I have spoken with some disdain of the suffragette. What is the matter
with her, fundamentally, is simple: she is a woman who has stupidly
carried her envy of certain of the superficial privileges of men to
such a point that it takes on the character of an obsession, and makes
her blind to their valueless and often chiefly imaginary character. In
particular, she centres this frenzy of hers upon one definite
privilege, to wit, the alleged privilege of promiscuity in amour, the
modern droit du seigneur. Read the books of the chief lady Savonarolas,
and you will find running through them an hysterical denunciation of
what is called the double standard of morality; there is, indeed, a
whole literature devoted exclusively to it. The existence of this
double standard seems to drive the poor girls half frantic. They bellow
raucously for its abrogation, and demand that the frivolous male be
visited with even more idiotic penalties than those which now visit the
aberrant female; some even advocate gravely his mutilation by surgery,
that he may be forced into rectitude by a physical disability for sin.
All this, of course, is hocus-pocus, and the judicious are not deceived
by it for an instant. What these virtuous bel dames actually desire in
their hearts is not that the male be reduced to chemical purity, but
that the franchise of dalliance be extended to themselves. The most
elementary acquaintance with Freudian psychology exposes their secret
animus. Unable to ensnare males under the present system, or at all
events, unable to ensnare males sufficiently appetizing to arouse the
envy of other women, they leap to the theory that it would be easier if
the rules were less exacting. This theory exposes their deficiency in
the chief character of their sex: accurate observation. The fact is
that, even if they possessed the freedom that men are supposed to
possess, they would still find it difficult to achieve their ambition,
for the average man, whatever his stupidity, is at least keen enough in
judgment to prefer a single wink from a genuinely attractive woman to
the last delirious favours of the typical suffragette. Thus the theory
of the whoopers and snorters of the cause, in its esoteric as well as
in its public aspect, is unsound. They are simply women who, in their
tastes and processes of mind, are two-thirds men, and the fact explains
their failure to achieve presentable husbands, or even consolatory
betrayal, quite as effectively as it explains the ready credence they
give to political and philosophical absurdities.