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Some practitioners of Tantra are ethical and responsible. They place the concept of ahiṃsā (अहिंसा) at the top of their list; do no harm. Homoerotic Tantra℠:Mascul-IN-Touch℠ has a policy of strict ethics.
In the United States and in Europe, organizations and institutions of all kinds are taking unprecedented steps to contain the CoronavirusCOVID-19 outbreak, and to protect citizens from contagion. Schools are closed, government offices are closing, there is increased security and surveillance in healthcare facilities, health and fitness centers are closing, restaurants are limiting the number of patrons. The list goes on and on. That’s how organizations and institutions act responsibly.
Homoerotic Tantra℠:Mascul-IN-Touch℠ is confronting the COVID-19 situation with similar measures. I am not accepting new clients until there is clear evidence that the plague has been contained, and spread has diminished. I am asking some very sensitive questions of every follower and śiṣya (शिष्य) particularly relating to recent travel to endemic areas, recent respiratory infections, possible contact with infected individuals, etc.
For the duration of this worldwide public health emergency I am recommending that followers and śiṣya-s avoid group activities, including group meditation, until the health authorities give the green light to such group activities. We are offering extensive online opportunities to those interested in avoiding unnecessary social contact.
We all have to take responsibility for each other and make sometimes great sacrifices to ensure the health and well-being of those around us.
As a professional and as a Tantric daka and psychospiritual care provider, I consider anything less than these measures to be unconscionable and irresponsible.
I am especially offended by the fake gurus who are neither Tantric, nor yogic, nor professional, but purely mercenary and pecuniary in their sales and marketing efforts, placing money and profit before the health, safety and well-being of their clients. Those irresponsible scoundrels are thinking of their own pockets, and are willing to place trusting and innocent men at risk of severe illness and even death, just to ensure their own financial interests and to avoid “bankruptcy!”
The materialistic fraudstalk of community and Love, while counting their cash. They preach of support and brotherhood, while planning risk-laden events that fly in the face of the counsel of public health authorities and good judgment.
These men and their programs should be avoided at all cost! Unfortunately, it took a global crisis to force them from behind the masks and to expose their frauds.
Most of my readers know exactly what I am referring to and the persons to whom I am referring. Now you know them for what they are.
I can only hope that the men who have in the past trusted the frauds and scoundrels will wake up and use good judgment and not allow illusion or delusion to extinguish their divine inner light.
If you have any questions or feel in need of guidance or support, please contact me directly.
ॐ शान्तिः शान्तिः शान्तिः ॥
Oṃ śānti, śānti, śāntiḥ || Peace to you in body, mind, and spirit!
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Homoerotic Tantra℠:Mascul-IN-Touch℠ Statement on the Coronavirus COVID-19 Pandemic
I recently received an email notification from a well-known so-called Tantra practitioner, who allegedly organizes events in the United States and the UK as well as in other venues. They are group events and they involve intimate contact among participants. The email I received provided a link to the practitioner’s Internet site, where he and his partner had published a rambling, poorly written, so-called update on the Coronavirus situation, and how it would affect their upcoming events. The so-called Update was wordy, long, ignorant, and revealed a disturbing irresponsibility on the part of the practitioner and his partner.
It was obvious from the very start that the organizer and his partner are very concerned about their financial situation, and they mentioned the possibility of bankruptcy as an outcome of the COVID-19 pandemic.
While the practitioner was clearly concerned about the financial impact on him and his so-called community, his approach the situation, I found, was irresponsible and ignorant. To his credit, though, he did provide a couple of links to public health organizations, but his wordy ramblings about “community,” “love,” and possible “bankruptcy” far outweighed any facts he might have included in his diatribe.
The fact that he claims that he will be traveling from the UK to areas in the United States is certaintly of concern, give the recommendations to keep travel to a minimum, or even to avoid travel. The practitioner seems unconcerned, since he could be financially disadvantaged.
He also seems oblivious to the fact that even though he explicitly suggests that some of his events will be in isolated venues and in smallish groups (up to 20 men!), he seems to ignore the fact that participants are coming from heavily populated, at-risk areas, and are clearly potential, if not probable carriers of the COVID-19!
The practitioner and his partner do not appear to have any medical or healthcare qualifications or experience but offer chat opportunities for men who are afraid or anxious about the situation. Sheer arrogance and total lack of humility.
This practitioner has been the subject of previous complaints and criticism because of his ignorant marketing and over-the-top claims. He is not practicing yogic Tantra and is offering merely sextasy for sale. His own angst comes through his poor writing with the utmost clarity, and he seems not to benefit from any yogic practice or meditation, since he and his partner are,in his words,
“What we do know for certain is that Love does not know fear. When we sit in our heart centre, we sit in our core of love. That core is something that nobody and nothing can take away.”
