[Marxism] Robert Duncan's "The Homosexual in Society"

[Louis Proyect]

In my review of Paul Buhle and Harvey Pekar’s “The Beats”, I referred to 
Robert Duncan’s essay “The Homosexual in Society” that appeared in 
Dwight Macdonald’s journal Politics in 1944. This seminal gay liberation 
document certainly deserves to be available on the Internet and so I 
have scanned it in from Duncan’s “A Selected Prose” that was published 
in 1990.

A word or two about Dwight Macdonald is in order. He was a Shachtmanite 
who eventually dropped any pretensions to Marxism and embraced a mixture 
of anarchism, liberalism and pacifism. He was also bitterly 
anti-Communist and even hooked up for a while with the CIA-backed 
Congress for Cultural Freedom. When the 60s radicalization began, 
Macdonald reverted to the radical politics of his youth to some extent 
and became part of a cadre of high-profile intellectuals who opposed the 
Vietnam War (Norman Mailer and Mary McCarthy were two other notables.)

The inclusion of Duncan’s essay in Macdonald’s journal in 1944 opens up 
some interesting avenues for research. As far as I know, the Trotskyist 
movement was pretty bad on gay issues. Cannon’s group was worse than 
Shachtman’s—at least that is what I would suspect. If Macdonald was 
open-minded enough to challenge the prevailing homophobia on the left, 
you have to wonder what else was appearing in the pages of his magazine.

Leon Trotsky supposedly once said that “Everyone has the right to be 
stupid, but comrade Macdonald abuses the privilege”. This remark 
reportedly delighted Macdonald. I can only say that at least on the gay 
question, Macdonald holds up very well.

Duncan’s essay anticipates many of the gay liberation themes that would 
be articulated after the Stonewall rebellion, despite a certain 
defensiveness expressed in terms of his disapproval of the “homosexual 
cult” and “camp”.

Originally appeared in Politics, I, 7 (August 1944). The revisions were 
made in 1959. The expanded version was first published in Jimmy & Lucy’s 
House of “K,” 3 (January 1985).

The Homosexual in Society

INTRODUCTION

Seymour Krim has urged me to reprint this early essay as “a pioneering 
piece,” assuring me “that it stands and will stand on its own feet.” At 
the time it was printed (Politics, August 1944) it had at least the 
pioneering gesture, as far as I know, of being the first discussion of 
homosexuality which included the frank avowal that the author was 
himself involved; but my view was that minority associations and 
identifications were an evil wherever they supersede allegiance to and 
share in the creation of a human community good—the recognition of 
fellow-manhood.

full: 
http://louisproyect.wordpress.com/2009/05/02/robert-duncans-the-homosexual-in-society/