April 7, 2011

"First homosexual caveman found."

How do you figure out that a skeleton is gay? The body was buried "with its head pointing eastwards and surrounded by domestic jugs, rituals only previously seen in female graves."

132 comments:

traditionalguy said...

But was he wearing shorts???

Ron said...

Hey, maybe he was just the Felix Unger of cavemen!

Scott M said...

I heard this on the way in this morning and couldn't believe what I was hearing. It is absolutely just as valid to assume that the guy was buried by people that hated him and wanted him to be as disgraced as possible by having him show up at their Happy Hunting Grounds as a she.

What the hell? Let's just assume that Lincoln's boyfriend was a time traveler. There's just as much evidence for that as assuming this guy was gay to satisfy some contemporary social strata.

Nauseating.

WV - "niseflu" - the opposite of being really sick and not enjoying it.

Trooper York said...

The skeletons of two rare saber tooth clumbers were found nearby.

Trooper York said...

Also there was a large pile of fossilized pinched loaves at the back of the cave.

Anonymous said...

Well there you go, then.

It isn't choice or culture, it is innate and immutable, and we can prove that now by looking at choice and culture.

The Dude said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Anonymous said...

Oh.

I thought the way to tell if a skeleton is gay is if you find it in a closet.

Lucien said...

So the article says he may have been homosexual or transsexual -- and the survival rate after sex reassignment surgery in those days must have been low.

Maybe he was the chief pottery maker, or in mourning ("bury me just like you buried my wife last week"), or maybe the people burying him were his enemies and wanted to shame him, or maybe he was a eunuch, or otherwise castrated earlier in life, or . . .

One could come up with lots of guesses, without even having a PhD.

Moose said...

..and Sully LOVED HIS BEARD.

Lucius said...

Probably some sort of shaman, would be my flying guess.

I'm sure a lot of people would try and spin that as a sign of "acceptance" or something. I suppose shaman are highly revered, but then-- do the mothers really want their boys to grow up to be shamen?

coketown said...

This is what we call projection. Our contemporary society puts male homosexuals in the category of the feminine. Ergo, any males put in the feminine category, regardless of era or culture, must be homosexual.

But what if they find another male surrounded by jugs with its head pointing east? Will they have found two homosexuals? Or will they have found that such a ritual is not unique to females?

Science!!!

DADvocate said...

Another desperate attempt at validating homosexuality. If they were comfortable with homosexuality, they wouldn't have to go through these logical gyrations constantly.

I thought maybe he had a limp wrist bone or extremely stylish clothes. That would be proof!!

Robert said...

He wasn't wearing kneesocks. He was wearing kneepads.

Nick said...

Because scientists understand everything about caveman society and there can't possibly be any other explanation.

chickelit said...

It's plausible. Compare the last paragraph of this historical account of California indians at the time of Spanish exploration: link

Anonymous said...

Was he a hair stylist?

chickelit said...

Excerpt from the link:

Polygamy is not permitted among these people; the chiefs alone possess the right to take two wives. In all of their towns there was noticed a class of men who lived like women, associated with them, wore the same dress, adorned themselves with beads, earrings, necklaces, and other feminine ornaments, and enjoyed great consideration among their companions. The want of an interpreter prevented us from ascertaining what kind of men they were, or to what office they were designed; all suspected however, a sexual defect or some abuse among those Indians.

Lisa said...

All they are saying is that because he was buried the same way women were, there was likely something unusual in his sexuality.

He could easily have had a micropenis or had one of many genetic disorders that confuse gender identity.

Or perhaps he had been castrated, accidently or intentionally.

But something was clearly different about this man.

Scott M said...

It's plausible.

Maybe. But it's not making headlines because it's plausible. It's making headlines because people hear "anthropologist" (ooo...big, official-sounding word), "gay", and "caveman". The details go out the window and another plank in the meme is established.

Unknown said...

Some Indian tribes in the Southwest believed that a young male who had a vision of a woman during puberty meant that he was meant to do woman's work the rest of his life. This may be similar.

But coketown and DADvocate are right, somebody's really reaching.

Trooper York said...

Well if he had jugs maybe he was a transsexual.

Not that there's anything wrong with that.

Dust Bunny Queen said...

How do you figure out that a skeleton is gay?

The same way we do when the skeleton is alive.

By lifestyle. Cultural artifacts.

It is all about perception.

Dust Bunny Queen said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Placeholder said...

More Democrat vote fraud! Everyone knows that liberals invented homosexuality in San Francisco in 1968.