Well, to be very frank and honest, I don’t think that COVID-19 gives a damn about love or “heart center” or whether the practitioner offers a hug! And COVID-19 doesn’t give a whit about Tantra or about diploma courses.
Bottom line is this: the practitioner and his partner are clearly self-interested and self-centered. They are worried about their programs and not about their participants. They use a lot of words to say very little, and what they do manage to say is not worth hearing. I had to stop reading the “Update,” because it was so irresponsible.
The bottom line, dear brothers, is that the practitioner intends to put his participants at risk, and is attempting to reassure them that he, the practitioner and his collaborators, can safeguard their health and well-being. He does not intend to put his programs on hold much less to cancel any out of consideration for the dangerous situation his is exposing his so-called friends and brothers to.
After all is said and done, I have spent considerable time researching the current state of the pandemic, and I’d like to share some facts with my followers and readers. I have included some informative links at the end of this article and urge you all to visit those links and to review the information provided there.
I have published some very rigid provisions of personal and professional conduct in my Code of Ethics, which is firmly grounded in the yogic yama-s (यम) and niyama-s (नियम). First and foremost is ahiṃsā (अहिंसा), do no harm. I only wish some of the snake-oil salesman and fake-tantrikas would adhere to similar ethics.
The Facts
Coronavirus or COVID-19 is a virus that focuses on the respiratory system; it is the virus that has caused severe pneumonia, and was first identified in Wuhan City, Hubei Province, China. Since the first reports of human cases in China, COVID-19, is now spreading person-to-person and is infecting growing numbers of people around the world, and has been reported in more than 50 countries; about 94% of the cases are in China.
Coronaviruses are not new and make up a large family of viruses that are common in humans, and other species. From time to time, we see new (a.k.a. “novel” in CDC language) coronaviruses that have not previously been described in human beings. There are many types of human Coronaviruses, including some that commonly cause mild upper-respiratory tract illnesses in human beings.
This virus was originally thought to have emerged from an animal source that ultimately mutated to infect humans, but now we are seeing this virus being spread from person to person. As of this writing, it remains unclear how easily this virus can spread among people.
COVID-19 can cause mild cold-like symptoms as well as severe pneumonia requiring ventilator support. In 5% of cases, it can be virulent and in some susceptible people such as the very young, the elderly, immunocompromised people (immune deficiency diseases or chemotherapy), cancer patients, weakened persons, diabetics, etc. the virus can cause severe pulmonary disease, which has been observed in previous outbreaks of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) and Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS), for example.
Coronavirus is spread person to person, and like the common cold it is spread by droplets generated when a person coughs or sneezes
How does COVID-19 spread? Epidemiologists don’t know exactly but their current understanding of how this virus spreads and causes COVID-19 disease is based on what they know about Coronaviruses in general. It is believed that the virus is spread person to person, and like the common cold it is spread by droplets generated when a person coughs or sneezes. Exposure usually requires relatively close contact (a radius of about 6 feet) with someone who is infected but not be clearly symptomatic. The greatest risk of contagion and infection is when a person has symptoms. It’s important to understand that people have become sick after contact with someone with few or no symptoms at all. Spread by an asymptomatic person is unclear but still demands caution.
COVID-19 can cause mild cold-like symptoms but can also cause a severe pneumonia requiring ventilator support, and even death.
Coronavirus is thought to be more contagious than the seasonal flu
The latest areas of widespread infection and disease include China, South Korea, Japan, Iran and Italy.
COVID-19 may spread relatively easily in a close community. In fact, it is estimated that that for every 1 person that is infected, potentially 2 other people can get the infection if they do not protect themselves with simple prevention measures, such as hand washing, covering the mouth when coughing or sneezing, etc.
Coronavirus is thought to be more contagious than the seasonal flu but much less than other highly contagious viruses, such as measles or chicken pox.
Some simple prevention measures
Many people are asking how they can protect themselves. Well, common simple everyday personal hygiene and courtesy are preventive actions to help prevent the spread of respiratory viruses, and they will work with this novel Coronavirus. Some simple prevention measures include: washing your hands frequently with soap and water for at least 20 seconds, using an alcohol-based hand sanitizer that contains at least 60% alcohol if soap and water are not available. You should avoid touching your eyes, nose, and mouth with unwashed hands. Obviously, you should avoid close contact with people who are sick, and presumed infected with COVID-19, which is common sense whether it’s COVID-19, the flu, or even a cold. Cover your cough or sneeze with a tissue, then throw the tissue in the trash. Clean and disinfect frequently touched objects and surfaces.
Very importantly stay home when you are sick. So many people are so inconsiderate and stupid, even if they have sick time benefits that they go to work in crowded offices etc. when sneezing and coughing. Self-isolation in any contagious or infectious disease is a personal responsibility, and if employees are such irresponsible idiots to go to work and put their co-workers at risk, employers should send them home immediately out of concern for the health and well-being of the other employees.
