Same-sex Activity Research Articles

From the Closet To the Grave: Architecture, Sexuality and the Mount Royal Cemetery

This paper argues that the burials of individuals who engaged, or were speculated to have engaged, in same-sex relations in the late-nineteenth and early twentieth centuries were in constant relation to the material and metaphoric closet. Due to limited archival material concerning cases of same-sex activity in Montreal, Canada, I look out toward international grave sites to construct a framework for analysis. Using case studies from French and American cemeteries alongside those in Mount Royal Cemetery in Montreal, I argue that, for those whose memory is directed by the living, the grave functions much like the closet—closing or disclosing what institutions and society deemed “abominable.” However, more powerful individuals were able to subvert the authority of the cemetery by immortalizing their “romantic friendships” in the grave. By navigating the binaries of the closet—closure/disclosure, hetero/homosexual and repression/pride— the grave has the potential to function as an important archive of identity, sexuality and memory.

Gays, Cross-Dressers, and Emos

Gays, Cross-Dressers, and Emos

The Called, the Chosen, and the Tempted: Psychologists, the Church, and the Scandal

In 2002, the U.S. Catholic bishops finally accepted that the sexual abuse of minors by priests was a widespread problem within the church that required action. The bishops asked researchers at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice to study the problem. The John Jay reports (2004 2011) found a thirty-year trend of rising incidents between 1950 and 1980, followed by a sharp decline during the 1980s. These incidents involved nearly 4,500 accused priests and nearly 11,000 different alleged victims. More than eighty percent of the victims were male. Failing to find a psychological profile that differentiated perpetrators from non-perpetrators, the researchers argued that many priests succumbed to situational temptations involving male minors, due to changing socio-cultural values about sexual activity associated with “the Sixties.” The John Jay studies showed little awareness that an increasingly close relationship existed between the church and Catholic psychologists during the very decades that the incidents were rising. This relationship involved professional psychologists assessing candidates for the priesthood in order to screen out those with serious psychopathologies, including various forms of sexual deviancy, as well as psychologists and psychiatrists who treated priests for aberrant sexual behavior. Assessment psychologists detected no systemic proclivity for future child sexual abuse (although patterns of psychosexual immaturity, sociopathy, and homosexuality seem suspiciously relevant in hindsight). At the time, child sexual abuse had not been identified by the public as a serious social problem, no method existed for detecting this potential, and psychologists as a broader discipline struggled to understand the complexity of human sexual identity and behavior. Even so, there were two and possibly three points before 2002 when clergy sexual abuse might have been detected and acted on as a systemic problem within the church: the late 1930s, 1965–1971, and 1985–1986. When considered together, the work of psychologists in screening candidates, therapists in treating priests, and the John Jay data suggest that perhaps two-thirds of priests in the 1950s and 1960s were psychosexually immature and that a subset of these priests who also were sociopathic, attracted to minors, or open to same-sex activity for various reasons, including a fear of women, accounted for a sizeable share of the problem. Why these apparently relevant factors may have characterized candidates and priests to a greater degree between 1950 and 1980 is not clear.

Persistence or change in leisure-time physical activity habits and waist gain during early adulthood: a twin-study.

ObjectiveTo determine the relationship between persistence or change in leisure-time physical activity habits and waist gain among young adults.Design and MethodsPopulation-based cohort study among 3383 Finnish twin individuals (1578 men) from five birth cohorts (1975–1979), who answered questionnaires at mean ages of 24.4 y (SD 0.9) and 33.9 y (SD 1.2), with reported self-measured waist circumference. Persistence or change in leisure-time physical activity habits was defined based on thirds of activity metabolic equivalent h/day during follow-up (mean 9.5 y; SD 0.7).ResultsDecreased activity was linked to greater waist gain compared to increased activity (3.6 cm, P<0.001 for men; 3.1 cm, P<0.001 for women). Among same-sex activity discordant twin pairs, twins who decreased activity gained an average 2.8 cm (95%CI 0.4 to 5.1, P=0.009) more waist than their co-twins who increased activity (n=85 pairs); among MZ twin pairs (n=43), the difference was 4.2 cm (95%CI 1.2 to 7.2, P=0.008).ConclusionsAmong young adults, an increase in leisure-time physical activity or staying active during a decade of follow-up was associated with less waist gain, but any decrease in activity level, regardless baseline activity, led to waist gain that was similar to that associated with being persistently inactive.

