LITTLE BLUE BOOK NO. 846
Edited by E. Haldeman-Julius
Womanhood: The Facts of
Life Revealed to Women
Gloria Goddard
HALDEMAN-JULIUS PUBLICATIONS
GIRARD, KANSAS
Copyright, 1927,
Haldeman-Julius Company
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
INDEX
Page
I. The Opening Door of Womanhood 5
Adolescence 5
Essential Education 8
Adolescent Training 11
II. The Origin of Love 16
Natural Love 18
Romantic Love 19
Marital Love 20
The Pyschological View of Love 21
III. Mating 23
Woman’s Equality 23
The Right of Choice 25
The Child Problem 27
Moral Codes 29
Courtship 31
IV. The Proper Mate 33
The Purpose of Marriage 33
Eugenics 35
The Future of Eugenics 38
Birth Control 39
V. Proper Education 41
In School 41
At Home 45
Love Education 47
VI. The Price of Error 49
Youthful Restraint 49
Over-Indulgence 54
Venereal Diseases 55
VII. Idealism 56
Chastity 56
Sexual Morality, Present and Future 57
The Purity Ideal 63
WOMANHOOD: THE FACTS OF LIFE REVEALED TO WOMEN
I. THE OPENING DOOR OF WOMANHOOD.
_Adolescence._—It is the habit of age to call youth the golden era, to
speak of that period as the halcyon days of life, and to look back over
its tempestuous beauty with eyes misted by years and longing. It is one
of man’s most regrettable traits that he is ceaselessly yearning back
toward the past. For the few brief years of childhood, he is content in
the present, and looks, if he looks at all, toward the beckoning doorway
of the future. Once he has reached that threshold, he commences the
endless looking back, until we have a race of Lot’s wives whose souls,
at least, are static from backward glances. This is particularly true of
women, though it applies in general to the whole race. The child with her
dolls is happy, and in her play looks toward the future when she will be
a grown woman. Every girl who mothers her dolls has a yearning toward
motherhood, but let the period for that estate arrive, and she looks
back tearfully on her carefree childhood. Once the girl has stepped,
irrevocably, into the narrow pathway of adolescence that leads to the
opening door of maturity, she commences looking back. The adolescent girl
pins up her hair, or bobs it, today, and gazes regretfully at the curls
of childhood. She packs away her dolls, and passes the closet where they
are sleeping with a sigh. The widespread fad of fancy dolls that has
swept the country during the past few years has a double significance.
Largely, it points toward starved motherhood. It is the irrefutable sign
that there are thousands of women who long for children, but who, for
various reasons, deny that urge. It points to something else, too. It is
the answer to that harking back to childhood, when dolls were the only
children, and all the world was play.
This is regrettable. Looking back to the past is a deadening pastime. No
one period of life should be more delightful than another. The rounded
person lives fully in the present, and looks toward the future happily,
with no yearnings toward the past. The chief reason why people look
back, rather than forward is that, through faulty education, unfortunate
miscomprehension, they spoil the present and see no hope for doing
otherwise with the future. If we study the matter sensibly, we will
see that we do not actually want to go back to the past for its actual
activities; what we want is the happy carefree life we then enjoyed. But,
if people lived rightly and thought correctly, they would not want to go
back from a state of comparative freedom to a period of supervision. No
normal, healthy adult wants to go back to a period wherein all of his
thinking is done for him. It is merely an effort to dodge the cares of
life. But, if our lives are properly regulated, and if we are properly
educated, our cares will not hamper us, and gathering years will increase
rather than decrease our enjoyment of living.
This period of unrest, of wanting something that we have not, commences
between the ages of fourteen and sixteen. In exceptional cases, it may be
hastened or retarded. At first, it is mere unrest, and the mind fastens
on the past, as something that it knows, only because it must have
something to hold to, something to explain its uneasiness. Actually, at
this time, it is the unrest of ignorance, the desire to know the causes
and reasons for everything, especially ourselves. The adolescent girl,
seeing, for the first time, most of the life about her, is puzzled, and
longs to understand. She is restless because she cannot do so. Powers and
faculties that only existed potentially before, now come into being. New
relations are established, and for the first time, the ego recognizes
itself, and takes the center of the stage.
Heredity has done its part toward molding the young life, and slips
quietly into the background. Childhood environment has started the girl’s
development, especially those intricate and usually hidden bonds that
exist between the daughter and the parents. A physical change commences
its course, a change that will slowly guide the girl from childhood to
womanhood. Physically, mentally, morally, the woman is gradually being
born. From the soft clay of girlhood is springing what the woman will
be. The model is being fashioned from within, where the girl’s real
nature and hereditary instincts are doing their work, and from without,
where environment and outside influence are doing their best to guide
the new person. Tradition has said that love is blind. More truly might
it be said that youth is blind. Youth starts toward life with eyes
raised toward idealism whose glow blinds eyes already sightless through
ignorance. The problem is, will those eyes, when they finally open upon
such reality as the world knows, fall dejectedly upon gray ashy ruins,
blackened by the now cold fires of that idealism, or will they gaze
joyfully on a not too perfect world, but one still bright with hope and
beauty? The burden of the choice lies, during these years, with the
people around the girl. Tactful, sympathetic advice, and guidance by
those whose lives touch hers will do much toward making a rounded woman
of her, and will help to open her eyes on a world she will want to live
in. Ignorance and false teachings on the subjects that vitally concern
her may leave her a warped and twisted being, dragging weary feet down
tedious years.
