Richard von Krafft-Ebing (1840–1902) was interested in sexual perversions; his
major book Psychopathis Sexualis(1886, 1998) (“sexual psychopathology”) was a
study of sex crimes. It was Krafft-Ebing who first observed and labeled fetishes and
“perversions,” which he defined as any nonprocreative sexual activities or any activ-
ity in which women took an active role: Women should never experience sexual desire
of any kind. He believed that all perversions and fetishes were caused by masturbation.
Havelock Ellis (1859–1939) came to very different conclusions from Krafft-Ebing.
His six-volume Studies in the Psychology of Sex(1896–1910), the largest sex research
ever undertaken, argued that masturbation was harmless, same-sex behavior was per-
fectly normal, and women had a strong sex drive and could actually have orgasms
of their own. Unlike his contemporaries, Ellis believed that sex was normal, natural,
and “good.” Sexual pleasure, he wrote, is “the chief and central function of life—
ever wonderful and ever lovely.”
Ellis’s ideas were contradicted by his contemporary, Sigmund Freud. While he also
believed that sexual desire is among the great driving forces of life, Freud argued that
civilization requires that we redirect our sexual energies toward productive pursuits. This
process of redirection he called sublimation. Freud believed that same-sex desire was
caused by a developmental abnormality, the failure of the child to fully identify with the
same-sex parent (because this was much easier for girls than for boys, there were far
fewer lesbians than gay men). However, he did believe that gay men and les-
bians were capable of being fully functioning and happy members of society.
Magnus Hirschfeld (1868–1935) was the first systematic collector of
sexual data in Germany. Hirschfeld believed that people are born bisex-
ual—capable of experiencing sexual pleasure with both women and men.
As they develop, they lose their same-sex desire and become exclusively
heterosexual. On the other hand, he believed that gay men (but not les-
bians) were a third sex, with masculine bodies but feminine spirits, so their
interest in other men was actually a type of heterosexuality.
In 1903, Hirschfeld undertook the first sex survey in history, and he
found that 2.2 percent of the German population was gay. Hirschfeld
founded the Institute of Sex Research in Berlin in 1919, began a scholarly
journal, and held international conferences. Both gay and Jewish, Hirschfeld
was increasingly a target of Nazi persecution, and in 1933, his offices were
stormed by Nazi troops and all his books and papers destroyed.
Modern Sex Research
After World War II, the center of sex research moved from Europe to the
United States. At Indiana University, a zoologist named Alfred Kinsey
(1884–1956) had been asked to teach a new course on sexuality and mar-
riage. Realizing there was little reliable information, he set about gather-
ing data on American sexual behavior.
The Kinsey Reports.A scientist, Kinsey was determined to study sexual
behavior, unclouded by morality. Eventually he and his colleagues at
the Institute for Sex Research collected sexual histories from 18,000
Americans. His books were for many years the definitive works on
American sexual behavior (Kinsey et al., 1948, 1953).
So as not to confuse behaviors with identities or ideology, Kinsey
asked what sorts of “outlets” people used to have orgasms: masturba-
tion, oral sex, anal sex, or coitus? With male or female partners? How
often? Under what circumstances?
RESEARCHING SEXUALITY 327Some of America’s most prominent health
reformers of the nineteenth century were
preoccupied with curtailing sexual
activity. They believed changes in diet
could and should stop adolescent boys
from masturbating, which would weaken
their bodies and drain their brains. No one
was more obsessed than J. H. Kellogg,
who invented the corn flake to reduce
sexual impulses among young American
men. In his advice manual, Plain Facts for
Old and Young(1888), he warned parents
of 39 signs that young men might be
masturbating. (These included acne,
slouching posture, using tobacco, desire
for solitude, confusion, and talking back
to one’s parents.) Worried parents were
counseled to take some rather chilling
steps to stop their children, including
bandaging the genitals, covering the sex
organs with small cages, tying their
children’s hands to the bedposts, or, more
drastically, circumcising the boys “without
administering an anesthetic” or, for girls,
applying carbolic acid directly on the
clitoris. “It is better to endure any
physical discomfort than to sacrifice one’s
chastity,” wrote one physician (Kellogg,
1888; see Kimmel, 1996, pp. 129–131).Didyouknow