APA Leaders Urge Uganda to Drop Law Criminalizing Homosexuality

Back to table of contents Previous article Next article International NewsFull AccessAPA Leaders Urge Uganda to Drop Law Criminalizing HomosexualityKen HausmanKen HausmanSearch for more papers by this authorPublished Online:31 Mar 2014https://doi.org/10.1176/appi.pn.2014.4a19AbstractUganda’s president ignores warnings that a law mandating prison terms for homosexual activity will lead to discrimination and violence against gay Ugandans.Silhouette Lover/ShutterstockThe president of Uganda ignored pleas from governments and human-rights and advocacy organizations worldwide that he rethink his announced decision to sign a law imposing severe prison sentences on Ugandans who engage in homosexual behavior. He signed the law on February 24.APA was one of the organizations that tried to convince Uganda President Yoweri Museveni to reject the law. “APA is deeply disappointed that the president of Uganda signed a law imposing harsh prison terms on people who engage in same-sex activity,” CEO and Medical Director Saul Levin, M.D., M.P.A., told Psychiatric News. In a February letter to Museveni, Levin and APA President Jeffrey Lieberman, M.D., emphasized that “criminalizing homosexuality will only lead to public unrest and violence against those who pose no harm to society and cannot change who they are.” APA provided a detailed summary of scientific research showing that sexuality is the result of a complex interplay of genetics, certain hormones, and environment factors, pointing out that “there is no scientific evidence that either homosexuality or heterosexuality is a free-will choice.” The letter states that in light of the scientific evidence on the roots of sexuality, “punishing [homosexuals] with prison terms will not change their orientation or lessen the incidence of homosexuality in Ugandan society.”Despite this information, and protests from a long list of government officials and advocacy groups from multiple countries, Museveni signed the law.Kenneth Ashley, M.D., president of the Association of Gay and Lesbian Psychiatrists, told Psychiatric News that the law “will mean the dismantling of Uganda’s LGBT support systems and social networks. The isolation and psychosocial stressors will likely result in increased symptoms of anxiety and depression. It will also be a barrier to health care, as the law has been interpreted by some to mean that even health care providers are included as ‘a person who aids, abets, counsels, or procures another to engage in acts of homosexuality, commits an offense, and is liable, on conviction, to imprisonment for seven years.’ It also seems likely that there will be a number of LGBT people who will be forced to undergo ‘rehabilitation,’ while others may seek it out as a way to remain in Uganda.”On March 11, a group of Ugandan human-rights organizations and advocates filed a formal legal challenge to the law, saying that it violates the country’s constitutional right to equality and privacy and illegally discriminates against people with HIV disease and disabilities, according to a report in the Washington Blade. The coalition’s petition to a Ugandan court states that the law “amounts to institutionalized promotion of a culture of hatred and constitutes a contravention of the right to dignity.” Secretary of State John Kerry spoke with Museveni soon after the law was signed, expressing the U.S. government’s “deep disappointment” in the decision to enact the law. Kerry noted that the Obama administration is reviewing its relationship with Uganda. The State Department said that Kerry “raised U.S. concerns that this discriminatory law poses a threat to the safety and security of Uganda’s LGBT community, and urged President Museveni to ensure the safety and protection of all Ugandan citizens. ■ ISSUES NewArchived

Three Ways Forward: The Present and Future State of Homosexuality Legislation in Africa

This Article examines the three diverse ways nations in Africa are engaged in legislating homosexuality and same-sex relations. Much of the international community has focused on Uganda's Anti-Homosexuality Bill, commonly described as the 'Kill the Gays' bill, which for a time included a provision permitting the death penalty for certain forms of 'aggravated homosexuality.' This focus on the death penalty aspect of the legislation has obscured a discussion of a similarly insidious aspect of the legislation - the criminalization of pro-gay activism and the providing of 'aid or assistance' to LGBT persons. This criminal penalty, the first of its kind in the world, serves as a dangerous model for other countries attempting to legislate against homosexuality. This paper serves to contextualize the Uganda statute, and compare it with 2012 legislation in Malawi, which would decriminalize same-sex activity, and Zimbabwe, where an attempt to enshrine gay rights in the constitution led instead to blowback from antigay activists and resulted in the inclusion of an antigay amendment in the country's new draft constitution. Each of these laws serves as a model for pro-LGBT and antigay activists attempting to legislate sexual orientation and activity in Africa. Ultimately, this Article concludes that each measure will serve as a model for different constituencies: Uganda's for antigay legislators attempting to corral public sentiment against homosexuality into legislative power; Malawi's for pro-LGBT grassroots organizations and sympathetic political leaders; and Zimbabwe's for international LGBT organizations providing strategic advice for ways to move legislation forward on the continent.