_Essential Education._—Throughout a large portion of the world, education
in sexual matters is the accepted custom. Most of the savage tribes
have it. Oriental civilizations still practice it, and are the better
for it. Our ancestors, until the birth of Christianity, knew it. The
Old Testament lays down frank and open laws upon the subject. But the
rites of sexual education had groped so far toward licentiousness, that
Christianity, banning the latter, smothered the former. The Christian
doctrine, aiming professedly toward cleaner living, taught that the body
was worthless, and pointed toward a future life, when only the spirit
would count. Since the body was worthless, and since catering to its
appetites led to much so-called wrong, it followed that the body, and
all that pertained to it, must be vile; only the soul was sacred. Out of
this there gradually grew a taboo. Discussion of this vital subject was
prohibited. It is this prohibition that has done the greatest harm to the
Christian men and women of today.
Any sensible person can see that this teaching is worse than false. It,
not the body, is vile. Slowly, after nineteen hundred years of a lie, out
of the blood of the World War, the truth is springing, phoenix-like. The
lie has been the more insidious since men have never practiced it. The
pale Galilean light of chastity has wavered like an _ignis fatuus_ over a
distant horizon; men, gazing toward it, have stumbled into pitfalls that
had otherwise been mountain heights. The joy of the body lived and grew
in spite of taboos, but, like a flower doomed to bloom in a cellar, it
flourished wanly, and raised its anemic tendrils in the foul blackness of
subterfuge.
Only within the last decade has man come to see the foulness of this
course. Slowly the race is lifting itself out of this slough of deceit.
It rests with each parent to see that the rising continues, until the day
dawns when every girl and boy will know all of the facts of life, and
know them correctly, in all their shining beauty. Then, and then only,
will that _ignis fatuus_ fade in the new dawn of a brighter light.
It is the silence of the parents that does the most toward making life
seem sordid, and brutal. If the parent maintains an obdurate and
sanctified silence, as the majority do, will the girl grow into a second
Mary? Unfortunately, yes. But science has so far enlightened the race,
that we no longer are willing to accept stories of virgin births, and are
too apt to see, with cynical eyes, the Angel Gabriel in any of the young
men about town. Mothers expect girls to wait for this necessary knowledge
until they are married, and then to learn it from the young husband. But
all too frequently, the husband is as sadly ignorant as his bride. What
then? Will some miracle point the way to happiness? Sadly enough miracles
are infrequent. Both young people blunder on, usually into misery.
But even the most assiduous silence on the part of the parent rarely
prevents the girl from learning some part of the truth. As soon as the
little girl commences going to school, she is exposed to the danger of
learning these vital facts, and learning them in a sordid way. Even the
most careful of parents cannot keep from arousing a child’s curiosity
concerning its body. Chance remarks are overheard; when the child reaches
the school age, words seen in books, heard in conversation, send the
curious one to the dictionary; worst of all, information is freely
scattered by their less restrained and more evil-minded companions. These
facts, seen through the fouling haze of secrecy and miscomprehension,
tantalize the youthfully curious mind. The young girl, hating to appear
less knowing than her acquaintances, adopts the secrecy of her elders,
and prowls through books and dictionaries; her mind, like a mole, chases
the truth through the dark of ignorance, until what truth she finally
gleans is smudged with the filth of the streets, and dulled by an aura
of shame. They learn bad habits, alone or by falling into unhealthy
relationships with other girls, if they do not know the facts.
This accurate knowledge, properly given, is the more valuable, if to it
is added a restrained example on the part of the parents. If the mother’s
actions are admirable, this example is a louder preachment to the young
daughter than any amount of words. Nor need a mother shrink from telling
her daughter the simple facts of life. These mysteries can be pointed out
in a beautiful way through the life-stories of animals and plants. The
simple tale of how young birds and kittens arrive in the world can be
made into a lovely symbol of the girl’s own origin, and will point out to
her the role that she, in the normal course of nature, will fulfil.
_Adolescent Training._—The essential thing to guard in the adolescent
girl is her bodily health. If the body is properly cared for, the sexual
nature will take care of itself. Barring some physical deformity, sexual
life grows strongly and healthily of its own accord. A normal woman is
capable of bearing at least thirty children. This is neither desirable
nor economically possible, today. The task is to rein sexual energy, not
to stimulate it. Exercise drains off this energy, which, in the girl,
is chiefly an undefined longing. Enjoyable occupations keep the girl’s
mind occupied and prevent that restlessness that is so taxing to the
adolescent person. All young girls should be encouraged in participating
in sports. They develop a healthy body, increase grace, and occupy a
nervous mind.
