Has homosexuality ever been accepted in society?

[zanana]

Someone here must know the answer to this. I was thinking about how long it would take this society to accept gay marriage, then I figured that homosexuality has been around as long as man has been around. Somewhere in the time spectrum of back then to now, there must have been a society somewhere that accepted homosexuality as normal.

[Loonman]

1. Greece

Rome, somewhat.

[enkidu2]

7. actually not

in rome it was an insult (see suetonius on caesar), in greece it was perhaps favored more but only in the upper classes and only between a mature man and a boy not between equals (a more debased version of this can be seen in some central and south american cultures today). That not everyone felt this positive regard towards it can be seen in Philip of macedons comments about the man-boy pairs who fought together for the greek allies paraphrase "no one should say there is anything wrong about these noble people." I dont think either of these societies would approve of gay marriage as it implies a connection between equals.

None of the great religions support homosexuality (even the dalai lama is a homophobe to his flock in his own language). No unfortunately for those of us who believe there is nothing wrong with being gay history aint going to help, only hope for the future will

[buck4freedom]

21. Actually not...

You misinterpret a prohibition against all physical sex in the Mahayana Monastic tradition as "homophobia."

Try again.

BTW: Greek heterosexual marriage was not a marriage of "equals" either.

[Loonman]

25. Yep, in ancient Greece, your wife was for baby-making and housework

If you wanted converation or companianship, you went to a prostitute.

[Product of Evolution]

56. Tibetan Buddhism disapproves of homosexuality...

BUT...

The Tibetan-Government-In-Exile's only political party -- the National Democratic Party -- is supported by the Dalai Lama (duh) and says the following in its platform:

"The guarantee of a humane livelihood and equal opportunities for all, regardless of class, gender, sexual orientation, age, ethnic identity or belief."

With the exception of Tibet and to a lesser extent, Japan and Taiwan, Asian nations are generally quite anti-gay.

[terrya]

10. Yes. Although men who were in the active role sexually...

Were praised. Those men who took the passive role were less accepted. Passitivity in gay men at that time was considered effeminate...which was denigrated.

An older man in ancient Greece could take a much younger man as his lover. And educate him and refine him for adulthood.

I'm reading a book about homosexuality and past historical cultures. Pretty fascinating.

Terry

[Loonman]

11. Warrior class

It was encouraged in the Greek military because a man would fight harder for the safety of his lover than the state.

[pagerbear]

26. Book?

Please post the title and author of this book you mention. Sounds interesting. I quite liked George Chauncey's book about gay New York from 1890 to 1940.

[terrya]

27. Homosexuality and Civilization by Louis Crompton.

I bought it from Insightoutbooks.com, a gay and lesbian online book seller.

I'm sure you could get it from Barnes and Noble if you wanted.

It's a very good book, btw.

And I really liked George Chauncey's book. One of the best books about gay history I've ever read.

Terry

[pagerbear]

30. Cool

To digress from the topic, I'm now reading Luc Sante's Low Life, a book about the "lower" classes in NYC throughout its history. Quite a read.

[markses]

66. Yup. Great book

[Media_Lies_Daily]

65. The Spartans.

[warrior1]

2. I believe it is

excepted in some of the American Indian tribes.

[LeahMira]

36. You're right!

I believe it is...
excepted in some of the American Indian tribes.

There are stories of women who rode into battle along with the men, and there are stories of men who remained in the villages to help with gathering, raising food, and tending the children. When the French traders observed these people, they called them the berdache.

American Indians feel that each person has special gifts to offer the people. When I worked with children who were retarded, one of the American Indian instructors told me she believed that these children had a special gift because, among other things, they would quite cheerfully do tedious and repetitive chores that would drive the "average" person to raving boredom. She also thought that the children helped the rest of us to better appreciate the small triumphs in life.

Although I don't know specifically how the tribes feel about people who are homosexual, I believe they would be accepting and grateful for the special gifts that homosexuals have to offer. An Indian lady friend of mine knows several men who are homosexual, and she has said that she thinks one of these gentlemen is an especially sensitive counselor in part because he is gay.

[0007]

69. From the many tribes of the American Indian I've associated with..

I find in my experience that is true what you say.

