We are led to see that their whole conception of a sexual experijectivity of earlier writers on sex, yet their own subjectivity is someence is totally comprised by the physical act and that their principles times extreme. In the nature of the enterprise, a degree of subjectivity
of evidence are entirely quantitative and cannot carry them beyond
was inevitable. Intellectual safety would then seem to lie not only in
the conclusion that the more the merrier. Quality is not integral to
increasing the number of mechanical checks or in more rigorously
what they mean by experience. As I have suggested, the Report is
examining those assumptions which had been brought to conscious
4 The statistical method of the report lies, necessarily, outside my purview. Nor
formulation, but also in straightforwardly admitting that subjectivity
am I able to assess with any confidence the validity of the interviewing methods that
were employed.
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partisan with sex, it wants people to have a good sexuality. But by
structure. This strongly formulated attitude of the Report is based
good it means nothing else but frequent. "It seems safe to assume
on the assumption that the whole actuality of sex is anatomical and
that daily orgasm would be within the capacity of the average male
physiological; the emotions are dealt with very much as if they were
and that the more than daily rates which have been observed for
a "superstructure." "The subject's awareness of the erotic situation is
some primate species could be matched by a large portion of the
summed up by this statement that he is 'emotionally' aroused; but
human population if sexual activity were unrestricted." The Report
the material sources of the emotional disturbance are rarely recognever suggests that a sexual experience is anything but the discharge nized, either by laymen or scientists, both of whom are inclined to
of specifically sexual tension and therefore seems to conclude that
think in terms of passion, or natural drive, or a libido, which parfrequency is always the sign of a robust sexuality. Yet masturbation takes of the mystic5 more than it does of solid anatomy and physioin children may be and often is the expression not of sexuality only logic function." Now there is of course a clear instrumental advanbut of anxiety. In the same way, adult intercourse may be the extage in being able to talk about psychic or emotional phenomena in pression of anxiety; its frequency may not be so much robust as
terms of physiology, but to make a disjunction between the two
compulsive.
descriptions of the same event, to make the anatomical and physio
The Report is by no means unaware of the psychic conditions of
logical description the "source" of the emotional and then to consider
sexuality, yet it uses the concept almost always under the influence
it as the more real of the two, is simply to commit not only the
of its quantitative assumption. In a summary passage (p. 159) it
Reductive Fallacy but also what William James called the Psycholodescribes the different intensities of orgasm and the various degrees gist's Fallacy. It must bring under suspicion any subsequent generof satisfaction, but disclaims any intention of taking these variations alization which the Report makes about the nature of sexuality. 6
into account in its record of behavior. The Report holds out the
The emphasis on the anatomical and physiological nature of sexhope to respectable males that they might be as- frequent in peruality is connected with the Report's strong reliance on animal be-formance as underworld characters if they were as unrestrained as
5 We must observe how the scientific scorn of the "mystic" quite abates when
this group. But before the respectable males aspire to this unwonted
the "mystic" suits the scientist's purpose. The Report is explaining why the inter
freedom they had better ascertain in how far the underworld charac
views were not checked by means of narcosynthesis, lie-detectors, etc.: "In any such
study which needs to secure quantities of data from human subjects, there is no way
ters are ridden by anxiety and in how far their sexuality is to be
except to win their voluntary cooperation through the establishment of that intangible
correlated with other ways of dealing with anxiety, such as dope,
thing known as rapport." This intangible thing is established by looking the re·
spondent squarely in the eye. It might be asked why a thing which is intangible
and in how far it is actually enjoyable. The Report's own data
but real enough to assure scientific accuracy should not be real enough to be con·
suggest that there may be no direct connection between on the one
sidered as having an effect in sexual behavior.
6 The implications of the Reductive Fallacy may be seen by paraphrasing the
hand lack of restraint and frequency and on the other hand psychic
sentence I have quoted in which Professor Kinsey commits it: "Professor Kinsey's
awareness of the intellectual situation is summed up by his statement that he 'has
health; they tell us of men in the lower social levels who in their
had an idea' or "has come to a conclusion'; but the material sources of his intellectual
sexual careers have intercourse with many hundreds of girls but who
disturbances are rarely recognized, either by laymen or scientists, both of whom
are inclined to think in terms of 'thought' or 'intellcction' or 'cognition,' which
despise their sexual partners and cannot endure relations with the
partakes of the mystic more than it does of solid anatomy or physiologic function."
same girl more than once.