“Unseemly Practices”: Sodomy and Punishment in Seventeenth Century British North America

Despite numerous laws and religious tracts prohibiting homosexuality and the practise of same-sex activity in colonial North America, very few people were ever brought to trial – and even fewer found guilty – for engaging in such “unseemly practises.” Using both primary and secondary sources, this paper attempts to dissect the reasoning behind the relative lack of prosecutions of men thought to have participated in “sodomitical [sic] behaviour”. Issues of community, power, and religion as they related to sodomy will be discussed.

Sexual hazards, life experiences and social circumstances among male sex workers in Nigeria

The sexual health and rights needs of male sex workers in Nigeria remain poorly understood and served. Men who sell sex are at high risk of discrimination and violation because of laws criminalising same-sex activity and sex work. This paper examines the experiences, social circumstances, vulnerabilities and sexual hazards experienced by male sex workers in Nigeria. In-depth interviews were used to explore the experiences of six male sex workers who were selected by means of convenience sampling from among those who came for counselling. Findings reveal that economic disadvantage drives some men to engage in sex work and risky sexual behaviour. Subsequently, sex work may put their lives and health at risk as a result of violation by the police and clients, including ritual murder. Men's extreme vulnerability points to the need for appropriate interventions to improve well-being. Sexual health and rights programmes must identify ways of making male sex workers less vulnerable to abuse, and devise strategies for protecting their health and human rights, while empowering them economically to reduce their dependency on often risky sexual behaviour for livelihoods.

Prevalence and correlates of sexual behaviors among university students: a study in Hefei, China

BackgroundIn China, sexual health and behaviors of young people have become a growing public concern but few studies have been conducted to investigate the prevalence and psychosocial correlates of the phenomenon.MethodsA self-reported questionnaire survey on youth sexual behaviors was conducted among 1,500 university students in 2011 at Hefei, a middle-size city in eastern China. A total of 1,403 students (age = 20.30 ± 1.27 years) completed the questionnaire with a high response rate of 93.5%.ResultsAmong the respondents, 12.6% (15.4% of male versus 8.6% of female) students reported having pre-marital heterosexual intercourse; 10.8% (10.5% of males versus 11.2% females) had oral sex; 2.7% (3.4% of males versus 1.7% females) reported same-sex activities; 46% (70.3% of males versus 10.8% of females) reported masturbation behaviors; 57.4% (86.2% of males versus 15.6% females) students viewed pornography. In terms of sexual communication about sexual knowledge acquisition, 13.7% (10.7% of males versus 18% of females) talked to their parents about sex; 7.1% (6.1% of males versus 8.4% of females) students reported having conversation with parents on contraception. About forcing sexual behavior, 2.7% (4% of males versus 0.9% of females) reported forcing their sexual partners to have sex, and 1.9% (2.4% of males versus 1.2% of females) reported being forced to have sex. Gender was found to be significant predictor of sexual behaviors in university students: males reported more sexual behaviors including sexual fantasy, heterosexual intercourse, masturbation, viewing pornography and talking about sex with friends. Several correlates of sexual behaviors were identified for students of different gender separately. For males, having romantic relationships, past sex education experiences, low educational aspirations, time spent on the Internet, and urban native settings were significantly associated with more sexual behaviors. For female students, having romantic relationships and urban native settings predicted sexual behaviors.ConclusionSexual behavior among University students in China is not uncommon, although there are limited ways for students to acquire sex-related knowledge: male students showed significantly more sexual behaviors than female students. Having romantic relationships and more time spent online were important predictors of sexual behaviors among university students. To guide healthy sexual behaviors in young people, comprehensive sex education programs that provide necessary sexual health knowledge about safe sex should be developed and implemented in universities in China, particularly for students who have romantic relationships and those who spend long periods of time on the Internet.

