“There it is,” he said. “You can only think about women in some sort of relation to men, of a change in marriage relations as merely a change in kind; whereas what has happened is a change in degree. We still have monogamous marriages, on a much purer and more lasting plane than a generation ago; but the word ‘wife’ does not mean what it used to.”
“Go on — I can’t follow you at all.”
“A ‘wife’ used to be a possession; ‘wilt thou be mine?’ said the lover, and the wife was his.”
“Well — whose else is she now?” I asked with some sharpness.
“She does not ‘belong’ to anyone in that old sense. She is the wife of her husband in that she is his true lover, and that their marriage is legally recorded; but her life and work does not belong to him. He has no right to her ‘services’ any more. A woman who is in a business — like Hallie, for instance — does not give it up when she marries.”
I stopped him. “What! Isn’t Hallie married?”
“No — not yet.”
“But — that is her flat?” Yes; why not?” He laughed at me. You see, you can’t imagine a woman having a home of her own. Hallie is twenty-three. She won’t marry for some years, probably; but she has her position and is doing excellent work. It’s only a minor inspectorship, but she likes it. Why shouldn’t she have a home?”
Why doesn’t she have it with you?” Because I like to live with my wife. Her business, and mine, are in Michigan; Hallie’s in New York.”
“And when she marries she keeps on being an inspector?” I queried.
“Precisely. The man who marries that young woman will have much happiness, but he will not ‘own’ her, and she will not be his wife in the sense of a servant. She will not darn his socks or cook his meals. Why should she?” “Will she not nurse his babies?” “No; she will nurse her babies — their babies, not ‘his’ merely.”
“And keep on being an inspector?” “And keep on being an inspector — for four hours a day — in two shifts. Not a bit more difficult than cooking, my dear boy.” “But — she will not be with her children—” “She will be with her children twenty hours out of the twenty-four — if she wants to. But Hallie’s not specially good with children. . . . You see, John, the women have specialized — even in motherhood.” Then he went on at considerable length to show how there had arisen a recognition of far more efficient motherhood than was being given; that those women best fitted for the work had given eager, devoted lives to it and built up a new science of Humaniculture; that no woman was allowed to care for her children without proof of capacity. “Allowed by whom?” I put in.
“By the other women — the Department of Child Culture — the Government.”
“And the fathers — do they submit to this, tamely?”
“No; they cheerfully agree and approve. Absolutely the biggest thing that has happened, some of us think, is that new recognition of the importance of childhood. We are raising better people now.”
I was silent for a while, pulling up bits of grass and snapping small sticks into inch pieces.
“There was a good deal of talk about Eugenics, I remember,” I said at last, “and — what was that thing? Endowment of Motherhood?”
“Yes — man’s talk,” Owen . explained. “You see, John, we couldn’t look at women but in one way — in the old days; it was all a question of sex with us — inevitably, we being males. Our whole idea of improvement was in better breeding; our whole idea of motherhood was in each woman’s devoting her whole life to her own children. That turbid freshet of an Englishman, Wells, who did so much to stir his generation, said
‘I am wholly feminist’ — and he was I He saw women only as females and wanted them endowed as such. He was never able to see them as human beings and amply competent to take care of themselves.
“Now, our women, getting hold of this idea that they really are human creatures, simply blossomed forth in new efficiency. They specialized the food business — Hallie’s right about the importance of that — and then they specialized the baby business. All .women who wish to, have babies; but if they wish to take care of them they must show a diploma.”
I looked at him. I didn’t like it — but what difference did that make? I had died thirty years ago, it appeared.
“A diploma for motherhood!” I repeated; but he corrected me.
“Not at all. Any woman can be a mother — if she’s normal. I said she had to have a diploma as a child-culturist — quite a different matter.”
“I don’t see the difference.”
“No, I suppose not. I didn’t, once,” he said. “Any and every mother was supposed to be competent to ‘raise’ children — and look at the kind of people we raised! You see, we are beginning to learn — just beginning. You needn’t imagine that we are in a state of perfection — there are more new projects up for discussion than ever before. We’ve only made a start. The consequences, so far, are so good that we are boiling over with propositions for future steps.”
“Go on about the women,” I said. “I want to know the worst and become resigned.”
“There’s nothing very bad to tell,” he continued cheerfully. “When a girl is born she is treated in all ways as if she was a boy; there is no hint made in any distinction between them except in the perfectly open physiological instruction as to their future duties. Children, young humans, grow up under precisely the same conditions. I speak, of course, of the most advanced people — there are still backward places — there’s plenty to do yet.
“Then the growing girls are taught of their place and power as mothers — and they have tremendously high ideals. That’s what has done so much to raise the standard in men. It came hard, but it worked.”
I raised my head with keen interest, remarking, “I’ve glimpsed a sort of Iron hand in a velvet glove back of all this. What did they do?”
Owen looked rather grim for a moment.
