Allen Ginsberg: The Beat Poet Who Leaves A Bad Taste In My Mouth
Picture this: you're 13 years old and stumble across the queer and broody 2013 film Kill Your Darlings. The 90-minute drama formed my first introduction to Allen Ginsberg; I fell in love. A childish love. I never bothered to do much research or reading of Ginsberg until almost a decade later, (or any of the beats to be honest, it's shameful I know).
Upon rewatching Kill Your Darlings I unfortunately discovered it did not reach the pedestal my 13-year-old brain had placed it. Daniel Radcliffe is excellent in it but at times it starts to feel like one long Tumblr gif.
The film dramatises Ginsberg's time at Columbia University, fictionalised, of course. In it, Radcliffe portrays a young Allen. At Columbia, Allen meets Lucien Carr, Jack Kerouac and William Burroughs. Some of the best-known, founding members of the Beat Generation. What's that? Well, it was a literary movement concerned with experimentation - finding inspiration in W.B. Yeats's A Vision. Beat writers aimed to explore new forms, and push boundaries within their writing. This rebellious inclination often seeped into their personal lives. Two years after starting his undergraduate degree, Columbia dismissed Ginsberg for writing obscenities on his dorm room window.
One thing that I remember learning about Ginsberg back in 2015, which hasn't left my mind since is that he was an outspoken supporter of NAMBLA. The North American Man/Boy Love Association. Yikes. In essence, they are a group whose name exactly sums them up. North American adult men who are sexually attracted to younger boys. A paedophilic, or to be more specific: a pederastic organisation.
In case their name alone is not evidence enough of what a foul organisation NAMBLA is... This quote from their website may help reinforce that fact:
"It's the love of a man for a boy, and of a boy for a man. Enjoyable, consensual, beautiful." - 'What is Man/Boy Love?'; NAMBLA 'About' Menu
Here they are explaining what man/boy love is (I don't even want to include the address as a hyperlink. It is not worth your time but feel free to research this yourself if you don't believe me).
This is one of many quotes you can find on the NAMBLA website illustrating what they believe in. In their 'Who We Are' they affirm their beliefs in such a way that one cannot deny, defend, avoid, nor justify them:
"NAMBLA is strongly opposed to age-of-consent laws and all other restrictions which deny men and boys the full enjoyment of the bodies and control over their own lives. [...] We call for fundamental reform of the laws regarding relations between youths and adults."
It goes without saying, but I will clarify anyway. These laws are in place to protect children. Children are too young to provide consent to sexual relationships. Abolishing age-of-consent laws would, in essence, legalise child abuse.
Now. I'm not going to use this as evidence to start claiming Ginsberg was a paedophile. Those close to him claimed he believed it to be more of a speech therapy group. Ginsberg believed it was imperative to protect freedom of speech for everyone. That a person deserves to vocalise whatever desires they may have, even controversial ones.
Ginsberg's best-known poem 'Howl' was censored a year after its publication. Finding itself involved in an obscenity trial due to its graphic language. Within the first section of the poem, Ginsberg lists different ways in which he has seen the 'best minds of his generation destroyed by madness' [line 1] from lines such as:
'waking nightmares, alcohol and cock and endless balls,'- line 11
To:
'who let themselves be fucked in the ass by saintly motorcyclists, and screamed with joy' - line 36
Needless to say, this language didn’t fare well with a lot of people in the 1950s. But 'Howl' did beat the charges and was cleared for sale. His own experiences with censorship likely led him to his anti-censorship viewpoint. I can't begin to imagine how awful it must have been to be a queer man like Ginsberg in the 1950s. A time when it was illegal to be gay. A time when it was a risk to express your true self for fear that they would label you as obscene. BUT did he have to support NAMBLA of all organisations to get this point across?
Ginsberg wrote an essay in 1994 titled "Thoughts on NAMBLA" in which he makes clear:
"I became a member of NAMBLA a decade ago as a matter of civil liberties."
The entire essay is an uncomfortable read - at best weird and at worst criminal. Sure, you can interpret it as a defiant defence of free speech, lacking any personal stakes in the matter. It's easy to read between the lines, and I understand how many jump to sinister conclusions about Ginsberg due to quotes such as:
"Often police intrusion into consensual intergenerational affections and affairs results in abuse of both parties."
But, I do not know Ginsberg. I am not going to accuse him of criminal and morally reprehensible behaviour such as paedophilia. So, let's say this essay is exactly what it presents itself to be: a defence of freedom of speech. I'm sure Ginsberg has a lot of supporters who agree that it's important to push the boundaries of what is acceptable. To discuss uncomfortable matters. To question what to celebrate and what to shun but is it so crazy to think there needs to be a line somewhere? Not everyone needs a safe space to discuss their desires. Especially if their desires are little boys.
Here, we start to go down a slippery slope. It would be naive to believe the government cannot abuse censorship; I am not in support of censorship. But, I will proudly state that my boundary is when something promotes harm. Harm to oneself, harm to others, harm to animals, harm to children, HARM. Not fictional harm. Not a horror movie where characters are slapstickily stabbed to death. But real-life harm. NAMBLA promotes that, and not in an abstract form via the media they produce. No, this group campaigns for the abolition of age-of-consent laws. That is not a group someone should associate with unless they are a reprehensible person. Paedophile or not.
Does that mean we should burn all Ginsberg's books and refuse to speak of him again? No, that would be unproductive. You can read his work, resonate with it, love it, celebrate his poetry, and hang a picture of him on your wall for all I care. You can separate the art from the artist. What an artist gets up to in their personal life should not taint the art they create. Ginsberg's connections with NAMBLA are not a secret, nor new information. But it does leave a bad taste in my mouth.
By all means, an artist does not need to be a perfect person. After all, they are human like everyone else. We don't have to agree with every single thing they say or do to appreciate what they give to the world. I do not expect a person to conform to my personal beliefs to be worthy of respect.
But, it isn't unreasonable to feel a little weird when they use their talents to defend a paedophilic organisation. Unfortunately, it's a part of Ginsberg's legacy that is often left out of doting articles discussing the American poet. Is the solution to include an introduction of his unsavoury connections at the start of anything discussing him? No. But, it is important to remember that many of our heroes are only human. It's important not to let their brilliance blind you. NAMBLA were extremely proud of their support from Ginsberg, using it to grasp mainstream legitimacy. This part of his past is very real and very uncomfortable, and we should not gloss over it.
As an adult looking back on my tween obsession with Kill Your Darlings, I'm not quite sure how to feel. Ginsberg's poetry is powerful, this is an irrefutable fact. I won't lie to you by saying that his writing is trash. I like what I've read of Ginsberg's work, but I dislike some of the things he stood for. So where do I go from there? Ginsberg's goal when writing wasn't to be palatable or to fit into a mould of what his readers think he should be. If what Ginsberg wanted was to push boundaries, both in his personal life and within poetry, he succeeded.
