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The Gay Question (Asylum Mag): homosociality vs sodomy

anon_dony said in #3698 2w ago: received

https://web.archive.org/web/20240116022903/https://asylummagazine.ca/THE-GAY-QUESTION

An explosive thesis: the centrality of male homoeroticism to premodern production of manliness and great men. We're all familiar by now with a few key ideas:

1. The greeks, english, and aryan koryos boys in general were frequently homoerotic but not in the modern anonymous bathhouse chemsex sodomy-as-self-identity style. In particular, the institution where a man adopts a somewhat younger boy (of late teens) as muse, student, best friend, and occasionally lover was common and valued, and not like the modern pattern of homosexual pedophilic abuse.

2. Modern man is stuck in a gynocentric social prison with very little socialization as men among men, and this is a probable cause of many of our social and political pathologies. The mannerbund is the key lost institution, and for its lack we have little direct insight into the psychology of real masculinity.

3. The lack of any enforceable taboo against the horror of modern sodomy is a significant part of why male sociality has collapsed. See for example gay abuse fears in boy scouts, the neurotic half-taboo against close male bonds and physical affection for fear of it being a slippery slope into the Foucauldian bathhouse, the profanation of male physical ideals ("bodybuilding is gay, bro"), association of "the sausage fest" with sexual and social weakness, etc.

The author of this article builds on this foundation, his experience of all-boys school, and history and psychology of various male-male erotic practices to paint a very interesting picture: the mannerbund and homoeroticism are inseparable and the modern identification of homoerotic affection with sodomy is a lie and both consequence and cause of the destruction of male sociality.

He makes the wider case that the deliberate destruction of male spaces before and after the war is central to the decline of the west, and the constant distraction of easy females and chaperoning of boys by women makes it impossible now for great men to arise.

I didn't appreciate his dooming about islam overtaking europe and other such nonsense, but the essay is very interesting overall. At the least it's a great reminder of the importance and power of all-male space. There's a lot of good stuff in there (I haven't discussed his claim about different types of male sexual psychology for example) but the most interesting may be the implied challenge that we have to re-interpret homoeroticism to achieve the return of male sociality. That's a huge claim that I'd love to discuss more with you guys.

In my own mannerbund-adjacent experiences, I have seen nothing of the erotic element, but the undercurrent of great affection for each other held back by gay suspicion is definitely real. The mannerbund is clearly an institution of extreme importance that we must bring back, but what do you make of this claim that that's going to mean easing the taboo on male physical affection and sharpening the taboo against sodomy? Is this faggy nonsense or a major truth nuke?

referenced by: >>3702 >>3716

An explosive thesis: received

anon_sevu said in #3699 2w ago: received

Yeah it’s an interesting claim. Let’s approach it purely empirically:

> In my own mannerbund-adjacent experiences, I have seen nothing of the erotic element

I have seen it. My fraternity in college had a few gay guys. They didn’t ruin the scene but they didn’t particularly contribute to it, either. Had everyone been straight, it would’ve been fine.

The mannerbund or fraternity is a critical institution but it doesn’t rely on or benefit from any kind of homoeroticism. It does of course require basic straight male physicality, high fives, partying together, sports, hijicks around campus, weekend trips to the woods and so on. Hopefully it goes without saying that you cannot do a mannerbund over zoom.

> what do you make of this claim that that's going to mean easing the taboo on male physical affection and sharpening the taboo against sodomy?

I haven’t seen any evidence that this is helpful or good.

The culture where “physical affection” between straight men is most normalized today is the Muslim world, where men greet each other with a kiss on the cheek and it’s common for friends to walk down the street holding hands. There are some kino pics of Taliban fighters walking and talking hand in hand, AKs on each shoulder.

But guess what, that culture also has a lot of outright gay sex as well, up to and including the disgusting bacha bazi “dancing boys” pedo culture in tribal AfPak. The Turks are famous for their own bathhouse culture that predates Foucault by several centuries.

And in general, I consider Islam to be a degenerate culture that has empirically produced little progress and from which we should mostly take negative lessons (what not to do). Muslim sexual practices between men, boys, boy-slaves, hijabis and the occasional donkey are not exactly aspirational.