Simon said...

With all due respect to our gay friends, why are some gays and their supporters so desperate to make incredible leaps to show that some historical person—in this case prehistorical person—was gay? What does it add? What do they think they're accomplishing here? It just makes them look stupid and desperate to make connections that don't exist in pursuit of some kind of... What? Validation? Is that it? At bottom, it's needy. It's clingy, needly, attention-seeking.

Trooper York said...

If they were fake jugs then they found the rare fossilized remains of a Real Housewife of Beverly
Hills.

Scott M said...

If they were fake jugs then they found the rare fossilized remains of a Real Housewife of Beverly
Hills.


"Some of those parts aren't biodegradable."

Name the movie...without doing a search on it. I'll give you a hint. It's an affected Brit accent when said.

Paddy O said...

Archaeologist #1: "We need more funds for research, but no one cares about cave men anymore."

Archaeologist #2: "Let's ,do what television does. Add a gay character. Then the Ford Foundation will be sure to give us millions of dollars."

Ann Althouse said...

"What does it add? What do they think they're accomplishing here?"

1. It supports the proposition that homosexuality is a normal, natural phenomenon that occurs in the human animal.

2. Each example of another respected culture that includes homosexuality as an accepted way to live builds support for the argument that we would do well to accept/tolerate/love the homosexuals that dwell among us.

YoungHegelian said...

I'll believe the guy was gay when they find the fossilized 8-track Barbra Streisand tapes in the same stratum.

Maybe he was just bi-curiousing a stairway to heaven....

Anonymous said...

2. Each example of another respected culture that includes homosexuality as an accepted way to live builds support for the argument that we would do well to accept/tolerate/love the homosexuals that dwell among us.

We're already doing that.

A large percentage of us just don't share your obsession with gay marriage.

The purported oppression of gays is a fabrication.

Triangle Man said...

The purported oppression of gays is a fabrication.

It never happened?

Anonymous said...

It never happened?

Not during my lifetime, no.

And, I suspect, not before my lifetime, either.

Were individual gays beaten up or killed? Yes. Same is true for individual heteros. Have heteros killed gays? Yes. Have gays killed heteros. Yes.

Creating martyrs is a cynical, stupid political game.

Gay men, in my lifetime, have had a 1000 times more reason to fear for their lives because of their own sexual behavior than for any other reason.

Anonymous said...

Paddy:

"Archaeologist #1: "We need more funds for research, but no one cares about cave men anymore."

Archaeologist #2: "Let's ,do what television does. Add a gay character. Then the Ford Foundation will be sure to give us millions of dollars.""

LOL

We have our thread winner!!!

Bob said...

"Gay" is in now. Even if you were born thousands of years ago...

Methadras said...

Did they find the lyrics to Somewhere over the Rainbow clutched in his cold dead fingers?

Placeholder said...

1. It supports the proposition that homosexuality is a normal, natural phenomenon that occurs in the human animal.

2. Each example of another respected culture that includes homosexuality as an accepted way to live builds support for the argument that we would do well to accept/tolerate/love the homosexuals that dwell among us.


3. They found a gay caveman to sell car insurance to a selected demographic.

Phil 314 said...

Professor;
1. It supports the proposition that homosexuality is a normal, natural phenomenon that occurs in the human animal.

I don't see how this can be implied. If its not "nature" but "nuture" you'd have to conclude that the "nuture" factors did not exist in caveman times.

2. Each example of another respected culture that includes homosexuality as an accepted way to live builds support for the argument that we would do well to accept/tolerate/love the homosexuals that dwell among us.

Again how do you assume acceptance by this burial. As suggested previously this could be a "disgraceful" burial for a cave man of that location.

Unfortunately we don't have preserved copies of the NYT nor Time magazine of that age to tell us what the cultural norms were.

Anonymous said...

2. Each example of another respected culture that includes homosexuality as an accepted way to live builds support for the argument that we would do well to accept/tolerate/love the homosexuals that dwell among us.


Cavemen are a "respected culture" now? For most of the history of that word, it was a term of opprobrium.

Any stick to beat the dog, I guess.

WineSlob said...

A Gay Man Caveman to a Layman
Is Like a Celestial God to a Pagan
A Reality Abstraction
Of the Politically Correct Faction
Fresh Manure Far Afield From the Wagon.

Sofa King said...

I'm just an unfrozen caveman homosexual lawyer.

Placeholder said...