[Vernunft II]

3. Well, there´s still some grumbling here and there but

here in Germany the Majors of Berlin and Hamburg are openly homosexual. Now keep in mind that those 2 cities have country status, it´d be like in the US the governors of 2 of your States would be homosexual.

Plus, we have civil unions as the legally binding ceremony and hardly anyone goes to church anymore to marry.

Of course, if you go to a rural place and make out openly you´ll get stared at but keep in mind that just 20 years ago a heterosexual couple would´ve gotten the same stares.

[rogerashton]

4. Some societies have been very tolerant of pederasty.

(Modernism may be a bit odd in accepting adult homosexuality while condemning pederasty). The Greeks were pretty tolerant of male homosexuality, but it was usually a relation of older to younger men, in practice, I believe.

[pagerbear]

28. Defining pederasty

Sexual relations between adults and those we now consider minors can vary in dynamic widely. I suspect those cultures we say were tolerant of pederasty had some boundaries in place.

In our own time we seem to condemn all sexual interaction between adults and minors, regardless of the age of the minor, the conditions of the interaction, the degree of consent/coercion/force involved, and the feelings of the minor about the experience. A few years ago a sociologist (I think) at Princeton (I think) wrote a paper suggesting the degree of harm done, if any, by sexual relations between adults and minors varied widely depending on these and other factors--even suggesting that it wasn't harmful at all in some cases. Once the conservatives got wind of this--without reading the paper, of course--they soundly denounced the author, the university she was associated with, and anything else they could think of so that they could posture in front of the press.

[kayell]

5. Several American Indian tribes

http://www.nu-woman.com/berdache.htm

[ClintonTyree]

6. The animal kingdom............

doesn't seem to have a problem with it. And no, I'm not talking about Disney's Animal Kingdom.
It happens in nature all the time. So if gawd created all things, and gawd is perfect, why would gawd create gay animals (men and women included). And don't tell me it's a choice they make, I doubt animals consciously think about becoming gay.

[enkidu2]

9. yes

of course, we cant look to history but we can look to nature

[Third Eye]

33. Atypical

Typically male animals only "hook up" if there is an absence of females. I've never heard of two males hooking up for the sake of hooking up. Now there is a class of apes (they're like small chimps, but I can't remember their exact name) where lesbianism is rampant and sexual expression between the opposite sex reads like the Kama Sutra. Evolutionists theorize that they might be in the line from which humans descended but it really complicated the theory because of their location of origin. It was in USAToday about 5-6 years ago.

[Dookus]

48. not true...

homosexuality has been observed in a wide variety of animals, even when opposite-sex partners are freely available.

There was a very sweet story recenty about a pair of gay penguins at a zoo back east. They kept trying to hatch rocks. The zookeeprs finally gave them a fertilized egg and they hatched it and reared the baby to adulthood.

The chimps you're talking about are Bonobos, all of which seem to be bisexual. Fully 50% of their sexual contacts are with same-sex partners.

[kayell]

63. Now, that's interesting

IIRC, bonobos are the closest primates to humans, closer genetically than chimps.

[smirkymonkey]

55. Not true - I guess you didn't get the memo

about the penguins...

[markses]

67. Nonsense

The notion that male animals only engage in homosexuality when there is a scarcity of females is a typical myth meant to deflect the rampant homosexuality in the animal world. And it's been thoroughly debunked for years.

For a really great study, see Bruce Bagemihl's "Biological Exuberance: Animal Homosexuality and Diversity."

[ozymandius]

8. Absolutely

In complete contradiction to today's norms, some of the world's fiercest fighting forces were homosexual institutions: the Roman legions, the armies of Alexander the Great, Hitler's SS.

In making so many of the world's great military empires, it was much easier to have your honey with you on the front lines than a thousand miles away.

Military institutions aside - the societies behind these institutions were very liberal about homosexuality. EDIT: Rome to a large degree; Germany under Hitler, not at all permissive; Some indigenous cultures of pre-Columbian Peru were ceremonial in the homosexual prctices as were the Greeks in sacred services. Alexander's Macedonia - don't know about the cultural norms there at that time.

[La_Serpiente]

13. As for Alexander the Great

It is said that Hephaestion, one of Alexander's Generals, may have been more than just a friend. The debate still goes on, but there was no doubt that these two individuals were close.