TLDR; we need to destigmatize and grow all-male physical spaces. We need more close male friendships. However, do not need “non-gay homoeroticism”; it’s unclear that such a thing even exists and in any case it’s not useful.

referenced by: >>3709 >>3710

Yeah it’s an interes received

anon_wule said in #3702 2w ago: received

>>3698
Here's the canonical reply to this mode of inquiry:
https://blog.reaction.la/culture/gay-needs-to-be-suppressed/

And two more from bygone legends:
https://archive.ph/meYie
https://archive.ph/zv83E
(full Social Matter archive here for people who haven't heard of this very high signal resource: https://socialmatterarchive.wordpress.com/)

It may be that you have to ease the former taboo and sharpen the latter to get 100% of Hellenic male culture back, but you're gonna have a lot of difficulty doing anything at all if you don't sharpen the latter first. In particular, you run into the very real gay mafia problem if your gaydar isn't operating at 100% (as Mr. Perilloux so eloquently explains). In the modern American legal system unfortunately once they're in they're very difficult to get out.

As things stand we are so far away from being historically reasonable on the latter taboo that resolving things there must be emphasized over the question of whether Hitchens et al is faggy nonsense. There are plenty of great examples of proper männerbund-like coordination even today (e.g. military spec ops teams) where there is just no erotic element. You'll face pretty severe cultural resistance if you try to ease the former taboo too soon, simply because we are in no real condition to do so yet.

For what it's worth, in my männerbund experiences the erotic element has also not shown up at all. Gentlemen shake hands, faggots fuck each others thighs. And the "I wouldn't refuse him anything" from the OP essay is also just straighforwardly faggy.

referenced by: >>3724

Here's the canonical received

anon_dony said in #3709 2w ago: received

>>3699
Good points on the muslim world being both the most homosocial and the most degenerate. But the Taliban and Houthis are also some of the more impressive bands of men around these days, with a great will to sovereignty. Can we be so sure that bacha bazi is the inevitable result of war-bros holding hands? I don't buy it. There is a large confounding factor: that those peoples are degenerate and have a degenerate religion.

>My fraternity in college had a few gay guys. They didn’t ruin the scene but they didn’t particularly contribute to it, either. Had everyone been straight, it would’ve been fine.
The point isn't that the gays make it better (they probably detract). The point of the essay is that "gay" is a fake concept. Anyways a college fraternity probably isn't enough to really get into the koryos dynamics. It's not like being isolated in a distant boarding school with no girls, or being out on campaign. Too many girls easily at hand.

>>3705
>>3701
I don't know where you get the idea that the author is BAP. The author mentions growing up in a Christian sect, and BAP was raised as an atheist communist. BAP also didn't go to school much because he was tutored. In any case he doesn't sound like BAP. No doubt BAP is ghey and this guy is similar, but I don't think they are same guy. And I agree with >>3703 that dox speculations are bad form.

Good points on the m received

anon_hwdu said in #3710 2w ago: received

>>3699
Very much agree with this perspective. However insightful the essay is, I think the author is ghey. While not overly important I do think it clouds his judgement in terms of the importance of the erotic dimension of male bonding.

The most illuminating point in the essay for me was about the difference between full men and gyno men. It is true, unfortunately, far too many men wish to only appeal to women and are unreliable. I have found myself and observed in my own life men throwing men under the bus for a crumb of pussay. True male bonding is frowned upon because of the proliferation of gay sex associations with male closeness--which we can directly blame on the absence of homosexual repression. Men turn to women for all their validations, intimacy, and closeness. As the author highlights, men only use other men to the extent that it can get them further pussy. A sad state of affairs really.

Very much agree with received

anon_viwe said in #3711 2w ago: received

So I don't know how many of you have been in mannerbund-esque institutions like firefighting, the police, or the military but I've consistently observed that homoeroticism is widespread as a source of comic relief, explanatory models for hierarchy and dominance, and genuine friendship that is self-conscious of itself.