Visit COVID-19 Prevention and Treatment page to learn more about how to protect yourself from respiratory illnesses, like COVID-19.
Even if you have done everything right, you still need to be able to identify the symptoms of COVID-19 disease.
The current symptoms reported in patients with COVID-19 included mild to severe respiratory illness, fever, cough, and difficulty breathing. According to the CDC symptoms may appear anywhere from 2 to 14 days after exposure to the virus.
If you develop a fever and symptoms of respiratory illness, such as cough or shortness of
breath, or if you have recently returned from travel in an affected area (such as China, South Korea, Japan, Iran, or Italy), you should contact your primary care physician or a health care professional and inform him of your recent travel or close contact. Your doctor or the healthcare professional will cooperate with the public health authorities in your area and the CDC to determine if you need to be tested for COVID-19.
Public Health Response and Current Situation
Although this is an early stage of a possible pandemic, it is just an emerging, rapidly evolving situation, about which the public health authorities still now little about but the CDC will continue to provide updated information as it becomes available.
Reliable information and ongoing updates are available about CDC’s response to COVID-19 online. (See the links at the end of this article.)
Although there are a number of concentrations of COVID-19 affecting entire communities, it is still a relatively low risk in many communities. But that may give many people a false sense of security; we may still eventually have cases of COVID-19 in more communities, affecting wider regions. We need to keep in mind that this is a very rapidly evolving situation and the risk assessment may change daily.
Obviously, we can’t rely on wishful thinking of people in La-La-Land, or on the media that irresponsibly reports false or incorrect facts. Fear and anxiety are powerful forces if people don’t use their heads and think clearly.
We know that cases in the US have done very well, in part due to access to healthcare and the preparedness of hospital providers caring for the individual cases but the sad fact is that most people are inconsiderate and behave stupidly. Another sad fact is the shameful lack of access to healthcare for a large number of people.
COVID-19 is here in the United States, in the UK, and we have to face that fact. People are infected and people are infecting other people. The governments have been slow to respond with adequate treatment of the cases even though the first infection with COVID-19 in the United States was reported on January 21, 2020. The outbreak in China was well known some time before that. That is not surprising when you consider how irresponsible China is with industrial farming, antibiotics, and the fact that Americans are kept unaware of the number and quantity of Chinese meat and other products arrive on our tables! There’s no telling what we are being exposed to, and our government is at fault for dropping the ball!
So the question is very reasonable whether you are at risk for COVID-19 or another plague from a package or products shipping from China? Well, the good news is that, in general, Coronaviruses don’t survive very long on surfaces, there is presumably a low risk of spread from products or packaging that are shipped over a period of days or weeks at room temperatures. But don’t feel too safe too soon! There’s an awful lot that we still don’t know about this new strain of Coronavirus (COVID-19), particularly about how it spreads.
Coronaviruses are thought to be spread most often by respiratory droplets. Currently there is no evidence to support transmission of the virus causing COVID-19 associated with imported goods and there have not been any cases reported in the United States that are attributed to contact with imported products but that isn’t very convincing.
We know what we know but we don’t know what’s being kept from us. Do we?
Yes. COVID-19 is here and if you start to feel sick with fever, cough, or difficulty breathing, within 14 days after you think you’ve been exposed, seek medical care right away. Before you go to a doctor’s office or emergency room, call ahead and tell them about your recent travel and your symptoms, so that they can take infection control precautions, if necessary, to safeguard the health and well-being of the other patients.
First and foremost:
Avoid contact with others. Do not travel if you feel sick, and certainly not if you are sick.
Cover your mouth and nose with a tissue or your sleeve (not your hands) when coughing or sneezing, and dispose of the tissue immediately or place your contaminated clothing in the wash.
Wash hands often with soap and water for at least 20 seconds to avoid spreading the virus to others. Use an alcohol-based hand sanitizer that contains at least 60% alcohol, if soap and water are not available.
Visit the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s COVID-19 situation summary page to find the most current information on the COVID-19.
For Further Information and Official Updates, Please Visit these Sites:
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An Official Site of Homoerotic Tantra:Mascul-IN-Touch℠
The penis, cock, dick, whatever you like to call it is an awesome and powerful symbol of maleness and masculinity. It’s been on everyone’s mind since time began but no one seems to know much about it.
In Homoerotic Tantra℠:Mascul-IN-Touch℠ a great deal of ritual and spirituality centers on this concentration of masculine energy and power.
Judging by what I have seen on social media, most men are stuck in the animal or paśu(पशु) stage of development. The paśu, or more properly called the puruṣapaśu (पुरुषपशु), the animal man, a stage in a man’s development where he focuses on animal urges. In some writings in Tantra this is also called the anal-genital stage, a very primitive stage in a man’s development but one that we all have to go through. Some of us get through it some get trapped in it and never leave it.