[x-g.o.p.er]

14. Hitler's SS? I've never heard that

I am a bit of an amateur military historian, and although I have heard about homosexuality in the Roman legions and the armies of Alexander the Great, I haven't about the SS. If you might have a link or book title that would discuss that, I would like to read more about it. Thanks!!

[buck4freedom]

22. It's crap...

It was part of the propaganda to 1) make Hitler's henchmen look less "scary" and more "perverted" and 2) justify the internment after the liberation of the camps of Gays and Lesbians who were not freed when the Jews were.

The Nazi Queer myth has been part of the attack on gays since the late 40's.

[junker]

15. Hey don't forget two of the armies which defeated britain - ZULU and Fuzzy

let us not forget that two of the four armies to defeat britain, that is the ZULU of southern Africa, and the Fuzzy Wuzzy (kiplings' name for the homosexual armies maintained by the Ethiopians/Somali's) were basically organized around homosexual cadres.... in both cases these armies of gay warriors armed only with blades fought and won against the brits at the height of their military power...perhaps a lesson for USofA

further in several of the largest of the advanced civilizations in Afica (pre white dudes) and meso-america accepted homosexuality as normal. In fact the meso-americans defined humans as having 8 sexes, which included the homosexual and hetero....


by the way, the other two armies to defeat the British are of course, USofA and the Afghanies.....

[junker]

17. For Ozymandias

Ozymandias
I met a traveler from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read,
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed,
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look upon my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.

-Percy Bysshe Shelley
1792-1822

seriously cool these days of repubs trying to build themselves a king-of-kings on shifting sands...

[Calico4000]

32. The British

have not been defeated for hundreds of years.

The colonists would NOT have been able to do so with out French assistance, and the strategic time of the event. If the British had devoted full resources to the colonists even with French assistance they would have failed.

I would say British occupations have been defeated, but certainly the British have not. Hell, even Hitler couldn't get a foot soldier on British soil. I believe the time frame of no foreign army setting foot on British soil is equally as impressive.

[rogerashton]

38. The Americans didn't win that war,

but the British did lose it -- had they not been incompetent boobs, they would have crushed the colonists long before the French came in.

Washington, the only person the various factions could all tolerate, became a skillful general in time -- but it was learning by doing, and the learning curve was steep. Meanwhile, the Brits slept and let him escape again and again.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

64. "Incompetent boobs"? Most of the British combat units in the Colonies...

...were veterans of the wars with France during this time period. It took the Colonists quite some time to actually win a battle against those troops.

The one tactic for which the British seemed most ill-prepared was the one at which the Colonists excelled...guerilla warfare. The British used the time-honored European tactic of occupying the Colonists' cities and towns, while the Colonists lived off the land and attacked when presented with proper opportunities.

Another factor in that long war that led to the American victory was the generally poor leadership exhibited by the British generals. Had the British troops been led by anyone remotely competent, the war would have been over very quickly.

A final factor which tipped the balance against the British for good was the participation in the final years of the war by the French. The French played a major role at the Battle of Yorktown. The French fleet held the British fleet at bay, while the French army units occupied approximately 1/3 to 1/2 of the perimeter facing the surrounded British units in Yorktown.

[rogerashton]

68. We are in agreement.

The troopies were quality veterans. The generals stank (usually of the boudoir).

If Wolfe had not been killed at Quebec, good chance there would have been no USA.

[AngryAmish]

39. Zulus did not defeat the British

They won one battle (Isandlwana) and tried to move into British controlled area. They won the battle because the British were poorly lead. They came upon a small group of more disciplined British soldiers at Roarke's Drift and got slaughtered - see the movie Zulu. The rest of the war went as poorly for the Zulus.

What was the condition of the Zulu Empire before the British invaded? Owned vast amounts of territory, multiple lesser tribes as vassals and had the baddest indigenous army in Africa (most likely).
After the war, empire split up into something like 13 states, all owing loyalty to the British (and then the Afrikaners-but that is another war), and the king being lead around London like a upper-class sideshow freak. They did not gain Independence for over 100 year, and Independence is as a lesser partner in the ANC lead gov't. (I think, modern S. African politics is not my thing.)

But what about the old saying about the Royal Navy "Rum, sodomy and the lash"?