Some examples of the above: I've seen men over the age of 30 refer to critcism from their supervisor as "pee-pee slaps." Two brothers on the crew referred to as the "blowjob brothers," with the implication of such a sobrequet left to the imagination of the reader. Guys on the crew saying "I love you" as a casual goodbye. Constant allusions to jerking each other off. The youngest guy on the crew was often referred to as a catamite, in colorful language that I will not reproduce here.

I never liked to partake in this kind of talk, but it was out of temperament rather than principle. I'm not sure if it's always been this way or if it's the product of masculinity under siege, in the sense that gynocracy and homosexualism is so rampant in society that many men--even chud types--are under a certain shock or subtle discomfort when in a heavily masculine setting, so alien is it to the way we moderns were raised. In such strange settings, it becomes standard to signal your heterosexuality by "agreeing and amplifying" homoerotic behaviors. If a man on the crew was known to be gay he would never be joked with in such a fashion.

referenced by: >>3712 >>3713 >>4060

So I don't know how received

anon_lefa said in #3712 2w ago: received

>>3711

Depends on ethnicity

You're approaching their behavior from too analytic of a perspective

Why do some kids like to make poop jokes at a young age?

Inborn temperament. Same behavior here.

Depends on ethnicity received

anon_lefa said in #3713 2w ago: received

>>3711

Case in note: People in this thread are calling each other 'gheys' looking for 'pussay' and 'faggy nonsense'

It's not my style either but I see the reasons for why it exists

Case in note: People received

anon_pusu said in #3716 2w ago: received

>>3698
Pretty sure homoerotic behavior (whether involving actual sex or not) does not contribute to, but poisons and degrades, male groups and friendships.

I think most of us value mannerbund / male friendship and think we need more of it and better. That's not the dispute. The dispute is strictly the homoerotic aspect.

Personal data point: I went to an all-boys school. My friend group got pretty close. We would hang out all night on weekends, go camping, etc. It was not rare for a guy to put his arm around another guy's shoulders, like a football coach. In all that time, I neither witnessed nor even heard of a single sex act among the guys. Not one blow job, mutual jerk off, nothing. Quite the contrary, all the sexual banter, of which there was a lot, was hetero in nature (did you see that girl's tits, etc.)

So, given my experience, I know this is at least possible. Now, in a culture with a lot of gay stuff, are you going to get gay stuff seeping through in many places? Of course. That's to be expected. But that doesn't prove anything. It's just a fact about our culture, not about the dynamics of male friendship.

referenced by: >>3718 >>3724

Pretty sure homoerot received

anon_viwe said in #3718 2w ago: received

>>3716

The homoerotic element of masculine spaces today is definitely a degradation of some kind but its geneology seems like a puzzle. Even if it wasn't the case for your friend group or my friend group, I think anyone who's seen a decent amount of life has encountered this kind of setting before.

The Evola quote in another thread today reminded me how he speaks somewhere of the way the life and motivations of soldiery today do not measure up to ethos of warriors past, which is to say their relationship to their profession is more befitting slaves than freemen. I think this might be a useful way to think about it--the professional mannerbunds one can be initiated into today exist in a state of male to male transexuality because they exist in a gynocratic substrate.

The homoerotic eleme received

anon_dony said in #3724 2w ago: received

>>3716
This is certainly my default assumption, coming from the tradition the other anon >>3702 linked. Mannerbund would seem to work best without sexual motivations being involved at all. But the OP essay made an interested case for the idea that the deep friendship love among men, which is obviously good, may involve more physical and even pseudo-sexual affection than that. I have not seen it, but he claims we wouldn’t see it except in certain remnant institutions, so what do i know?

I will say the scouts culture and ideas of wholesome sanitized male fraternity one sees in general in first half of 20th century america have the taste of being a proto-gynocratic imposition over the “wild type” masculinity. Like something they experimented with before they realized they could annihilate masculinity altogether by banning unchaperoned male social contact. This is just an intuition, but its enough to make the author’s claims plausible to me.

