Psychiatrists who can read between the lines recognise in those murders the result of homosexual jealousy and infidelity.
In that respect the behavior of the two sexes seems slightly different.
"It is well known," remarks Havelock Ellis, "that the part taken by women generally in open criminality, and especially in crimes of violence, is small as compared with men. In the homosexual the conditions are to some extent reversed. Inverted men, in whom a more or less feminine temperament is so often found, are rarely impelled to acts of aggressive violence, though they frequently commit suicide. Inverted women, who may retain their feminine emotionality combined with some degree of infantile impulsiveness and masculine energy, present a favorable soil for the seeds of passional crime, under those conditions of jealousy and allied emotions which must so often enter the invert's life."
A Homosexual Tragedy. In a recent case in Chicago a homosexual woman shot her former roommate and then seriously wounded herself. They had roomed together and last fall the victim broke off the life together because the invert "was too affectionate." The victim went to her parents' house in the South to get rid of the invert. On her return to Chicago two months later she was bothered by the invert who insisted that she room with her. On April 22d she received a letter from the invert containing a bullet and a threat. Alarmed, she had the invert arrested, but the invert was discharged on promise she would not annoy the girl. The invert had a number of swagger sticks, one of which she carried each day. There is no account of her masculinity of attire. She wrote poems to her victim and made her presents including a diamond ring and a diamond studded watch, all of which were returned. There had been several threats of killing the victim, before the letter came, if she ended the friendship.
Women More Homosexual than Men. Remembering how the mother's fetishes affect us in the choice of a sexual mate we may expect to find more homosexualism in woman than in man. The facts bear up our theory. While the gross forms of homosexualism are less frequent among women, a thousand mild forms of it are observable in the behavior of even apparently very normal women.
The sentimental attachments of school girls for certain teachers, the pleasure which they derive from spending nights with some friend on whom they have a "crush," the thousand and one bodily caresses female friends shower on each other, the curiosity they manifest about each other's physical condition, their frequent bed room or bathroom conferences, are manifestations of a mild homosexualism, which, however, do not always lead to overt acts.
Boastfulness. Many homosexuals compensate for the scorn meted out to them by normal individuals with a certain proud boastfulness.
"We are supermen," one hears them say when they find a sympathetic listener, "we have reached beyond the usual, boresome, bourgeois form of gratification. Our intellect is nauseated by woman's silliness."
And the females say in their turn: "We are super-women, we have conquered the fear of man and we are tired of man's boorish ways."
Some of the male homosexuals who are bisexual, that is, can also be attracted by women, pride themselves over the mentality of the women they love. "Men have accustomed us to a higher intellectual level and to a more intelligent form of conversation," a homosexual said to me.