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This book is a symposium about homosexuality, by workers in different fields, each of whom writes from his own particular standpoint. These different views are the outcome of the different ways in which the problem of homosexuality impinges upon workers trained according to those different disciplines. Sincerity of approach, and some perplexity, too, run through all the essays, which consider homosexuality in its relationship to the law, society, and to Christian morality, in that order.
Then follows a discourse upon the medical aspects of the problem, followed by an interesting section outlining the law as it relates to homosexuality in certain other Western European countries. This shows that there has been a gradual development of greater tolerance towards homosexuality between consenting adults, provided that such relationships do not outrage public decency. The seduction of young boys, however, is a much more knotty problem, and any easing of the stringency of the law has been curtailed because of anxiety lest the victim should be left dangerously unprotected. Medically the problem is complex, and the question arises as to whether or not all homosexuals are ill. Undoubtedly there are illnesses in which homosexuality may erupt as a symptom, and these illnesses have to be treated in their own right apart from the homosexuality. The problem in those facultative homosexuals who have the capacity to achieve heterosexual relationships is different from that in those who have not had even a flutter of heterosexuality. The rôles of uncovering the determinants of homosexuality and of supporting and strengthening conscious control over it are considered, but no fixed conclusion has been reached, nor could it have been in the present state of our knowledge. The section ends with an apposite quotation from the Medical Press: 'Those who lay down the law as regards sex seem to take it for granted that we know, in fact, what is normal and healthy, whereas we know onl