A relationship between members
of the same sex characterized by the expressions of the affection,
commitment, and intimacy associated with romantic love, but without the
sex. Such relationships were common between men in England prior to
1700, but the emergence of the effeminate molly
subculture then made professions of intimacy between men suspect, and
Englishmen developed a self-consciously masculine interpersonal reserve in
their relationships with each other.
The early United States lacked
the effeminate urban subcultures of England and Europe, so male romantic
friendships lasted longer in America. Medical models of homosexuality
came to American attention around 1900 and they attributed ardent friendship
between men to inner homosexuality. Under
the influence of this new definition of male intimacy, male romantic
friendship waned in the U. S., and the former professions of undying love
that typified so much of the correspondence between young men in the 1800s
ceased.
During the modern period,
women enjoyed more freedom to pursue romantic friendships than men did
because few imagined that women could or would have sex with each
other. Sexual desire was thought to be rare in women, and many men
could not imagine a sexual act that didn't involve a penis. Female
romantic friendship was well enough accepted that female households were
widely known, and suffered little disparagement, except perhaps pity
that women had been unable to find husbands. The advent of medical
models sounded the death-knell for these relationships, too, since
doctors from Westphal to Freud
agreed that women drawn too much to their own kind are probably perverts.