I wonder what future generations will say when they dig up a website from a wingnut woman lawyer. "Impossible" "Trying to justify the bizarre!"

Carol_Herman said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Anonymous said...

I wonder what future generations will say when they dig up a website from a wingnut woman lawyer. "Impossible" "Trying to justify the bizarre!"

You are completely tone deaf, idiot.

Althouse just posted on her support for gay marriage. And, she's a wingnut?

Try to display some degree of intelligence.

Titus said...

domestic jugs=tits.

tits.

Anonymous said...

Placeholder,

You are correctly named. You seem to be merely holding place until something of some substance comes along.

Is there any possibility that you will actually read the postings and comments before posting your empty blurts?

Titus said...

Trooper You are Hilarious.

fossilized pinched loafs-where do you come up with this stuff?

Trooper York said...

Placeholder said...
I wonder what future generations will say when they dig up a website from a wingnut woman lawyer. "Impossible" "Trying to justify the bizarre!"

I already answered that question about what happened when they found
the Althouse fossils!

Padre said...

Browndog: "I thought the way to tell if a skeleton is gay is if you find it in a closet."
My vote for best post on this subject.

LordSomber said...

His cave must've looked fabulous.

Wonder if he was friends with Wilma and Betty?

Trooper York said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Placeholder said...

With all due respect to our gay friends, why are some gays and their supporters so desperate to make incredible leaps to show that some historical person—in this case prehistorical person—was gay? What does it add? What do they think they're accomplishing here? It just makes them look stupid and desperate to make connections that don't exist

With all due respect to idiot wingnuts, maybe they're just trying to have the historical record be accurate. Gays are constantly airbrushed out of the picture.

Trooper York said...

LordSomber said...
His cave must've looked fabulous.

Wonder if he was friends with Wilma and Betty?"


Well maybe Wilma but never Betty. He is not Betty's kind of guy. Because you know Betty is a dirty girl.

Anonymous said...

With all due respect to idiot wingnuts, maybe they're just trying to have the historical record be accurate. Gays are constantly airbrushed out of the picture.


(1) The cavemen are prehistoric--there's no historical record involved. That's why the conclusions are taken with a grain of salt.

(2) "Airbrushed out of the picture"?? In what cave are you living? The academic/media game for the last two decades has been Pin the Tail on the Queer. Everyone from Jesus Christ to Gandhi has been accused of being a sodomite--and apparently that's a good thing.


Now run along.

Rabel said...

Thanks for this post Althouse. It taught me something about equality.
I was curious as to what the gay community thought about the publicity seeking speculation reported in the article.
What I learned was that people who post and comment on gay websites are equally as gullible, ignorant, and unthinking as those of us who comment on non-gay sites. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

It also raised my opinion of some of your regulars in a relative sort of way.

A.Worthing said...

being gay... its so easy a caveman can do it!

Placeholder said...

"Airbrushed out of the picture"?? In what cave are you living? The academic/media game for the last two decades has been Pin the Tail on the Queer. Everyone from Jesus Christ to Gandhi has been accused of being a sodomite--and apparently that's a good thing.

Oh hell, I got a history degree at UW-Madison, and thus have always been interested in the subject. The other day, I saw another example of airbrushing, with respect to Abraham Lincoln.

The guy slept in the same bed with a "close friend" for several years, and while he was president moved from the White House to a "summer cottage" where he lived with an Army captain.

The program trotted out some "academic" to say that, regardless of how it looked, Lincoln couldn't possibly have been homosexual. Yeah, and I migrated here from Jupiter last week.

Gays are constantly airbrushed out of the picture. Happens all the time. I mean look right now. Do you really think there are no gay major league football players, baseball players, nascar drivers, or pro rodeo stars? That's what the lack of mention would have us believe.

AST said...

This might explain why Neanderthals became extinct.

Titus said...

I am a homo that dwells amongst yous guys. That sounds creepy, like I am some fish at the bottom of the lake eating other fishes loaves.

Shouting Thomas said...

The guy slept in the same bed with a "close friend" for several years, and while he was president moved from the White House to a "summer cottage" where he lived with an Army captain.

It was common for men to share beds at that time, without regard to sexuality.

The program trotted out some "academic" to say that, regardless of how it looked, Lincoln couldn't possibly have been homosexual. Yeah, and I migrated here from Jupiter last week.

Yes, you are a very bad historian. You're not, in fact, a historian at all. You're the usual ideologue.