I doubt on first principles and intuition alone that wild type sovereign masculinity is wholesome and acceptable to this society’s moral taboos. I suspect anything acceptable to those judging from today is just domesticated, and the real thing is the much more dangerous and alien wolf pack koryos that we have little knowledge of. Above all the koryos is a sovereign brotherhood, and sovereignty takes on many psychological loads and freedoms that a professionalized or educational mannerbund would not. Elites and professionals are different. The latter are domesticated. Consider for example the authority to sentence a member to death. A real koryos trivially has this, but nothing we have ever seen in our time does. On that grounds i have large and open minded uncertainty about the mores of true masculinity.

This is certainly my received

anon_xywu said in #3725 2w ago: received

I think, perhaps, the young radicals of today are at a disadvantage when tackling this kind of polemic, having not actually read queer theory. I'm neither young nor a radical, so I should be able to quote Leo Bersani on the gay fixation on mimicking machismo and heterosexual vitality. But I can't.

Since he was mentioned, I thought about Foucault. I've read him, at least. Before he actually went to Iran, he was sure that the Persians, having not fallen to modernity, following religious orders on sodomy (Khomeini said, from memory, that save for cases of incest, penetrating a man’s ass was a spiritually petty crime, one that could be cleansed through fasting and charity) might maintain the sort of faggy fraternity that he thought natural. He hoped they believed that men were made for men, with women as a fleeting distraction and reward. He was disappointed upon arrival, when, after discreetly asking what they thought of the homosexuals, to learn that his comrades would put sentence them to death. The Persian revolutionaries were on guard against the corrosive influence of same-sex lust. He flew immediately to San Francisco.

Foucault writes about sex and friendship. He was talking about the Greeks, too. But I still haven't read him well enough.

I can share my own experiences, for what they're worth. I grew up without enough women around, or fewer than most boys grow up with now. Some of the boys I grew up with confessed in later years to being homosexuals, usually when the rumors became too much, or they got busted trying to hook up with boys off Instagram. We had sussed it out before they even realized it themselves. Their attention was sometimes appreciated, since they could mimic girls. I mean that they asked about feelings, not that we let them suck us off (although that could have happened, I never heard of it, and adolescent homosexuals are, I believe, not generally attracted to other adolescents, but to the old men that get them as youngsters). They were never completely ostracized. We knew to exclude them from certain conversations, whether because we were creeped out, because we knew they had no valuable information to share, or because we didn't want to hurt their feelings.

I think, perhaps, th received

anon_segy said in #3946 7d ago: received

Framing the question as "should you allow homoeroticism in the Mannerbund" is wrong for two reasons.

First-even if that were the correct policy in an ideal society direct implementation today would be totally subverted because of modern gay, as others have correctly noted.

Second-the author talks about pair bonds between men. Mannerbund is not the right unit of analysis, it's male-male individual friendships especially in early life. Nobody wants all-male group promiscuity or group sex like with modern gay. We would have to understand what sorts of male-male friendships a man can have if he is open to the possibility of homoeroticism before describing the Mannerbund.

No you should not allow homoeroticism in the Mannerbund now. Do not kiss the homies goodnight.

In the privacy of our own thoughts, consider that any upstanding young man has a strong internal taboo about anything that suggests sodomy, which is good. It is noted repeatedly that modern social arrangement has caused our upstanding young man to associate almost all expressions of masculine affection with sodomy, which is bad. I suspect this works internally: when he feels a surge of love, affection, respect, admiration for another man it is immediately tamped down and converted into something ironic and possibly spiteful for fear of the gay.

If, just in his own mind, our upstanding young man learned not to reject any feeling that could, if acted upon, lead to the stuff the OP describes, he might form deeper male friendships--because he is no longer suppressing his natural inclination to deep male friendship. He could maintain a strong internal disgust of sodomy and a practical policy of stopping his expressions of physical affection from becoming sexual.

