Educational film producer Sid Davis released countless “cautionary tales” over the span of the 1950’s and ’60’s, one of the most notorious being the film Boys Beware (1961). XGW mentioned the film in a brief posting in 2006 when Davis died. It shows predatory men targeting young boys for sexual gratification, warning the audience that homosexuals are on the loose. The film includes such quotable gems as:
What Jimmy didn’t know was that Ralph was sick. A sickness that was not visible like smallpox, but no less dangerous and contagious — a sickness of the mind. You see, Ralph was a homosexual: a person who demands an intimate relationship with members of their own sex.
One never knows when the homosexual is about. He may appear normal and it may be too late when you discover he is mentally ill.
The entire film is a fallacy, in that it equates homosexuality with pedophilia – the condition in which a person, male or female, seeks out sexual relationships with prepubescents. Homosexuals seek out relationships in the same manner as heterosexuals, with sexually mature people, engaging in romantic courtship and often seeking mutual lifetime commitment. The film also equates homosexuality with an obsession with sex. But perhaps the biggest shortcoming of the film itself is that it ignores the fact that female pedophiles and child molesters exist, failing to warn young boys of this very real danger.
Watching the movie, it’s easy to dismiss it as old-fashioned and a testament to the ignorance of the time. But today anti-gay groups have diverged little from the basic themes: That homosexuals are dangerous to children, obsessed with sex, and are sick (and therefor need to be cured) – providing a need for ex-gay groups. In addition, ex-gay and anti-gay groups are focused especially on male homosexuality, despite the existence of homosexual women.
[googlevideo]https://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6328986021541085902&ei=QnfNSO27CJSyrgLG6tXJAg&q=boys+beware&hl=en[/googlevideo]
Well of course they don’t focus on women, because all women need to be happy is to be forced to submit to a man. Jesus would wanted it that way. In fact the bible DOES have some passages about female slaves…so go out and do the biblical thing.
And yes I am being sarcastic, also love how they arrest the kid too WTF was up with that.
Although, of course, it’s now well out of date, this film would have been a very good warning against paedophiles and sexual predators if only it hadn’t equated such people with “homosexuals”. In my experience this confusion has sometimes served as a smokescreen which has protected the former group from discovery. It is also quite likely to have had a pernicious effect on gay teenagers as they were becoming aware of their sexual orientation: “Is that the sort of person that I’m growing up to be?” There may just possibly have been an excuse for such ignorance back then, although I’m not sure about that; there is certainly none now.
Perhaps a new, updated version should now be made, in which all mention of “homosexuals” has been excised and replaced by more appropriate language. It could also include some cautionary tales for gay teenagers about the risks of falling into the hands of vicious homophobics and of being enticed into ex-gay programmes.
Oh, we have to beware, just not apparently of homosexuals:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-fAKo-i4jpQ