Gays are constantly airbrushed out of the picture. Happens all the time. I mean look right now. Do you really think there are no gay major league football players, baseball players, nascar drivers, or pro rodeo stars? That's what the lack of mention would have us believe.

What makes you think that athletes, if they are gay, want it mentioned?

Besides, you're just wrong. In the 70s there was a parade of athletes announcing their homosexuality.

Your have an obsession with announcing your homosexuality to people. That's your problem. I know many gay people who don't share your obsession.

Now, could you please stop being a fucking airheaded idiot for a moment, and notice that Althouse supports your gay activist agenda?

Got that, moron?

Anonymous said...

Gays are constantly airbrushed out of the picture. Happens all the time. I mean look right now.


Yeah, look right now.

Titus said...

I wish they would do a raffle and raffle off Zza's amputated leg for charity.

I would love to have that leg in my house and put a long cigarette holder between her toes.

I want Zza Zza's leg NOW.

B said...

'Some Indian tribes in the Southwest believed that a young male who had a vision of a woman during puberty meant that he was meant to do woman's work the rest of his life.'

There are young males who DO NOT have visions of woman during puberty? There are young males who have visions during puberty that do not include woman?

Titus said...

Leo, I already brought the Gandhi thing up over a week ago here.

If they found a lesbian cave woman it would have short hair on top and a mullet in the back mounting a porpoise because lezzies love everything about sea mammals.

We in India are thinking about banning the book.

The Dude said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Saint Croix said...

"It supports the proposition that homosexuality is a normal, natural phenomenon that occurs in the human animal."

Well, it also supports the proposition that homosexuality means "acting like a woman."

I swear, if the p.r. was different ("archeologists discover that homosexuals are deviant throughout history"), the same damn people who are promiting this as science would be mocking it as science.

What's really kinda obscene about the left is how it expands outside of politics into more and more fields of humanity. Art, science, religion, nothing is safe from the left. Everything must bow before the political agenda. Insanity.

Trooper York said...

"Do you really think there are no gay major league football players, baseball players, nascar drivers, or pro rodeo stars?"

I agree with you dude. Most of the Boston Red Sox are gay. That's why they haven't won a game yet. Homophobia.

The Dude said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Shouting Thomas said...

What's really kinda obscene about the left is how it expands outside of politics into more and more fields of humanity. Art, science, religion, nothing is safe from the left. Everything must bow before the political agenda. Insanity.

OK, I gotta correct you, too.

Althouse isn't a leftist. She's an independent. Social liberal. Fiscal conservative. Pretty standard ID for an older person.

Her interest in the gay biz is personal. It's her son. I'm only guessing, but it appears her son is a believer in the gay activist agenda. I have gay friends who are not, but there you go. For Althouse, it's about loyalty to her son.

But, your critique, if actually applied to leftists, is probably true.

Shouting Thomas said...

I agree with you dude. Most of the Boston Red Sox are gay. That's why they haven't won a game yet. Homophobia.

So, what you got to say about my Cubbies, Troop?

Be careful.

Anonymous said...

It's Fred and Wilma, not Fred and Wilbur.

Anonymous said...

For Althouse, it's about loyalty to her son.


Isn't that also called "special pleading"?

J said...

they probably located a GOP Log Cabin membership card, or perhaps it was the "Larry Craig"ish stance of the femurs and tibia-- or just maybe the stiff had on his pretty-boy tie ala Bone-ner.

MadisonMan said...

Not much, um, hard science behind that conclusion.

Dustin said...

Yeah... um, apparently it's not the case that this ritual is exclusive to women. The entire argument is absurd, since it posits A, and then posits the fact A isn't true, and concludes something very difficult to know.

I'm sure there were homosexuals a long time ago. I'm sure the people who think this is the proof are pretty stupid.

Unknown said...

This has got to be the stupidest of the many idiotic "news" stories I've read this year.

Simon said...

Ann Althouse said...
"It supports the proposition that homosexuality is a normal, natural phenomenon that occurs in the human animal."

No more so than the observation that it exists today, I wouldn't think. I don't think anyone believes that homosexual orientation is a fruit of fluoride in the public water system, street lighting, or some other purely modern phenomenon, although it may certainly be observed that homosexual activity—which is a very different proposition—may be more widespead as a result of modern communications. (In particular the explosion of pornography, the crossbreeding of which with the internet was like saddling the common cold for Ebola.) Cf. Phyllis Schlafly, Pornography's Victims 16 (1987).

