Today we bring you another list inspired by one of those ’60s faux sociological studies of human sexuality penned by a pulp fiction author pretending to be a doctor. Last week we looked at 1963’s “A New Look At The Lesbian,” and this week we bring you 1966’s The Lesbian Handbook. This paperback comes to us from Dale Brittenham, M.D., one of many names used by the esteemed author of Campus Sexpot and Appointment by Sex, who began his career as a writer after losing his job as a high school English teacher for having affairs with his students.
Below are statements about lesbian sexuality ripped mercilessly out of context. This book promised specifically to expose “lesbian activity in all its deviant forms,” by which they meant, of course, “sex.” All the case studies contained wherein and quoted below were most likely completely fabricated. I’m sure you’ll find it very educational.
18 Keen Insights On Lesbian Sexuality From The Lesbian Handbook, including sections from fabricated “case studies” of “real lesbians.”
1. If several women are assembled together in prison, their erotic indecency, even when they are closely watched, increases in cubic ratio; and when they are locked up together, scenes take place which far surpass the compass of any imagination.
2. They had sex in the bedroom of each of the girls when no one was home, they had sex in barns, in wooded areas, and finally they discovered the place they could be alone almost certainly: in the church.
3. The main attraction of the circus is the sight of lesbians making love on stage, in full view of everyone in the audience.
4. Some lesbians take only the feminine role in lovemaking, allowing themselves to be loved without ever once really taking the active role with their partners. These women are called femmes, and their appearance is often deceiving.
5. There are women who would rather do almost anything else under the sun than engage in intercourse with a man.
6. Two women will meet, find themselves infatuated with each other, and from there they make the move to establish a permanent relationship, living together and enjoying sex as often as they wish. But since they are both unstable to begin with, it is almost certain that the affair will be short-lived.
7. Parents of teen-age girls in the Hollywood area are warned to be certain that their daughters do not engage in conversation with strange women, for there have been many cases of lesbian seduction begun through just such an innocent-looking encounter.
8. She said she had always been indifferent toward men. In fact, she avoided balls. Female statues pleased her.
9. Before the declaration of love is made, there may be an elaborate courtship, with the active lesbian behaving much like a moonstruck adolescent boy.
10. It is true that sapphism is also to be met with in quite young girls, but only if they live in houses of prostitution or in girls’ colleges.
11. Breast stimulation is the most frequently encountered form of sexual indulgence found among lesbians.
12. The girls who are susceptible to seduction are, of course, the ones who are willing to engage in conversations with lesbians on the make.
13. Lesbians showed a higher incidence of successful orgasm than comparable groups of married women, which might at first appear surprising until it is remembered that a woman is more likely to understand the physical nature of her parter in love when that partner is another woman than is a man, and she is more likely to understand feminine psychology.
14. This woman was also somewhat sadistic, for she would bite and scratch Cora around the waist and on the shoulder. Cora felt this made the whole affair quite unpleasant, but she was disappointed when it stopped.
15. The woman initiated the practice of mutual masturbation, and they would spend hours in mutual embraces whenever they had the opportunity.
16. They have sex almost every day, and each encounter takes from five to six hours. The nurse takes that long to make one climax, but Sharon is able to have as many as fifteen during the course of their lovemaking.
17. Most lesbians do not utilize their bodies in a direct way for stimulation most of the time. Their sexual energy is drained off through caresses, hand holding, and other seemingly innocent activities.
18. It is significant that many of the girls who are thus brought into contact with lesbianism offer little or no resistance to the love that is offered.
“This paperback comes to us from Dale Brittenham, M.D., one of many names used by the esteemed author of Campus Sexpot and Appointment by Sex, who began his career as a writer after losing his job as a high school English teacher for having affairs with his students.”
So shouldn’t this be re-titled “The Ezbian Handbook” then? Ezra Fitz, I have found your back-up career.
Ahahahahaha, this made me laugh.
Hahahah. These are hilarious!