[Calico4000]

29. Wrong about the SS

There were certainly homosexual SS, but please don't give the Nazis any credit for being tolerant in this regard. They killed homosexuals as viciously as they did Jews. They even marked them. (research where the pink triangle came from)

[Lydia Leftcoast]

34. There was one early group of Nazis

that was predominantly homosexual, and I don't remember what they were called, but they were all killed in what was called The Night of the Long Knives. After that, the Nazis were extremely anti-gay.

[Dunedain]

40. Ernst Rohm

It was charged that he and several of the SA members were homosexuals.

http://www.fatherryan.org/holocaust/homogenocide/WWII.html

[AlienGirl]

71. That was the SA

They were the "brownshirts." I've heard rumors that the Night of the Long Knives came about because Roehm had pressured Goebbels for sex.

Goebbels himself was probably bisexual; one time when Hitler was complaining of being horny, he offered to "take care of it for him."

But the Nazi state as a whole was extremely homophobic and oppressed gays mercilessly as a matter of policy.

Tucker

[NewJeffCT]

12. didn't the church sanction gay marriage for centuries?

Didn't the christian church both sanction & perform gay marriage ceremonies for centuries 1500-1800 years ago, or am I mistaken?

[Strapping Buck]

42. You are mistaken...

There is no such animal as "The Christian Church", as a factual, historical entity.

Secondly, assuming you are referring to the Catholic Church-- which was the only Christian Church during the time frame you are citing-- they did not sanction, nor "perform" any gay marriages.

[DrWeird]

45. When did the christian orthodox churches form?

Or are they not really christian?

[DrWeird]

44. Yup, ended around the 1300s, due to rising homophobia.

"Same-Sex Unions in Premodern Europe." By John Boswell.

Was a big deal a few years ago. Lot's of people got upset. Particularly catholic scholars.

[NewJeffCT]

46. thanks

I knew it was out there somewhere... I didn't realize it lasted until that late in history.

But, shouldn't those priests have known better, as they were closer in time to God than modern 20th & 21th century types.

[Lone_Wolf]

16. The Sambians of Papua New Guinea

are probably the best studied society. Homosexuality is ritualized in their culture and, to a lessor extent, other Melanesia cultures.

[kayell]

18. Victorian New England

in the form of "Boston Marriages". Of course, like Queen Victoria, most Victorians could not imagine that women would be involved in such sexual relationships.

[kayell]

19. One thing we have to remember when looking at history

of homosexuality, is that like any other part of history, the winners get to write the history books. So it can be hard to know how much has been purged over the years, or how much the interpretation has been changed.

[pagerbear]

35. Another thing to consider

...is what you're calling homosexuality?

Do you merely mean homosexual behavior? Even people who identify as straight do this for a number of reasons--isolation from the opposite sex, money, etc. (Just as people who identify as gay have been known to have heterosexual sex for many reasons--procreation, coercion, including religious coercion, fear of exposure as being gay, etc.) Although I don't have references, I've read that many societies, current and historical, are full of examples of men who have wives for family reasons and also have male lovers, who more often than not are married themselves. I'm sure this is true of women, as well.

Do you mean what we now call a gay sexual orientation? This concept is relatively recent in written history, although there have certainly been times and places throughout history where people have been exclusively homosexual in their sexual contacts, and sometimes have been open about that fact.

Do you mean a gay lifestyle? Leaving aside the question of whether there is one representative gay lifestyle and just what that is, again we have to admit this is also a relatively recent phenomenon.

We can see that this question is much more complex than our socially conservative friends would like to believe!

[Nikia]

50. Friendship vs lovers, an issue too

I read the website Celebratefriendship.com. It was written by a gay man, but he states that some relationships that modern Westerners interpret as homosexual are frienship type relationships that don't involve sex even if they involve affectionate behavior and other things which Modern American usually only do in sexual relationships.
For example, two men might live together, hug, kiss, and swear their devotion to one another and have a pseudo kinship relationship but not have sex with each but their wives.
In many cultures, "best same sex friend" is a serious relationship between both people and recognized by the community. A relationship like this in modern America might be interpreted as homosexual but it is usually not.
I am not saying that there are not gay people. I have gay friends which I am sure are gay. We should not impose our cultural understanding of relationships onto other cultures though.
To answer the orignal question, as stated before, several American Indian tribes did have men and women who functioned as the opposite gender in their society and married people of the same sex. These people often were assumed to have spiritual gifts since they were considered both male and female.

