DAVID:
Yes, what is acceptable to entertain yourself on a cold winter's night... and perhaps that’s what we’re discussing: what molesters and those who obsess over them have in common: delusion versus reality, the desire for fantasy as an escape, a way to supercharge a dull reality, which might be what religion does too. It’s possibly okay in law to fantasize about molesting children, or even to be deluded that other people are doing so. Then again, child pornography -- even wholly digital images created on a computer without any real children -- is worse than illegal: it's perceived as a kind of scourge. As if everyone's doing it, or as if it has the power to somehow undermine God, family, and country.

DAN:
Perhaps it's the power of the taboo that makes it so appealing, both to the molesters and the prosecutors. I wonder if there's a certain frisson associated with the whole drama. It's exciting just to be a part of it.

[2]

DAVID:
Since we’re talking about this with Zeek in mind, I wonder what the Jewish angle is. Is fantasizing in this way ok with Jewish law? And does this abuse have a Jewish meaning or just a human meaning? Theoretically, it seems to me that Jews are not as caught up in the mythical drama of guilt and redemption in the way the Catholic priests are. That our religion prides itself on being one of reason and laws and not a mystery religion - especially not one that makes sex a dark secret and trains a class of men who are “virgins” for whom sex is completely mysterious. Part of me wonders if Christianity is uniquely suited to encouraging this sort of behavior.

DAN:
Maybe, but we are talking about Jews behaving badly, so I suppose it’s human nature.

DAVID:
Yeah but there are systems that encourage more or less abuse and bad behavior. Isn’t that what we liberals believe? That social systems matter and human nature isn’t fixed?

DAN:
Are we both liberals?

DAVID:
A doomed species.

DAN:
But even if I agree, there is some predisposition in some people to hurt, and abuse. It’s too universal a trait to remove.
DAVID:
And so when tied to religion, what is it? A desire to escape reality?

DAN:
Well here’s a story: about 15 years after I left school, one of my “homeroom teachers” was accused, and I think convicted, of molesting students. Such a cliché, a Latin teacher in an all boys' school.

DAVID:
Had he been doing it all the time since you'd been there?

DAN:
That's the odd thing - the suit was brought about by someone who had been at the school when I was there, probably someone in my year or one either side of it. But they had to keep his identity secret.

DAVID:
So it was someone you knew?

DAN:
It must have been, but I still don't know who it was. The thing was, there's so much sexual tension at a boys' school, and the teacher was well known as being effeminate. So you could say that "everyone knew." But actually, no-one knew of any actual events apart from sitting around giggling at Latin texts. Everything at a big school is surrounded by a fog of uncertainties and rumours and there are a million ways of being gay, and the typologies are different again at a boys' school. So our Latin teacher was effeminate, but erudite, fun, and popular with a group of boys who were known to us, in his class, as "the bum chums."

DAVID:
Original and enlightened choice of nicknames.

DAN:
Anyway, here's my dilemma about that whole thing. Boys used the UB40 song “One in Ten” to tease each other about being gay – “If he’s gay there must be two more – and maybe you’re one.” My class was the only one in the school where our “quota” was openly fulfilled. In my class of 30 boys, 3 were out and proud from a very early age, and at least one other became "openly" gay right after leaving school. This led to some weird and unpleasant incidents that reflected more on other people's insecurities than on those boys. So, without knowing anything about the merits of the case it's totally believable for me that the whole incident never happened. Imagine if the rhetoric of "the bum chums" played on someone's mind for 15 years -- God knows, there were enough people at that school who never thought about sexuality in anything approaching an open or healthy way. It's easy to imagine how someone might believe in something that never happened outside his mind -- thoughts are just so real, not least when you are at school AND there were pretty strong rumors that if there had been any molestation it was by another teacher. So, at the same time as wanting to believe the victim, I also know the situation a little and I can see it from another point of view as well. Rumor was that “Poof” Cooke was already on his last warning.

DAVID:
You said there were weird and unpleasant incidents that happened because your classmates were gay...?

DAN:
Well one day Lewis, a Jewish boy - someone I played football, er, soccer, with - came to the door of our room and pulled a very public moonie in the general direction of Barry and said something to the effect of "Cop a load of that, gay boy." For me, that was about the most fucked-up abusive moment in school.

DAVID:
That doesn’t seem so bad – I’ve heard of people who were beaten up, peed on, and worse.

DAN:
The shock of it was that it happened in a place of collegiality and chat. I went to a private high school with a uniform, a strict sense of discipline but – more to the point – with a group of people who were at school together for six years. I see nightmare US high schools on TV but this was a pretty civilized place that had come to terms with its different groups. There was plenty of racism and homophobia but this came from someone who was not the equivalent of a jock – this was a Jewish bloke who ended up at Cambridge.

[1]       2       [3]       [next->] Image: Hila Lulu Lin

From previous issues:

I Still Believe that People are Good at Heart
Jay Michaelson

Eminem & Class Rage
Dan Friedman

Playing Eve
Hila Ratzabi

Web www.zeek.net