I'm not convinced by the OP but I do think that the right way to approach the topic is first by seeing what changes in your experience of male relationships when you try to recover some of what's been incorrectly associated with sodomy, not by trying to make policy changes about what faggy behaviors you allow in your existing all-male spaces.

referenced by: >>4060

Framing the question received

anon_mide said in #3954 7d ago: received

I suggest some of you read this: https://thebutlerian.com/posts/a_case_study.html

I suggest some of yo received

anon_woqy said in #4037 4d ago: received

Have been meaning to reply to this thread for a few weeks now. I'm just gonna post these passages:

From St. Augustine's confessions:

> In those years when I first began to teach rhetoric in my native town, I had made one my friend, but too dear to me, from a community of pursuits, of mine own age, and, as myself, in the first opening flower of youth. He had grown up of a child with me, and we had been both school-fellows and play-fellows. But he was not yet my friend as afterwards, nor even then, as true friendship is; for true it cannot be, unless in such as Thou cementest together, cleaving unto Thee, by that love which is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost, which is given unto us. Yet was it but too sweet, ripened by the warmth of kindred studies: for, from the true faith (which he as a youth had not soundly and thoroughly imbibed), I had warped him also to those superstitious and pernicious fables, for which my mother bewailed me. With me he now erred in mind, nor could my soul be without him. But behold Thou wert close on the steps of Thy fugitives, at once God of vengeance, and Fountain of mercies, turning us to Thyself by wonderful means; Thou tookest that man out of this life, when he had scarce filled up one whole year of my friendship, sweet to me above all sweetness of that my life. Who can recount all Thy praises, which he hath felt in his one self? What diddest Thou then, my God, and how unsearchable is the abyss of Thy judgments? For long, sore sick of a fever, he lay senseless in a death-sweat; and his recovery being despaired of, he was baptised, unknowing; myself meanwhile little regarding, and presuming that his soul would retain rather what it had received of me, not what was wrought on his unconscious body. But it proved far otherwise: for he was refreshed, and restored. Forthwith, as soon as I could speak with him (and I could, so soon as he was able, for I never left him, and we hung but too much upon each other), I essayed to jest with him, as though he would jest with me at that baptism which he had received, when utterly absent in mind and feeling, but had now understood that he had received. But he so shrunk from me, as from an enemy; and with a wonderful and sudden freedom bade me, as I would continue his friend, forbear such language to him. I, all astonished and amazed, suppressed all my emotions till he should grow well, and his health were strong enough for me to deal with him as I would. But he was taken away from my frenzy, that with Thee he might be preserved for my comfort; a few days after in my absence, he was attacked again by the fever, and so departed. At this grief my heart was utterly darkened; and whatever I beheld was death. My native country was a torment to me, and my father's house a strange unhappiness; and whatever I had shared with him, wanting him, became a distracting torture. Mine eyes sought him every where, but he was not granted them; and I hated all places, for that they had not him; nor could they now tell me, "he is coming," as when was alive and absent. I became a great riddle to myself, and I asked my soul, why she was so sad, and why she disquieted me sorely: but she knew not what to answer me. And if I said, Trust in God, she very rightly obeyed me not; because that most dear friend, whom she had lost, was, being man, both truer and better than that phantasm she was bid to trust in. Only tears were sweet to me, for they succeeded my friend, in the dearest of my affections. And now, Lord, these things are passed by, and time hath assuaged my wound. May I learn from Thee, who art Truth, and approach the ear of my heart unto Thy mouth, that Thou mayest tell me why weeping is sweet to the miserable?

referenced by: >>4039

Have been meaning to received

anon_woqy said in #4038 4d ago: received

from the Iliad:

As thus he mused, illustrious Nestor’s son
Drew near Achilles, and with eyes that shed
Warm tears he gave his sorrowful message thus:⁠—
“Son of the warlike Peleus, woe is me!
For bitter are the tidings thou must hear
Of what should not have been. Patroclus lies
A naked corpse, and over it the hosts
Are fighting; crested Hector hath his arms.”
He spake, and a black cloud of sorrow came
Over the chieftain. Grasping in both hands
The ashes of the hearth, he showered them o’er
His head, and soiled with them his noble face.
They clung in dark lumps to his comely vest.
Prone in the dust of earth, at his full length,
And tearing his disordered hair, he lay.
Then wailed aloud the maidens whom in war
He and Patroclus captured. Forth they came,
And, thronging round him, smote their breasts and swooned.
Antilochus mourned also, and shed tears,
Holding Achilles by the hand, for much
His generous nature dreaded that the chief
Might aim at his own throat the sword he wore.
[...]
The swift Achilles, sighing deeply, made
This answer: “O my mother! True it is
Olympian Jove hath done all this for me;
But how can that delight me, since my friend,
My well-beloved Patroclus, is no more?
He whom, of all my fellows in the war,
I prized the most, and loved as my own self,
Is lost to me, and Hector, by whose hand
He was cut off, has spoiled him of his arms⁠—
His dreaded arms, a wonder to the sight
And glorious, which the gods of heaven bestowed
On Peleus, sumptuous bridal gifts, when thou
Wert led by them to share a mortal’s bed.
Yet would that thou hadst evermore remained
Among the immortal dwellers of the deep,
And Peleus had espoused a mortal maid,
Since now thy heart must ache with infinite grief
For thy slain son, whom thou shalt never more
Welcome returning to his home. No wish
Have I to live or to concern myself
In men’s affairs, save this: that Hector first,
Pierced by my spear, shall yield his life, and pay
The debt of vengeance for Patroclus slain.

referenced by: >>4039

from the Iliad:... received

anon_pusu said in #4039 4d ago: received

>>4037
>>4038

You've given two examples of intense male friendships (Augustine & unnamed friend, Achilles & Patroclus). In neither passage is there any indication of sodomy in any form. In the case of Augustine, it seems extremely unlikely this was going on, or he would have mention it, presumably with denunciation. In the case of Achilles, in spite of later interpretations of the classical period, there is nothing in the Iliad itself to suggest such.

The point of interest is not to deny or downplay the role of intense male friendships. Quite the contrary. I would very much deny that such friendships necessarily entail or are aided by sodomy in any form.

You've given two exa received

anon_woqy said in #4040 4d ago: received

When you read these passages it's clear that the homoerotic discussion is merely a distraction. These are two passages who have stayed with me but there are countless others like this you can pull out of history/literature.

This has bothered for a long while but the impoverishment of human emotions is the elephant in the room, in the romantic sense or otherwise. We are almost certainly poorer in and less capable of love. For almost all of history men loved their friends with the same intensity of a fairytale romance (without necessarily implying anything erotic). This also puts the Christian commandement of love in it's right frame. This also bleeds into other relationships we have with our families, our peers, our wives/lovers. We treat everyone like pleasant acquaintances and never really learn to truly love one another. If you spent enough time with old texts, and let your vision of the world be moulded by them, you will see how weird we are for treating the people who are supposed to be the closest to us like acquaintances. That husband and wife can live their whole lives as strangers to one another is the real tragedy of modernity. No wonder people run to forums and therapists and whatnot to find comfort or direction at the slightest inconvenience.

referenced by: >>4041 >>4044

When you read these received

anon_pusu said in #4041 4d ago: received

>>4040

Yes, I think the strength and genuineness of love in friendship is an important theme. Aristotle treats this well in Nicomachean Ethics, book 9, where he describes the true friend as "another self."

Yes, I think the str received

anon_viwe said in #4044 3d ago: received

>>4040

Strong agree. The story of man becoming modern is also the story of his everyday and interior life becoming rationalized, creating the flattened emotional affects we know today. I will note that one of the signs of this flattened affect is fake-exaggerated emotional outbursts like when people say "I'm literally crying," instead of actually, literally crying.

Strong agree. The st received

anon_viwe said in #4045 3d ago: received

Continuation of above.

Continuation of abov received

anon_viwe said in #4046 3d ago: received

Please forgive me for posting multiple times in a row, but it just occurred to me that the disappearance of the "high style" from modern speech is what limits people from expressing higher emotions in an outward way. We have intellectual or bureaucratic registers, yes, but there is no "beautiful" way of speaking that also lets us posit ourselves as anything other than meatbags.

referenced by: >>4049

Please forgive me fo received

anon_woqy said in #4047 3d ago: received

Absolutely. The medievals in particular were supremely colourful, jolly, funny and good-hearted in a very rare way (historically speaking). If you study the period enough this comes across pretty easily. Canterbury tales being a very easy peak into the medieval mind.