[Retrograde]

60. superimposing current values on the past

I agree: I came across a term, homosocial, in a number of social histories of the mid-19th century in the US - it refers to the practice of spending most of one's work and leisure time with members of one's own sex. If you read accounts of this time you come across references to men sharing beds (well, during the Gold Rush one's own bed was a luxury), dancing together in the gold camps, forming close friendships with each other, etc. Was sex involved? Maybe, maybe not. More likely people didn't define themselves by their sex lives.

A book I'm currently reading, "Gotham", a history of New York City up to c. 1890, mentions that same-sex male relationships seemed to be tolerated, but cross-dressing wasn't.

linda

[buck4freedom]

20. Native Americans

Plains Indians held gays in high regard calling them the "People of Two Spirits" and looking to them as very special members of the tribe both socially and spiritually.

Early Christianity had no problem with homosexuality and for almost 300 years Orthodox Christianity even had same-sex marriage rights. They really got testy about the same time they decided women should sit down and shut up too.

Gay marriage has been legal in Denmark since 1989 and is widely accepted as one of the greatest social goods. Even the clergy who opposed gay marriage by almost 89% then have overwhelmingly come to see it as a social positive.

Homosexuality has long been accepted in Buddhist societies and Buddhist sects were among the first to speak out against the Christians during the Hawaii debate when they kept stating that "all religions" condemned homosexuality.

So, yes, there have been many cases of acceptance in history as well as in modern times.

In fact, there is evidence that the Leviticus prohibition so often quoted by Christians may have referred to ritual temple prostitution involving male prostitutes which had become fashionable in ancient Israel.

[Strapping Buck]

43. ????

"Early Christianity had no problem with homosexuality and for almost 300 years Orthodox Christianity even had same-sex marriage rights. They really got testy about the same time they decided women should sit down and shut up too."

What are your resources for this? I have been fighting for this issue for many years, but this is bad history.

[EV1Ltimm]

23. Rome...

Roman generals often encouraged their soldiers to sleep with each other in order to get them to fight harder for one another in combat.

[buck4freedom]

24. Oh and Pirates!

Yeah, I forgot that. In the 17th and early 18th centuries when it was very much "out of fashion" elsewhere, the buckaneers were doing it. Very often additional charges of "sodomy" with other men were leveled against pirates.

I even had an ancestor who was hanged in Jamaica in 1699 for sodomy with his cabin boy. :-) Like, ancestor, like descendent! ;-)

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[Lydia Leftcoast]

37. Medieval Japan

In The Tale of Genji (written about 1000 AD), Genji is trying to woo a certain woman, but she's hiding in her rooms and refuses to come out, so he keeps sending her brother in as a messenger. He finally gives up and has sex with the brother instead.

Some sects of monks interpreted the rules about chastity to forbid only sex with women, so being used by older monks was sort of a rite of passage for boys who went into (or, more likely, were sent to) a monastery.

Later on, the samurai seem to have been okay with homosexuality. There's a collection of stories by the Edo period author Ihara Saikaku called The Manly Loves of the Samurai.

When the tradition of arranged marriages (previously limited to the upper classes) took hold throughout society, the expectation was that everyone would get married as part of their duty to reproduce to increase the strength of the clan. As long as a man fathered a few children, no one cared what kind of relationships he had on the side.

Modern Japan has a surprising number of VERY androgynous entertainers, ranging from a male singer whose costumes put Priscilla Queen of the Desert to shame, to really butch female wrestlers who wear men's kimono at New Year.

My knowledge of Japanese nightlife is outdated and limited, but when I was a student 25 years ago, I was told that a certain bar in my neighborhood was straight till midnight and gay from midnight to six a.m. One morning I had to walk to the commuter train station at 4:30 a.m. to meet some other Americans for a long day trip, and I was surprised to find that area around the station full of men in drag.

(That's what I like about Japan. For such a homogenous country, it is full of surprises, and I find new ones every time I go back.)

[SoCalDem]

41. Even in America , it was "accepted" sort of..

For people of my age (50's), we ALL remember the single 40-ish school teachers who lived with a roommate (same sex). They were often passed off as cousins, sisters, family friend, etc.. The euphemisms abounded, but we ALL knew about the "confirmed bachelors" or the "old-maid" school teachers, phone operators etc..

