The Sexual Question Part 23

Krafft-Ebing's cases show the same phenomena, (for instance the invert called "Count Sandor" and her victims). In these cases also young girls, seduced by inverts, fell into despair and even threatened to commit suicide when their seducers abandoned them. On the other hand, when a normal man, seduced by an invert, practices mutual masturbation the affair remains localized and limited to purely animal sensations of pleasure which do not irradiate to his psychic life; such irradiations only occur in the invert, so that his victims are always ready to abandon him without the least regret. If we except children, it therefore follows that the so-called male victims are nearly always blackmailers, or simply offer themselves for money.

In fact, the normal man entirely separates the sympathy, or even the exalted affection, which he feels for another man, from all s.e.xual sensations, and has not the least desire to kiss or caress his best friend, still less to have s.e.xual intercourse with him. All sensual caresses between men are, therefore, suggestive of inversion even in places where women are absent.

In the normal woman, on the contrary, as we have already mentioned, sentiments of exalted sympathy easily provoke the desire for kisses and caresses, and these caresses often cause in women a certain amount of vague sensual pleasure. When this pleasure leads to progressive tenderness and ends in mutual onanism, etc., it nevertheless remains intimately connected with psychic exaltations and sentiments of sympathy, from which it cannot be separated as in man.

In a former chapter we have described the difference between the two s.e.xes, but nowhere is it more distinctly shown than in the relations between a female invert and her victims.

It is therefore much more difficult in woman than in man to distinguish in particular cases between the hereditary disposition to inversion, and saphism acquired by seduction or habit. The latter is common in prost.i.tutes and libidinous women.

As we have already said, the pure female invert feels like a man. The idea of coitus with men is repugnant to her. She apes the habits, manners and clothes of men. Female inverts have been known to wear men's uniforms and perform military service for years, and even behave as heroes; their s.e.x sometimes only being discovered after their death.

=s.e.xual Appet.i.te for Children. (Pederosis.)=--It may be questioned whether this is a special category, for many s.e.xual a.s.saults committed on children are simply the effect of senile dementia, or abuse of children to satisfy an otherwise normal s.e.xual appet.i.te. I have, however, observed cases where children were so specially, or even exclusively, the object of the s.e.xual appet.i.te, that I cannot doubt the existence of a special hereditary perversion in this direction.

No doubt, most of those who abuse children are also capable of coitus with women, or else they are inverts, s.a.d.i.s.ts, etc.; but with many of them s.e.xual pa.s.sion for children is so marked from their youth upward, that it shows a special hereditary disposition. For this pathological disposition, thus defined, I propose the term _pederosis_; that of _pederasty_ applying to degeneracy between man and man, whatever causes lead to it. Krafft-Ebing, who does not believe in the existence of a hereditary pederosis, gives the name _erotic pedophilia_ to the abuse of children by depraved persons.

The following are cases of exclusive and hereditary pederosis: A talented artist, possessing high moral sentiments, was affected from his youth with a s.e.xual appet.i.te exclusively directed toward little girls of five or six years. At the age of twelve they ceased to attract him. He was quite indifferent to adults of both s.e.xes, and never accomplished coitus. _Having recognized in good time the anomaly of his appet.i.te, he succeeded in mastering it all his life, and through education on the subject as well as a general physical development, he neutralized these morbid desires, particularly through the training of his mind to cleaner and more wholesome topics. A great help in this type of condition is work therapy. His moral sentiments and principles were always strong enough to prevent him going any further, and he eventually obtained relief. But this condition gave rise to increasing nervous irritation and melancholic depression._

In another man, the s.e.xual appet.i.te, also perverted since its origin, was directed only toward boys of twelve or sixteen. At one time girls of the same age excited him, while he was quite indifferent toward adult women and men.

In rare cases the s.e.xual appet.i.te of certain women is directed toward little boys.

=s.e.xual Appet.i.te for Animals. (Sodomy or b.e.s.t.i.a.lity.)=[6]--A human s.e.xual appet.i.te exclusively directed toward animals is certainly not common. Coitus between man and animals usually takes place for want of the opportunity for normal satisfaction, or else as the result of satyriasis, nymphomania or desire for change. I have observed it especially in idiots and imbeciles who are ridiculed by girls. To console themselves, they give vent to their feelings with a patient cow or goat in the silence of the stable: for this act they get several years imprisonment, for the law on this point is severe.

Certain degraded libertines satisfy their hyperaesthetic and perverted appet.i.tes with goats or even with large birds or rabbits.

There are, however, cases where a pathological s.e.xual appet.i.te is specially directed toward animals, and it is curious to observe the frequent preference of certain individuals for small animals which they skin (fowls, geese, rabbits), and thus put to death.