Occupying the mind does not mean keeping it ignorant. The most curious
mind is usually the most empty one, provided the emptiness is not due
to sheer laziness. Young minds are very empty, and the only sure way
to fill them properly is to give them complete and adequate knowledge.
If the adolescent girl knows the true clean facts of sex, she will not
spend surreptitious hours poring over filthy books. This ignorance not
only pollutes the young mind, but helps to ruin the young eyes. Girls
seek eagerly for trashy books, then read them in bed, at night, and hide
them during the day, for fear of being caught with them. The moralists
of today who would suppress all of the so-called foul literature would
achieve their purpose if, instead of indicting these books, they
turned their energies to teaching youth the decent facts. This would
immediately decrease the market for such trash, for the educated mind
gets no thrill out of such books. These books pander to the ignorant, the
curious-minded. The young people seize them, and read them avidly, in
the vain hope of learning something of this whispered mystery. They are
invariably disappointed. There would be nothing really wrong with such
books, if they actually told any facts. They don’t—they merely add fuel
to an already hot fire.
The girl’s mind, properly equipped with a knowledge of the realities
of life, should be fed on good books. She should be encouraged in the
studies that she prefers. It is a great mistake of parents to force their
children to learn certain things, whether the children want to or not. If
the girl shows a fondness for languages, let her study them; if she leans
toward astronomy, let her learn what she can about it. True, it may be an
interest of which she will soon tire, but some of it will linger in her
mind, and the mental training will be invaluable. As much as possible,
turn the adolescent mind toward things outside of itself. Interest the
young girl in the world about her, and thus avoid that super-development
of the ego that leads to the lonely introspective person.
The period of adolescence brings with it a complete physical change. It
is now that menstruation begins. If the girl has been kept in ignorance
up to this time, she should be told all the truths of life now. Also,
her health should be guarded more carefully than ever before. This does
not mean coddling; it merely means proper attention to food, exercise,
and rest. Many girls are very much weakened by this condition at first.
Plenty of fresh air and sleep are the best remedies. Of course, if the
girl continues to suffer from this period, she should be put in the hands
of a capable doctor. Even in these broadening days, this remains the one
subject that the most frank-minded persons refuse to discuss. This absurd
secrecy has given rise to the most harmful myths on the subject. There
is no reason why a healthy woman should suffer during this time. It is
a natural physical phenomenon that takes place once every twenty-seven
days. Certain conditions and certain climates sometimes lengthen or
slightly decrease the time between, but no pain should ever result. The
most that should be expected is a certain lassitude during the flow.
If a girl or woman does suffer pain, she should immediately consult a
physician. Many women go on through life suffering at this time rather
than talk to a doctor on the subject. This is a ridiculous reticence.
Under normal conditions the flow will last three or four days.
Due to this strange silence on the subject, many absurd notions and
taboos have grown up concerning this period. Many women still believe
that they must not bathe, walk, or indulge in any form of exercise during
this time. Provided the woman is healthy, this is untrue. During these
periods, the body is more susceptible to colds than at other times;
therefore it is unwise to expose oneself. A warm bath will have no ill
effect, and moderate exercise will do no harm. There is no reason why
one’s daily routine should be altered in any way by this condition.
The main thing to remember is to keep the body clean, and to take such
sanitary precautions as will insure comfort and ease, and will prevent
any unpleasant odors. Such equipment as is necessary is obtainable in
every drug store.
It is highly important for the girl who is experiencing these periods for
the first time to avoid undue excitement, and above all, any emotional
indulgences. The girl who is equipped with the proper knowledge will
realize this, and will know that the proper restraint at this period will
insure her a healthy future. Sexual indulgences during the adolescent
period weaken the nervous system, and generally enervate the body.
Adolescent girls are invariably sentimental and romantically inclined.
The parents should not laugh at this display—rather they should guide
it into right channels. Faulty sex-consciousness is grounded in this
ridicule of the parents. If her sentimental dreams are sneered at, the
girl does not cease having them; on the contrary, they increase in
volume, but she hides it all, and ultimately grows shy and reticent.
She begins to fall in love with matinée idols, with the older men about
her, with some favorite teacher. This is natural, and should not be
suppressed. If she has proper sex-knowledge, and is considerately treated
by her parents, she will soon grow out of this stage into a normal
womanhood..