17. Hand holding while maintaining intense eye contact definitely counts as lesbian sex, right?
Number 13’s gotta be true.
brb running off to join the circus
I literally ran away to join the circus. People questioned it. I question it occasionally. It all makes sense now.
“She said she had always been indifferent toward men. In fact, she avoided balls.”
Wow. This explained everything to me: I’ve been avoiding balls! (I must say, Cora in #14 sounds pretty conflicted. Maybe she needs more of the stimulation from #11. Or something.)
Honestly some of these are true for me and my girlfriend…
Here that, femmes? We’re ALL pillow princesses!! What a relief, I’ve been doing it wrong this whole time. Now I guess lying next to my also-femme girlfriend is going to be proper sex.
*Hear that
*chuckles* There has always been the long running joke about lesbian sheep. As in, scientists find the incidence of homosexuality in all animals of every species except there are no lesbian sheep, none at all – and that majorly puzzles them. Why? And the breakthrough comes with a realisation the sexual arousal behavious of female sheep is to stand still and do nothing…
#3 – is THAT what happened at the A-Camp carnival? I haven’t been able to bring myself to read the recamps.
It was the best day…
“There are women who would rather do almost anything else under the sun than engage in intercourse with a man.”
YUP.
yup
#17 is exactly what my mom thinks happens during lesbian sex
I would be more inclined to get over my issues with clowns if circuses were really like that
If femmes tend to not take an active role, it would appear that there is no such thing as a submissive butch from this article. Hey, sweet. I don’t exist!
Is it just me or does submissive butch sound ridiculously hot?!
Oh hai
Did they issue you the book or did you have to buy it after you were recruited? ;-)
I curious to know how #7 came about. And which circus has said lesbians, because all I have seen at the circus is animals that look unhappy.
it was a thing in Paris, apparently?
riese, i’m really enjoying this insightful, highly educational new series
i mean, i love learning everything there is to know about our “history” and “nature”
I can’t even with the one about femmes.
“If several women are assembled together in prison, their erotic indecency, even when they are closely watched, increases in cubic ratio; and when they are locked up together, scenes take place which far surpass the compass of any imagination.”
Sam Healy must have read this book.
Who are these women who have five to six hours daily to spend having sex… I think Autostraddle needs to run a column on time management for all of us who just can’t find that sort of time allowance!
Well, since we’re all delinquents we don’t have “jobs”. So then that opens up the timetable so to speak for all of the marathon sex sessions we started having do to being raised in houses of ill repute and going to girl’s colleges and/or the circus.
#2 made me think of A-Camp and OITNB, respectively.
As for #9 and #10, well…
I really enjoy the phrase “ripped mercilessly out of context”.
thank you mary
“They had sex in the bedroom of each of the girls when no one was home, they had sex in barns, in wooded areas, and finally they discovered the place they could be alone almost certainly: in the church.”
Someone’s been watching Orange Is The New Black.
“7. Parents of teen-age girls in the Hollywood area are warned to be certain that their daughters do not engage in conversation with strange women, for there have been many cases of lesbian seduction begun through just such an innocent-looking encounter.”
Shane much?
yes, i honestly thought to myself, “if this was a different kind of list, a shane gif would go perfectly after that statement”
Noooo resistanaaaaance. NOOOOO RESISTANCE. You will give us NOOOO RESISTANCE.
Welcome….to Night Vale.
What actual psychiatrists of this period were saying was sometimes even sadder/sillier/funnier. Check out George Devereux, “The Nature of Sappho’s Seizure in Fr. 31 LP as Evidence of Her Inversion,” _The Classical Quarterly_, n.s., 20 (May 1970): 17–31, http://www.jstor.org/stable/637501, which you can now read online for free without institutional affiliation, thanks at least in part to the noble sacrifice of الشهيد Aaron Swartz, عليه السلام.
The book seems great, but when are they making the movie? I want to see the movie!
#8 is entirely me