"Each example of another respected culture that includes homosexuality as an accepted way to live builds support for the argument that we would do well to accept/tolerate/love the homosexuals that dwell among us."

That's quite a leap, isn't it? Who says that the culture extant at the time and place of burial was respected and respectable? Who says that that culture accepted, tolerated, or loved the homosexuals that dwelled among them? The Telegraph story contains an awful lot of speculation, but what it ultimately comes to is this: We've found a skeleton buried in a manner inconsistent with the pattern of other similarly-situated skeletons. Everything else is speculation, informed or not, tenuous or not.

To say that a mispositioned skeleton is by itself proof that a bronze age proto-civilization accepted homosexuality as a way to live is an awfully heavy weight to rest on so rickety a support. And in this case, it's particularly inapt, because (as Scott pointed out above) the evidence could just as well support precisely the opposite inference: That the man was buried that way as a sign of opprobrium and disgrace, a last insult. Or it may mean what the Telegraph says. Or it may mean that our understanding of that culture's burial rituals (taken as an unchallenged predicate in the Telegraph) is flawed or incomplete. Or it may mean nothing at all—an accident, aberration, or oversight. I see no warrant for elaborating a grand cathedral of speculation from a single brick of evidence.

And to the extent we're talking about my broader comment rather than this particular instance, how does it help the case that it was tolerated when we retroactively "out" an historical figure (usually based on equally thin evidence)?

I'm Full of Soup said...

The oldest example of revisionist history ever!

Unknown said...

As Eddie Izzard said after mimicking an archeologist pointing along several foundation lines and explaining what all occurred with: "You're making this shit up, aren't you?"

Drew said...

What the hell? Let's just assume that Lincoln's boyfriend was a time traveler. There's just as much evidence for that as assuming this guy was gay to satisfy some contemporary social strata.

Nauseating.


Yes, but would you be able to get a large grant to study Lincoln's time-traveling boyfriend?

I didn't think so.

traditionalguy said...

It says that these were proto-Germanic "corded ware culture" people. So suppose a proto-semitic dude was living among them as the first diamond merchant. So the Germans would have killed him just to steal his money and hidden the body in a woman's grave. Prove that did not happen.

Placeholder said...

It was common for men to share beds at that time, without regard to sexuality.

While Lincoln was president? I don't think so.

Scott M said...

While Lincoln was president? I don't think so.

Why not? You think one of the staffers would have twittered about it? Please make the case why it wouldn't have happened and provide how you come by that knowledge.

Scott M said...

and provide how you come by that knowledge.

...and, for the record, claiming, "Because I was there," is dubious, at best.

Drew said...

Ooo! We are thisclose to solving the mystery of Lincoln's time-traveling boyfriend! And we didn't need a grant to do it!

Placeholder said...

Here you go, bunky. What's funny is the great lengths the academics go to try to refute the evidence.

Why, how could one of the great American presidents have been a part-time beefer? O! The horror!

Placeholder said...

There's a whole group of "Lincoln scholars" who are dead-set against the idea that he could have been homosexual.

This is academia, which means it's rarely about the truth. They could find an old daguerreotype of Lincoln and some dude in flagrante delicto, and you could be certain that the "Lincoln scholars" would find a way to explain it away.

Look, the guy liked guys. With a wife like Mary Todd, who can blame him? The woman was batshit crazy, y'know.

Titus said...

Phyllis Schafly's son is a a big gay too.

Go figure.

Titus said...

I admit I would be interested in inspecting fossilized loafs.

A.Worthing said...

Place

> With a wife like Mary Todd, who can blame him?

You do know he had children, right?

Btw, how come no one at the time thought he was gay or that there was anything untoward going on?

i mean with jefferson there were always rumors about him and sally hemmings. and thad stevens and smith. but abraham, its all looking after the fact.

the reality is that gay people want him to gay to score the political points they think this will achieve. but i am a little more devoted to verifiable fact and truth.

Simon said...

Placeholder said...
"There's a whole group of 'Lincoln scholars' who are dead-set against the idea that he could have been homosexual."

Yes, and there's a whole other group who are absolutely set on the idea of claiming certain historical figures "for the team," in the misguided notion (as A.Worthing said above) that it will score some kind of point. What do you imagine is going to happen? Do you think someone who is dead set against homosexuality is going to change their mind if an historical figure they admire was gay?

Placeholder said...

Btw, how come no one at the time thought he was gay or that there was anything untoward going on?