A girl’s first sweethearts should not be jeered at. If her youthful
friendships are encouraged among nice boys, if her choice of a first
“beau” is accepted as natural, and not made fun of, she will avoid that
sex-consciousness which so frequently leads to secrecy in such affairs,
and to ultimate misery. Do not fear to have your daughter go out with
young boys. See that her friends are honorable boys, and that she knows
what life means, and no harm can come to her. Parents recoil in horror
from the fear of a youthful misstep, and scorn the unfortunate girl who
makes it. They never realize that the fault lies with them. Nine-tenths
of the unfortunate errors made by young girls and boys are made through
ignorance. If a girl has no knowledge of life, she is an easy victim of
any man’s or boy’s pleadings. Her curiosity urges her on, and once the
thing is done, she, not the guilty parents, pays for the social sin.
II. THE ORIGIN OF LOVE.
The thing we call love is known to no species but man. The urge toward
mating is in all plant and animal life, taking place at such times and
places and in such a manner as is most valuable to the species. No one,
even the most prudish, regards the mating of animals as shameful. We do
not speak with bated breath of the arrival of a litter of kittens, nor
do we lock the cat in the closet when she feeds these offspring. Yet,
the very same phenomenon, taking place among men, is spoken of in hushed
tones, and when we see a woman nursing a baby in public, we regard her as
little higher than an animal.
There is no longer much doubt of the fact that man evolved from
lower animals. But, while this is an accepted truth, few realize the
significant facts that follow from it. In animals, the thing we term love
is merely an urge planted there for the continuation of the species.
Selection is made for fitness only. The female does the choosing, and
picks out the mate that seems to her to have the best attributes for
the furtherance of a strong and healthy stock. Animals have no knowledge
of paternity. Only in man, and that very recently, has this knowledge
developed. In zoology, children are taught that certain animals eat their
young, if the mother does not protect them. We are told of the brutality
of the male rabbit, who is supposed to do this. But the rabbit has no
realization of the fact that he had anything to do with the tiny hairless
things that clutter his home. It is not male jealousy, or any such
emotion that prompts this, but the sheer instinct to kill for food. The
idea of paternity has grown up within civilized times.
In most of the lower animals, the female is the acknowledged selector.
Again, only man has built up the myth that he does the choosing. The
selectivity of the female is responsible for the development of brain,
and is therefore responsible for her own downfall. It was the dawning
realization that men were the fathers of children that changed early
civilization from a matriarchate, or mother-rule, to a patriarchate, or
father-rule. Up to this time, the women, as mothers of the race, had
held a high place in the tribe; she had the sole choice of mates; she
ruled and guided the children to maturity. When paternity was finally
acknowledged, and the man was admitted as much kin to the child as the
woman, he claimed a right to part control of it. His high opinion of
women, as the founders of his clan, diminished, and he commenced to
domineer over her as he did over lesser males. With the acknowledgement
of paternity came the first conflict between men and women. No animal
ever fights with, or abuses his female, or any of the females of his
pack. Man, who admits that he is made in the image of some god, was the
first to introduce this lowest form of animalism into the world, and into
a partly cultured world, at that. The male had become stronger than the
female, through her selection of strength, and he soon became lord over,
not only his children, but his wife as well. From that dark day, down to
the present, man has ruled the world, and enslaved the women. He has made
the laws and made them so that women have grown weaker and weaker. Today,
things are changing, and once more woman is standing equal with her mate.
_Natural Love._—Originally, love meant merely selection for purposes of
reproduction. In the ancient days, even religion was founded upon this
basic principle of fertilization. It remained for Christianity to deny
the necessity of this deep fundamental fact.
Sheer animal passion, or natural love, is no less noble than the
highly sophisticated esthetic sentiment that we favor today. Nor can
love necessarily be limited to one individual. Monogamy is a stricture
laid down to bind us by religion and social morals. The lower animals
are not usually monogamous. Women have done most to advance this law,
although they, too, in the dawn of life were not more monogamous than
men. They were more selective, that is all. Modern monogamy is a product
of property rights, and was merely intended to insure the legitimacy of
the sons so that they might inherit the father’s property. But this
monogamy never applied to the men. Man’s nature is against it, while his
mouth speaks words in its favor. With the appearance of monogamy, came
prostitution. Men demanded that their wives be virtuous, and then went
out and sought other women for their pleasure. This gave rise to the
double standard, of which more will be said later.
Some persons believe that the coming of Christianity raised woman’s
status. This is far from true. Christianity, bringing its preachment
against the flesh, made woman appear as an evil influence. Men were
told to scorn the body. By this time, men were ruling the world, so
they immediately laid all of the blame of sex upon the women. Many of
the early promoters of the church preached violently against marriage,
calling it sinful and wicked. Men came to assume the attitude that they
could be pure and godly, were it not for the alluring seductiveness of
women. The urge of man toward women was denounced as a thing of the
devil. Today, our growing intelligence recognizes the folly of this, and
the purity and loveliness of natural love is conceded.
