Jack Malebranche got his first job at 13, working the line in a turkey slaughterhouse during the holiday season. He’s been an office manager, a public relations hack, a bad salesman, a worse waiter, a burger flipper, a coffee slinger, a cubicle dweller, a stockboy, a barback, a pastry cook, a go-go dancer, a nightclub promoter and the graveyard shift desk attendant at a seedy residence hotel.

Raised in the bosom of Amish country in rural Pennsylvania, he’s since lived in New York City, San Francisco and Los Angeles, and has had ample opportunity to observe homosexuals in the wild. He currently lives in Portland, Oregon, where he paints, works in warehouses and sells velvet portraits of an unsavory nature.

Jack Malebranche is an ordained Priest in The Church of Satan, and more information on Jack can be found at his website, www.jackmalebranche.com

Jack's new book is Androphilia: A Manifesto. Rejecting the Gay Identity, Reclaiming Masculinity.

In Jack Malebranche's Androphilia, the word gay has never described mere homosexuality. Gay is a subculture, a slur, a set of gestures, a slang, a look, a posture, a parade, a rainbow flag, a film genre, a taste in music, a hairstyle, a marketing demographic, a bumper sticker, a political agenda and philosophical viewpoint. Gays and radical queers imagine that they challenge the status quo, but in appropriating the stigma of effeminacy, they merely conform to and confirm long-established expectations. Androphilia is for those men who never really bought what the gay community was selling; it's a challenge to leave the gay world completely behind and to rejoin the world of men, unapologetically, as androphliles, but more importantly, as men."

Jack spoke with Mark Adnum via email in March 2007.

MARK ADNUM: Jack, the key part of your Androphilia manifesto is that gay men return to masculinity, and move away from "gayness". Yet a defining element of masculinity, or "manhood", is the pursuit and acquisition of as much sex with as many different partners as possible. It's one of the few things that modern gay men still excel at and so in this sense, even the most effeminate of gay men are, fundamentally,super-masculine. What's your view?

JACK MALEBRANCHE: I wouldn't say that, based on the fact that they are often highly promiscuous, extremely effeminate gay men could be rationally defined as 'super-masculine.'

I would say that a desire for multiple partners is typically male. An increased sex drive, a highly visual sexual focus, the way we objectify sexual partners and sex itself--all of these things are part of the male experience. Along with other biological factors that scientists are just beginning to either understand or finally admit, our male bodies, brains and hormones shape how we experience and perceive the world around us. Being male entails more than a bit of external plumbing.

Your question here is interesting because so many of those same effeminate gay males embrace the idea that gender is meaningless, a construct, a mere pose, a form of drag. Or they believe that they are androgyne--part of some mythical 'third gender.' Yet, in most cases, I don't see anything authentically female about their behavior--I see a hackneyed, performed caricature of the least admirable qualities associated with women. Even the most effeminate gay males share this experience of maleness with other males, and the example of sex drive illustrates how very male they typically are. I don't believe that most homosexual males are truly 'hermaphrodites of the soul,' an offensive notion popularized in the 19th century by the earliest homosexual advocates and one that is still far too pervasive among homos today.

Manhood has, in every society I can think of including ours, meant a lot more to most men than sex drive and sexual conquests. Virility and fertility have always been obvious and important components of manhood and they always will be. But isn't it possible to describe a man as highly masculine without knowing a thing about his sex life? Is there no such thing as a manly priest? If a soldier takes a vow of celibacy for religious or philosophical reasons yet he carries himself like a man, exhibits honor and strength and courage in the face of real physical danger, would we not call him manly? Don't we often make a determination about a man's masculinity without any information about his sexual history? When we ask a man to be more manly, are we simply asking him to go bang a lot of bitches, or are we asking him to take responsibility for his actions? To be more self-reliant? To carry himself with strength and dignity? To stop whining?

Many gays and some feminists are quick to dismiss masculinity as being indefinable or completely malleable, and cite superficial differences between cultures as evidence to support these theories. But I can't recall any cultures that have traditionally associated masculinity with submission, dependence or weakness. In Androphilia, I discussed different aspects of masculinity. Essential masculinity seems to be a fairly consistent cluster of ideas that all have a relationship to strength or dominance--concepts that grow naturally from the fact that males are naturally stronger and tend on average to be far more aggressive and competitive than females.

Effeminate behavior is a rejection of masculinity, a rebellion against codes of masculinity. On some level, effeminate gays know this to be true. They emasculate themselves willingly and often proudly. Isn't every obviously exaggerated swish down a public street a big, half-conscious "fuck you" to every man who ever told a sensitive boy to "walk like a man?" The only time flamboyant queens want to be thought of as men in the conceptually loaded sense of the word (as opposed to the general biological sense) is when someone excludes them from the ranks of men in the context of an insult or criticism. This is when gays scramble to redefine manhood according to their convenience.

For most men, manhood is more of an aspirational ideal. A common truism in the gay community is that drag queens are in some way more manly than more butch types and straight men. This is completely absurd relativism, but some people seem to think it's witty and I hear it repeated all the time. Effeminacy is the polar opposite of masculinity, if the popular definitions of those words mean anything at all. To describe males who celebrate their own emasculation as being super-masculine is contradictory, no matter how horny those males happen to be.



I agree with you that "Gay Is Dead". I think it only was alive for a few brief years before AIDS. The whole thing has next to no meaning these days. But all people, all communities, need their fetishes, their community-idiosyncratic celebrations. If, as you recommend, gays dispense with bear culture, dance parties and so on (we could only hope), what do you suggest that hey coagulate around instead?

'Coagulate' is an interesting word to apply to gay culture. It brings to mind a blood clot--something that stops progress and, when it reaches critical mass, explodes, and generally kills off its host or turns him into a blithering idiot.

