Eros & Capricorn: A Cross-Cultural Survey of Sexual Attitudes and Techniques (John Warren Wells on Sexual Behavior Book 1)

by John Warren Wells

  The value of this study exceeds measurement. For through the earnest investigation of sexual ways and means throughout history, the modern reader can draw parallels to his own experience and develop a deeper and more profound understanding of the nature of his own sexuality. And through the consideration of the sexual techniques of the past, examined in the light of modern scientific knowledge, today’s student can begin to separate myth from reality in this vast area of human experience.

  No recent age has been so equipped as ours to deal with this opportunity. In the era of banned books and hidden longings, such investigation was a virtual impossibility. In earlier times, science itself was too imprecise and the body of scientific knowledge too small to allow for meaningful research.

  By the same token, it would be hard to imagine an age more ripe for this sort of exploration and discovery than our own, the sexual preoccupation of modern man ranges from curiosity to obsession, from interest to monomania. Doctors Albert Ellis and Benjamin Morse have been in the vanguard of those reporting upon that contemporary phenomenon which they have respectively labeled The American Sexual Tragedy and The Sexual Revolution. These and other authorities have graphically outlined the particular sexual dichotomy of our times, the great emphasis placed upon sex, the conflict of dying puritanical mores with laissez-faire libertinism. If any culture needs to be able to separate the wheat from the chaff in this sphere of human activity, ours is certainly the one.

  The works we shall examine in the pages to follow are, to be sure, a curious group. Some of them are the marriage manuals of other cultures, the Advice of the Lovelorn of other times and other places. Others are more in the nature of the Kinsey Reports, chronicling sexual behavior that the author has seen or experienced Still others are frankly pornographic. Written with the more or less estimable purpose of arousing the reader’s sexual appetites, with or without any higher literary value, they have acquired a patina of respectability over the ages and have in fact developed a special value for the contemporary scholar of sexual behavior.

  This book will not attempt to provide answers to the unanswerable questions outlined earlier. On the contrary, it is written to enlarge the questions themselves for the reader, to the end that he will be able to draw his own answers from the body of past and parallel experience. A variety of sexual techniques will be brought to the reader’s attention, and some, no doubt, will prove to be of more than passing interest. But whether the reader should choose to enlarge his own sexual experience is a secondary consideration at best.

  Every society has its taboos and restrictions. Every society has its definitions of normal and abnormal. Every society has its own special concepts of sexual perversion, its sexual outcasts, its unmentionable crimes. And one can no more develop a profound acquaintance with contemporary sexual behavior without considering the normal and abnormal behavior of past history than one can become an expert geographer through no more than an intimate acquaintance with the streets and back alleys of his own hometown. Travel, through time as well as through space, is broadening in every respect.

  And this, in essence, is the aim and the theme of the material to follow. Whether we are examining the pleasure-pain philosophy of the Marquis de Sade or analyzing the fellatory feats of Cleopatra, we are really examining the sexual nature of man, transcending both time and space. Whether we are studying the Turkish custom of raping wounded enemy soldiers on a battlefield or discoursing upon the thousand distinct postures of Hindu coition, we are actually attempting to determine the relevance of this vast body of prior experience to our own personal view of sex and sexuality.

  “Know thyself”—‌this, of course, was the ultimate Socratic admonition, and Alexander Pope extended it by pointing out that “The proper study of mankind is Man.” With the aim of enlarging upon one segment of this proper study of mankind, of lighting one small candle in the darkest corner of human experience, this book has been written.

  Eros and Capricorn

  The Many Faces of Morality

  The concept of right and wrong seems inescapable in the realm of sexual behavior. Every society, whether exceptionally permissive or exceptionally rigid, has attempted to codify, and to a large extent, dictate, the sexual behavior of its members. While few specific restrictions are universal, the concept of restriction and direction is all-pervasive. One culture’s meat is, to be sure, another’s poison—‌but each divides the sphere of sex into meat and poison and expects the division to be observed to a greater or lesser degree.

  In those cultures where religious orientation is keen, the explanation for a sexual taboo is likely to be stated in religious terms. The simple argument that homosexuality or incest or sodomy is “against God’s will” is sufficient to render the practice beyond the pale for those who would obey the will of God and the law of the society. This is not to say that certain individuals will not violate these taboos. For every taboo, there are individuals who desire to violate it and others who translate the desire into action. Indeed, one might argue that a taboo cannot be promulgated in the absence of a desire to engage in the prohibited act. It is highly unlikely, for example, that the legislature of the state of South Dakota might enact legislation prohibiting the chewing of coca leaves. There are no coca leaves in South Dakota and no persons there desirous of importing them into the state. The question never arises, and the taboo is never established. But if a minority of South Dakotans should begin to chew coca leaves, it is certain that such legislation would be speedily enacted.

  This example, incidentally, is not so farfetched as it might sound. When peyote was of importance in the United States solely as an Indian ceremonial drug, the law ignored it. Now, with mescaline and its derivative peyote recognized as effective hallucinogenic agents, and with more than a few persons throughout the country using the drug, a body of restrictions has grown up around it.