_Romantic Love._—Romantic love is a hot-house growth feasting upon the
dank soil of denial of natural impulses. It grew up in the days of roving
knighthood, when for long months, and perhaps years, the lovers were
separated. Men and women swore fidelity to each other, and the women at
least were obliged to keep their vows. It became more noble to refuse
than to accept love. All that the couple required was to be together.
They contented themselves with sighs and madrigals. Natural love demands
the possession of the person of the beloved; romantic love contents
itself with the mere presence, or often the mere thought, of the beloved.
Such love, in general, was regarded as illicit. Young knights knew this
passion for great ladies, who were unattainable through marriage, or high
station. Thus sprang up the belief that it was wrong. In fact, it is
harmful only to those who yield to it, in that it festers in the soul,
and knows no outlet.
_Marital Love._—This form of love, the affection between husband and
wife, is also of comparatively late growth. In general, it requires
monogamy. Frequently it is at war with romantic love. In early centuries,
there was no thought of love when a union between two persons was
arranged. The mating was planned for political or monetary reasons. Then,
when romantic love sprang up, certain young people rebelled against this
cold-blooded way of disposing of their lives, and chose to marry for
love. Often this is no more satisfactory than the commercial method. In
many European countries, the two are still divorced. In France, the wife
and the mistress are both socially acknowledged facts, but are rarely
embodied in the same person. In America there is a growing tendency to
make wife and mistress always one and the same person. This is the ideal
situation, though it is by far the more difficult of consummation. It is
a sin to yield one’s body to a man whom one does not love.
_The Psychological View of Love._—Freud, who blames most of man’s
unhappiness on improper sex-knowledge and development, divides the growth
of love in the human being into three stages:
1. Auto-eroticism, or self-love.
2. Homosexuality, or love of the same sex.
3. Heterosexuality, or love of the opposite sex.
The infant is always auto-erotic. It gains its first pleasure from
suckling the mother’s breasts, or the bottle. Soon it discovers the
pleasure of this apart from the mere joy of eating. Then it sucks
anything handy. It will suck an empty bottle, a toy, its thumb. This
practice naturally should be discouraged, chiefly because it is deforming
to the mouth. Soon the child discovers its own body. It finds real joy
in handling its own body. The normal child grows out of this stage as
it grows out of safety pins and bibs. There are cases where the child
does not grow out of this phase of life. Something goes wrong, and the
child’s development is arrested, and throughout life he or she remains
a victim of self-love. The next thing that the normal child realizes is
the existence of other persons in the world. This realization naturally
centers on children. The grown-ups are very remote. Children come to
have reality for the small child. She recognizes something akin to
herself, and, since she has no way of knowing differently, she assumes
that all children are physically equipped like herself. Boys and girls
are alike to her; she does not know that there is any difference, other
than clothes, between them. Her affections are drawn away from herself to
others, and usually center upon some older girl. This is the period of
homosexuality. Its most common manifestation is the schoolgirl “crush” on
an older girl, or a favorite woman teacher. This is the most dangerous
period for the girl’s future happiness. If she chances to place her
affection in a girl or a woman who is emotionally biased, she may ruin
her life or, at least, seriously damage it. Homosexuality, put into
physical practice, definitely retards the mental growth of the person.
The right sort of friendship, at this stage, can lead the girl through
the period without any danger. Mothers, in general, should not encourage
their daughters in friendships for older girls. It is better to drain off
this urge in friendships for girls of an equal age.
A great number of children actually practice onanism, or self-love, and
homosexuality. In general, parents are horrified by the thought of such
things. The danger arises if the child does not normally grow out of
these practices. They are the lowest forms of love merely because they
are obviously sterile forms.
From these two stages, the normal girl or boy passes to the third when
she or he reaches adolescence.
This third stage, heterosexuality, is the ultimate love development, in
that it signifies love for the opposite sex. The young body has at last
matured and grown into harmony with natural laws. This is the highest
form of bodily contact with human beings. This is the ultimate threshold
of womanhood. The girl who reaches this point and goes on into life
with the proper regard for the opposite sex, is a woman; those whose
development is retarded and whose inclinations linger in one of the
earlier stages never fully achieve true womanhood.
III. MATING.
_Woman’s Equality._—As we have shown before in this Little Blue Book,
woman, in the dawn of man’s history, was acknowledged as superior. It
was woman who mothered the race, therefore she was allowed to rule the
clan. With the coming of paternal knowledge, woman sank, until in the
days when civilization had reached its highest point in Greece and Rome,
woman was merely a chattel. This was not wholly true, even then. In the
Old Testament, lineage was always traced through the mother, showing that
the matriarchal idea still lingered. In Greece, Rome and Egypt women were
politically men’s equal, at least in the matter of property rights. With
the coming of Christianity woman reached her lowest point in the social
scale. She became hardly more than a breeder. Men ruled the world and
their homes with equal rigor. But slowly, during the past hundred years,
woman has been winning back her rightful position. The very nature of
woman’s duty, her motherhood, may keep her from ever fully sharing all
of man’s activities, but she can and will be equal in importance and in
power. The first thing for her to realize is that she must concentrate
on shining in those lines of endeavor where she has supremacy, and leave
to men the other fields of endeavor. Man has built up a civilization
of dollars and things. It remains for women to reconstruct this to a
civilization of persons. Millions of dollars are spent yearly to produce
better cattle, and almost nothing is spent for better babies. It remains
for the women to see that this condition is altered.