Nice guys finish last: same-sex sexual behavior and pairing success in male budgerigars

In budgerigars (Melopsittacus undulatus), a social parrot in which females are socially dominant, males of all ages engage in a set of behaviors with other males that closely resembles the repertoire used in heterosexual courtship. One adaptive hypothesis for this tendency, the practice posits that males with greater experience in same-sex activities develop superior skills that increase their courtship success with females. To test this hypothesis, we measured individual variation in tendency of subadult males to engage in such behaviors and asked whether birds' relative participation in same-sex activities predicted adult pairing success in competitive pairing trials conducted after birds reached adulthood. Males' tendency to participate in same-sex activities was correlated across samples collected a month apart. Directly contrary to the courtship practice hypothesis, however, males that participated in same-sex interactions more often were less likely to obtain mates. Pairing success was also predicted by 2 sexually dimorphic facial traits, namely iris prominence and cere color. We hypothesize that the tendency of males to engage in same-sex interactions may represent a mechanism of mutual assessment of male abilities, especially those involved in group foraging efforts (the leader assessment hypothesis) and suggest that increased investigation of allopreening and other seemingly affiliative behaviors that occur outside the heterosexual pair bond may advance understanding of social organization in flocking birds.

&lt;i&gt;Before Wilde: Sex between Men in Britain’s Age of Reform&lt;/i&gt; (review)

Reviewed by: Before Wilde: Sex between Men in Britain’s Age of Reform Paul R. Deslandes Before Wilde: Sex between Men in Britain’s Age of Reform. By Charles Upchurch. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2009. Pp. 288. $45.00 (cloth). Charles Upchurch’s new book, Before Wilde: Sex between Men in Britain’s Age of Reform, provides some important correctives to traditional assumptions about the history of male same-sex desire and intimacy during the formative years of the nineteenth century. He challenges the idea that public discussions of sex between men were minimal between 1820 and 1870 by showcasing hundreds of newspaper accounts and court cases where proscribed behaviors between men figured very prominently. With this intervention, Upchurch adds nuance and chronological breadth to recently published studies on nineteenth-century, British queer history by Sean Brady, H. G. Cocks, Matt Cook, and Morris Kaplan. As he positions himself in relation to these other works (and especially to Cocks’s Nameless Offences: Homosexual Desire in the Nineteenth Century), Upchurch asserts that the earlier decades of the nineteenth century, when grappled with at all, have principally been treated as preludes to familiar fin de siècle scandals.1 Upchurch brings the insights of legal, media, and political historians to bear on a subject that is most frequently explored through a cultural lens. In preliminary chapters that deal, respectively, with family reactions, spaces of sexual opportunity, legal reform, policing, and press coverage, Upchurch ably documents the world that same-sex-desiring men inhabited in the late Georgian and mid-Victorian periods. In his final two chapters, he provides readers with an overarching assessment of these years by highlighting, for example, how legal reforms after 1820 led to greater consistency in the application of penalties and the more systematic policing of public sex, [End Page 576] long before the landmark Criminal Law Amendment Act (1885). In so doing, Upchurch refutes Foucauldian-inspired analyses that privilege the late nineteenth century as a critical breaking point by showing how early Victorian ideas about sexual character and respectability persisted in the writings of late Victorian sexologists. Upchurch is careful to point out that understandings of same-sex desire between men in the early to mid-nineteenth century were not unitary, a fact reflected in the occasionally disparate newspaper reports that appeared in the working-class Weekly Dispatch, the middle-class and politically liberal Times, and the aristocratic Morning Post. While families of means frequently ostracized or disinherited men who committed sexual transgressions, Upchurch shows that they also provided incomes to exiled sons or petitioned the Home Office for the early release of their sons from prison. Reactions within other segments of British society were equally varied. In addition to facing legal sanctions and punishments, men who had sex with men in working-class communities could be publicly ridiculed by crowds who burned effigies of perpetrators or subjected their families to loud forms of what was called “rough music.” This diversity of experiences was also reflected in the social interactions and sexual activities that British men engaged in between 1820 and 1870. Most of the subjects examined in Upchurch’s book were not active members of an easily discernible gay subculture but, rather, men who participated in same-sex activities in the “twilight moments” of their lives (182). In London, these men met in public and coffee houses, in Hyde Park, or while window shopping. Class structured their sexual interactions in profound and enduring ways. Aristocratic and middle-class men, for example, utilized their social power and financial clout to solicit soldiers or errand boys, while those from the working classes occasionally extorted money from elite men who feared public exposure and the loss of reputation that revelations about their sexuality might precipitate. Upchurch is at his most ambitious when he attempts to link the history of same-sex desire and behavior to Britain’s so-called Age of Reform. His chapter on legal changes effectively illustrates how reforms like the 1828 Offences against the Person Act altered definitions of sodomy by eliminating a requirement that proof of ejaculation be presented in such cases. Other legislative changes in the 1820s and 1830s addressed the problem of...

