Mother-fixation theory alone cannot explain the lesbian choice

Evidence

However, the very fact that they appear as a classic stage in the adolescent girl’s development means that they cannot suffice to explain a determined choice of homosexuality. The young girl seeks in it both a liberation and a security she can also find in masculine arms. Once the period of amorous enthusiasm has passed, the younger one often experiences the ambivalent feeling for her older partner she felt toward her mother; she falls under her influence while at the same time wishing to extricate herself from it; if the other persists in holding her back, she will remain her “prisoner” for a time; but either in violent scenes or amicably, she will manage to escape; having succeeded in expunging her adolescence, she feels ready to face a normal woman’s life. For her lesbian vocation to affirm itself, either she has to reject her femininity—like Sandor—or her femininity has to flourish more happily in feminine arms. Thus, fixation on the mother is clearly not enough to explain homosexuality. — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1053

Categorization

• XREF: Beauvoir’s anti-essentialist move replicates Sartre’s ‘existence precedes essence’ — a choice cannot be reduced to a prior fixed cause. Also prefigures later feminist critiques of psychoanalytic etiologies.
• QUESTION: The two alternatives she offers for a ‘lesbian vocation’ — rejection of femininity OR flourishing femininity — seem to cover all possibilities, which is odd. Worth chasing what exactly distinguishes a determined choice from a stage for her.