Pseudo girlfriend in the 1960s
1964
John had a ‘pseudo girlfriend’ in the early 1960s; “She definitely liked me, the most she even got from me was a peck on the cheek”. He talked of the pressure to get married. He said that many of the fellow pupils with whom he had had homosexual experiences as an adolescent, got married and shut the door on homosexuality. From his early 20s, the pressure to get married increased. Marriage was important to a man’s career, because it was ‘unusual’ not to be married, which he said affected chances of promotion.
Contributed by: John McGarry, 70