This is the second interview (Interview 1, Interview 3).
Interview with Theo
(Age: 13 years, 11 months.)
What do you do a lot?
Play football!
Are you in a club?
Yes, and that’s real nice.
Can you tell me why you like football?
Playing together, working together. If you have a good eleven then you feel great. If not you just keep on trying because if you don’t they’ll say you can’t do anything right. I think it’s really nice when you have a good eleven.
Are there other things that you do a lot?
Oh, well, I don’t know…
What do you enjoy a lot?
Playing tricks on people. Tying up bicycle wheels and so on, that’s lots of fun. Then they can’t bicycle away. So then we stop and watch and you see them do all kinds of stupid things to get it loose. Or tie a cat up by his tail: we tried that once, but I got scratched good!
By the cat? I don’t blame him. Why do you enjoy playing tricks on people so much?
I don’t know, they act so crazy when it happens. And I like pottering around with things. I like fiddling with things. Two times I’ve built a toy auto from a kit. I enjoy doing that.
Do you build other kits?
Yes, I used to always make Christmas tree ornaments.
Are there other important things you enjoy?
No.
What do you really dislike?
Doing the dishes, or shopping, that I don’t like much.
Do you have to do that a lot?
Yes, every evening my brother and I have that job. One evening one of us washes, the other dries. We eat late, because my father and mother work late, until around six o’clock. So we do the dishes while the good TV programs are on.
So you can’t watch the TV?
Yes, so we miss the best ones. But the guy who washes has the best deal because he’s finished first.
And shopping?
I have to do that alone, because my little brother always drops the bottles whe he takes them out of the refrigerator. So I have to do the shopping.
Your mother and father can’t do it because they work so late?
Yes, but my mother’s always off on Fridays.
Are there other things that you really dislike?
No, I think it’s fine at school.
What do you think about a lot?
I think a lot about school, about arithmetic and so on.
What class are you in?
First form in technical school.
Are there other things you think about a lot?
Yes, about a nuclear war and so forth. That seems to me so horrible. Like in Harrisburg, when there was an accident, what then would follow. If that really happened on a large scale. It shocked me; it started me thinking. The consequences of a nuclear war. One bomb like that over the Netherlands and everyone’s dead.
Are there other things that you think about a lot?
Well, no.
Who do you get on well with?
With Bert. [The older partner - Ed.]
How long have you known Bert?
Three months. And I get along well with my mother and father, too.
Why do you think you get along so well with Bert?
He has a better understanding of kids, of boys. So does my mother, and so does my father. But I think he knows more about them.
You say you can also get along very well with your father and mother?
Yes, because when something happens, if you get in a jam or something, you don’t have to worry, you can always tell them about it, and then they’ll help you.
Because they’re not strict?
Well, strict… Yes, they are strict, because I fight with my little brother quite a bit. Then my father asks who started it and the one that did gets punished. My father can see it on our faces.
And your mother?
Yes, she always catches you. One time my brother said we needed money for photos, two guilders, and she trapped us. She gave him two guilders but he just spent it on candy. But she caught on, and from then on she wanted a note. So we can’t trick her any longer, or we have to forge a note the following time.
Shall we write down your parents?
Yes, my parents, because you can always bring your problems to them.
Are there also people you can’t get along with?
My little brother.
Why’s that?
Oh, he’s always pestering me, and then I hit him and I’m to blame. And then I get punished.
And so you dislike him?
Well, dislike, no. But once in a while I do. Sometimes he is nice, and then he helps you, but the next minute he is pestering you.
But you do dislike him.
Yes.
And what’s the biggest reason?
If he’s won at football, which they usually do, then he sits around teasing me because we’ve lost. And he’s for Ajax [an important Dutch football team - Ed.] and I’m for Feijenoord, but if Ajax loses to Feijenoord I tease him.
Should we put down your little brother?
Yes, my pestering brother, my bratty little brother.
He is younger than you?
Yes, I’m thirteen; he is ten.
Are there other people you just can’t get along with?
No.
You also make love with Bert, don’t you?
Yes.
Some people call that sex or sensual contact. What do you, or you and Bert, call it?
Making love.
We have to make sure we mean the same thing, because ‘making love’ can be two things, can’t it? If you sit on someone’s lap, you can call that making love, but making love in bed is, of course, something quite different, and that’s what you mean now, isn’t it? (The Dutch word ‘vrijen’, more than the English expression ‘making love’, can, and frequently in the reference to young children does, refer to cuddling, caressing and other physical but non-sexual expressions of affection. - Ed.)
Yes.
Most things have pleasant and unpleasant sides. If you now think about making love with Bert, what are the pleasant sides?
Yes… Well, I don’t know.
Let’s put it another way: why do you do it?
Well, because I enjoy it.
Then that’s a pleasant side?
Yes.
You think it’s nice?
Yes, I think it’s real nice.
And unpleasant sides. What do you find are the unpleasant sides to making love with Bert?
Well, he prickles so bad.
He prickles?
Yes, here, he’s all stubbly, and then he shaves. The stubble prickles so bad.