_b.e.s.t.i.a.lity is not rare in women who are also subject to this filthy, obnoxious and degenerative practice. Even if we put aside cases of torture inflicted on small animals and if we avoid all prejudices, we can still, in all normality, consider b.e.s.t.i.a.lity as a crime, manifested by the depraved mind. In fact, considered from the point of view of law and humanity, b.e.s.t.i.a.lity is one of the most indecent of all the pathological aberrations of the s.e.xual appet.i.te. Human imagination only has marked it with the stigma of moral depravement and has made it a crime. But it is recognized scientifically that it is a state of mental inferiority and often a sign of idiotic tendency, usually accompanied by a case history, tainted heredity and highly neurotic const.i.tution. aestheticism has reason for complaint, and more than one painter or sculptor has represented the union of Leda with the Swan. It is certainly much better for society, for an idiot or an imbecile to be castrated than for him to make a girl pregnant and breed more idiots._

_In cases of this kind which I have known and which were brought to justice, I consider that the real sinner, the sodomite, should be confined to an insane asylum under medical attention, and not, as at present, to be condemned to imprisonment, thus making a martyr of him for no reason, and putting the ban of society upon him. It is needless to say that cases of sodomy complicated by cruelty or sadism, should be judged differently._

There are also other hereditary or const.i.tutional perversions, more or less characteristic, of the s.e.xual appet.i.te, but we cannot enumerate all of them. We may mention, however, the erotic excitement which some men feel at the sight of statues of women, which urges them to m.a.s.t.u.r.b.a.t.e against these statues.

s.e.xUAL ANOMALIES IN THE INSANE AND IN PSYCHOPATHS

When one is familiar with the population of a lunatic asylum, one is struck by a singular phenomenon, from the s.e.xual point of view. A great number of insane women give evidence of intense s.e.xual desire.

This desire is manifested in some by incessant masturbation; in others by obscene conversation; in many others, by imaginary love, sometimes sensual, sometimes platonic; often by direct provocation to coitus addressed to the medical officers; but especially by perpetual scenes of jealousy, and often by reciprocal suspicions regarding their s.e.xual life. In fact, a lunatic asylum reveals to us, in the form of repulsive caricatures, all gradations and variations of a more or less degenerate feminine s.e.xual life, coquetry, wearing all kinds of ornaments, jealous anger, erotic excitement, etc.

The s.e.xual excitation of the insane often makes them soil themselves with urine and excrements, and heap insults on persons whom their diseased imagination suspects of s.e.xual a.s.saults or immodest acts toward themselves or others. They have a tendency to believe themselves betrothed or married to kings, emperors, Jesus Christ or G.o.d. Pregnancy and childbirth play a large part in their delirium.

Some patients imagine themselves pregnant and pretend that they were fecundated secretly. Afterwards they believe that some one has taken away their child while they were asleep.

One of my former patients once accused me of going to her bed at night and fecundating her every week. She also accused me of having hidden the hundreds of children which I was supposed to have procreated with her, and martyred them. Owing to these hallucinations she heard their cries day and night.

Another patient, affected with curable acute mania, was so erotic during her attacks that she made advances toward all the doctors who visited her. Her mind was full of such erotic images that after her cure she was frightened of being pregnant, although she had pa.s.sed the whole of her time of detention under supervision by female attendants.

Women who in their normal state are most modest or s.e.xually cold may be most erotic when they become insane, and may even behave as prost.i.tutes. This is especially observed in periodic hypomania. It is a well-known fact in the female divisions of lunatic asylums, that the doctors are always surrounded by erotic patients, who catch hold of their clothes and pinch them, and try and embrace or scratch them according as they are amorous or jealous, so that they often have trouble in escaping from these signs of violent love or furious jealousy.

On the other hand, in the male divisions of asylums, one is astonished at the indifference and profound s.e.xual apathy of nearly all insane men. Some practice masturbation and others attempt pederasty, but all with a philosophical calmness due to their dementia. Young women may even go among them without any fear of a.s.saults or indecent language.

It is only a few of the most violent who are exceptions to this rule.

A young lady doctor, a.s.sistant medical officer to the asylum at Zurich, made her visits alone among all the males, even the most violent, without any inconvenience; while, in the female divisions, she was approached by the erotic patients as much as were the male a.s.sistants. I mention this fact because some people wrongly imagine that the s.e.xual excitation of insane women is due to the visits of male doctors. These facts are very striking and furnish perhaps the best proof that the feminine s.e.xual appet.i.te is especially situated in the higher brain, while the masculine appet.i.te is situated more in the lower cerebral centers, as we have shown above. Mental alienation is due to irritations of the higher brain, and this explains why in women it lets loose such violent s.e.xual pa.s.sions and images, and why there is so little of this in men.

