Sexual perversions

“ The sexual perversions of adults, on the other hand, are tangible and unambiguous. As their generally accepted nomenclature shows, they are undoubtedly sexual in character; whether we designate them as signs of degeneration, or otherwise, no one has yet had the courage to place them outside the phenomena of sex. They alone justify the assertion that sexuality and reproduction are not coincident, for it is clear that all of them disavow the goal of reproduction. ”

“ Perverted sexual habits often arise from [57] a craving for variety, or as makeshifts adopted when the opportunity for normal sex intercourse is denied. Our efforts must be directed towards removing these causes by raising the general standard of social morals.
Religious morality has been the cause of untold mischief in this matter of sexual perversions by representing as great sins and crimes actions which are in reality the result of a diseased mental state.
The habit of self-abuse is also extremely variable in its origin. ”

“ By violation of sexually immature individuals, the jurist understands all the possible immoral acts with persons under fourteen years of age that are not comprehended in the term rape. The term violation, in the legal sense of the word, comprehends the most horrible perversions and acts, which are possible only to a man who is controlled by lust and morally weak, and, as is usually the case, lacking in sexual power. ”

“ In this way prostitution becomes the high-school for all the refinements of sexual perversion. It not only offers special objects required by individuals tainted by heredity with various perversions, but it artificially develops perverse habits in the normal man. The manipulations of sadism or masochism are even utilized to revive a sexual appetite weakened by abuse. Individuals who have become impotent often try to excite themselves by observing the coitus of others. ”

“ If we wish to contend with sexual perversions acquired at an early age, or the precocious development of an unhealthy sexual appetite, this is not to be effected by prudery or vague moral preaching, but by affection and frankness. In this case, evasive replies, combined with so-called strict morals, only lead to estrangement, dissimulation and hypocrisy, and the result is often irreparable. ”

“ For wounds or death he may despise, Who helps his side to win the day. And as the factions join in strife, They shout amid the battle's din; Fighting as if for very life, Each one will do his best to win. Each hopes the victory to gain; Each would the bravest warrior prove. Hurrah! they cry, and each is fain To win bright glances from his love."
As I have previously explained, the existence of sexual perversions may sometimes be traced back into early childhood, although, in individual cases, the experiences of childhood may throw little light on the subsequent sexual life. ”

“ According to Ricardi, many frigid prostitutes practice with pleasure clitoris-masturbation, cunnilictio, and, especially, sapphism, preferring these perversions to the normal sexual act. Moreover, among prostitutes and female criminals there is no lack of lovers of martyrization, of flagellation, even to the drawing of blood, of tyrannical treatment, and of the initiation of children into the mysteries of sex. ”

“ In the sexual inclination of adults towards children, we find a source of serious danger; but the risks are greatly enhanced by the fact that the paedophile tendency is often complicated by other sexual perversions. Exhibitionism in the male is exhibited not only towards adult females, but also towards children, commonly towards girls, but in exceptional instances towards boys. It appears that in these cases the stimulus of innocence plays the chief part. In many cases, the exhibitionist is satisfied with exposing his genital organs ”

“ As far as we can ascertain, the majority of sexual perversions, of which we shall speak in Chapter VIII, are a sad pathological acquisition of the human race. We observe, however, especially in the higher mammals, acts of pederasty between males when the female is wanting. ”

“ It appears to be because the sexual perversions are subject to a peculiar ban that extends even into theory, and stands in the way of their scientific appreciation. It seems as if no one could forget that they are not only revolting, but even unnatural, dangerous ”

“ In seeking to comprehend this perversion it is necessary to divest ourselves of the attitude toward animals which is the inevitable outcome of refined civilization and urban life. Most sexual perversions, if not in large measure the actual outcome of civilized life, easily adjust themselves to it. Bestiality (except in one form to be noted later) is, on the other hand, the sexual perversion of dull, insensitive and unfastidious persons. It flourishes among primitive peoples and among peasants. It is the vice of the clodhopper, unattractive to women or inapt to court them. ”

“ Often they manifest an apparent interest in religious services, thinking it may lead to some preferment, but not for any moral reason. They are notoriously untruthful, unreliable and exhibit a low cunning which often deceives those not familiar with handling individuals of that type. Curiously enough they are exceedingly critical of others and quick to notice their shortcomings. Sexual perversions and immoral conduct [183] are only too common. Prostitution, as has already been shown, is one of the most common failings of the female delinquent. ”

“ The great advantage of such discoveries is that children affected with sexual perversions can be put under special supervision, and above all things kept away from boarding schools, where they are subject to great temptations. ”

“ Rather, we recognize more and more clearly that the essential nature of perversion does not consist in overstepping the sexual aim, nor in a substitution for the genitals, not even in the variety of objects, but simply in the exclusiveness with which these deviations are carried out and by means of which the sexual act that serves reproduction is pushed aside. When the perverse activities serve to prepare or heighten the normal sexual act, they are really no longer perversions. To be sure, the chasm between normal and perverse sexuality is practically bridged by such facts. ”

“ A certain amount of direct sexual satisfaction is for most organizations indispensable, and the renunciation of this individually varying amount is punished by manifestations which we are compelled to regard as morbid. The process of sublimation, under the influence of civilization, leads both to sexual perversions and to psycho-neuroses. These two conditions are closely related, as Freud views the process of their development; they stand to each other as positive and negative, sexual perversions being the positive pole and psycho-neuroses the negative. ”