Already, they have done a great deal. One hundred years ago, women had
no voice in the government; today, they have gained seats in state
legislatures, in federal legislatures, in state and federal courts and
two have gained seats in State capitols. A century ago, a woman entering
upon industrial life found it impossible to receive the same wages or
consideration paid to men; the higher institutions of learning were
closed to her. Now, she can engage in any occupation, and granted the
same ability, can earn as much as a man; she can attend a good college
or university. Worst of all, one hundred years ago, she was completely
dependent upon a man for her very livelihood. Her choice was limited. She
must choose between being the wife, mistress, or spinster daughter of a
man. Now she has won in the economic field, and can accept or decline any
or many men, at will.
This last is of the utmost importance and has done more than anything
else to change woman’s status, and to give her love-life a chance to
blossom normally. A woman of a century ago had neither the opportunity
nor the ability to choose the man she wished for husband or lover. She
was dependent upon a father, who sold her to the highest bidder. Her
wishes were rarely consulted. The father had reared her and he decided
who would undertake her future support. A woman, unable to support
herself, could not afford to refuse a man when he offered to marry her.
Now, any woman can support herself. She is limited only by her education,
which she can make as little or as great as she chooses, and by her
abilities. But there is some path of economic independence opened to
every woman. She need no longer wait for a man to marry her so as to
insure her future safety. She can pick a mate, or decline one at will.
This more than anything else will help to put love relationships upon a
footing of decency and equality. When a man marries a woman, not because
the woman needs support, but because she loves him, there will be less
chance or need for illicit and clandestine loves.
_The Right of Choice._—Those who oppose woman’s entry into industry,
when defeated on every point, fall back upon the absurd notion that it
will tend to make woman bold, incline her to do the choosing of a mate.
Naturally, men resent this. It will take from them their lordship. They
will no longer be able to feel themselves masters in their own homes.
Nothing better for civilization could happen. There should be no master
in any home. Men and women should rule equally.
In point of fact, women have always done the choosing, from the
matriarchate down to the present. To be sure, daughters have been
married off according to parental arrangement, but where this custom has
prevailed, the sons have been similarly treated. Marriages were arranged
by the families, with little regard for the young persons. In America,
the large majority of young people are allowed to decide for themselves
in the matter of marriage. And the women do the choosing. Oh, they don’t
actually propose. Their tactics are far more subtle. Tantalizing frocks,
alluring rouges, provocative perfumes, all do their part toward luring
the man on. From among several young men, it is the girl who makes the
choice, and does it so cleverly, and perhaps so unconsciously, that the
young man thinks all credit is due to him. When the daughters are inept,
the mothers are usually on hand to help.
This is right. Only, it should be frankly admitted, rather than cloaked
under a veil of hypocrisy. For the good of the race, women are the better
choosers. Man, whose only instinct is the biological urge to fertilize,
pursues all women, and takes those whom he can get. From among a group of
women, he is sure to take the least clever, the one who is slow-witted
in eluding him, the one whom he can get. To be sure, he may try to pick
the most beautiful, but usually her beauty covers an empty head, and
he doesn’t care. Needless to say, these women are not the best fitted
to mother the race. When a woman chooses from among a number of men,
she picks the tallest, the strongest, the most clever. So, while man’s
choice tends to bring down the standard of the race, woman’s tends to
raise it.
Prudish minds may some day come to realize that there is no immodesty in
a woman’s letting a man know that she is willing to marry him. The best
of all methods would be where the proposal was a mutual thing.
_The Child Problem._—The natural purpose of mating is to beget children.
The original scheme of nature is built around this fact. But nature had
no hand in planning civilization, large cities, and our present economic
standards. It is all very well to say that people are going contrary to
the plans of nature in refusing to have children, and that this is a sin.
Poverty is a sin, the struggle for existence is a sin. And since these
are part and parcel of our living today, it is often better to add the
so-called sin of refusing to have children to the list than to commit
a more heinous offense by bringing small lives into the world without
having the adequate means to provide for them. No human being has an
ethical right to bring children into the world unless he can provide
healthy surroundings and all of the normal advantages.
Those who rant against socialism and the insubordination of the working
classes, and who spend large sums of money in a vain endeavor to keep
these less fortunate individuals from rising against wealth, would do
better if they spent that money in preaching against too many children
and in teaching men and women how to limit their families to their means.
