William Benemann

“Perhaps that distance also “opened up a space” that allowed sailors who were primarily homosexual in orientation to reevaluate their own position vis à vis their country, and to consider embracing a culture that they had been taught to disdain. Sailors who were attractive physical specimens were given a choice early in their captivity: arduous labor or sexual submission. Given what has been discussed regarding the social marginalization of American sailors, given the relaxed attitude toward discreet male-male sexuality aboard ship, given the likelihood that a portion of a ship’s population were endowed with a sexual orientation that inclined them more towards homosexuality, would it not be likely that some of those men might choose a life of sexual servitude to a Muslim master over near certain death working in the quarries or the slave galleys?”
― William Benemann, Unruly Desires: American Sailors and Homosexualities in the Age of Sail

“For some sailors the cultures of North Africa, with their pragmatic accommodation of homosexual desire, provided a more attractive alternative to anything then provided by the United States.”
― William Benemann, Unruly Desires: American Sailors and Homosexualities in the Age of Sail