R E C E N T L Y Can actors (or wrestlers) be great leaders? (11/11/98) Forget Foucault; remember the facts (11/04/98) The dangers of the gay agenda Plus: Elizabeth Dole, Ayn Rand and Grace Jones (10/28/98) Take your thinking elsewhere! (10/21/98) Do Bill and Hillary swing? (10/13/98) - - - - - - - - - - A L S O About Camille Paglia Ask Camille archives - - - - - - - - - - C O L U M N I S T S The Reluctant Capitalist By Heather Chaplin Some people buy porn; I like to buy make-up -- in private (11/20/98) Left Hook By Joe Conason The GOP goes "liberal" (11/17/98) Unspun By Steve Erickson Democracy on life support (11/25/98) Right On! By David Horowitz Dictator of choice (11/23/98) Mr. Blue By Garrison Keillor What if the shame of whoring around becomes as intoxicating as the clandestine sex? (11/17/98) Word by Word By Anne Lamott Thanksgiving (11/25/98) Media Circus By Susan Lehman Boy story? (11/19/98) On Television By Joyce Millman Heart of "blue" (11/23/98) Under the Covers By James Poniewozik What kind of woman reads Playboy? (11/24/98) Let's Get This Straight By Scott Rosenberg Windows on the wane? (11/19/98) Home Movies By Charles Taylor From sweaty Nixon to gentleman gambler: The character actor you can't name and won't forget (11/16/98) Second Thoughts By Sallie Tisdale A modest proposal (11/19/98) Salon Columnists - - - - - - - - - - S A L O N E M P O R I U M FREE! 12-ounce bag of Salon Blend with a purchase of $30 or more. While supplies last.

A S K_C A M I L L E +|+ C A M I L L E+P A G L I A | PAGE 2 OF 3 --- Online advice for the culturally disgruntled --- Dear Camille: I am a 19-year-old sophomore in college who reads you avidly, and therefore admits to being a "gay" man in what seems to be a bisexual world. Using you as an atlas, I began experimenting with my bisexual side, fantasizing about women occasionally, and what have you. I soon found myself able to be aroused by the mental image of a naked woman, and of course, this scared me, yet intrigued me at the same time. You have often stated that humans are indeed capable of bisexual responsiveness, as opposed to a strict dichotomy between hets and homos. However, just as a straight male may be unsettled about being aroused by another man, shouldn't a gay male be just as befuddled when he succumbs to the power of women? I seem to be torn between my cravings for a strict gay-straight split and a need for a more ambiguous sense of sexuality. What is a gay boy to do nowadays? Post-gay in Providence Dear Post-gay: I'm delighted to hear that my sexual sermons are taking effect! You must realize that neither you nor anyone else was "born gay." Unless you are in the minuscule percentage of those suffering from innate endocrinological or developmental conditions, you were intended by Mother Nature to function heterosexually. That is your ancient heritage, which gay militants have tried to deny and hide from you. It is what connects you to the sensory experience of the overwhelming majority of men who have walked this earth. In an earlier period of limited resources and sparse population, you would probably have gone about procreating in a perfectly ordinary manner, with your cravings for male companionship satisfied by the group solidarity of hunting forays and warfare. But in this industrialized, urbanized era in the West, Ma Nature has put the brakes on. It's in her interest to keep overpopulation in check by letting homosexual impulses flourish. You should try to clarify for yourself the unique topography of your sexual landscape. There is a reason you "fall in love" with men, but nothing in the current gender-theory curriculum will help you find it. Your attraction to men relates to what your father gave or did not give you. Alas, in the marooned household of the middle-class nuclear family, individual fathers cannot supply everything a son needs to secure a stable masculine identity. Male homosexuality today is a quest for that missing term, just as it is also a recoil from the decline in glamour and appeal of female archetypes like mother and wife. My observations of the social scene -- which includes everything from academic and political debates to exchanges on the street or in grocery stores -- convince me that many young American men who call themselves gay these days have been suffocated by overclose attachments to strong-willed, self-supporting, but emotionally needy mothers, stranded by divorce or unsatisfactory marriages. White middle-class girls are so timid, conformist and undeveloped that they offer no meaningful alternative. They have never advanced beyond the sister archetype: Hence mating with them would be like incest. In this kind of dispiriting sexual climate, it's no wonder male homosexuality is attractive: The energy and definitiveness of male sexual expression seem like a blast of cold, clean air. But anyone genuinely interested in self-knowledge will try to break through habit and expand the range of his or her sexual and emotional responses. There is no better vehicle for this than art. Blessed be those who are equally ravished by the "Kritios Boy," the "Cnidian Aphrodite" and the "Farnese Hercules"! My advice: Follow your longings for men (caution: Avoid psychopaths!) but repossess your power with women, whose sexuality opens you to elemental forces of nature. The banality of American middle-class personalities today may be putting you off: Women from Latin America, southern Europe and Russia, for example, still have a sexual magnetism that our smarmy girly-girls (see "Ally McBeal") completely lack. Think global! N E X T_P A G E | Date-rape hysteria