The Psychologist's Fallacy is what James calls "the confusion of his own standpoint
with that of the mental fact about which he is making a report." "Another variety
But the Report, as we shall see, is most resistant to the possibility
of the psychologist's fallacy is the assumption that the mental fact studied must be
of making any connection between the sexual life and the psychic
conscious of itself as the psychologist is conscious of it." Principles of Psychology,
vol. I, pp. 19�7.
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havior as a norm. The italics in the following quotation are mine.
stand by its ability to be inverted and extended. Thus, in having lost
"For those who like the term, -it is clear that there is a sexual drive
sexual periodicity, has the human animal lost naturalness? Again,
which cannot be set aside for any large portion of the population,
the female mink, as we learn from the Report itself, fiercely resists
by any sort of social convention. For those who prefer to think in
intercourse and must be actually coerced into submission. Is it she
simpler terms of action and reaction, it is a picture of an animal
who is unnatural or is her defense of her chastity to be taken as a
who, however civilized or culture
d, continues to respond to the concomment on the females, animal or human, who willingly submit stantly present sexual stimuli, albeit with some social and physical
or who merely play at escape? Professor Kinsey is like no one so
restraints." The Report obviously finds the second formulation to be
much as Sir Percival in Malory, who, seeing a lion and a serpent in
superior to the first, and implies with a touch of irony that those
battle with each other, decided to help the lion, "for he was the more
who prefer it are on firmer ground.
natural beast of the two."
Now there are several advantages in keeping in mind our own
This awkwardness in the handling of ideas is characteristic of the
animal nature and our family connection with the other animals.
Report. It is ill at ease with any idea that is in the least complex
The advantages are instrumental, moral, and poetic-I use the last
and it often tries to get rid of such an idea in favor of another that
word for want of a better to suggest the mere pleasure in finding
has the appearance of not going beyond the statement of physical
kinship with some animals. But perhaps no idea is more difficult to
fact. We see this especially in the handling of certain Freudian ideas.
use with precision than this one. In the Report it is used to establish
The Report acknowledges its debt to Freud with the generosity of
a dominating principle of judgment, which is the Natural. As a conspirit that marks it in other connections and it often makes use of cept of judgment this is notoriously deceptive and has been belabored
Freudian concepts in a very direct and sensible way. Yet nothing
for generations, but the Report knows nothing of its dangerous repucould be clumsier than its handling of Freud's idea of pregenital tation and uses it with the na·ivest confidence. And although the
generalized infantile sexuality. Because the Report can show, what
Report directs the harshest language toward the idea of the Normal,
is interesting and significant, that infants are capable of actual orsaying that it has stood in the way of any true scientific knowledge gasm, although without ejaculation, it concludes that infantile sexof sex, it is itself by no means averse to letting the idea of the uality is not generalized but specifically genital. But actually it has
Natural develop quietly into the idea of the Normal. The Report has
long been known, though the fact of orgasm had not been estabin mind both a physical normality-as suggested by its belief that lished, that infants can respond erotically to direct genital stimulaunder optimal conditions men should be able to achieve the orgasmic tion, and this knowledge does not contradict the Freudian idea that
frequency of the primates-and a moral normality, the acceptability,
there is a stage in infant development in which sexuality is generalon the authority of animal behavior, of certain usually taboo practices.
ized throughout the body rather than specifically centered in the
It is inevitable that the concept of the Natural should haunt any
genital area; the fact of infant orgasm must be interpreted in condiscussion of sex. It is inevitable that it should make trouble, but junction with other and more complex manifestations of infant sexmost of all for a scientific discussion that bars judgments of value.
uality.7
Thus, in order to show that homosexuality is not a neurotic mani7 The Report also handles the idea of sublimation in a very clumsy way. It does festation, as the Freudians say it is, the Report adduces the homonot represent accurately what the Freudian theory of sublimation is. For this, how·
ever, there is some excuse in the change of emphasis and even in meaning in
sexual behavior of rats. But the argument de animalibus must surely
Freud's use of the word.