In Homoerotic Tantra℠:Mascul-IN-Touch℠ I teach a whole series of exercises, practices, rituals, and sadhana-tapas (साधन-तपस्) (spiritual practices) focusing on the phallus or the liṅga(लिङ्ग) or liṅgam(लिङ्गम्), so it shouldn’t be surprising that I feel it’s very important for followers and aspirants to know something about this emblem of masculinity.
From about March 15, 2020, I will start publishing a series of essays about the vajra(वज्र) or penis and the liṅgam(लिङ्गम्) or phallus (erect penis). Here is a preview of some of the modules:
Anatomy and physiology of the penis and phallus
Ejaculation and the how it works (Ejaculation control is a separate subject)
The importance of the liṅgam (लिङ्गम्) in Homoerotic Tantra℠:Mascul-IN-Touch℠
The vajra(वज्र) the liṅgam(लिङ्गम्) in religion and mythology
The liṅgam(लिङ्गम्) and śukra (शुक्र) (semen, cum) as amṛta (अमृत) (divine nectar), somā (सोम) (elixir of life).
Adoration of the liṅgam (लिङ्गम्) and associated ritual.
I hope that by the time we reach the level of ritual adoration of the Tantric Lover’s liṅgam in his manifestation as iṣṭadeva(इष्टदेव) or personal deity in the form of the Tantric Lover, followers and aspirants will have a understanding and appreciation why the liṅgamis an object of worship in the context of homoerotic tantra, and why your Tantric Lover’s semen is considered the Tantric eucharist, the holy communion of Homoerotic Tantra℠:Mascul-IN-Touch℠ .
As a teacher, spiritual guide, your Daka, and as a practitioner of Homoerotic Tantra℠:Mascul-IN-Touch℠ I am grateful to be able to say that the knowledge I will be sharing is not only fascinating, but will raise you to a higher level as men-who-love-men and practice homoerotic Tantra.
I also hope that by sharing knowledge about the male body and its function on a biological level, followers and aspirants will have a better appreciation of the spirituality associated with their maleness, their masculinity, and the divine symbol of masculinity, the liṅgam.
This post is a pre-publication announcement. The actual posts will appear on the Homoerotic Tantra℠:Mascul-IN-Touch℠private site. Please request access to the site at Homoerotic Tantra (Private).
Patrons will receive the notebook inserts by email.
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There is a reasoning behind the choice of a 108-day cycle.
Since time immemorial 9 x 12 or 108 has been studied, analyzed, interpreted, applied. Think about these facts from the Surya Siddhanta (4-5th c b.c.e.), an ancient Indian astronomical work: The distances between the Sun and the Earth, the distances between the Moon and the Earth, the way the planet rotates and its effect on us all – all these things have been studied carefully. The ancient astronomers found that diameter of the Sun multiplied by 108 equals the distance between Sun and Earth, and the diameter of the Moon multiplied by 108 equals the distance between Earth and Moon. The diameter of the Sun is 108 times the diameter of the Earth. This is one of the reasons we have 108 beads in a mālā (माला). The brilliant mathematicians of the Vedic age considered the number 108 to represent the oneness and wholeness of existence, and as noted above, provides an extraordinary connection among the sun, the moon, and the earth (cf. masculine principle, feminine principle, and material principle). Those figures are remarkably accurate and coïncide with modern instrumental measurements and scientific calculations. The number 108 also has significant ritual meaning. There are said to be 108 sacred sites in India. There are 108 Upanisads. Hindu deities have 108 names. There are 108 marma (मर्म) points or sacred ‘vital points’ on the human body. In homoerotic yogic tantra, the number 108 represents spiritual completion. The japamālā (जपमाला) used to count māntra (मन्त्र) repetitions has 108 beads (plus one “guru bead”); prāṇāyāma (प्राणायाम) is frequently completed in 108 cycles; the Surya Namaskar (सूर्यनमस्कार) (“sun salutations”) is frequently done in 9 sequences of 12 āsanas, totalling 108. The ancient yogis, based on the observations of the cosmic movements and astronomical calculations, believed that performing our exercises and practices in abhyāśa (अभ्याश) in sets of 108, we would be able to align the microcosm (ourselves) with the macrocosm (the cosmos), in the rhythm of creation, and thus vanquish saṃsāra (संसार) or wandering from birth to birth. The Vedic scholars were not alone in their fascination with the number 108. The Sarsen Circle at Stonehenge is 108 feet in diameter; the temple at Lamanai, an ancient Mayan temple in Belize, is 108 feet tall; the mortuary temple at Tikal, Guatemala, and in the temple of Kukulkan at Chitzen Itza, the dimension of 108 figures significantly in the architecture. Particularly in Mesoamerica, these temples and ritual structures were designed and constructed to house the souls of great men but were also ritually designed to connect human beings not only with the sun and celestial bodies, but also to the Divine Creator. Do you note the connections? In yogic disciplines we often toss the saying “As above, so below” around. The saying comes from alchemy. But that’s not the only connection between the celestial 108 and our bodies: there are 108 nadis converging to form anāhata(अनाहत), 