Page:Autobiography of an Androgyne 1918 book scan.djvu/162

132 Some of their number who looked upon a fairie as necessarily a monster of wickedness—for why otherwise would the law place upon his sexual conduct a penalty of ten years in state's prison?—gave me several severe thrashings, so that I always visited the Square in great fear, but took the risk for the affection that I had for those who were glad to have me talk and coquet with them.

The following was my extreme suffering at their hands: I happened to be one evening seated alone on a park bench. Several of my enemies discovered and surrounded me. Very much frightened I attempted to leave, but they would not permit it. They stuck pins into me, inflicted slight burns with lighted matches, and pinched me unmercifully, particularly the penis. There were policemen within hailing distance, but I was told I would be arrested if I called for help. I was entirely innocent, but the police would have believed the false testimony against me of a half-dozen accusers. When satisfied with wreaking their vengeance, they turned me over to a policeman with charges, but he simply ordered me out of the park. Seemingly the higher the standard of morality of adolescents as at present trained, the greater the physical violence that they inflict on fairies. One lecturer to students on personal purity whom I heard counselled his adolescent hearers to give a blow in the face to any associate who ever suggested homosexuality.

I wish here to emphasize the fact that there would be no risk of the spread of homosexual practices through the removal of the legal penalties attached to them and the consequent removal, at least in large part, of the practice