Certainly being homosexual added to the leverage the blackmailers were able to exert on the victims during this era, but didn't the article also mention that all these men's partners were children? I'd suspect that this fact alone would make targets like this even more vulnerable to blackmail - for example to those with security clearances - today. And as well, for this reason it might also be appropriate to allocate at least some of ones own outrage toward these supposed "victims" themselves.