#anyone who is unconvinced about the existence of celibate queer people needs to read thomas gray's letters right away

[my-deer-friend]

"stick their dick"

Typical Virgin Tumblrina

I know you're trying to be hurtful and sarcastic but I'd like to thank you for making me nostalgic for my time at high school mumblemumble years ago, which was the last time I recall "virgin" being thrown around as an insult. I guess some things never change.

It's obvious that you've come across my post floating around in the wild, because if you were one of my followers you'd know the context relates to the way (18th century) queer history is critiqued – often held to an impossible standard of proving a sex act occurred before a historical figure can be "assigned gay" – and my frustration in the way expressions and non-sexual acts of love, desire, need, longing, heartache and more are dismissed as being "just the normal way friends were back then".

This positionality entirely ignores the many, many, many ways a historical person could have been queer even if they couldn't, didn't, or didn't want to have homosexual sex – off the top of my head, there are: asexuality, celibacy, fear of social stigma and legal punishment, gender confusion, experiencing romantic but not physical attraction to a specific person, disability, lack of opportunity, unreciprocated desire, internalised homophobic rhetoric about how "dirty" and "sinful" gay sex is.

It ALSO ignores the teensy little issue that we cannot prove a same-sex sex act occured at all. Heterosexual sex leaves traces – pregnancies – but since men in the 18th century faced the threat of shame, ostracisation, ruin and even death by execution for "sticking their dick" in another man, not a lot of them were writing it down when it happened. I'm not sure why my innocuous and pedestrian turn of phrase brought out this response from you, but if you prefer, please feel free to substitute "sodomise", "fornicate", or "engage in pederasty" (or "play backgammon", if you're feeling whimsical). In any case, I did intend to convey a sort of vulgarity or lewdness in the phrasing, on account of how puerile this academic discourse can get.

What delights me most, anon (other than the opportunity to write a few paragraphs about my favourite topic), is that your impulse on seeing something that annoyed you was not to spend a minute or two looking at my blog to see if you might have misconstrued me (normal behaviour), but rather to hop onto anon and send some amusingly off-piste trollish comments (Typical Tumblrina behaviour). Well done!