Quote:The recent investigation started earlier this year after a video was posted on social media showing two male soldiers having sex. Since then, according to human rights groups and local media, at least 32 soldiers have been charged. The military declined to give a number. [...] President Moon Jae-in [...] saying that it was "still a little early to allow homosexuality within the military" on the ground that South Korean society was not ready for it.
There are instances of LGTB figures in older Korean history, but one can't say they were always approved due to the the 36th ruler of the Silla Dynasty who was slain by other noblemen because of his "femininity".
North Korea doesn't even formally recognize homosexual nomenclature (ergo no laws specifically barring it). The state treats instances of it as degenerate sex habits spread by foreign capitalists. Gays have been imprisoned and executed under the grounds of an ambiguous law that amounts to "being a menace to or against the socialist lifestyle". The second son in line for supreme leader was supposedly deemed too effeminate ("no good because he is like a little girl") and passed over for the youngest son Kim Jong-un, who was more masculine like his father (cigars, drinking, womanizing).
South Korea has conservative Christian influences, but in light of North Korea disparaging religion, the later homophobic Western influences are probably likewise just stoking erratic attitudes that were already present or semi-dormant in the culture. Around the world, when there are indigenous antipathies not connected to Abrahamic contamination, they seem to ancestrally stem and spread from the societies' warrior class or military elites in deep history who judged LGTB traits and behaviors as detrimental to the quality of fighting men.
But on the flip-side, of course, there were cultures in ancient Europe (Greece, Macedonia, Rome, etc) who felt homosexual bonding strengthened the soldiers. (With Alexander the Great amply demonstrating that even a world conqueror can be bisexual? [footnote]) Also the
Etoro and
Sambia peoples of New Guinea, wherein male-male sex rituals were an essential step in masculinity (mythical as their belief is). Becoming
outright pederasty as evaluated from Western perspective, when pre-adolescent males were involved in the practices revolving around ingesting and receiving the fluid of the tribal elders.
Hank Hyena: [...] Although many boys tremble initially ("I felt afraid... the penises were enormous," recalls Kalutuo, a Sambian from the Eastern Highlands) they all adjust quickly, because they believe semen is an elixir for manhood. Many tribes -- like the Etoro of the Papuan Plateau -- claim that semen does not even exist in boys until it is orally or anally "planted."
[...] The "butching" of Melanesian boys with homoerotic activity is not unique in the annals of history. Spartan soldiers were carnal tent-comrades when they conquered Greece in the Peloponnesian War. They believed genital bonding between buddies enhanced battlefield loyalty and valor. The warlike Romans -- Mediterranean masters for 500 years -- were also a pederastic people. Catullus' poems reveal that men seeking boys' bottoms were not regarded as sissies; the habit was at least as "studly" as pursuing women.
The aggressive, arrogant, sperm-sucking warriors of Melanesia would probably agree with Spartans and Romans that the current "gays in the military" phobia is laughably obtuse; physical love between GIs, they would suggest, is beneficent for morale. Gay male lust is often castigated as "feminizing" in Western society, but Melanesians in Herdt's studies refute this: the sole purpose of homosexuality in their culture is to create "a fierce warrior masculinity that is the inverse of femininity." -- Semen Warriors of New Guinea ... (alternate)
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[footnote] An Historian Goes To The Movies: [...] If that’s the case, why don’t any ancient authors explicitly say the men were lovers? One possible answer is that there was the same uncertainty about them as about Achilles and Patroclus. Which one of them was the erastes? Alexander was undoubtedly the higher status man, which means he ought to have been the lover, but Diogenes’ accusation carries the suggestion that Alexander was not the one in charge of the relationship. The idea that the greatest conqueror in the ancient world might have been the one getting penetrated would have been as shocking as it would be for a modern action hero in a film to be getting penetrated. But while Hephaestion was socially the inferior partner, he was still a full adult and a very important man, so he could not have been the receptive partner either. So perhaps ancient authors discretely passed over this question by simply talking about an intimate friendship and assuming the reader would draw the fairly obvious conclusion.
There’s no slam-dunk proof that Alexander carpe’d the diem with Hephaestion. Given the evidence, I think it makes sense to assume that he did, and that in modern terms he was bisexual. But it’s possible that he was, in modern terms, straight and merely enjoyed a very close friendship with Hephaestion. The gay community wants to reclaim as much of its history as possible, and having one of the greatest conquerors in world history in our camp carries considerable symbolism, as those Greek lawyers understood. But wanting Alexander to be gay is not proof that he actually was, and we’ll probably just have to accept that, as with so many other details of his personality, we can’t completely resolve the issue. --Was Alexander Gay?