108 marma-s (मर्म), pressure or vital points, sacred foci on the human body. In Jainism, a child of Sanatanadharma, there are 108 virtues. Some forms of Tai Chi have 108 movements. In Buddhism temples there are 108 steps representing the 108 steps to enlightenment. In Tibetan Buddhism there are 108 delusions. In Japanese Zen Buddhism, a temple bell is intoned 108 times at the end of the year, ritually closing a cycle reminding the believer of the 108 temptations that must be overcome to achieve nirvana. Need I go on? Reflecting on these facts, we have to wonder whether we will ever be able to fully fathom the mystical meaning of 108. Perhaps, but like all else and, as the Greek mathematician Archimedes taught: “Mathematics [understood to be the hidden order of the cosmos] will reveal its secrets…only to those who approach it with love.” It seems only reasonable that I chose 108 days as the meditation/reflection cycle for these Homoerotic Tantra℠:Mascul-IN-Touch℠ daily spiritual practices. Thank you for joining me!
I recently reviewed a number of retreat and workshop
offerings for gay men. The events ranged from NakedMan in Australia to events
in Europe and the U.K., to events in the USA, such as the Easton Mountain
retreat center in New York State. Based on what I could discern from the images
and galleries, the events are generally stereotypical and reinforce negative
stereotypes of a subgroup of gay men. For the most part, the events and
workshops attracted a majority of middle-aged men with a smattering of
30-somethings.
Many of the gallery images showed physically mature men
engaging in regressive behaviors, that is, they appeared to be revisiting
childhood rather than developing mature patterns of behavior. Some examples
include, water activities riding pink swan blow-up floats, body painting,
drag-queen performances.
Some of the so-called spiritual programs featured men
holding other men, which is not alien to homoerotic Tantra (तन्त्र) and represents an important ritual activity, but in the
depictions, the holding was done in a manner that suggested almost fetal
behavior with one partner wrapping around the “fetus” as if mimicking a womb.
This is again, a form of regressive representation, and does not figure into
the behavior of a mature man seeking mature masculine awakening.
Dressing up as women is not a healthy way to awaken a
masculine spirit; in fact, it is demonstrative of an imbalance of the
masculine-feminine principles, with an unnatural skewing towards the feminine.
What that means is imbalance, and imbalance is contrary to any notion of
healthy human development in any aspect or sphere.
Many of the events and workshops were unconvincing in terms
of having any real purpose, other than to provide a scenario for acting out
childish characters, or enabling regressive behaviors. What I found
particularly offensive is that many of the events and so-called workshops
openly claimed to provide the participants with techniques and skills that
normally take a good deal of time, work, study, and dedication to cultivate and
practice effectively. Of course, getting in a quick grope in a touch workshop,
or fondling another man in a “massage” workshop is exactly what most of the
participants are after, so who am I to criticize. Right?
Well, I believe I am qualified not only to objectively and
professionally criticize such events and workshops from the standpoint of
ethics — they are not ethical —, from the standpoint of efficacy and
effectiveness — they are far from beneficial to the participants because they
reinforce stereotypes and encourage regressive behavior —, they claim to teach
skills — in fact, they do not teach implementable or worthwhile skills but
merely offer an opportunity not otherwise available to most of the men
participating —, I object strongly to the fact that they offer spirituality for
a price — when most of the abuses of institutionalized religion are based on
economic or control abuses, none but the most base traditions actually allow a
qualified practitioner or preceptor to charge for spiritual services.
Flamboyance and outrageous, unqualified claims are snake-oil sales techniques
unworthy of a true guru (गुरु), dāka
(दाक), preceptor, or teacher.
Calling an assembly of lonely hearts who are willing to
shell out hundreds, sometimes thousands of dollars to participate in what is
tantamount to a carnival side show should not be accepted by mature men seeking
authentic spiritual development and guidance. But that’s exactly what these
misguided men are paying for and getting from the charlatans offering these
events and workshops.
In New York State and in the United States, for example, if
these charlatans describe themselves as organizations fostering education or
spirituality or religion, which many of them seem to do on paper, they may
qualify for non-profit, tax-exempt status, and many of these organizations do
exactly that, and they get away with it. The participants in such events and
workshops who pay the big bucks to play are, in my opinion, accessories to the
fact: If they didn’t enjoy being made fools of and if they didn’t participate
in the frauds, the frauds would have to get real jobs, and they wouldn’t be
cashing in on the neurotics with too much recreational cash and time on their
hands.
