religious systems of the West and their siblings, the Oriental escapist doctrines. Is not each of them in its own way rigid with fear, the fear that the human mind cannot be allowed to function without being watched? Each of them discloses, despite many more or less ingenious disguises, the weak and trembling fears of its proponents that chaos will follow should the slightest deviations be allowed; that controls must therefore be imposed.

It would appear that a great many persons are afraid to grow up intellectually and morally. They cling rigidly to fixed positions and established dogmas, terrified with superstitious premonitions at the prospect of having to think about something for themselves, or at allowing others to do the same.

Their fears are genuine. The causes of the fears are not. Laws presently directed at homosexuality can be changed without bringing down fire and brimstone. Titillating peep-hole surveillance of homosexuals by the police, the State Department, the FBI and other social agencies could be eliminated at considerable saving to the taxpayers without precipitating another "decline and fall" of society.

Like the dope addict, the frightened authoritarian must feed himself with ever stronger and stronger doses of authority. He must do this lest he have to face those sickening fears and weaknesses which rot him from within. At heart he mistrusts the essential healthiness of heterosexuality. If not, why is he so afraid of homosexuality? His revulsion at homosexuality is not natural. Is it a device for protecting himself from having to do some real honest-to-goodness thinking about the very alarming insecurities inherent in marriage and the family structure?

Until we shall attain mature and sensible views about socio-sexual matters thought-control is apt to stay with us concerning our private lives. Until we are willing to study and to think about such questions as male and female homosexuality-their relevance to the institution of marriage, to overpopulation and birth-control, to juvenile delinquency and to many other problems, fears and phobias, and the general unhealthiness of a thought-control society will be with us, for controls in one area of life lead inevitably to controls in all directions.

Be of good cheer, for at least some are discerning that it is the thoughtcontrollers, the status quo crowd who are the real neurotics. Despite the many ominous signs to the contrary we are in an age of tremendous socio-sexual changes.

As each of us gets down to work and uses his own sovereign power of thinking for himself just a little more actively than he did yesterday, as he resists a little more vigorously the numerous brain-washing cults of the day, he will hasten the time when society will glory in men's deviations and at the richness that this promises.

Nature has indicated the way for us, for never are two diatoms or two snowflakes just alike. Nature abhors conformity. Whatever be the samenesses and the interconnections it is diversity that is natural. Rigid controls are unnatural and, in the long run, self-defeating. Deviation is here to stay. Why not relax and enjoy it?

William Lambert, Associate Editor

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