C.B. Cox writes, "In Elizabethan times the crime of buggery was punishable by death. Today this legal term for homosexual intercourse offends our ears, but its use draws attention to the abhorrence with which many Christians of the time (and since) regarded physical intimacies between men. In these circumstances it's difficult to believe that Shakespeare would not only participate in an active homosexual relation with a handsome young man, but broadcast this affair to the world in sexually explicit sonnets pass round among his friends." The competing view of a bisexual Shakespeare conflicts with Wilde's view. Cox bases his argument on the verb "to have." He argues that why must the verb usage of "to have" mean sexually possess? Elizabethan people had trouble believing "had" meant to have sexually when it came to the young man, but Cox writes, "It's difficult to refute Pequiney's contention that in these three examples (Sonnet 52, Sonnet 75, and Sonnet 87) there is a sexual innuendo in "had," particularly when in Sonnet 129, which concerns heterosexual love for the Dark Lady, everyone agrees that there is such an implication. Elizabethan society feared homosexual desire, but embraced heterosexual conquests. Cox writes, "The poems may be based on personal experience but still that doesn't actually prove that Shakespeare 'had' the youth. There's an element of playfulness in the sexual innuendoes, a delight in wit as if Shakespeare is enjoying his own virtuosity and may not have expected to be taken literally... In his poems to the youth he may be using sexual innuendo as a kind of joke, a playful but at times almost serious hint that his affection may even extend to physical desire."