David Thorstad

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David Thorstad (born 1941)^[1], an American political activist and historian of the gay rights movement since the 1970s, was a founding member of the North American Man-Boy Love Association (NAMBLA). He was also active in Trotskyist politics for some years.

For more than six years, Thorstad was a member of the Upper West Side branch of the Socialist Workers Party (SWP), and a staff writer for its newspaper, The Militant. He left the SWP in December 1973, citing the organization's lack of enthusiasm for the gay liberation movement and failure to develop a "Marxist materialist analysis" of it. In 1976 he self-published a collection of internal party documents relating to its discussion of the gay liberation movement, under the title Gay Liberation and Socialism : Documents from the Discussions on Gay Liberation Inside the Socialist Workers Party (1970-1973).^[2] In the early 1970s Thorstad was active in the Gay Activists Alliance, a leading gay liberation group in New York, ^[3].

In June 1973 Thorstad and John Lauritsen published The Early Homosexual Rights Movement (1864-1935), a fourteen page historical survey in the SWP internal Discussion Bulletin which attempted to prove that the gay liberation movement had a long and substantial history, particularly in Germany. ^[4]This was expanded the next year into a 92-page book of the same name published by Times Change Press, a New York publishing house specializing in feminist and politically progressive books. ^[5] The book was translated into Spanish^[6] and German^[7].

In 1978 Thorstad was a founding member of NAMBLA, and has remained active in its leadership ever since. He was one of a group of NAMBLA members who were sued for the wrongful death of a ten-year-old boy in a long-running court case in Boston, Curley v. NAMBLA. In 2003, in the course of this case, Judge George O'Toole found that:

David Thorstad has been a resident of St. Paul, Minnesota since approximately 1992. Thorstad has been a member of NAMBLA since 1978, and served as a member of the Steering Committee from some undetermined time until September 1996. He is listed as a member of the Bulletin Collective, though he claims he "had no role in producing" the publication. He did contribute letters and articles to the Bulletin, and one of his articles was also posted on NAMBLA's webpage. In 1995, he was nominated to be an official NAMBLA spokesman.

^[8]

Thorstad's involvement with NAMBLA led him to break with most of the mainstream gay and lesbian rights movement, which was never sympathetic to NAMBLA's views and activities.^{[citation needed]} In 1998 Thorstad told an audience: "Pederasty is the main form that male homosexuality has acquired throughout Western civilization - and not only in the West! Pederasty is inseparable from the high points of Western culture - ancient Greece and the Renaissance."^{[citation needed]} Thorstad describes the modern gay rights movement as "politically correct zombies," and the "radicalism of such groups as Queer Nation" as "bizarre and offensive."

Summaries of Thorstad's views appear in his articles "Man/Boy Love and the American Gay Movement" in Male Intergenerational Intimacy: Historical, Socio-Psychological and Legal Perspectives (Theo Sandfort, Edward Brongersma, and Alex van Naerssen, editors, Routledge, 1990), and "Homosexuality and the American Left: The Impact of Stonewall," in Gay Men and the Sexual History of the Political Left (Gert Hekma, Harry Oosterhuis, and James Steakley, editors, Haworth Press, 1995).

[edit] Writings

• The Leninist theory of organizations: its relevance for today by Ernest Mandel London: International Marxist Group, 1973 (translator from the French with Theodore Edwards)
• Israel: a colonial-settler state? by Maxime Rodinson New York, Monad Press; distributed by Pathfinder Press, 1973 (translator from the French)
• The Early Homosexual Rights Movement (1864-1935) New York; Times Change Press, 1974 with John Lauritsen
• Gay Liberation and Socialism : Documents from the Discussions on Gay Liberation Inside the Socialist Workers Party (1970-1973) pt.2, pt.3 editor, [New York] : Thorstad, [introd. 1976
• No apologies: the unauthorized publication of internal discussion documents of the Socialist Workers Party (SWP) concerning lesbian/gay male liberation. Part 2, 1975-79 editor, [New York : D.Thorstad] ; New York (415 W. 23rd St., Box 11F, New York 10011) 1980
• Le Gay Voyage: Guide et regard homosexuels sur les grandes métropoles interviewee, [New York : D.Thorstad] ; Paris(22 rue Huyghens, 75014) : Albin Michel, 1980
• Boys speak out on man/boy love. San Francisco, Calif. : North American Man/Boy Love Association, 1981 (introduction) link goes to introduction only.
• A Witchhunt foiled: the FBI vs. NAMBLA New York : North American Man/Boy Love Association, 1985 (introduction)

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Harry Hay on Man/Boy Love by David Thorstad
• Pederasty and Homosexuality by David Thorstad