"Gay" didn't exist at the time. But the relationship with the Army captain was indeed the subject of gossip. So, too, was the subject of the relationship between Franklin Pierce and James Buchanan, who were presidents just before Abe.

It's hilarious to watch the discomfort about Lincoln. Any fair reading of the history is that he had intimate relationships with men, but a lot of people just go crazy about it.

To me, it's a really good example of how homosexuality gets airbrushed out of the picture. We're fine if it's a typical flamer, but one of our heroes? Can't be!

Placeholder said...

What do you imagine is going to happen? Do you think someone who is dead set against homosexuality is going to change their mind if an historical figure they admire was gay?

It's history. That's all. It's not "gay activism."

Placeholder said...

Oh, and I'm sure some of the "Lincoln scholars" have the purest of motives. They want to protect his reputation, and the union. If it becomes settled history that Lincoln liked the boys too, that's ammo for the neo-Confederates.

To me, it's history, and it ought to be accurate. Silly me.

Scott M said...

To me, it's history, and it ought to be accurate. Silly me.

Accuracy, in many cases like this, is somewhat elastic, though, wouldn't you say? There is no direct evidence. There are the second-hand mentions in a couple of diaries, which are then looked at through the lens of over 100 years hence, despite what scholars think they're doing.

Placeholder said...

Accuracy, in many cases like this, is somewhat elastic, though, wouldn't you say? There is no direct evidence. There are the second-hand mentions in a couple of diaries, which are then looked at through the lens of over 100 years hence, despite what scholars think they're doing.

History's been written with a lot less. I don't think there's any real question about Lincoln being fond of the males. Every time I see a denial, it makes me chuckle about the depth of squeamishness about anything involving homosexuality.

Automatic_Wing said...

But the relationship with the Army captain was indeed the subject of gossip.

Right, there was gossip, but the link you provided helpfully debunked the idea that there was any funny business going on with the Army captain.

Or is the guy at your link one of those gay-Lincoln denialist bastards that we're not supposed to listen to?

Automatic_Wing said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Scott M said...

History with less? That doesn't rise to your need for accuracy then, does it?

As Maguro points out, the link you provide is a bit confusing given the context of your point. Besides, again with the gossip, how do we know Chamberlain and "Tish" weren't part of the same coffee klatch?

Revenant said...

The article mentions this:

She said that archeologists had uncovered an earlier case dating from the Mesolithic period where a female warrior was buried as a man.

There's no mention of an assumption that the woman was a lesbian -- just that she did what was traditionally men's work. Perhaps this man did work that was traditionally done by women. That could mean sexual duties, or it could just mean he was a primitive day-care worker.

Does anyone know of a good count of how many Corded Ware graves have been found? If the number is large -- hundreds or thousands -- then it would be bizarre if this was the first "gay caveman" found. On the other hand if not that many have been found then that means scientists are working with a small number of data points, and should be reluctant to generalize.

Placeholder said...

Or is the guy at your link one of those gay-Lincoln denialist bastards that we're not supposed to listen to?

I didn't call anyone a denialist or a bastard. Why are you wingnuts always so quick with the insults?

J said...

Lincoln wrote poetry and was palsies with...Walt Whitman. There's a pic of him and Walt at some early Jersey leather bar--allegedly!

GOP tradition.

Revenant said...

Do you think someone who is dead set against homosexuality is going to change their mind if an historical figure they admire was gay?

Well, yes, actually. Some will do exactly that.

Not every homophobe is a homophobe because of, say, strict religious beliefs concerning sexual behavior. There are plenty of people who hate gays our of simple ignorance, e.g. because they think gays are all a bunch of evil boy-raping perverts. The latter sort of homophobe can be cured of their delusions -- and showing them that plenty of good and noble people have been gay is one way to achieve such a cure.

Automatic_Wing said...

Why are you wingnuts always so quick with the insults?

Heh.

Anonymous said...

Every time I see a denial, it makes me chuckle about the depth of squeamishness about anything involving homosexuality.


Yes, and that reaction is valuable evidence of the natural and universal revulsion for unnatural vice.

The whole Lincoln contretemps also points out another of the problems with public acceptance of homosexuality: it taints close, but nonsexual, male friendships. Every such relationship is then subject to suspicion. If you think there are too many anti-social men about now, just wait till even more are driven crazy by isolation and friendlessness.

Simon said...

Placeholder said...
"To me, it's history, and it ought to be accurate."