328: Changes in care associated with introduction of a post-partum hemorrhage patient safety program

a post-partum hemorrhage patient safety program Justin Lappen, Dominika Seidman, Carol Burke, Kim Goetz, William Grobman University Hospitals, Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Cleveland, OH, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Chicago, IL, Northwestern Memorial Hospital, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Chicago, IL OBJECTIVE: To determine whether the introduction of a multipronged patient safety program regarding the management of postpartum hemorrhage (PPH) was associated with changes in patient care or outcomes. STUDY DESIGN: In August 2008, a patient safety program designed to assist with the management of PPH was instituted at a tertiary care urban maternity hospital. This program was composed of three principle components: (1) an educational initiative designed to improve the accuracy of blood loss estimation; (2) the training regarding and institution of a protocol for the management of post-partum hemorrhage; and (3) the institution of the active management of the third stage of labor. Patient care processes and outcomes were assessed for the six months prior to (period A) and six months after (period B) the institution of this program. RESULTS: There were 278 and 341 women diagnosed with PPH during periods A and B respectively. The women with PPH in both time periods were of similar age, height, weight, parity and gestational age. They also had similar frequencies of multiple gestations, placenta previas, preeclampsia, and operative deliveries. Conversely, several aspects of care were significantly different during the two time periods. Women who had a PPH after the program was instituted had significantly shorter third stages (P .03); were significantly more likely to receive more than one type of uteronic (46% vs, 60%, P .01) or a B-lynch suture (4.7% vs, 9.4%, P .03); and were significantly less likely to undergo a manual extraction of their placenta (18 vs. 12%, P .049). Patient outcomes, including the frequency of blood transfusion, hysterectomy, and ICU admission were similar between the two time periods. CONCLUSION: Introduction of a program aimed at optimizing management of postpartum hemorrhage resulted in several indications of a more quickly escalated response to postpartum hemorrhage. Further study will be required to determine whether this more rapid escalation translates into improved health outcomes. 329 Postpartum sexual functioning and mode of delivery in a diverse population of women Lynn Yee, Sanae Nakagawa, Anjali Kaimal, Miriam Kuppermann University of California, San Francisco, Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology & Reproductive Sciences, San Francisco, CA, Massachusetts General Hospital, Obstetrics and Gynecology, Boston, MA OBJECTIVE: Sexual functioning and satisfaction are hypothesized to be adversely affected by vaginal delivery, yet this has not been well studied. We sought to explore this relationship using the Sexual Health Outcomes in Women Questionnaire (SHOW-Q), which assesses female sexual functioning including same-sex and unpartnered activity. STUDY DESIGN: Prospective observational study of 160 pregnant women. Baseline questionnaire included sociodemographic characteristics, reproductive history and sexual activity. Postpartum questionnaire (6-8 months) included the SHOW-Q, an open-ended question on factors interfering with sexual activity and items on delivery mode, depression and breastfeeding. Primary outcomes were overall SHOW-Q score among those who had resumed sexual activity and the sexual satisfaction subscale among all women. RESULTS: 71.3% of participants delivered vaginally. At follow up, 23.2% had depression, 43% were exclusively breastfeeding, and 79.8% had resumed sexual activity. Mean SHOW-Q satisfaction subscale score was 67.8 (SD 27.8); mean overall SHOW-Q score was 72.8 (SD 19.6). Depression (p 0.01) and exclusive breastfeeding (p 0.01) were associated with poorer sexual satisfaction in multivariate analysis, while Asians showed a trend toward better scores (p 0.07). Bivariate analyses of the sexually active sample yielded African American or Latina ethnicity and having less than a college education as significant positive correlates of overall SHOW-Q score, and age and breastfeeding as negative correlates. The age and education trends persisted in multivariable analysis. Factors identified as interfering with sexual activity included being tired (21.9%) and presence of children at home (35.9%). Women who delivered by cesarean had lower scores than those who delivered vaginally, but this was not statistically significant. CONCLUSION: Postpartum sexual functioning as measured by the SHOW-Q appears to be associated with depression and exclusive breastfeeding, and may be related to delivery mode. Further research with larger sample sizes are needed to gain a better understanding of these relationships. www.AJOG.org Diabetes, Labor, Medical-Surgical-Disease, Obstetric Quality & Safety, Prematurity, Ultrasound-Imaging Poster Session II