“ When we come to ask what practical conclusions may be drawn from our recognition of the relationships between corporal punishment and sexual perversions, the first point that occurs to our minds is to consider whether the corporal punishments which may possibly give rise to such perverse stimulations are in fact absolutely indispensable. ”

“ On this side the Geschichte der Lustseuche is of the highest importance, supplying as it does innumerable instances of those very phaenomena of morbid sexual perversions that constitute the subject matter of this rapidly progressive branch of Science, one likely in the near future to prove of infinite benefit to afflicted humanity. ”

“ The fact of the matter is that the sexual repression has to be added as an inner factor to such external ones as restriction of freedom, inaccessibility to the normal sexual object, dangers of the normal sexual act, etc., which cause the origin of perversions in individuals who might have otherwise remained normal. ”

“ Thus, in many individuals, sexual perversions make their first appearance in dreams. It has even been suggested that dreams may exercise a similar influence to that of post-hypnotic suggestion; that is to say, that a dream may be the actual originating cause of sexual perversion. ”

“ In the first place, the normal phenomena give the key to the abnormal phenomena, and the majority of sexual perversions, including even those that are most repulsive, are but exaggerations of instincts and emotions that are germinal in normal human beings. In the second place, we cannot even know what is normal until we are acquainted with the sexual life of a large number of healthy individuals. And until we know the limits of normal sexuality we are not in position to lay down any reasonable rules of sexual hygiene. ”

“ It is a fact that the psychosexual processes of the child are less sharply differentiated from other psychical processes than is the case in the adult; and it is therefore possible that the specific sexual perversions, and the specific sexual sensibility, develop out of a corresponding sensibility in the child which is not yet of a sexual character. ”

“ It is a very remarkable fact that although for many years past serious attempts have been made to elucidate the psychology of sexual perversions, little or no endeavor has been made to study the psychologic development of the normal sexual emotions. Nearly every writer seems either to take for granted that he and his readers are so familiar with all the facts of normal sex psychology that any detailed statement is altogether uncalled for, or else he is content to write a few introductory phrases, mostly made up from anatomic, philosophic and historical work. ”

“ Just the type of girl to whom the lure might become dangerous will be pushed to ever new inquiries, and if the policy of information is accepted in principle, it would be only wise to furnish her with all the supplementary knowledge which covers the multitude of sexual perversions and social malpractices of which to-day many a clean married woman has not the faintest idea. ”

“ The unfortunate people who suffer from these perversions are treated unjustly and, for the most part, far too harshly. Perverse instincts which injure no one when carried into practice (fetishism, for example) , are ethically indifferent and harmless, in that their possessors, generally speaking, do not multiply. It is, however, immoral for such persons to marry. Any one who suffers from an hereditary perversion of the sex instinct should avoid marriage and all procreation of children. ”

“ In the case also of these latter perversions, some maintain that in those instances in which the perversion began in childhood, some early association was the originating cause; whilst others, from the very fact that the perversion appeared very early in life and was apparently primary, infer that it must be of a congenital character. For instance, a man experiences sexual excitement whenever he sees a cook or other woman kill a fowl ”

“ Far commoner than the acts of such stabbers are the cases in which the striking of children is to the sadist a source of sex-stimulation. Erotic literature is full of the description of such perversions. ”

“ Homosexual persons (i.e. men or women whose sexual inclination is for their own sex) are, on the other hand, comparatively harmless as long as they direct their attentions to adults, and provided there is no seduction or use of compulsion. The same holds good in the case of other perversions such as inclination for animals. ”

“ At other times he felt no pederastic desires and liked the society of women, notwithstanding which he would, not without a certain amount of wit, defend the form of sexual perversion which occupies our attention. ”

“ It is to be feared that in consequence of the excessive freedom in education and the emancipated independence of feminine youth, these “half-virgins” are increasing both in number and in intensity, a fact which cannot fail to increase also the number of sexual maladies and perversions. ”

“ Now, we learn from experience, that when a perversion is traced back to its origination in a chastisement endured during childhood, this chastisement was as a rule the customary whipping of the buttocks. Far less frequently, and indeed hardly over, are we told that any other form of punishment has initiated a sexual perversion. ”

“ Some male sex deviants do not stop with infecting their often-innocent partners: they descended through perversions to other forms of depravity, such as drug addiction, burglary, sadism, and even murder. ”

“ What tends yet further to develop the senile form of pederasty is early sexual en- joyment, excessive sexual intercourse in rich families, leading to satiety of the senses. Again the great disparity of age between an old man and a young woman serving him as slave is a powerful agent for producing degen- eracy in the descendants, and by that means to sexual perversion. ”

“ The following is another example of a further degree of development of sexual perversion in the same direction :
A young man, 24 years of age, entices a little girl, 12 years old, into a wood, where he first violates and then murders her, drinks her blood, cuts out her sexual parts and her heart, which last he devours. ”

“ Individuals of feeble, cynical, egoistic or abnormal natures, whose number is legion in the corrupt centers of modern civilization, yield to their perversion and often come before the tribunals, or else become objects of public contempt. As it is this class which generally become known, it is assumed by too hasty generalization that sexual perverts are necessarily cynical, vicious or weak-minded individuals ”

“ Thus it comes that so often, side by side with a rapid progress of civilization, an increase of sexual aberration may be observed. Depravity, which formerly was almost exclu- sively adduced to account for sexual perversion, now combines with the rapid growth of culture, and for the same reasons, and on account of the rapid progress of intellectual development, unavoidably brings along with
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it an increase of mental and nervous disease. ”