Right, exactly—so stop trying to revise it to fit your notions of what it ought to be. You are starting from a conclusion ("homosexuals have been airbrushed out of history") and working backwards, looking through history for candidates who could be, because if there aren't any candidates, the conclusion must be wrong. It's like the old saw, 'don't think of an elephant." What do you think of? An elephant. "Gays are brushed out of history." What do you see? Gay historical figures. It's in your imagination. And what's silly about it (apart from the revisionism, which is insidious rather than silly) is how unnecessary it is, how totally unimportant it would be if you were correct. Let's stipulate that Lincoln was gay. Apart from demolishing the dreams of hundreds of young men to be the first gay President,* what difference would it make?

____
* Not that this will stop the media when it happens. The hair will be split finer. It's not enough that we have the first black President. In the due course of things, we will have the first black President descended from slaves, the first "dark-skinned" black President, the first female black President, the first black President whose experience mirrors the typical black community, and so on. The "first" machine demands that the hair be split over and over again.

WineSlob said...

Placeholder Got TeaBagged by a FaceHolder
Who Held PH's Face Near His AceHoler
"I Said Ann's a Wingnut,
NOT Can Ya Swing Nuts!!!"
Placeholder Complained With his Face Golder.

Scott M said...

Why are you wingnuts always so quick with the insults?

Seriously...? You insult in the very same sentence that you ask why someone insults? Further you pretend that roughly half the political spectrum is quick to insult, thereby insinuating that the other roughly half, ie not right-wing, do not.

Thus endeth your credibility. Thanks for the jump, Fonz.

Simon said...

Leo Ladenson said...
"Every such relationship is then subject to suspicion."

Right, exactly. How long before some idiot "claims" Jerry and George as an ersatz homosexual relationship? Wait, they already had that episode. The surest way to foul up history is to project modern ideas back onto it.

D. B. Light said...

This is an absurd story. The individual lived in a post-neolithic, agricultural village, not a cave. Homosexuality is only one of many possible explanations for his mode of burial. The assumption that he was homosexual is either agenda driven or a simple bid for publicity, probably the latter.

Paddy O said...

"Every time I see a denial, it makes me chuckle "

Anonymous blog commentator attempts to win point by arguing from authority not possessed and by using scare quotes. I think it also displays the "I want this to be true so it is true" fallacy.

Look! I have some facts which if you squint enough, and click your heels three times, definitively prove what I think they should prove!

William said...

I think it's fair to say that different societies approve and disapprove of different aspects of human sexuality. Nowadays, I think we would all agree that there is sexual behavior worse than homosexuality. I think Gandhi's thing for enemas is far more icky than his crush on a kraut. I would be more forgiving of John Edwards if he had asked his syncophant for a blow job instead of requesting that he take the fall for an illegitimate child. Who knows? That may be the dynamic underlying their relationship......I agree that there is a natural phenomenon of homosexuality, but there is also the cultural as well. Rosie O'Donnell and Liberace were organic homosexuals, but what were Anne Heche and Marlon Brando. Are we allowed to criticize dilletante homosexuals? It seems to me that everyone should pick a side and stay there. Except for good looking women. They get a pass.

D. B. Light said...

And, by the way, Franklin Pierce wasn't gay and neither was Lincoln. James Buchanan, however, probably was, as was William Rufus King [Pierce's Vice President]. The two men lived together and were probably lovers.

raf said...

I can tell you that only 50 years ago it was not scandalous for men to share a bed. Men had a network of associations separate from women and non-sexual proximity was just normal. It was scandalous for men and women to be in company together unsupervised because it was presumed that sexual activity would occur in the absence of restraints. It was not considered worrisome to have two men or two women in close company.

Were there clandestine homosexual relationships then? Undoubtedly. And back in the roaring twenties there were probably a lot more casual heterosexual liaisons. Times change. But the casual acceptance of male-female uphooking today should not be projected backward just because we may like a certain conclusion that it might help support.

A.Worthing said...

Place

> But the relationship with the Army captain was indeed the subject of gossip.

Prove that. Because i have read alot on lincoln and heard nothing about it.

Placeholder said...

Prove that. Because i have read alot on lincoln and heard nothing about it.

You crack me up! You obviously didn't bother to look at the link I gave, in which a "Lincoln scholar" goes to great (and hilarious) lengths to discredit two separate sources by concocting a link to them.

It's good reading, and shows the lengths to which people will go. Like I said before, I'm sure if someone unearthed a daguerreotype of Lincoln and some dude in flagrante delicto, you could be certain that the "Lincoln scholars" would find a way to explain it away.