If the poor were not largely sex-ignorant, and were not over-ridden by
religious superstition, they would not have such families, and would
stand some chance of improving their condition. A working man with a
dozen children stands very little chance of raising himself out of the
squalor in which he was born. Give the same man one or two children,
and his energies could be spent in learning more, in rising, instead
of in the everlasting enervating struggle for enough bread to feed
the too-profuse mouths. The children would have a greater chance. Two
children put through high school are infinitely more valuable to the
state and the family than a dozen who are forced into sweat shops before
they are old enough to leave off playing dolls.
Here is where the women of today may help. Those who give an intelligent
interest to politics can, if they will, help the passage of bills that
will allow for sex education, and that will teach families not to have
more children than they can decently support. The general idea that all
women want children is an absurd fallacy. Most women have them because
they do not know how to prevent it. Certainly, the average man, given his
choice, would not elect to have a number of children, so that he could
have the privilege of slaving away his days to feed them.
Nor need the pessimists fear that this will lead to race suicide. The
average couple is glad enough to have two or three children, provided
they can support them adequately. If some of the economic load of the
present were lifted by a wise state legislation, most married persons
would be glad to raise a small family. It is the strain of too many
children that wears out the parents, and that reduces each child’s chance
for a happy, useful life.
_Moral Codes._—The double code of morality is one of the most insidious
weeds of our man-made civilization. By this code man is forgiven all of
the social sins; woman, none. This code has been rigidly enforced down
to the last twenty years, and is still largely favored in many places.
This amazing code allowed—rather expected—every young man to sow his wild
oats before his marriage. His escapades, provided they were carried on so
as not to appear too brazen, were condoned, and frequently encouraged.
But when he came to marry, regardless of how many unsavory affairs he
had indulged in, he demanded, and society backed him in this demand, a
pure, unsophisticated girl. Women, on the other hand, were required to
be absolutely pure and innocent, else their value as wives was gone. It
was insisted that the young girl sit by the fire and sew a fine seam
until some man came with the offer to transfer her to his fireside, to
continue the seam. If, as too frequently occurred, no man came, she must
decline into a sour spinsterhood, and give her energies to care of the
sick, or church suppers, with a sweet smile, while her vitals were gnawed
by the malignant cancer of ingrowing love-longing. Any girl, who by the
slightest gesture, stepped a fraction of an inch from this allotted
way, was immediately damned, and was thenceforth not a fit mate for any
“nice” man, but the prey of all men. If a girl yielded to unmarried
love, the river or prostitution were the delightful alternatives offered
her, and men and women united in maligning her. Surreptitiously, the men
changed their maledictions with the waning light of day. Needless to
say, since the human animal is removed by degree rather than kind from
his four-footed ancestors, there was a great demand for prostitutes. Men
could not satisfy their urge toward variety among the women of their
class, so they devised a system whereby they could keep their women
virtuous, and still enjoy the fruits of passion. The prostitute was
allowed to carry on her tragic trade, but was thrust into the lowest
depths of degradation.
With woman’s rising importance in the economic world, this double
standard will cease. Already it is showing signs of age. Woman has traded
the fragility of the hot-house rose for the sturdier wind-blown beauty of
the wild rose, and she has not suffered for it. The old legend that men
admired only the shy retiring girl has been shattered. The business girl
is not left to sit at home in the evening while her more simple sister is
wooed. Far from it—men are anxious to win the favor of these new women.
Nor do they ask for ignorance in them, nor decline to marry them when
they discover their knowledge of life. The modern girl, who accepts a
friendship if she wishes one, has no difficulty in finding a permanent
mate when she desires to. The time will come when the double code is
but an unpleasant memory of an incomplete civilization. Woman has the
choice. It is more probable, and will be infinitely more beneficial to
the race, that she will choose a single standard, whereby men and women
may be monogamous, if they desire, but may elect any other course that
is mutually agreeable. Under such a system, prostitution will wither,
or will be carried on only by those who select it voluntarily, and the
exploitation of young and innocent girls will end.
_Courtship._—The average person believes that courtship ends when the
minister brushes the bride’s cheek with his ecclesiastical lips. And this
belief is the rock on which marriage founders. The girl, once married,
is convinced that her life-work has been accomplished, so she ceases to
consider her new husband. How many young girls are there who would come
down to entertain her beau for the evening with frowsy hair, and in an
untidy house dress? Not one. When a young man is coming to call, the
girl primps and dresses in her most becoming frocks. She fixes her hair
smartly, powders, and looks as alluring as possible when she opens the
door for him. One year after they are married, the man comes in after a
weary day’s work and finds a dowdy woman, with wisps of hair streaking an
unpowdered face, through which a shiny nose gleams like a beaconlight.
When the beau comes wooing, the young girl sees that the living room is
neat and dusted. When the young husband returns in the evening, papers
may be lying about everywhere, the furniture undusted, and a general air
of unkemptness may prevail. We do not say this is universally true.
