Witchcraft-and-the-Gay-Counterculture-1

A similar type of venom can be found just beneath the surfacein the writings of so-called liberal historians. A good exampleis the widely read work of a liberal Anglican priest. He concludeshis whitewash of the church’s atrocities against Gay people with thisstatement: “Homosexual perversion, therefore, is not itself a fountof corrupting influence, but only, as it were, the ineluctable consequenceof a corrosion which has already left its mark upon marriageand family life and, if not checked, may ultimately undermine thewhole social order and lead to sexual anarchy” (Bailey, 166).Just as bad is the liberal approach found in the popular historicalstudy by a Danish psychotherapist. While assuring the readerthat he is most fair minded, the author concludes by saying thatthere is no such thing as Gay history and that men who are exclusivelyGay suffer from an “inability to adjust themselves heterosexually”(Vanggaard, 52).The professionals have suppressed Gay history, just as theyhave suppressed the truth about Third World people, women, thepoor, the imprisoned, and the insane. They have been co-opted, notonly by being bought off, but in a more insidious way. Through theirlong “training” they have lost the ability to see other realities thanthe official ones, and have internalized within themselves the valuesof the ruling classes. Intellectually and spiritually, they have beenanesthetized.We will have to write our own history, and when I say “we”I mean any of us who have the interest and energy to do so. We mustdemystify ourselves from the illusion that only well-paid professionalscan do this work. In many ways, trained professionals, includingGay ones, are the least suited to teach us, for they have been mostassimilated into the lifestyles and values of the ruling classes.This book is an attempt to record some of the things thatprofessional historians usually leave out. It is one-sided, in that itis mostly concerned with the victims of Western civilization, ratherthan their rulers. It is subjective, in that it reflects my own personalvalue judgments and emotions. It is arbitrary, in that it picks andchooses among all the source material, accepting a few things hereand there, but rejecting most as biased or unreliable.The book, however, is as true as any other historical work.It is true because all historical works are one-sided, subjective, andarbitrary. Every historian works this way. The real falsehood occurswhen historians hide their values, emotions, and choices under a veneerof “objectivity.” A work of history cannot be assessed apart from14Almost everyone who has written about gay life has called itpretentious, absurd, pitiful or repugnant. The great majority ofhomosexuals seem to vouch for the accuracy of its depiction inThe Boys in the Band, a play replete with jealousy, competitiveness,insecurity, malice, tantrums, and hysterical mood shifts(Karlen, 526).1290 AD Beguines and beghardsincrease in number. Among someof them a new heresy appears, theFree Spirit movement. Free Spiritsare accused of attacking all existinginstitutions and saying thatthere is no sin “under the belt.“ The first beghards are arrestedfor heresy (Lerner, 16-20 & 44;Cohn, Millennium, 164).1290 AD King Edward I ofEngland decrees the death penaltyfor anyone convicted of sorcery,apostasy, heresy, or sodomy (Bailey,145-146).1292 AD A homosexual scandalerupts at the University of Paris,and many professors are banished(Lea, Templars, 155).1296 AD Pope Boniface VIIIissues a bull condemning a sectwhose members are said to prayin the nude (Lerner, 79).1300 AD An accused Catharnamed Lepzet confesses before asecular court that ritual lesbianismand male homosexuality arepracticed at the meetings of hisreligious group (Russell, 162).1307 AD King Philippe of Francearrests all the French T emplarsand accuses them of heresy andsodomy (Lea, Templars, 158).1307-1314 AD Through a conspiracyof King Philippe of Franceand Pope Clement V, the Templarsare hunted down all overEurope, and the order is abolished(Russell, 195).1307 AD Archbishop Henry ofVirne.burg condemns beguinesand beghards for rejecting theconcept of sin and saying thatsimple fornication is not sinful(Lerner, 66-67).1310 AD Marguerite Porete isexecuted by the Provost of theUniversity of Paris for practicingheretical mysticism (Lerner, 71-72). The Franciscan Nicholas ofLyra writes that new heretics haveappeared who say that peopleshould not obey the prophets butlive freely after the flesh (Lerner,79). Again through a conspiracyof King Philippe, Pope BonifaceVIII is accused posthumously ofritual magic, sodomy, and murder(Cohn, Demons, 180-185).1310-1315 AD Heretics areaccused of worshipping Luciferand practicing orgies in Austria,Brandenburg, Bohemia, Prague,and Krems (Russell, 177-179;Lerner, 28).1311 AD Pope Clement V, actingthrough the Council of Vienne,issues the bull Ad Nostrum. Itcondemns the heresy of the FreeSpirit, accusing its advocates ofrejecting the concept of sin and ofbelieving that no sex act in itself issinful (Lerner, 81-84).1317 AD The Bishop of Strassbourgorganizes an inquisitorialpersecution against the Free Spiritin his diocese (Cohn, Millennium,170; Loos, 85-87).1320 AD The inquisitor BernardGui mentions women who arecalled “the good people” andwho ride out at night (Russell,175). Pope John XXII empowersinquisitors to act against practitionersof ritual magic as heretics,thereby broadening the conceptof heresy (Cohn, Demons, 176).1323-1328 AD The peasants ofFlanders re volt (Cohn, Millennium,216).159