  To draw this same line of reasoning into the area of sex, we may observe that certain sexual aberrations are not specifically prohibited in our society for two reasons—‌because their overt incidence is rare and because their latent appeal to the normal individual is rare. Many of the fetishes fit this category. The man who drools over a woman’s shoe is as surely a deviate as anyone may be, but the law does not regulate his conduct as it does that of some other deviates. Nor does the law attempt to deal with the vicarious stimuli designed to appeal to him. Law enforcement officers who attempt to combat heterosexual and homosexual pornography rarely pay attention to demimonde publications geared to the fetishist. They find them in no sense stimulating, do not think of them as specifically sexual, and consequently ignore them.

  To return to the bases of taboos, we have seen that the religiously oriented taboo is little more than the assertion that a given act is wrong, that it is evil, that it is against the will of the god or gods. This basis for moral injunctions prevails in the majority of primitive cultures, whether the fundamental religion is pagan, pantheistic, polytheistic, or whatever. In cultures possessing an exalted priesthood, the word of a high priest as instrument of the will of the gods is sufficient argument. The duration through several generations of any taboo yields added strength. The Tanganyikan tribesman knows that he may have sexual relations with the daughters of his mother’s sisters but not with cousins on his father’s side. He knows this because his father knew it a generation ago and his father before him.

  In those more sophisticated religions which possess a written rather than a purely oral tradition, the writings of sages centuries dead acquire a special spiritual significance. From a philosophical standpoint, the judgment of an Aztec priest and the “thou shalt not” of the book of Exodus are substantially identical. Each represents to the adherents of a particular religion the will of a supreme being conveyed through revelation to a religious leader. Whether that person is a contemporary or a remote ancestor, whether the injunction is called up fresh or preserved upon parchment, is a secondary distinction and little more.

  The concepts of he
alth and of cleanliness—‌not always the same things—‌are often employed to bolster the god’s will basis of a taboo. The religion of the ancient Hebrews is doubly noteworthy in this respect. Several practices that seem to be of unquestionable hygienic origin were wrapped in the cloak of religious observance and tied to the concept of the will of god, probably to enhance their appeal to the general public, perhaps as a case of a custom enduring in a society’s collective mind while its basis has been forgotten.

  The Jews of the Old Testament made the practice of washing one’s hands before a meal into a religious ceremony. Through the laws of Kashruth, a whole body of dietary restrictions, was established. The legislation of certain methods of slaughtering animals and of certain methods of curing or cooking meat and the proscription of the flesh of certain animals seem from the vantage point of history to have had distinct hygienic origins. But the law of the Bible simply stated that “thou shalt” do this and “thou shalt not” do that, with the word “unclean” employed frequently as a de facto synonym for “evil.” Predictably enough, Orthodox Judaism retains dietary laws and similar rules as an intrinsic element of religious observation, while the original hygienic advantages have been bypassed by the advances of science and civilization.

  In our own times, health and cleanliness again play a role, not so much in determining elements of the moral code but in reinforcing them. Masturbation is an ideal case in point. Cultures aside from our own have rarely made much of a to-do over masturbation. Most primitive cultures regard the practice as wholly normal among children and adolescents. Oriental cultures, though often apt to regard the adult masturbator as sexually inadequate, find the practice neither sinful nor unhealthy in its own right.

  But the Judaeo-Christian system of sexual morality has long held masturbation to be sinful. The precise origin of this proscription is uncertain. The identification of masturbation as a sin dates at least as far back as the Church of the early middle ages and probably has roots far further in time. Although we cannot say just when masturbation became a sin or why this view was taken, we do know the theological justification for the taboo. Fascinatingly enough, the sole scriptural passage invoked against the masturbator does not refer to masturbation at all! The passage describing the crime and fate of Onan—‌thus the term “onanism” for masturbation—‌tells of a man who was compelled to have coitus with the wife of his deceased older brother, who had died without issue. Onan practiced coitus interruptus out of reluctance to waste his semen providing children for his late brother. Genesis 38: 8-10 is explicit enough.

  And Judah said unto Onan, Go in unto thy brother’s wife, and marry her, and raise up seed to thy brother.

  And Onan knew that the seed should not be his; and it came to pass, when he went in unto his brother’s wife, that he spilled it on the ground, lest that he should give seed to his brother.

  And the thing which he did displeased the Lord: wherefore he slew him also…

  It is hard to imagine how any sexual proscription can be read into this passage. Onan practiced not masturbation, but interrupted coitus, or withdrawal; indeed, the Lord slew him not even for this birth-control method, but because he violated the law of the Levirate by refusing to impregnate his brother’s wife. With the increased sophistication of modern times, reference to Onan’s crime is no longer a sufficient argument in and of itself against masturbation. The moral argument against the practice thus needs to be reinforced, and the argument of health has long been a mainstay here. The quantity of myths that have surrounded masturbation almost exceeds belief. Masturbation has been cited as the cause of deafness, blindness, insanity, feeble-mindedness, weakness of character, adolescent acne, impotence and premature ejaculation in later life, sterility, and a variety of other complaints every bit as absurd. In the last century, the findings of science inevitably reinforced this belief. Psychiatrists studied neurotics and psychotics of varying persuasions, and their case histories almost invariably included the information that the unfortunate had masturbated during adolescence. Since 95 percent of all adolescent males masturbate at one time or another (and, as one cynical psychologist phrased it, the other five percent lie), there is little remarkable in the incidence of masturbation in the past experience of the emotionally disturbed. Yet this illogical post hoc ergo propter hoc reasoning went unquestioned for generations.