Narrative, Identity, and the Politics of Exclusion: Social Change and the Gay and Lesbian Life Course

The social and political context of sexual identity development in the United States has changed dramatically since the mid twentieth century. Same-sex attracted individuals have long needed to reconcile their desire with policies of exclusion, ranging from explicit outlaws on same-sex activity to exclusion from major social institutions such as marriage. This paper focuses on the implications of political exclusion for the life course of individuals with same-sex desire through the analytic lens of narrative. Using illustrative evidence from a study of autobiographies of gay men spanning a 60-year period and a study of the life stories of contemporary same-sex attracted youth, we detail the implications of historic silence, exclusion, and subordination for the life course.

Patterns and Correlates of Same‐Sex Sexual Activity Among U.S. Teenagers and Young Adults

Little is known about the prevalence and correlates of same-sex sexual activity among teenagers and young adults, particularly those who do not identify themselves as gay, lesbian or bisexual. Effective interventions to prevent STDs require accurate understanding of youths' sexual behavior. Descriptive and regression analyses of data from the 2002 National Survey of Family Growth examined patterns and correlates of same-sex sexual activity among a sample of 2,688 never-married, noncohabiting men and women aged 15-21. Same-sex behavior was assessed separately by gender, as well as by heterosexual experience and sexual attraction and identity. Eleven percent of women and 4% of men reported same-sex sexual experience. Youth who were attracted only to the opposite sex had a decreased likelihood of reporting same-sex activity (rate ratio, 0.1 for each gender), while women and men who identified themselves as homosexual or bisexual had an elevated likelihood of such activity (5.1 and 5.9, respectively). However, among women who were attracted exclusively to men, those who had had heterosexual sex were more than four times as likely as those who had not to have engaged in same-sex activity. Finally, among youth who reported any same-sex attraction, women and men who said they were homosexual or bisexual had an elevated likelihood of having engaged in same-sex behavior (4.7 and 5.6, respectively). A significant proportion of "straight" youth engage in same-sex activity, and so information on risks associated with such behavior should be included in sex education programs and targeted to all youth.

Male Team Sport Hazing Initiations in a Culture of Decreasing Homohysteria

In this longitudinal ethnographic research, we report on 7 years of hazing rituals on two separate men’s sports teams at one university in the United Kingdom. Using 38 in-depth interviews alongside naturalistic observations of the initiation rituals, we demonstrate that hazing activities have changed from being centered around homophobic same-sex activities to focusing on extreme levels of alcohol consumption. We show that whereas same-sex activities once occurred paradoxically to prohibit them, today these initiations open up the possibility of same-sex behaviors for young men in the life stage of emergent adulthood.

‘What blokes want lesbians to be’: On FHM and the socialization of pro-lesbian attitudes among heterosexual-identified men

We develop a critique of the social psychological hypothesis that media images of women engaged in same-sex activity have a positive effect on heterosexual men’s general attitudes to lesbians. A content analysis suggests that British print media usually represent lesbians either in news stories that also include gay men, or in entertainment stories. In focus groups, both gay and straight men were presented with photographs of ‘heteroflexible’ representations from the ‘lad mag’ FHMand photographs of ‘real’ lesbians from Gay Times. Men were asked to define what made a woman a real lesbian. Straight men rejected the formulation that there was a single ‘stereotype’ of lesbians in favor of the claim that the FHM images did not represent real lesbians. Gay men came to agree that the heteroflexible women were not identified as lesbian. Our analysis suggests that both gay and straight men perform bounded sexual identities in response to heteroflexible images which are scripted to be attractive to heterosexual men.

HIV Status and Coming Out among African American Gay and Bisexual Men

It is possible that disclosing one's HIV status can further a person's coming-out process as a gay or bisexual man and can have other mental health benefits. Using samples of gay identified and bisexually identified African American men, this study examined the relationship between HIV status and several variables: use of mental health services, levels of internalized homonegativity, levels of stigma associated with same-sex activity and disclosure about same sex activity to community and family. Compared to individuals without HIV, the African American HIV+ men who had sex with men in this study reported using more mental health services, having lower levels of internalized homonegativity and experiencing lower levels of stigma associated with same sex activity. Duration of HIV+ status was positively associated with disclosure about same-sex activity. This pattern of results was more pronounced for gay identified African American men than those who identified as bisexual. These findings highlight how disclosing one's HIV status can be associated with the coming-out process, but minority stress associated with a bisexual identity among African American men who have sex with men may minimize these potential benefits.