--·
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The Report, we may say, has an extravagant fear of all ideas that
uralistic terms; and it is sad to have the issue all confused again
do not seem to it to be, as it were, immediately dictated by simple
by the na'ivete of men of science. Rabelais' solution lay in the simple
physical fact. Another way of saying this is that the Report is reperception of the natural ability and tendency of man to grow in the sistant to any idea that seems to refer to a specifically human situadirection of organization and control. The young Gargantua in his tion. An example is the position it takes on the matter of male
natural infancy had all the quick and intense responses just enumerpotency. The folk feeling, where it is formulated on the question, ated; had his teachers confused the traits of his natural infancy with
and certainly where it is formulated by women, holds that male
those of his natural manhood, he would not have been the more
potency is not to be measured, as the Report measures it, merely by
natural but the less; he would have been a monster.
frequency, but by the ability to withhold orgasm long enough to
In considering the Report as a major cultural document, we must
bring the woman to climax. This is also the psychoanalytic view,
not underestimate the significance of its petulant protest against the
which holds further that the inability to sustain intercourse is the
inconvenience to the male of the unjust demand that is made upon
result of unconscious fear or resentment. This view is very strongly
him. This protest is tantamount to saying that sexuality is not to be
resisted by the Report. The denial is based on mammalian behavior
involved in specifically human situations or to be connected with
-"in many species" (but not in all?) ejaculation follows almost
desirable aims that are conceived of in specifically human terms. We
immediately upon intromission; in chimpanzees ejaculation occurs
may leave out of account any ideal reasons which would lead a man
in ten to twenty seconds. The Report therefore concludes that the
to solve the human situation of the discrepancy-arising from conhuman male who ejaculates immediately upon intromission "is quite ditions of biology or of culture or of both-between his own ornormal [here the word becomes suddenly permissible] among mamgasmic speed and that of his mate, and we can consider only that mals and usual among his own species." Indeed, the Report finds
it might be hedonistically desirable for him to do so, for advantages
it odd that the term "impotent" should be applied to such rapid
presumably accrue to him in the woman's accessibility and responresponses. "It would be difficult to find another situation in which siveness. Advantages of this kind, however, are precisely the matters
an individual who was quick and intense in his responses was labeled
of quality in experience that the Report ignores.8
anything but superior, and that in most instances is exactly what the
And its attitude on the question of male potency is but one examrapidly ejaculating male probably is, however inconvenient and unple of the Report's insistence on drawing sexuality apart from the fortunate his qualities may be from the standpoint of the wife in the
general human context. It is striking how small a role woman plays
relationship."
in Sexual Behavior in the Human Male. We learn nothing about the
But
by such reasoning the human male who is quick and intense
connection of sex and reproduction; the connection, from the sexual
in his leap to the lifeboat is natural and superior, however inconpoint of view, is certainly not constant yet it is of great interest. The venient and unfortunate his speed and intensity may be to the wife
pregnancy or possibility of pregnancy of his mate has a considerable
he leaves standing on the deck, as is also the man who makes a
effect, sometimes one way, sometimes the other, on the sexual be-
snap judgment, who bites his dentist's finger, who kicks the child
s It is hard not to make a connection between the Report's strong stand against
who annoys him, who bolts his-or another's-food, who is inconany delay in the male orgasm and its equally strong insistence that there is no difference for the woman between a clitoral and vaginal orgasm, a view which surely
tinent of his feces. Surely the problem of the natural in the human
needs more investigation before it is as flatly put as the Report puts it. The conwas solved four centuries ago by Rabelais, and in the simplest nat-junction of the two ideas suggests the desirability of a sexuality which uses a
minimum of sexual apparatus.
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havior of the male; yet in the index under Pregnancy there is but a
The quality of the argument which the Report here advances is as
single entry-"fear of." Again, the contraceptive devices which Preg
significant as the wrong conclusions it reaches. "It is not possible,"
nancy, fear of, requires have a notable influence on male sexuality;
the Report says, "to insist that any departure from the sexual mores,
but the index lists only Contraception, techniques. Or again, menor any participation in socially taboo activities, always, or even usustruation has an elaborate mythos which men take very seriously; ally, involves a neurosis or psychosis, for the case histories abundantly
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