RE: register
I think the human soul is composed primarily by words. You can’t build human complexity without the right words to achieve. It will either be absent or stillborn. That’s the role of literature in life. It furnishes you with the words to develop an inner life.

If you’re only exposed to therapy speak like trauma, abuse and boundaries, you’ll get a society of hostile strangers.

Absolutely. The medi received

anon_mexu said in #4049 3d ago: received

>>4046

We find in ourselves not a lack of words nor of education, but of the underlying biology itself. For when one is acquainted with works of past and free from inflammation and stress, as our modern society produces much of it by its very nature, the sensitivities previously thought lost may reveal themselves once again.

Not everyone can speak like that, nor can they understand depth and nuance to the same degree. Those of the past may not in daily life be much better than how we find things today like many an author has attested, for simply they did not leave their writing nor their works with us. In the silence of Walden pond, Thoreau found himself against the mean parvenus of industry without the slightest charm to their aims.

We find in ourselves received

anon_lako said in #4060 3d ago: received

>male-male erotic practices

Based on the conversation here it seems like there is a problem with modern society's understanding of the word "erotic" itself. I tend to agree with >>3946 that "homoeroticism" is already subverted by the rainbow brigade and perhaps is a term to be avoided. That said, the word "homosociality" is available and any number of affectionate practices within healthy male-male friendships, especially the dyadic friendships described in the article, could be described by that term. As the article also points out, the core issue is the psyop whose goal is to confuse same-sex attraction with opposite-sex attraction and vice-versa. Rebooting sex-segregated spaces (common in the United States until the 1960s!) will go a long way, but this can only be done *informally* in the present environment.

As someone who went through four years in an all-male school and two years of mandatory male conscription, I do remember that we made any number of jokes that would be now considered "homophobic", what >>3711 describes as homoeroticism but really might be termed homophobia. I embrace the term. Corrupting the youth and spreading disease is not a cost to be borne by the taxpayer! That said, being shoulder-to-shoulder or back-to-back with comrades for mutual support is a deeply comforting feeling, whether one is on the move or at rest.

Based on the convers received

anon_bari said in #4062 3d ago: received

Men used to form friendships through hunting, building, fighting, and working together—activities that were necessary for survival and building anything meaningful. You trusted other men because your livelihood depended on it. Sure, some abused that trust, but collectively, this environment was enough for real male bonds to form.

Once sex was separated from family-building—mainly through contraception—there was no longer any reason for women to choose men who could provide for a family as sexual partners. As long as a man is attractive, his inability to provide isn’t a social embarrassment for women, because there are no children at risk. The old system, where men helped each other out in hard times with the expectation of reciprocity, has broken down. Now, there’s no external force pushing men to work for or against each other and the male workplace where there no women is gone further damaging the bygone shared reality (with shared metrics as it once had).

The internet has made things worse. Women exchange information at a speed and scale that’s never existed before. They care about what other women think, and now, with no objective shared reality for what to want in a man, male work has become about satisfying female social perception—essentially, chasing standards that are arbitrary and constantly shifting. Men are left competing for what are, in the end, vain and empty markers.

There’s no shared mission, no real risk, and no reason to trust or rely on each other. Most “friendships” are just alliances of convenience, distractions from the loss of real purpose, or consumerist time-fillers with no deeper meaning.

Industrial society has also reduced the need for men to bond. In a way, we’re lucky it came before the separation from reality.

There are still a few men who could, in theory, form real bonds—usually those in the most critical roles, like those responsible for preventing nuclear war. But even they are often stretched thin, with family life taking priority and friendships becoming a once-a-month event, if their partner allows it.

It’s not about gay men or dating apps. The destruction of male friendship is the result of technological change—ironically, invented and spread by men themselves.

The Greeks could be friends (and more) because their society still gave men a place to prove themselves together. Ours doesn’t. Blaming gay men misses the point entirely and the fear of gayness leads to spirals of avoidance of both a man's self (e.g. spontaneous erections causing avoidanse of high-wordly-sensuality-behaviours) and other men.

(LLMs were used not for the ideas but the communication of them).

Men used to form fri received

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