Prenatal hormones and childhood sex segregation: Playmate and play style preferences in girls with congenital adrenal hyperplasia

We investigated playmate and play style preference in children with congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH) (26 females, 31 males) and their unaffected siblings (26 females, 17 males) using the Playmate and Play Style Preferences Structured Interview (PPPSI). Both unaffected boys and girls preferred same-sex playmates and sex-typical play styles. In the conflict condition where children chose between a same-sex playmate engaged in an other-sex activity or an other-sex playmate engaged in a same-sex activity, boys (both CAH and unaffected brothers) almost exclusively chose playmates based on the preferred play style of the playmate as opposed to the preferred gender label of the playmate. By contrast, unaffected girls used play style and gender label about equally when choosing playmates. Girls with CAH showed a pattern similar to that of boys: their playmate selections were more masculine than unaffected girls, they preferred a boy-typical play style and, in the conflict condition, chose playmates engaged in a masculine activity. These findings suggest that prenatal androgen exposure contributes to sex differences in playmate selection observed in typically developing children and that, among boys and girls exposed to high levels of androgens prenatally, play style preferences drive sex segregation in play.

Implementation of HIV Testing at 2 New York City Bathhouses: From Pilot to Clinical Service

Commercial sex venues (e.g., bathhouses) that cater to men who have sex with men (MSM) continue to function in most urban areas. These venues present a challenge to developing strategies to prevent the spread of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), but they also provide opportunities for interventions to reduce the risk and rate of disease transmission. Several cities in the United States have developed programs that offer HIV testing in these venues. Similar programs have not existed before in New York City. A pilot HIV testing program was implemented at 2 New York City bathhouses. Testing included rapid HIV testing, the use of the serologic testing algorithm for recent HIV seroconversion, and pooled plasma HIV viral load to detect and date incident and acute HIV infections. In addition to HIV tests, behavioral and demographic data were collected from 493 presumed HIV-negative participants. The pilot program recruited MSM who were at high risk for HIV infection. Of the 493 men tested, 20 (4%) were found to be positive for HIV, and 8 (40%) of these 20 men demonstrated evidence of acute or recent HIV infection. The program tested men often not tested in more traditional medical settings. Significant disparities were demonstrated in the testing habits of MSM who reported having sex with women and had not disclosed same-sex activities to their caregivers. Bathhouse-based testing for HIV infection can be implemented in New York City and would include a population of MSM who are at high risk for HIV infection. Because of the high rate of recent HIV infection, expanded testing in these venues may be a good strategy to reduce the forward transmission of HIV in this highly sexually active population.

All too human: responses to same-sex copulation in the common cockchafer (Melolontha melolontha(L.)), 1834–1900

Beginning in 1834, entomologists across Europe began reporting same-sex copulatory activity in a variety of insect species, sometimes between species or genera. Most communications concerned male-male couplings of the common cockchafer (Melolontha melolontha, syn. M. vulgaris). These reports offer a unique snapshot of how nineteenth-century naturalists responded when they were required to explain precisely what was natural in their observations. Initial communications of same-sex couplings were mainly accompanied by exclamations of surprise and the rhetoric of disapproval. Such activity was explained either by the assumption that one of the parties must in some way have a female anatomy or that blind or excessive lust compelled more virile individuals to force copulation upon weaker ones. As these explanations were questioned, more complex and controversial theories founded in fashionable evolutionary theories were forwarded as means of assimilating the phenomenon within hegemonic constructions of sexuality. These came from both within entomological circles and from outside observers whose primary interest was in theorizing human eroticism. This article follows a particularly intense dispute which erupted following the claim by one of France's leading naturalists, Henri Gadeau de Kerville, that the homoerotic activity demonstrated by male cockchafers evidenced the existence of a distinctly “homosexual” instinct. By 1900 no single taxonomy of non-human homoeroticism dominated intellectual discourse on the subject. Although zoological observations of same-sex eroticism continued to be made through the twentieth century, Melolontha were left in relative peace.