Please do give 'more thought and work'...

to the issue. Great post. An intellectual danger here lies in generalization of one's own feelings. Sexual attraction (and for that matter sexual repulsion) is so powerful it's difficult for any of us to accept that our feelings are NOT universal. (Who COULDN'T be attracted to Cole Sprouse when he was 13? Who COULD be attracted to some hairy dude with a mustache and bulging muscles - UGH! Or for that matter, some cunt oozing smells and fluid? YUCK!!) You manage better than most to separate your own feelings from your examination of the historical and anthropological record. But it's really hard. I know -- I've tried. When I first started thinking about these things, lo these many years ago, I just assumed that being gay meant liking boys. I was gradually forced to realize that many gay men really don't like boys -- that they get off on the overt, exaggerated features of adult masculinity and find boys "too young". Then when I discovered this community and began to make friends here, (it used to be easier and less dangerous) I came to realize that quite a number of the posters here -- both those who were RL friends and those whom I have never met RL but whose writing I respect -- liked both boys and women but had no time at all for adult men. And of course there were people like me whose primary attraction was to boys but who also could get off on certain types of adult men (usually smooth-skinned, boyish Asian men -- scratch a rice queen, find a TBL). And there were guys here who simply couldn't get it up for anyone but a male on the soft side of puberty or below. So how to separate one's own feelings from a dispassionate examination of the historical record? From my own reading and research, I have to conclude that Edmund is right when he writes: "The historical record shows unambiguously that most men who showed themselves sexually drawn to boys were also drawn to women and sexually repelled by other men." although I suspect that conclusion may be very comfortable for his sexuality (he can speak for himself), positioning himself in the historical if not the contemporary norm. Still, his contention is supported by an overwhelming amount of historical evidence. But then you raise a very real point: many boys in pederastic relationships are very turned on -- sexually demanding of their older male lovers (anyone who doubts this should read Saikaku's stories) . If they were "repelled" by older men, they wouldn't be this way - they would just lie their passively and let the men "have their way" with them. (This, not coincidentally, was the official Victorian view of female sexualiiy -- women were not supposed to have sexual feelings of their own and to find men sexually repellent.) So Edmund's is not a complete explanation -- there are lots and lots of people out there who find virile adult men sexually attractive -- many women, many boys, and even some other adult men. Human sexuality is so amorphous, so diverse -- it is ultimately rooted in biology but it can be and is very affected by the messages -- messages of who and what is allowed to be sexually attractive and to whom -- that a given culture beams at people at any given time in history. One thing that is clear from any dispassionate examination of the historical record: the beautiful boy is one of the great sexual personae of human history (thank you, Camille!) and perhaps the most central. But there are other personae too and we should be aware of those and give them their due -- which you seem to be. As always, I look forward to more from you. SR