Re: What causes BL?

Devereux, a psychologist writing about classics, had some interesting theories about boy babies being over-valued in Greek society, leading to mothers over-valuing their sons, leading to a sexual pattern in which the men themselves, as conditioned by their mothers, overvalued boys sexually. He threw around a lot of terms like "narcissistic overinvestment." The Christians who work in the care of people with fetishes analyze everything in terms of unprocessed trauma. For example, the man with the cage fetish, who has to have his boyfriend put him in a cage for hours tells stories of being left in in a play-pen for hours and hours because his parents did not want to interact with him. My own theorizing focuses on Developmental Hurdles which boys of various ages are supposed to TACKLE. I turned away from them all, hoping to escape the conflict. But those essential conflicts do come back to haunt you, if you don't LIVE THROUGH them. I can't 100% buy into either theory, but yeah, I WILL say this: the more you know about your childhood traumas, the more you know about what works and doesn't work for you sexually. As far as any theorizing that forecloses further identity development, I flatly reject it. "I was born in the wrong body, I was born gay, it's all about the genes." Fuck that shit ENTIRELY. Take ownership of what little free will you DO have, and don't farm your identity issues out to the stars, the genes, the parents, or ANY other influences. ---Sb