By writing this op-ed, I do not expect to convince anyone
already part of the problem to bow out any time soon. Nor do I expect that the
participants in such events and programs, and the supporters of such
organizations are going to have an epiphany and wake up to who they are and
what they’ve become or are becoming. I do expect, however, that those men who
are true seekers, who have the capacity to discern truth from fiction, and who
have a genuine desire to evolve, will at least consider what I have to say, and
at least be more critical and discerning in their choices of self-developmental
activities.
I created Homoerotic Tantra℠and Mascul-IN-Touch℠
as an alternative to the snake-oil salesmen, the carnival sideshows, the
stereotypical gay retreats, and the fake guru-s out there. Homoerotic Tantra℠and Mascul-IN-Touch℠
can make a difference, even if we’re a tiny minority.
Thank you for reading. Thank you for sharing. Thank you for
your support. Thank you for your blessings.
“There is no other source of beauty than the wound — unique, different for each person, hidden or visible, that every man keeps within, that he preserves and whither he withdraws when he wants to leave the world behind for a temporary but deep solitude.” (Jean Genet, The Studio of Alberto Giacometti, orig. 1957) [1]
Un Chant d’Amour (“A Love Song” – Jean Genet (1943)): A Revolutionary Vision of Emancipation Through Sensuality, the Film is a Song of Love Both Universal and Eternal.
I recently had the fortunate opportunity to have rediscovered Jean Genet’s acclaimed and only film, Un Chant d’Amour (“A Love Song”, LS below), the only film produced and directed by Genet, and a masterpiece of homoeroticism.
The film was banned for decades by prudish censors, courts, critics in France, the UK, the United States, and elsewhere because it was an unembellished statement by the French gay author, playwright, and novelist, of the beauty and passion of the masculine spirit in its raw physicality and tender sensitivity. The short film, a mere 28 minutes long from start to finish, portrays the would be hardened criminals in their cells enacting various erotic acts, including undisguised masturbation, and their voyeuristic warden, who appears obsessed with their performances. Genet portrays the confined untamed masculine spirit as represented by the prisoners, and the envious, hypocritical, lascivious eye of society enjoying the spectacle but doing so as a controlling and oppressive power.
I could not avoid relating my interpretation of the LS film to what I understand to be the essence of homoerotic Tantra and Mascul-IN-Touch℠ in contemporary western society.
There is a wide chasm separating an author’s attempt to show that love between men, a love disparaged by society and impaired by toxic cultural conditioning, that such love can still persist in spite of human weaknesses and compelled depravity, and an author’s decision to apparently deprive his characters of any redeeming characteristics ‘whatsoever, apart from physical beauty or ambiguous sexual charm. Note that I write “apparently” in its connotation of “appearing as if” or “seemingly” because I read Genet as pointing to the character’s depravity as being in the eye of society and not in the souls of the characters. Their crimes are mere metaphors of their failure to fit the mold society has provided for them, they refuse to wear the oppressive mask of “acceptability” merely to please the closeted and corrupt institutions.
The LS is based on Genet’s novel Journal du voleur (“Thief’s Diary”), which has been described as perhaps Jean Genet’s most authentically autobiographical novel, personifying his quest for spiritual glory through the pursuit of evil. But I take issue with that description because I do not interpret Genet’s description of “evil” as a ”quest for “spiritual glory through the pursuit of evil,” rather as an exposé of why “evil” is a product of society itself and its marginalization of those who dare to be different. I would agree that there is a spirituality in Genet’s exposés but the spirituality, regrettably, falls below the radar of western exclusivist society-at-large. Perhaps Genet earned the epithet of France’s “Black Prince of Letters,” but for the wrong reasons.