Denial ain't just a river in Egypt, that's for sure! But hey, want to know when all hell will really break loose? Hint: "quarterback" and "Super Bowl." Oh wow, is nothing sacred?

Phil 314 said...

Do you really think there are no gay major league football players, baseball players, nascar drivers, or pro rodeo stars? That's what the lack of mention would have us believe.

How did we get from cavemen to football players?

OK, maybe a few of the NY Giants are gay but I'm pretty sure none of the Packers are gay....

although that name does suggest...

nope, not the Super Bowl champs

(But I must say Aaron Rodgers is HOT!)

Placeholder said...

Rodgers isn't gay. He's got a roommate, and everyone knows there's a shortage of beds.

bagoh20 said...

According to experts, the remains date from the time of the first appearance of interior decorating, which was primitive at the time, but still required a special eye. This special eye - referred to as the "queer eye" is detectable in fossil remains beginning at around this time.

Dumb Plumber said...

Oh hell, I got a history degree at UW-Madison

Given the retarded crappola that has been going on in Madison and the You Tube interviews with protesting Madison students that show a distinct lack of historical perspective or any level of critical thinking.....I wouldn't brag on that credential or expect it to bring you any kudos.

Dust Bunny Queen said...

This article is so full of crap.

First of all the Copper Age was well beyond the time frame of "Caveman".

Second: it was a Neolithic agricultural/ pre-agricultural society. Again NOT Caveman.

Third: we don't know for certain that all females or all males were buried in the same fashion or with the same grave goods.

Fourth: we also don't know if the burial of a man with female cultural goods was an acceptance of homosexuality or a repudiation of such.

Maybe the specimen was the maker of the objects or an artist and was therefore buried with his work and tools.

Who knows. Until we have a time machine it is all guesswork.

Politically correct bull crap trying to re-write history in the views of today's society.

Placeholder said...

Given the retarded crappola that has been going on in Madison and the You Tube interviews with protesting Madison students that show a distinct lack of historical perspective or any level of critical thinking.....I wouldn't brag on that credential or expect it to bring you any kudos.

Don't worry, one of my best professors was a wingnut who made a great case for FDR having advance knowledge of the attack on Pearl Harbor. You'd have loved him.

Placeholder said...

Who knows. Until we have a time machine it is all guesswork.

Uh-uh. Come on, we all know that homosexuality is a Marxist plot. Completely modern phenomenon.

YoungHegelian said...

@Placeholder

"Uh-uh. Come on, we all know that homosexuality is a Marxist plot. Completely modern phenomenon."

Well, why not? According to orthodox Soviet Marxism and its acolytes, homosexuality IS an epiphenomenon of the social alienation caused by modern capitalism.

That's why there were no gays in the Soviet Union, doncha know? And on that happy day when the rest of the world would become a workers' paradise, no gays anywhere!

WV: Hanki, Meet Panki

Big Mike said...

Or it could be a case of Klinefelter syndrome, where the person has two X's to go with one Y (vice one X and one Y, for those of you who slept through biology class or spent your time texting).

Trooper York said...

""Denial ain't just a river in Egypt, that's for sure! But hey, want to know when all hell will really break loose? Hint: "quarterback" and "Super Bowl." Oh wow, is nothing sacred?"

It is certainly a smooth that you are a Packers fan Placeholder as the Packers are the second gayest
franchise in sports (after the Boston Red Sox). Refered to as the Fudge Packers by NFL insiders due to their founder Curly Lambeau who got that name because of his unfortunate habit of spitting out the curley pubes of waiters he molested during NFL meetings. And of course there are the little gay dogs that all you dudes have.
Just sayn'

Placeholder said...

It is certainly a smooth that you are a Packers fan Placeholder as the Packers are the second gayest
franchise in sports


Wow, who knew that the gays are also the best football players?

Methadras said...

Look, the bottom line is, is that there are to many inferences as to the context by which he was buried and why to come to some conclusion that he is a homosexual. They don't have the context to infer any of it. It's pure conjecture. Next.

Gary Rosen said...

"Why are you wingnuts always so quick with the insults?"

Ah, the crystalline purity of left-wing hypocrisy. Then again, he could have said "tea-bagger".

Placeholder said...

Then again, he could have said "tea-bagger".

I think the caveman might have been history's first tea bagger.

Gary Rosen said...

Placeholder, bravely going the last mile to prove leftists are not only hypocritical but couldn't find a clue with a flashlight and a GPS.