and sacred text - once the ideological form and ancient modes of thinking is discarded.

We are not dealing with bigotry as an abstraction but the most powerful impulse that has been the condition for existence, why and how it was ritualized.

What characterizes prehistory - we are still in prehistory today, is scarcity. This includes real people and an evolving mold of production demanding large populations. One can understand this issue - not a question, as Marxists materialist - although there is no such thing as a Marxist approach to homosexuality.

How and why history is manipulated is a class question, but the fact remains that of all writers on this question no one but I - the one who abhor homosexuality as it exist, disclosed how to defeat the wedge issue. In my opinion everyone else approach the question from homosexual ideology and not militant materialism. And, I approach this issue at the absolute top of politics.

READ WHAT EVERYONE HAS WRITTEN!

4. The bulk of my interviews took place in Detroit and I was very clear concerning the conditions under which the interviews took place. The bulk of my wife experience occurred over the course of the last twenty-five years in her field.

Homosexuality in history does not arise on the basis of the mode of production in material life and has been used by the ruling class as an issue of domination and subjugation of a conquered people. We are not talking about a mythical free choice of intimacy.

I assert that one does not have to subscribe to, agree with or advocate homosexuality as a free choice and life style to be progressive or a communist.

One comrade asserted that my disdain for homosexuality is equivalent to calling someone a Nigger. This is insanity.

How can "I" be wrong and have the only correct political solution to the wedge question?

Read the entire exchange.

More later but this is boring and very reactionary. The problem is that people speak who do not have to deal with real world politics.

Melvin P.