Indeed, Jean Genet may appear to suggest in his debut novel, “Our-Lady-of-the-Flowers,” (Notre-Dame-des-Fleurs (1943)) that all homoerotic expression is, in the final analysis, doomed to frustration: the attractive male is desirable because of his virile masculinity, but he immediately loses this attraction when he responds to his homoerotic nature, expresses his feminine principle, or in demeanor or language appears excessively feminine. After all, isn’t the clearest sign of virility an intense and exclusive desire for “real” women. I suggest that there is an underlying fallacy in that absurd moralizing assumption. Mignon-les-petits-pieds (“Darling Dainty-Foot”),[2] the Montmartre pimp in the novel, may well proclaim that ‘A male who fucks another male is a double male’, but as Genet suggests, and as Sartre makes explicit, this is not at all the case. [3] He is merely “a female without realising it,” and the longer Mignon associates with Divine, his transvestite lover, the more feminine he becomes.[4] Both Mignon’s and Sartre’s statements are exaggerated but make their point; sexuality and gender are not the same, sex is purposively procreative, gender is an ambiguous, even arbitrary social construct, and artifice; the masculine complements the feminine — the one principle cannot exist without the other.[5]
Actually, there’s a great mythology here about a young man (in the novel, Louis Culafroy), who becomes a stereotype (the notorious Montmartre drag queen Divine), has an affair with an outwardly sexy “pimp” (in the novel, Mignon), and a handsome criminal (in the novel, the murderer called “Notre-Dame-des-Fleurs” (Our-Lady-of-the-Flowers)), and then dies (in the novel of TB, the AIDS of the era). These portrayals are full of male beauty, sensuality, homoeroticism, passion, suffering, and death. But if we go beneath the surface, we find there sensitive, passionate men, and in the superbly directed and silent scenes, portrayals of beautiful males symbolically imprisoned and subjected to the hypocritical voyeurism of society, and the culture of conditioning, oppression and control. Genet portrays the drowning of the divine masculine spirit; but the divine masculine spirit refuses to suffocate. In the novel and in the film, the beautiful male actors continue to tease, to masturbate, to dance, to live — while society attempts to confine them and to steal glimpses of their unbridled freedom. It’s purest genius and every man seeking his homoerotic self and awakening of his divine masculinity should gorge himself on this film.
These remarks do draw attention to one of the several ways in which Genet’s prose and poems — and the films based on them — enlarge the reader’s or the viewers imaginative experience by enabling him to see how the world can appear to the gay man: the gay man sees the world as inhabited by handsome desirable males, whose crotches, buttocks, waists, thighs and shoulders glow with the same kind of erotic sensuality, the same qualities which the so-called straight male find attractive in a female. And, in isolation or confinement, the straight man find just as attractive in other men, and does not hesitate to taste of the forbidden fruit.[6]
The storyline and the characters of Genet’s masterwork are extraordinary metaphors for what I speak of in homoerotic Tantra and Mascul-IN-Touch as the toxic cultural conditioning and the oppression of the divine masculine, and suppression of the western man’s expression of the feminine principle, the Śakti principle.
In the darkness and tragedy of the Genet work, and despite the fact that it takes place in a dark prison, the only characters men isolated in confining cells, we can discern a free masculine spirit of energy, inventiveness, creativity, versatility, playfulness, spontaneity seems to enliven the individuals and channel the relationships. We can learn from such dark portrayals that a man cannot live a one-note symphony; it will become oppressive very fast. Moreover, quite realistically, the ingenious communication and feedback between the men, despite the walls of their cells is incredibly inspiring as well.
Just as the prisoners in the Genet novels and the film are individualized, categorized in their cells, and just as the prisoners are subjected to the voyeurism of a “bi- or gay curious” guard [viz. society; in Orwellian terms, the Love Police, the Thought Police], western men find themselves in an analogous situation. That situation requires them to be “innovative,” “resourceful,” “flexible,” “versatile,” in their expressions of their eroticism, sensuality, and spirituality.
The splendidly attractive males whom Genet presents in his poems and in his novels, many of which were made into films, are soon revealed in a very different light. Maurice Pilorge, for example, is described in Le Condamne a Mort as a beautiful Greek shepherd, with “eyes like roses” and “hair powdered with clear stars of steel.” Yet on the very first page of Our-Lady-of-the-Flowers, Genet reveals to the reader that Maurice killed his lover, Escudero, to rob him of less than a thousand francs, a pittance. Stilitano,[7] whom Genet follows “around Spain and Holland with dog-like devotion,” is a coward. Divers, the handsomest boy at Mettray[8] is syphilitic and betrays his accomplice Harcamone to the police, and even Querelle,[9] the most virile and enterprising of Genet’s pretty-boy social deviants, feels the need to do penance for his crimes by having masochistic relationships with a pimp and a policeman. It seems that the burden of male beauty and homoeroticism has to be offset by some sort flaw, the more egregious the better, for the homoerotic male to titillate the interest of readers and viewers.
Genet’s characters are beautiful men, desirable, men who are in many cultural respects gender-ambiguous, countercultural, and accordingly suspect; they need to be sequestered, physically or socially, and monitored. Such men are a threat to the status quo, its institutions, its power and control structure. Such men are dangerous.
In Genet’s writings, he presents these beautiful men as indeed gender-ambiguous but also as social stereotypes of a contrived masculinity and femininity, the one concealing the other, and if you experience Un Chant d’Amour appreciating this observation, you will better understand the metaphor that the entire short film in fact is.