The s.e.xual pathological symptoms of the insane are as follows:

(1). _Erotomania_ (satyriasis and nymphomania), or abnormal exaltation of the s.e.xual appet.i.te. This is especially seen in acute mania, in the early stages of general paralysis and senile dementia, also temporarily or permanently in other psychoses. It is manifested by s.e.xual excesses, obscene language or excessive masturbation. All these symptoms disappear after the attack of insanity.

(2). _s.e.xual anaesthesia_ or _hypoaesthesia_ or even _impotence_ may occur in the later stages of general paralysis and senile dementia. At the commencement of general paralysis there is often violent s.e.xual desire combined with more or less complete impotence. The same thing occurs, as we shall see, in alcoholism.

(3). Subjects affected with systematic delirium of persecution and grandeur (paranoia) sometimes commit atrocious s.e.xual excesses, and often tyrannize and torment in a terrible way the women who are their victims. It is especially in the religious forms of this delirium, combined with fanatic ecstasy, that the most repulsive s.e.xual orgies occur. I have treated a patient with paranoia who, full of pious sayings, regarded himself as a kind of prophet. He made a poor girl and her mother sleep in his room and had connection with them alternately. Finally, he mixed his s.e.m.e.n in coffee with the girl's menstrual blood and made her drink the mixture, pretending that this was a religious ceremony intended to produce a strong race. In the end he set fire to the house of these poor women.

Subjects affected with partial paranoia often turn the heads of susceptible women by the aid of ascetic religious phraseology, to gratify afterwards their s.e.xual pa.s.sions. The worst cases are those who are able to hide from the public their delirious ideas, and pa.s.s for normal individuals, misunderstood victims, or even saints. I have examined a very orthodox clergyman, highly esteemed by his congregation on account of his ascetic and enthusiastic preaching. In his own home he illtreated his wife, half strangled her, and exacted all kinds of s.e.xual depravity. Unfortunately, the nature of his delirium was not very evident, and he dissimulated so well that the jurists would not admit his irresponsibility, in spite of my medical certificate. His wife was obliged to run away to escape from her martyrdom. The community of property in force in this family completely ruined this unfortunate woman. The husband was not a hypocrite, but simply insane. Volumes could be written on s.e.xual atrocities committed by such people.

I will mention briefly the systematic delirium directed toward pathological love. This is a very common symptom in insane women who combine their amorous sentiments for man with the maddest ideas and hallucinations. An insane woman suddenly discovers that the object of her love is a king or Jesus Christ, and that she is betrothed to him.

In her delirium she imagines herself to be queen of the world. In her dreams and hallucinations her king or Christ is in bed with her and she imagines she has connection with him. Still under the influence of hallucinations, she believes herself pregnant and carries an imaginary child for nine months in her womb. She may even imagine that she has given birth to a child, and that the child has been taken away from her by the aid of narcotics, as we have seen above. Although there is an infinite variety in the gradations, the pathological images of the cerebral s.e.xual sphere of insane women always revolve round this eternal theme.

These pathological irradiations of the s.e.xual sphere are a.s.sociated voluntarily with jealous obsessions and ideas of persecution, which make the subjects furious, and which are confirmed by their paraesthesias and hallucinations. Illusions of memory play a great part in these cases, for the subjects have often never felt what they complain of, and it is then a question of veritable hallucinational memory. We may here observe by the way that, even among healthy people, the s.e.xual pa.s.sions, like the others, always tend to falsify memory, making things appear in the exclusive sense of the affective state. Once fixed in the memory, such conceptions, the false tendency of which was originally based on pa.s.sion, gradually a.s.sume the subjective character of certainty. Cool-headed people, or those whose affective state directs them to contrary conceptions, then see in such individuals a deliberate intention to misrepresent the facts. This is the reason why people so often hurl mutual insults at each others heads, calling each other liars and calumniators, owing to the affective illusion of memory.

(4). One of the worst of the s.e.xual anomalies in the insane is _pathological jealousy_, especially in men. Their wives then become martyrs, especially in cases of alcoholism and paranoia. It is not uncommon for a.s.sa.s.sination to put an end to their torments. Among insane women, jealousy is certainly not less, but they have less legal power and less muscular strength. The most violent jealousy is found in alcoholics.

Jealous delirium renders the subject furious; a word, a look, or some trivial circ.u.mstance are enough for him to prove the infidelity of his wife. The latter has to avoid the slightest thing which might arouse jealousy, but all in vain; reserve and even prudery are regarded by the jealous husband as hypocrisy. The unfortunate man watches his wife, night and day, like a watchdog: he threatens and insults her with no reason, and calumniates her in all ways, even in the presence of a third party. He even lays elaborate traps for her. Cases of this kind are legion.

(5). It is necessary to say that the _s.e.xual paraesthesias_, of which we have spoken, sadism, masochism, fetichism, inversion, etc., often occur in the insane.

