Faelivirin I am not sure where you got your information on
From multiple discussions with men and reading multiple essays by men (about toxic masculinity, especially in Latin America and the U.S.), from multiple discussions with and reading essays written by Christians (about Christian, especially Protestant, views towards sex in the U.S. and Europe), from studying European and U.S. history, and from studying comparative theology. And of course from my own experience being a woman (about sexism and sexual violence experienced by women). Nothing I'm saying is new or revolutionary, and you can read about it at length from a great many sources. You may disagree with their historical analyses, of course. You may not have personally met anyone with sexist, prudish, homophobic, or toxic masculinity attitudes in England, or met a rape survivor, but that does not mean such attitudes and violence do not exist
anywhere in any Western society, or that they have never existed in all of Western history.
Did I say that all Westerners are identical and have identical beliefs? No, of course not. I emphasized repeatedly that I was not speaking about a uniform, unvarying attitude of every single individual person in all Western societies, and I also pointed out that some of what I have seen and read about may be particular the U.S. That does not somehow mean there do not and have never existed any trends at all in Western cultures overall (such as sexism, homophobia, and prudishness towards sex). Prudishness is less significant in some Western cultures today than it was historically, but is alive and well in others (at least in the U.S.) and continues to be heavily promoted by some Christian groups in the U.S. Sexism and homophobia are less prominant in many Western cultures than before, but continue to exist.
In any case, homophobia is a cultural attitude in its own right with a life of its own, quite independent of its long-term historical origins. A person certainly doesn't need to be sexist or a prude to be homophobic -- (
Edit: for one thing, it's easy to be uncomfortable with or weirded out by homosexuality just because it's unfamiliar and often taboo: that was my attitude for much of my life.) I don't know whether Tolkien was sexist or prudish, despite accusations that Tolkien's [deliberately mythopoetic] stories are sexist. I don't get any particularly strong impression of prudish or sexist views from his stories.
I definitely did not say or imply that sexism is somehow caused by Christianity. Sexism clearly has other origins than that. And "Western culture" is not a synonym for "Christianity", despite the large overlap.
If we change it then it's a change, but let's be truthful about our intentions and not pretend to be unsure.
I am well aware what Tolkien wrote and thought, and have been quite clear all along about all the concepts in this thread being changes. Being able to have a calm discussion about the consequences of making a change does not make me unaware of what Tolkien wrote. I would greatly prefer this conversation to remain calm, non-angry, and respectful to all people posting here, even though many of us will disagree about many things. There is no need to accuse me of disonesty.
Elves, being elves, happen to not experience homosexual desire at all. Just one of those things about being an unfallen elf with perfect harmony between body and mind. Lust in general is uncommon to them and this is just...unknown.
This is most likely the intention of Tolkien, or at least the option closest to his intentions, since he probably viewed homosexual attraction as something unnatural, and/or wrong. In Arda Marred, that would make it like a disease inflicted upon humans. I would rather ignore the existence of homosexuality altogether (in
all people, not just Elves) rather than draw any attention to the notion that homosexual attraction is immoral or a disease, by making it something that exists (that we show existing) among fallen Mortals, but not among unfallen Elves. We also don't need to do that, since Tolkien didn't.
Elves may rarely/occasionally experience homosexual desire, but it is strongly discouraged by their culture and not acted upon.
Why?
IF homosexual attraction were experienced by Elves at all, that would necessarily require it to be something entirely natural, and not a disease caused by the Marring. [In other words, it would require significantly changing the setting, departing entirely from the concept in your first option.]
If that were the case, what specific, historical, cultural sources would develop into homophobia among Eldar? Homophobia does not manifest out of thin air, magically, for no reason. It is not a genetically determined biological instinct. It has cultural roots, and those roots are unique to any given culture. There would have to be an actual reason.
It would need to be an _in-universe_ historical reason, because this option starts by _ignoring_ the out-of-universe views of the author.
Elves do not distinguish between heterosexual or homosexual relationships. How people partner up is left up to them, as long as they're both adults and willing (and no incest). This last option has been used on the TV show "The 100" (which has lots of couples but no marriages), so it certainly can be done as worldbuilding, but it does call into question the cultural significance of marriage. It would be more appropriate to a post-apocalyptic dissolution of culture than to a high/flourishing culture.
Why? Considering homosexual relationships to be valid or acceptable doesn't require eliminating the existence of marriage, anymore than the existence of queer people would make heterosexual cis people stop existing. Leglizing gay marriage doesn't require outlawing heterosexual marriage.
To the Eldar, having sex automatically makes two people married. Always. It wouldn't make a difference what their genders were, if they had sex together they would be married. That doesn't necessarily mean that all types of marriage would be regarded as identical. Women and men aren't considered identical in Eldarin culture, though like I said I see no evidence that either is considered inferior, or subjected to sexual violence. At the least, anyone can tell the difference between couples who have biological children, and those who don't or can't. But Eldar would not be able to distinguish between the concepts of gay sex and gay marriage. They have no concept of sex as something separate from being married.
As regards to the Avari, I have little idea. We don't have a "Laws and Customs of the Avari" to read. We know a little bit about Dwarves and Edain and Hobbits in regard to marriage and sex, but not much. I don't know if there's any info about other Mortals' marriage customs. Regarding Ainur and Ents, I don't know if they even have anything that could be called sexual intercourse, though they do seem to feel some kind of attraction, which appears romantic at least in the case of Ents. Ainur have "spouses", but what that means is murky for everyone except Melian. Ents might reproduce the way trees do, for all I know.
It's also rather difficult to suggest that this was what Tolkien intended.
It's pretty clearly _not_ what he intended at all -- or at least, I would be very surprised if that turned out to be his intention. Depicting any queer characters (especially Elves) would be a significant departure from the author's ideas. If we were to make such a change, it would need to be done with a lot of care and thought -- not casually, just because it fits the values of a majority of the writers here (if that turns out to be the cae). As I said, I'm not going to strongly advocate that we must make such a change in the first place, because I recognize it goes quite outside the author's own views.