My interpretation of Genet’s motive in presenting his characters as exquisitely beautiful men, who are ardently desired by other men is simply the fact that society has forced such androgynous men into “deviance” and antisocial behavior; their spirits are free and countercultural, society strives to control them even if it means imprisoning them in real cells or by social marginalization. Such physically perfect men, men who are complete in expressing both their masculinity and their complementary feminine principle, that is, they are homoerotic, take advantage of their physical desirability to express their inner rage against society for pushing them to the edge of despair. They avenge themselves on those who grasp at their external beauty by inflicting on them the consequences of the evil that is born of their rage against toxic cultural conditioning. The homoerotic genius, Genet, hurls these men, the pretty boys and their lovers, and their rebellion, their crimes into the lap of society, with the outrage and anger of a all oppressed males, who have been deprived of the freedom to be homoerotic, homophilic, to physically, emotionally and spiritually love other men, to be homosexual. These men are the homosexual writer’s literary accusation and condemnation of a cruel and intolerant society that at the time made social monsters of homoerotic masculine gods.
Genet’s insistence on ramming the depravity and deprivation, stupidity and degradation, the depth and beauty of his heroes down the reader’s throat is the most effective homoerotic aphrodisiac and a wake-up call that a moralizing writer could find. But there is a wide difference between showing that love can still persist in spite of cultural oppression, social condemnation, intolerance, imposed weaknesses and compelled perversity, and the writer’s decision to deprive his characters of any redeeming features whatsoever apart from physical attractiveness, virility, and a somewhat ambiguous sexual charm. The love that can persist is the insistent homophobic message of the artist, however; the deprivation of the characters of any redeeming features apart from physical beauty and erotic charm is the message society has articulated.
Jean-Paul Sartre wrote his famous Saint Genet as an analysis of Genet’s work and life but most especially of Our-Lady-of-the-Flowers. Our-Lady-of-the-Flowers made Genet, in Sartre’s mind at least, a poster child of existentialism and most especially an embodiment of that existentialist views on freedom of the individual person as a free and responsible actor determining his own development through acts of his will.
If what Sartre proposes and presents is credible, Jean Genet may be a very acceptable poster boy for Homoerotic Tantra℠ and Mascul-IN-Touch℠.
Notes
[1] Genet, Jean, Marc C. Chaimowicz, and Phil King. The Studio of Giacometti. , 2013. Print
[2] The pun made with the French term “mignon,” which means darling but is also a slang word for a passive homosexual, should not be lost when discussing the gender ambiguity of many of Genet’s characters, most obvious in his transvestite characters, particularly Divine.
[3] Sartre, Jean-Paul, and Bernard Frechtman. Saint Genêt, Actor and Martyr. Minneapolis, Minn: University of Minnesota Press, 2012. Print.
[4] I interpret feminine as used here to connote longing, desire, vulnerability, surrender, tenderness, compassion.]
[5] For a detailed study of Genet, see Sartre, Jean-Paul, and Bernard Frechtman. Saint Genêt, Actor and Martyr. Minneapolis, Minn: University of Minnesota Press, 2012, and the article by the same authors in The Tulane Drama Review. Vol. 7, No. 3 (Spring, 1963), pp. 18-36.
[6] Thody, Philip. Jean Genet: A Study of His Novels and Plays. New York: Stein and Day, 1970. p.42
[7] The name Stilitano connotes a restless spirit seeking freedom, opportunities to enjoy life, and whose intense spiritually and powerful soul urge can sting or charm. His intention is to make love, to go places and to do things. The name suggests an individual who is very adventurous and willing to take risk to achieve his objectives. New ways and new experiences can’t satisfy his restless nature. One adventure leads you to another. Personal growth is vital for such a man, and it is difficult for him to be tied down by rules and obligations.
[8] The Mettray referred to here is the Mettray Penal Colony, which was situated in the small village of Mettray, north of the city of Tours. The Mettray reformatory was a private facility, established in 1840 for the rehabilitation of young male delinquents between 6 and 21 years old.
[9]Querelle in French means a “quarrel, feud, altercation, vendetta.”
“deviance” and antisocial behavior; their spirits are free and countercultural, society strives to control them even if it means imprisoning them in real cells or by social marginalization. Such physically perfect men, men who are complete in expressing both their masculinity and their complementary feminine principle, that is, they are homoerotic, take advantage of their physical desirability to express their inner rage against society for pushing them to the edge of despair. They avenge themselves on those who grasp at their external beauty by inflicting on them the consequences of the evil that is born of their rage against toxic cultural conditioning. The homoerotic genius, Genet, hurls these men, the pretty boys and their lovers, and their rebellion, their crimes into the lap of society, with the outrage and anger of a all oppressed males, who have been deprived of the freedom to be homoerotic, homophilic, to physically, emotionally and spiritually love other men, to be homosexual. These men are the homosexual writer’s literary accusation and condemnation of a cruel and intolerant society that at the time made social monsters of homoerotic masculine gods.
Homoerotic Yogic Tantra & Masculine Intimacy 