(a) The anatomy of the mildly androgynous is not conspicuously feminine. Only a few feminine traits appear in the psyche. The mildly androgynous always mingle with full-fledged males and seek to pass as such themselves. As a cloak, they are prone to fabricate about excesses cum femina. But while secretly preferring homosexual romance, they are capable of espousing a woman and begetting children. |The Ultra-Androgynous.| Sexologists have therefore called them “psychic hermaphrodites.”
(b) In ultra-androgynes alone, the physique is noticeably feminesque, and the psyche predominantly feminine. As a rule, they alone have a craze to decorate themselves in feminine finery and spread paint and powder on their faces. They tend to avoid the society of full-fledged males except to display to a tremendously virile coterie—to whom they are generally incognito—their skill in female-impersonation.
Unless otherwise indicated I shall use the terms “androgyne” and “pseudo-man” only in reference to the ultra-androgynous. All my androgyne associates whom I shall portray in this book belong to this class, because with a few exceptions they alone are Female-Impersonators. In my Riddle of the Underworld I describe some mild androgynes.
There exists vast diversity in the anatomy and psyche of androgynes—just as, from the standpoint of size and shape of the genitalia and sexual tastes, any two full-fledged males or any two full-fledged females differ more or less. In one androgyne, the only conspicuous external feminine stigma may be absence of beardal growth; in another, mammary glands; in another, the complete skeleton or the complete muscular system of the female. The one physical feminine stigma that is indispensable to the possession of a decidedly feminine psyche and the quasi-female method of sexual expression is the female variety of brain protoplasm. For there have probably lived naturally beardless men, males possessing milk glands or sissie voices, etc., who have nevertheless not been at all homosexual. But such are exceptions to the rule.
A Medical Superstition.
While an earmark of ultra-androgynism is sexual passivity, the mildly androgynous may be active pederasts or mutual onanists. Only in the case of ultra-androgynes are the individual’s genitalia entirely divorced—as a rule—from the sexual life. For them, Nature has substituted other organs.
Ultra-androgynes are, by birth, practically identical with males castrated in early childhood, except that adult artificial eunuchs are usually overlarge. Adult ultra-androgynes tend merely to plumpness as a result of their dwarfed genitalia.
I have heard of ultra-androgynes, who, in their early twenties, on their physician’s advice, married a woman, when Nature intended they should marry a man. All high-minded “homosexualists,” soon after arrival at puberty, consult a medical man for a cure. From time immemorial it has been one of the profession’s superstitions that marriage would cure homosexual tendencies. Some unsophisticated adolescent androgynes put faith in their physician’s positive assurance that marriage is a sure cure. If, as a matter of conscience alone, the androgyne promises the physician to marry, he sometimes goes insane over the dread of it, or else commits suicide, either on the eve of marriage, or a few days afterward. But even if the marriage ceremony is performed, the consummation never takes place in the case of ultra-androgynes, and the wedded state proves very unhappy for both parties. At least in the case of the ultra-androgynes, such marriage possesses no curative value. Chronic and extreme homosexuality is congenital and incurable. It is monstrous to advise even a mild androgyne to marry, and thus contribute to propagating a line of |Hermaphrodites.| unhappy and unwelcome bisexuals down through the centuries.
The two classes of androgynes do not mix well. Just as the full-fledged man is averse to attendance at a ladies’ sewing-circle. Particularly the mildly androgynous fear suspicion of their secret if they associated with ultra-androgynes. Coteries of ultra-androgynes naturally form. Knowing their own nature, they readily recognize one another, although down to 1921 at least, the sexually full-fledged have usually been blind to the androgynism of daily associates, because they were never permitted to learn of their existence.
(6) Pseudo-Hermaphrodites are humans possessing in part both the male and the female genitalia, or else organs so deformed that even sexologists are unable to determine the sex until puberty. In half such cases, the physician then pronounces the individual to belong to the sex other than that with which he or she has identified him or herself. As a rule, they subsequently live and clothe themselves per prescription. But some, accustomed to the dress and usages of their first sex, choose to identify themselves with it throughout life.