Shall we write that down?
Yes, Old Porcupine!
Are there other unpleasant sides to making love with Bert? You think it’s very nice, but are there maybe some reasons why you’d rather not do it?
Yes, later, when I’m bigger, I’d rather not do it. Then I’ll have a girl or something.
But it doesn’t bother you now?
No.
Nothing that makes you think you’d rather not do it?
No, absolutely nothing.
Then I want to ask you whether once in a while you have sex or make love with others, with boys or girls or with older people?
No. Yes, with Richard (another boylover - Ed.) once in a while.
You have done it with him?
Yes. It was through him I got to know Bert.
You came here with Richard once?
Yes.
But you don’t do it with him anymore?
No.
You say that fairly often you have the feeling of being afraid in connection with sex with Bert. Can you tell me about that?
If I forget myself and say something to somebody, and he spreads it around, that I’m afraid of.
Why are you afraid of that?
Because if people get to know about it you’ll get a bad name.
You say that quite often you feel embarrassed.
Yes, at first I was real embarrassed, when I wasn’t used to it.
Do you still have that feeling?
Yes, but not so bad as in the beginning.
You say that sometimes you feel naughty. Can you tell me about that?
Ah, yes, I feel naughty sometimes, yes. Because I do it and nobody really knows about it, my mother and so on.
But why do you feel naughty then? I sometimes do things which nobody knows about, too.
Well, because you don’t, really, uh… Normal kids just don’t do that. That’s the way you think.
You say that you almost never feel angry. But you have felt that way occasionally?
Yes.
Can you say something about that, when it happens?
I’m ashamed of it or something.
And that makes you a bit angry?
Yes, that I’d be ashamed of it if somebody got to know about it.
Do you think you ought to be ashamed of yourself, or not?
No, I don’t think so, no.
So, just if other people got to know about it?
Yes.
You say that you sometimes badger Bert. Can you tell me more about that?
Well, let’s say he wants to suck me off or something, and I say it hurts; then I’m tricking him.
Because it doesn’t really hurt?
No.
You also said you sometimes coerced him when you were making love.
Yes. He’ll say, ‘Come on, we’re going to bed,’ and I’ll go watch Tv or something, and then he’ll turn the TV off. And I’ll say, ‘If there’s no TV I’ll go sleep by myself,’ and then I get to watch TV a little longer.
How long have you known Bert?
Since summer vacation.
So about four months.
Do you remember how you got to know Bert?
Yes. I went one time with Richard to the cinema and swimming and then I met Bert. I thought that was nice, and then I went with him. Because René, who was with Richard, was being obnoxious. He used a whole lot of sugar in his tea so nobody else had any. He was only thinking of himself. Then I went to Bert’s. It was nicer there.
Did you go by yourself to Bert’s?
No. Richard had said, ‘You can also visit Bert if you want.’ Then one time I slept at Bert’s and I liked that a lot. Then I stayed with Bert – it is better than with Richard.
So you really got to know Bert through Richard?
Yes.
Can you remember the first time you had sex with Bert?
No, because I was asleep.
That was the first time you slept here?
Yes, and then he touched me.
Where you awake then?
Yes, but I didn’t think it was so bad, I thought it was nice.
Had you had sex a few times before with Richard?
Yes.
So you knew something about it already. Do you find it difficult to talk about this?
Well, maybe a little.
It doesn’t make any difference to me what you say. I don’t think it is dirty or anything, nor strange. When you have sex with each other now, how does it happen?
Well… just as it always does.
Who starts it?
Bert or me.
Can you tell me more about it?
Well, I just think it’s nice, so I go make love with him.
Are there people who know you have sex with Bert?
My father and mother know about it.
What do they think about it?
Well, that it’s normal. If you have a girl that’s completely normal. Because this person can’t do without a girl, that man without a boy, and a third without another man. Yes, they just think it’s normal.
They think it’s all the same?
Yes.
What do you think about that attitude of theirs?
I think it’s very good. Because some people would like to murder all homosexuals and paedophiles because they aren’t normal, but not my father and mother.
How do you react to that?
I think they’re right.
Your school friends, do they know you have sex with Bert?
No.
What would they think about it if they did know, do you think?
Well, they would all think I was a homo or something. Now, that’s not true. Yes, they’d call you names.
That’s an insult?
Yes.
Why would your friends be so much against it?
I wouldn’t know. Maybe they’d be jealous.
That they themselves would like to have what you have?
Yes, that could be it.
What do you think about their rejecting this? Do you agree with them?
No. They know nothing about it.
In other words, if they did know about it, maybe they’d think differently about it?
Yes, perhaps. If they knew more about it. Now they’re talking rubbish.
What do you really think yourself about your having sex with Bert?
I think it’s very nice, but I also want to do it with a girl.
Would that make any difference for you, or would you say that right now I just don’t know exactly?
I don’t know. I’ve never yet done it with a girl.
But you would like to?
You bet!
But it doesn’t have to be right away?
No. It will happen.
Meantime this is nice?
Yes.