(6). The most atrocious s.e.xual crimes are very often the work of idiots or imbeciles, but especially _moral idiots_, _i.e._, persons whose idiocy is limited to the moral sense, who are also called simply _amoral_. This is due to hereditary taint, an innate absence of all sentiments of sympathy, pity and duty. Rape, violation of children, s.e.xual a.s.sa.s.sination, etc., are usually due to the concomitant action of moral idiocy and violent or perverted s.e.xual pa.s.sions.

(7). _Hypochondria_ also causes singular results in the s.e.xual sphere.

We have already dealt with the masturbation of certain hypochondriacs, which is often wholly or partly imaginary. Others believe they have committed terrible s.e.xual excesses, when nothing of the kind has occurred. I have seen a hypochondriac married and strongly built, who believed his health was ruined because he cohabited with his wife once every two or three months. Other hypochondriacs become impotent simply because they think they are. Others again imagine they are affected with venereal disease, which they have never contracted.

(8). Hysterical men and women have a very peculiar s.e.xuality. Hysteria depends on auto-suggestion or on an exalted and morbid dissociability of psychic activity. A single idea is sufficient in a hysterical subject, to produce the realization of what it represents. The pa.s.sionate imagination may lead to opinions and actions which are absolutely contradictory. Love and hatred often alternate by transformation. According to the influences to which she is exposed, the same hysterical woman may become a good or evil genius.

In the s.e.xual domain the same extremes are produced in a very striking manner. Inflamed by love, a hysterical woman may exhibit phenomenal eroticism and the most violent s.e.xual excesses, while indifference, disgust, or simply distraction by other ideas will render her absolutely frigid. Cold as ice toward other men, she may have insatiable s.e.xual desire for the man she loves.

The question is often raised whether a woman can love more than once in her life. There is no doubt that many women are so monogamous by instinct that they cannot love more than once; but it is also certain that a hysterical woman is capable of loving several times, and very different persons at different periods of her life. The personality of certain erotic hysterical women is even so dissociable that they can love with all their strength several men at the same time. But the hysterical woman is also capable of hating a man with as much ardor as she formerly loved him; or, on the contrary, of loving the one she formerly hated, according to the suggestion of the moment. The same phenomena occur in hysterical men.

For the same reasons the quality of the s.e.xual sensations and sentiments may vary in a hysterical subject according to the influences it is subjected to, and pa.s.s from the normal to the perverted state, or inversely. I have observed a case where a highly cultured hysterical subject, in her early youth, fell in love with another young girl. At this period her sentiments were purely h.o.m.os.e.xual; her love for the young girl was clearly inverted and accompanied by intense s.e.xual desire, while she was absolutely indifferent to men. Later on, a man fell in love with her, and she yielded to him rather from pity and feminine pa.s.siveness than from love. Still later she fell pa.s.sionately in love with another man, quite as much as she had been with the young girl of her early youth.

Her latest love was both exalted and libidinous. Her s.e.xual appet.i.te had thus taken the normal direction under the influence of a hetero-s.e.xual affection.

In hysterical men a.n.a.logous changes occur less easily, on account of the nature of masculine s.e.xuality which distinguishes more clearly between the mind and the appet.i.te; but these changes are observed sometimes. In woman, the hysterical imagination and dissociation facilitate a polyandrous irradiation of the s.e.xual appet.i.te, which is otherwise rare in the female s.e.x. In this respect the s.e.xuality of hysterical women resembles that of men and differs from that of normal women. Hysterical men, on the other hand, become more feminine, not by their appet.i.te being less polygamous, but by the more dissociated form of their thoughts and sentiments.

(9). A variety of the pathological love of abnormal individuals is _imaginary love_, not founded on delirious ideas. Certain psychopaths of both s.e.xes are convinced that they love some one, but they suddenly perceive during their betrothal, or even only after marriage, that they are mistaken and that they have never loved the person in question. Such illusions are the cause of numerous broken engagements, divorce and conjugal bitterness.

(10). _Amorous tyranny_ const.i.tutes another variety in the pathology of love. Lovers of this kind constantly tyrannize and torment the object of their pa.s.sion, by their desires, their observations, their sensitive temper, their contradictions, their exigencies and their jealousy. This atrocious manner of loving is common in both s.e.xes; perhaps more so in women than men.

(11). The _love of psychopaths_ is a subject which has no end. If human society was better acquainted with psychopathology a great deal of conjugal misunderstanding and misery would be avoided.

I have known a woman who would not allow her husband to shut himself in the water-closet, for fear he would take the servant with him!

Another became madly jealous if a woman sat opposite her husband and cast the least glance at him; the unfortunate husband not knowing where to look, in the street or in hotels, so as to escape his wife's jealousy. It is still worse when the husband is jealous.

Other psychopaths torment the object of their love by the perpetual care they take over imaginary dangers or the slightest indispositions.