Fortunately it is not. But it has a wide enough prevalence to be worthy
of discussion. These same women complain bitterly that their husbands
come home and bury themselves in the paper, or do not come home at all,
or pay more heed to their business than to their wives. True, and can you
blame them? Far better to fasten their eyes upon neat black print than
upon a frowsy woman. It is this sort of carelessness that sends men to
billiard parlors, to poker games and to other women.
Of course there arises the cry of the old justification. Before marriage,
the woman had no house nor children to keep her busy all day. Cannot a
woman keep her house and herself clean and attractive at the same time?
A large number of women do do it, so all could. It is hard to understand
the psychology that is deep-rooted in many women and that allows them
to be slovenly. No one expects a woman, if she must do her own work, to
be attired in a party frock when her husband comes home in the evening.
But she can wear a simple pretty house dress, with a gay cretonne apron
over it, she can have her hair nicely arranged, and her face powdered.
If a woman must do her own work, she should live in a home small enough
for her to take care of, and still allow her time for herself. She
should not have so many small babies that every minute is occupied with
them. She should learn all of the simple labor-saving devices that make
housework easier. The home is the last place to be standardized. It is
no wonder that men become impatient with women, and conclude that they
are shiftless and brainless. If the same tactics were applied to business
universal bankruptcy would result. Housework can be standardized, and
should be. Once that women realize this, their labors will be cut in half.
The only way to make marriage a continual happiness is to continue the
courtship through life. Each party must make the effort to keep the
desire of the other alive and eager. Husband and wife must regard each
other as they did before marriage. This will not be hard if there was
true love to start with, and it will be infinitely worth while. Marriage
is not a thing to be lightly entered into and lightly cast aside. It
requires constant care on the part of each.
To be sure, if after these attempts to preserve the love of the
pre-marriage days, that love dies, it is better for the temper, health,
and morality of both parties to separate. But all other methods should be
adequately tried first.
IV. THE PROPER MATE.
_The Purpose of Marriage._—The essential thing to found a happy marriage
upon is the choice of a proper mate. Marriage, even from the most modern
standpoint, is something more than the satisfaction of the love desire.
It is an institution upon which all of our social life is founded. More
than that, it is the one undisputed method of gaining immortality. Men
and women live on in their children, their grandchildren, forever.
The perpetuity that they hand down must be the finest that they are
capable of. If two incompatible people marry and live together, they
give that incompatibility of temperament to all posterity. They bequeath
dissatisfaction, unrest, misery to the world, for it is an undisputed
fact that the children of unhappy couples are rarely rounded persons. So
it is no light matter to choose a fitting mate.
The perpetuation of the race is one of the deep fundamental principles of
marriage. It remains for each couple to see that their offering to this
end is the best that they can possibly make. From the standpoint of the
race, it is essential that only those who are fit should mate and give
children to the future.
The majority of matings are haphazard. A young woman chooses a husband
from among the men with whom she is thrown in contact. She cannot wait
until she has seen and known all the available men. Too often she takes
to the first one who pleases her. The economic independence of women
will alleviate this slightly. A young woman no longer needs to marry
in her earliest twenties. She can afford to wait. This gives her a
better chance of selection. But even with necessity for marrying early
removed, she knows little or nothing about the man she chooses. He is
attentive, dances well, is amusing, so she marries him. She does not stop
to consider his physical fitness to be the father of her children. Mere
passion too often determines the matter. This is a thing that comes very
easily, and on the crest of its urge, people marry. As easily it goes,
when there is no fundamental compatibility behind it. Then marriage is
wrecked. A young woman should not marry hastily, nor choose as a basis
of this estate the momentary thrill of a kiss, nor the charm of a man’s
dancing ability. We are not suggesting long tedious engagements, but as
deep a knowledge of the man as is possible before the girl enters into
matrimony with him.
_Eugenics._—The girl is confronted with the problem, What is the fitting
mate? Her own inclinations should be the first guide, but when they have
singled out a possible choice, she should bring common sense to their
aid. In general, all persons turn to their opposites. This is right.
Opposites in appearance and temperament are usually the most congenial.
This does not mean violent contrasts. A man who cares nothing for the
theater, dancing, social life should not pick a girl whose whole life is
bound up in these. If a woman feels immense or insistent love for a man
whom she knows is not a fit father for her children, she should either
forget the desired mating or the children. Eugenics, or the choice of
proper mates, is being more carefully studied from a scientific point of
view, and will ultimately be invaluable, at least as far as procreation
goes.
Eugenics is the science of improving the stock; of making the offspring
as nearly perfect as possible. It has been practiced in the breeding
of animals for a long time. Every farmer knows the value of having the
best cattle he can obtain, and having them, of mating his cows with
thoroughbred bulls. Yet people still shudder at the thought of applying
its principles to the human race. Its formulator, Francis Galton, defined
it as “the science which deals with all influences that improve the
inborn qualities of a race.” He further explained this idea and expanded
it, saying that the aim of eugenics is