An English farmer who lived 200 years ago was more woke about homosexuality than many people today, according to an entry from his newly unearthed diary.
Matthew Tomlinson was a farmer in West Yorkshire in Northern England. In January 1810, he heard about a naval surgeon who had been executed for sodomy and took to his journal to express why he thought criminalizing homosexuality was wrong.
In England and Wales, homosexuality was punishable by death until 1861, when it was replaced with a prison sentence. Homosexual acts remained illegal until 1967, when it was finally decriminalized.
In the diary entry, Tomlinson reasoned that penalizing people, let alone killing them, for something that had been their “nature from childhood” was cruel.
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Wrote Tomlinson:
It appears a paradox to me, how men, who are men, shou’d possess such a passion; and more particularly so, if it is their nature from childhood (as I am informed it is) — If they feel such an inclination, and propensity, at that certain time of life when youth genders [i.e. develops] into manhood; it must then be considered as natural, otherwise, as a defect in nature … it seems cruel to punish that defect with death.
Tomlinson went on to question why God would create gay people and then dictate that they should be punished, writing:
It must seem strange indeed that God Almighty shou’d make a being, with such a nature; or such a defect in nature; and at the same time make a decree that if that being whome he had formed, shou’d at any time follow the dictates of that Nature with which he was formed he shou’d be punished with death.
The journal was discovered by Eamonn O’Keeffe, a researcher at the University of Oxford, who had been investigating the role of British military musicians played during the Napoleonic Wars of all things.
O’Keeffe says the discovery “enriches our understanding of Georgian attitudes towards sexuality” and suggests that maybe not everyone throughout history was as homophobic as we tend to think.
“While Tomlinson’s writings reflect the opinions of only one man, his phrasing – ‘as I am informed it is’ – implies that his comments were informed by the views of others,” O’Keeffe says.
Related: PHOTOS: Sexy gay farmer on why he loves being home on the range
lovethyneighbor
I’d say this man questions and sums up the issue with homosexuality nicely. He considered religion while thinking about the reasons men would desire another man. This man was amazing thinking far ahead of his time.
djmcgamester
Woke? Let’s drop the drama words of today and call it what it is: acceptance.
lioness65
How enlightening this is! Just to think that 200 years ago there were men who knew that it wasn’t right to punish gays for being what nature intended them to be. Great story that it is inspirational. It has the makings of a movie…or a novel. Thank you Queerty.
Joshooeerr
More to the point, he’d worked out that religion is a crock.
baggins435
It has always been wrong to assume the people who came before you were all unenlightened and prudes. A woman, living with her boyfriend for a couple of years without her family knowing, had finally accepted the boyfriend’s proposal and visited her parents to tell them. Her conservative dad asked, “well, don’t you think you ought to live together for a while first, to make sure it will work out?”
My parents had been married almost 20 years when mom accidently got pregnant with my youngest brother. Her mother did not take the news well, and went to dad’s mother in a huff. According to dad’s mother, she complained “I can’t believe they are still having sex as long as they’ve been married.” Dad’s mom replied “Hell, I still want to occasionally.”
sillyme
Who ever thought sex ended after you raise a family never looked around outside at the other people around them very well, my own father was still having sex even after I grew up and graduated High school and for years after that. I think that helped him get over some of his “grow up and be a man” attitude in life. He even helped finish raising his current wife’s 5 kids also.
radiooutmike
It’s nice to hear actual empathy from a religious person. The farmer does not understand the desire itself, but he says it would be unjust to kill them for expressing the desire whether it was natural or a defect of nature.
That end is so precious. Even if he thought it was a defect by God/nature; it was still unjust to execute them because that’s just the way they were. That is a much more nuanced line of reasoning. That even if they were defective, it would be wrong to kill them.
Daddo
It’s really quite comforting to think someone working on the land could be so in tune with nature in all aspects, especially 200 years ago.
I do occasionally get people asking, because they can’t comprehend more than can’t accept, how do you think you became gay.
I know some people would reply with.
What a stupid ####### question.
I’ve always looked for answers in most things in life, took many years to realise that answers aren’t always there.
One explanation I created for myself and I will say to people, when I think the situation is acceptable, is; homosexuality is a part of nature’s balance. It is as natural as heterosexuality. It is another way of keeping the world from being over populated. Just as heterosexuality is nature’s way of populating.
We are in a world of 7 billion, if we were all allowed to be as nature intended, instead of trying to go against nature, to fit in. I wonder just how big the population would actually be… There I go again, looking for answers…lol.