There may have been talk behind their backs, but there was not the overt "faux hatred" that is common today..

Young people did not usually move out of their parents' home until they married or went to college, so setting up housekeeping with another person of ANY sex was not the norm until people were well into their 20's or even 30's.. A confirmed bachelor or spinster would usually just live with their parents until they passed away, and then they would live alone or with a "roommate"..

What they did behind closed doors was not really an issue.. People did not seem to be that curious..

[Lydia Leftcoast]

49. Next door to where we lived until I was six years old

there were two middle-aged women who lived together. Both were either widowed or divorced, because I was supposed to call them Mrs. S and Mrs. H. Mrs. H had a teenage daughter.

They may have been simply two single women who lived together to save expenses. On the other hand, they may not have been. What did I know? I was six years old.

[SoCalDem]

51. Exactly

Back then people just accepted that two women would live together and even share a checking account (for convenience sake), or that two men would be roomies to share expenses.. Were some/most of them gay?? Probably.. Did everyday people care?? Nope..

There was a time when teachers could not even BE married, so naturally that field would attract people who did not ever plan on even getting married..

I was in junior high before I ever even had a "Mrs" teacher.. up until then they were all Miss this or Miss that..

Somewhere around 1970 everyone got really interested in the sexlives of others... and it's only getting worse..

[kispoko]

47. many american indian peoples

i'll piggyback off of those saying native americans.... for instance, and probably a bit of a surprise to many, the lakota.

but i knew a woman who'd spent considerable time among many tribes in both the u.s. and canada, and remarked upon her visits that when the subjuct came up, she could not remember any who looked down upon it.


i, sadly, do not know exactly what my own peoples' thoughts were on that.... probably congruent with mine, and with many other tribes', but it doesn't matter ultimately, because it wouldn't alter my opinions anyway.

[historian]

52. yes

Ancient Greece though not actually condoning it turned a blind eye to it. Ancient Rome was the same - in fact one its mightiest emperors, Hadrian, neglected his wife constantly for his love to a young man. This young man fell into the River Nile and drowned and it is said that Hadrian wept like a baby.

[pippin]

53. Japan, the Samurai

had something they called the "Cult of the Young Man" where senior samurai often had young male lovers.

Roman soldiers who belonged to the Mithraistic religion had male lovers who fought side by side. Likewise the soldiers of ancient Sparta.

[LostInTheMaise]

54. Any sex in private is ok

Public sex is off limits.

[HereSince1628]

57. Follow the money...this is about expanding spousal rights

not about sexuality.

Homosexuality has been documented since the dawn of civilization. In some culture it is seen as a divine gift...a mysterious unexpected orientation. Which may seem personally non-adaptive but which may greatly benefit the group.

The issue in 2004 is that employers and the federal government are interested in reducing costs. Denying homosexual partners the rights of spouses is nothing but an attempt to be CHEAP.

The cloaking of the argument in religious issues is only an attempt to justify what is otherwise unjustifiable.

[SoCalDem]

59. It IS about the money.. it ALWAYS is

Every single person who dies before age 68 or so, never collects the money that they paid in to SS and medicare for those 40 + years that they contributed..

and for employers' insurance companies, they are less likely to have maternity expenses, pediatrician expenses etc..

Single people do not have a spouse at home "prodding" them to go to the doctor/dentist/shrink/etc..

Single people pay in and often do not "use up" their benefits..

[La Lioness Priyanka]

58. hinduism

but literally when it all started thousands of years ago did not seem to care much...its been downhill for us since

[Product of Evolution]

61. Are you nuts?

Homosexuality is illegal in India.

[FlaGranny]

70. I didn't read anything about

homosexuality NOT being legal in India. The poster said that Hinduism once accepted it. It also sounds like he/she wrote that they no longer do.

[Product of Evolution]

72. Well...

*blames the British*

[opiate69]

62. Ancient Turks.. to a degree, at least...

In the 1400s, during the time period when Vlad Dracul,and his son Vlad Dracula (Tepes)were trying to keep Wallachia free of Turkish reign, It was well known that the Turkish sultan, Mehmed, "preferred the company of young men"... the texts I've read don't shed much light on the rest of the Turkish society's acceptance of homosexuality, but one can maybe assume, if it was ok for the Sultan, it was probably at least somewhat accepted in normal circles too.