Lover of Men: The Untold History of Abraham Lincoln | movie | 2024 | Official Trailer - video Dailymotion

Lover Of Men examines the intimate life of America's most consequential president, Abraham Lincoln. As told by preeminen | dG1fTHh2T1ViUzBfV0U

Transcript

00:00He is considered a sacred figure by both Republicans and Democrats.

00:06He led the nation through its greatest crisis.

00:08He's on our currency.

00:10We build monuments to him.

00:11He's the greatest president the United States has ever had.

00:14Today, the big question that people are asking is, was Abraham Lincoln gay?

00:22In the 19th century, for many men, their closest relationships were other men, and same for

00:26women.

00:27He would live with another man when they're single, and often did in shared beds.

00:31Lincoln probably slept in the same bed with men more than he did with women.

00:35One of the things that fascinates scholars is his bedding down with Joshua Speed for

00:41four years.

00:43There is love between those two men.

00:45When you put together all of the evidence, it's really startling.

00:51Lincoln has a type, dashing, daring.

00:53We have this notion that if you have an attraction like that, boom, that's your orientation.

00:59Sexuality through the mid-19th century was far more fluid.

01:03But for someone who wanted a political career, it was mandatory that you have a wife.

01:09Dear Speed, I shall be very lonesome without you.

01:12Yours forever, Lincoln.

01:15What you have in the 19th century was very strict marriage culture.

01:19Get married, and then everything is possible.

01:22Captain David Derrickson became friends with Lincoln while they were living here at the

01:25cottage.

01:26There is a soldier here devoted to the president, and when Mrs. L is not home, sleeps with him.

01:32What stuff.

01:33He was seen wearing the president's nightshirt.

01:36If you want a smoking gun, here it is.

01:38But then you see all these shifts to the end of the 19th century.

01:43Freud was devastating to sexuality.

01:46Defining very rigid categories.

01:50They're saying if a man loves another man, it's unnatural.

01:54Homosexuality is a mental illness.

01:56It was not only wrong, it was punishable.

01:59If Lincoln were to look down today, he would see the United States at a particularly fragile

02:04moment.

02:05History is so important because it allows us to understand who we were, who we might

02:10become.

02:11Lincoln's legacy is the insistence on equality.

02:13We have been in the halls of power.

02:15If you can accept a queer Lincoln, you can accept queer people overall.

02:19It should inspire us to achieve a true democracy for everyone.