The most sensible homos I've met have by and large been fellas who, whether they were masculine or even quite effeminate, were fairly critical of the gay identity and the idea of a gay community. Outrate.net also interviewed Bruce LaBruce--he's one of those rare homos who presents himself as something of a queen but who actually thinks for himself and has his own inventive take on things.

The fags who really cling to their gayness--to their belonging in this big social group called 'gay'--so often seem to be perpetually adolescent or stunted in some way, or programmed and hollow like members of some campy rainbow-worshiping religious cult. I've been arguing with gays about the concepts in Androphilia for a few years, and in most cases when it comes to those who find my work truly offensive, I can basically write the content of their objections and their 'witty' high camp put-downs for them. It's a bit creepy, really. I often find that I'm having the same conversation over and over again with new people--almost down to the word. There are definitely unofficial programmed responses to any critique of the gay community, and when someone goes off-script, a lot of gays start spitting out whatever they've already got. Some gays cling to their gay identities like a recovering crackhead clinging to Jesus. It's like some magical pink fairy picked them up out of the gutter of depression and sexual confusion, and now recycled gayness is the only thing keeping them alive.

I should probably make it clear that I'm not trying to change the gay community at all. I'm seceding from it. There's a big difference.

Gays can have their gay community. There have always been and there will probably always be males who see themselves as being extremely effeminate, or who find high camp endlessly entertaining. That definitely seems to be a personality type that is out there and it works for a very small minority of people. To their credit, some of them do it really well.

I'm questioning the notion of having an all-inclusive gay community to begin with. Let the lesbians be lesbians. Let the queens be queens. Let the Irish be the Irish and let the Italians be the Italians. It's OK for groups of people with different interests and values to identify themselves separately. Masculinity and effeminacy are polar opposites that are naturally in conflict. I'd like to see other men like myself, who don't identity with the gay stereotype and who don't see themselves as constitutionally effeminate, reconnect with other men and re-imagine what male homosexuality could mean. I see androphilia as an opportunity to spend a lifetime enjoying male culture and male camaraderie without the interference of women. I see it as masculinity without compromise. I don't think you can take that idea as far as it can go with a rainbow flag still waving over your head.

You speak of an over-political gay sexual identity. To what extent would you say the AIDS Crisis is responsible for this identity?

What we now call the gay identity was a political identity long before it was even associated with the word gay. The guy who coined the word homosexual was passing out pamphlets and campaigning for the repeal of Prussian sodomy law in the mid-nineteenth century. Then for a while homos called themselves 'uranists,' which was almost as cunningly vague as the word 'gay' and also popularized for political reasons. The gay civil rights movement in the 70s was laced with Marxism from the get-go, and became well known through political activism as a response to unfair and irrational treatment by law enforcement authorities.The AIDS crisis kept the gay community together; had it not been for the AIDS outbreak, homosexual attraction probably would have become the virtual non-issue it is for many young men today a decade sooner. Instead, I think the gay pride culture peaked in the mid-90s and it's been sliding toward irrelevance ever since. The diverse and often dissonant groups of homosexually inclined individuals that banded together to form the gay community did so out of dire necessity. This artificial solidarity can only be maintained through fear. A minority of emotionally damaged, xenophobic gays who insulate themselves in rapidly disappearing gay ghettos continue to perpetuate the idea that everyone is out to get all homos, based on their sexuality alone, and that we can only survive if we stick with “our own kind.” That's not a rational path forward for the average homosexual male. It's the opposite of progress.

American gay culture seems to be the target of your manifesto. How far do you think Androphilia will translate in non-American markets?

Gay culture is a global phenomenon that came to fruition in a period of cheap cross-continental transportation. Gay bars, gay scenes, gay ghettos and gay attitudes across America resemble each other very closely. I've been corresponding with guys in Germany, Australia and the UK over the past year, and aside from minor differences in local flavor, gay culture seems to be almost completely homogeneous. We've all had very similar experiences with the gay community.

For this reason, even though Androphilia focuses specifically on American gay culture, I've had a great deal of interest from men outside the United States.

You're an ordained Priest in The Church of Satan. What sort of practices and principles are involved in this religion, and how does your homosexuality interact with your Satanism?

Androphilia really isn't about Satanism at all--the fact that I'm an ordained Priest in the Church of Satan is just something I had to address in my bio because I didn't want to give some smug little smartass the satisfaction of thinking he'd unearthed some sort 'dirty secret' to discredit me.

Androphilia is designed to be essentially apolitical and compatible with many religions. It's about manhood, which is bigger than any one religion. The best source for information about Satanism can be found in "The Satanic Bible", by Anton LaVey, or at www.churchofsatan.com. It's a pragmatic philosophy that tidily sums up my perception of the world based on my life experiences. Satanism is not devil worship; it's basically atheism, only more fun. Most people will never get past the "boo" factor that comes with the word "Satan," which is a nice filter but it also tends to create the perception that we're all drugged out nihilistic rockers or goth teens looking for attention. The adult Satanists I know who are worth the name, however, are discerning, epicurean hedonists who tend to be connoisseurs of the lost, forbidden or forgotten--which makes them some of the most fascinating people I've ever met. I'm proud to be associated with the Church of Satan for this reason, but I realize all too well that any association with Satanism will draw a too-cool-for-school eye roll from smug urban hipsters and it will be offensive or off-putting to religious people. Oh well. It's not in my nature to apologize for who I am or how I really feel. I'm an up-front kind of guy and I don't mince words. Just in case you haven't noticed...

Androphilia is currently on sale on online booksellers such as Barnes and Noble, Powell's and Amazon.

Mid-text photograph (with bat) copyright Kenji Mizumori.