If the author calls Sam and Frodo's relationship flat-out homosexual, that's dumb, but I don't think it's dumb to see hints of homo-eroticism in the tenderness -- even physical tenderness -- and solicitous love between them. Particularly because LOTR is noticeably reticent, if not awkward, on the topic of sexuality in general. But it certainly is a sign of our debased, deprived culture that physical tenderness is always taken as a sign of sex. I blame society!