  Such sex researchers as Kinsey have dispensed—‌forever, it is hoped—‌with this brand of illogic. But in spite of this scientific progress, the health element remains at the core of the masturbation taboo. Now, however, the question of mental health predominates, and not masturbation but “excessive” masturbation is the target. A large number of sex authorities identify excessive masturbation (and the term is a compelling one; one may imagine a teenage boy inquiring as to just how many times a week he may indulge himself auto-erotically without overstepping the bounds of normalcy) with neurosis and with sexual maladjustment in adulthood; few among them see excessive masturbation as more a symptom than a cause.

  Dr. Albert Ellis, a noted radical in the field of sexology, is virtually alone in holding the position that adult masturbation may be quite normal and in no sense harmful, qualifying this position only with the condition that the individual for whom masturbation is at all times the sole satisfactory outlet is sexually deprived. His view is not widely shared. The psychological motive for a masturbation taboo must evidently have deep roots; the parade of arguments to reinforce it seems endless.

  The guilt argument is another interesting one. According to this line of reasoning, masturbation would be perfectly acceptable except for one thing—‌the masturbator feels that his act is wrong, evil, unclean, unhealthy, etc., and thus develops deep guilt feelings over it. This seems to make solid sense until a reductio ad absurdum is employed; then one sees that it is akin to saying that murder is evil because one may be hanged for it. The parallel should be clear enough.

  Cleanliness reinforces sexual taboos in a similar fashion. Many persons who have no specific moral objections to fellatio or cunnilingus are conditioned to regard them as unclean, although there is no particular reason why the genitalia should be any less clean than any other part of the body if one only takes the trouble to wash occasionally. Intercourse during menstruation, originally labeled unclean by the Mosaic code, is still so regarded by a majority of persons in Western culture, although there is nothing specifically unclean about the menstrual flow. Further examples could readily be cited.

  In order to view these cleanliness taboos in the proper perspective, it is valuable to consider cultures other than our own. Many tribes find little to object to in intercourse during menstruation but look upon intercourse during pregnancy as the ultimate in uncleanliness. And, just as a Moslem woman will bare her breasts before she shows her face, so will members of at least one primitive culture engage in oral-genital acts without a second thought while looking with horror upon mouth-to-mouth kissing.

  Still another form of justification for the sexual taboo derives from the utilitarian principle that the social order exists to provide “the greatest good for the greatest number.” Thus certain sexual acts are outlawed because their practice is in some way a threat to society at large. This argument holds that such acts infringe upon the rights of others and create profound social problems.

  In certain instances the validity of this line of reasoning seems unquestionable. The rapist and the pederast engage in distinctly antisocial acts; one takes his partners against their will while the other takes partners below the age of consent. By the same token, the voyeur infringes upon another’s rights of privacy, the exhibitionist makes a public display of that which his audience has a right to go without seeing, and the bestialist is violating the spirit of the teachings of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.

  Yet a whole host of other sexual practices are attacked on this same set of grounds. A wide range of actions are legally identified as offenses against public morality; often one can scarcel
y visualize how public morality could possibly be affected by them. When two consenting adults engage in homosexual actions in private, whom does their behavior injure? When unmarried persons fornicate, what effect does this have upon public morality? When a man and his wife engage in extracoital sexual techniques, how is society adversely affected?

  In short, how do the private voluntary acts of mentally competent adults offend against the public morality?

  There is an answer, one that is not entirely the tautology it may seem at first glance. The argument, essentially, is this: The increasing incidence of actions that run contrary to accepted standards of morality will in time alter the moral fabric of society; a permissive attitude toward such deviant acts may foster and surely will not discourage the increasing incidence of these acts; a society has the inherent right to attempt to preserve itself; and, therefore, a society intent upon preserving its moral values may prohibit deviations from these values.

  Thus society jails the homosexual not to prevent him from winning converts to homosexuality, nor because he is a menace to others, but to discourage homosexuality in general. Society outlaws pornography not to protect children from its influence—‌which would be tantamount to outlawing the automobile to prevent four-year-olds from driving—‌but to discourage the production, sale, and purchase of a vicarious sexual stimulus.

  One may or may not agree with society’s end; one may or may not accept such a means as a valid one for the realization of this end. But one can definitely argue that prohibition in areas of this sort has little practical effect. The “noble experiment” that outlawed alcoholic beverages saved few persons from the evils of alcoholism and had horrible side effects in terms of municipal corruption and the rise of gangsterism, not to mention the less obvious effect of fostering disrespect for laws in general. And the laws against prostitution, which have existed for countless years in our culture, have done little to wipe the whore from the face of the earth.