“The worst of it was twenty or twenty-five years back. Most of those men are dead. That new religious movement stirred the socio-ethical sense to sudden power; it coincided with the women’s political movement, urging measures for social improvement; its enormous spread, both by preaching and literature, lit up the whole community with new facts, ideas and feelings. Health — physical purity — was made a practical ideal. The young women learned the proportion of men with syphilis and gonorrhoea and decided it was wrong to marry them. That was enough. They passed laws in every State requiring a clean bill of health with every marriage license. Diseased men had to die bachelors — that’s all.”
“And did men submit to legislation like that?” I protested.
“Why not? It was so patently for the protection of the race — of the family — of the women and children. Women were solid for it, of course — And all the best men with them. To oppose it was almost a confession of guilt and injured a man’s chances of marriage.”
“It used to be said that any man could find a woman to marry him,” I murmured, meditatively.
“Maybe he could — once. He certainly cannot now. A man who has one of those diseases is so reported — just like small-pox, you see. Moreover, it is registered against him by the Department of Eugenics — physicians are required to send in lists; any girl can find out.”
“It must have left a large proportion of unmarried women.”
“It did, at first. And that very thing was of great value to the world. They were wise, conscientious, strong women, you see, and they poured all their tremendous force into social service. Lots of them went into child culture — used their mother-power that way. It wasn’t easy for them; it wasn’t easy for the left-over men, either!”
“It must have increased prostitution to an awful extent,” I said.
Owen shook his head and regarded me quizzically.
“That is the worst of it,” he said. “There isn’t any.”
I sat up. I stood up. I walked up and down. “No prostitution! I — I can’t believe it. Why, prostitution is a social necess
ity, as old as Nineveh!”.
Owen laughed outright. “Too late, old man; too late! I know we used to think so. We did use to call it a ‘social necessity,’ didn’t we? Come, now, tell me what necessity it was to the women?”
I stopped my march and looked at him.
“To the women,” he repeated. “What did they want of prostitution? What good did it do them?”
“Why — why — they made a living at it,” I replied, rather lamely.
“Yes, a nice, honorable, pleasant, healthy living, didn’t they? With all women perfectly well able to earn an excellent living decently; with all women fully educated about these matters and knowing what a horrible death was before them in this business; with all women brought up like human beings and not like over-sexed female animals, and with all women quite free to marry if they wished to — how many, do you think, would choose that kind of business?
“We never waited for them to choose it, remember! We fooled them and lied to them and dragged them in — and drove them in — forced them in — and kept them as slaves and prisoners. They didn’t really enjoy the life; you know that. Why should they go into it if they do not have to — to accommodate us?”
“Do you mean to tell me there are no — wantons — among women?” I demanded.
“No, I don’t mean any such thing. There are various kinds of over-developed and morbidly developed women as there are men, and we haven’t weeded them out entirely. But the whole thing is now recognized as pathological — cases for medical treatment, or perhaps surgical. Besides, wantonness is not prostitution. Prostitution is a social crime of the worst order. No one thing did more harm. The women stamped it out.” m
“Legislated us all into morality, did they?” I inquired sarcastically.
“Legislation did a good deal; education did more; the new religion did most; social opinion helped. You remember we men never really tried to legislate against prostitution — we wanted it to go on.”
“Why, surely we did legislate against it — and it was of no use!” I protested.
“No; we legislated against the women, but not against the men, or the thing itself. We examined the women, and fined them, and licensed them — and never did anything against the men. Women legislators used very different measures, I assure you.”
“I suppose it is for the good of the world,” I presently admitted; “but”
“But you don’t quite like to think of men in this new and peculiar position of having to be good!”
“Frankly — I don’t. I’m willing to be good, but — I don’t like to be given no choice.”
“Well, now, look at it. As it was, we had one way, according to what we thought was good for us. Rather than lead clean, contented lives at some expense to ourselves in the way of moral and physical control, we deliberately sacrificed an army of women to a horrible life and a more horrible death, and corrupted the blood of the nation. It was on the line of health they made their stand, not on ‘morality’ alone. Under our new laws it is held a crime to poison another human being with syphilis, just as much as to use prussic acid.”
“Nellie said you had no crime now.” “Oh, well, Nellie is an optimist. I suppose she meant the old kinds and definitions. We don’t call things ‘crimes’ any more. And then, really, there is not a hundredth part of the evil done that there used to be. We know more, you see, and have less temptation.”
We were silent for a while. I watched a gull float and wheel over the blue water. Big airships flew steadily along certain lines. Little ones sailed about on all sides.
One darted over our heads and lit with a soft swoop on an open promontory.
“Didn’t they use to buzz?” I asked Owen, “Of course; just as the first motor boats thumped and banged abominably. We will not stand for unnecessary noise, as we used to.”
“How do you stop it? More interference with the individual rights?”
“More recognition of public rights. A bad noise is a nuisance, like a bad smell. We didn’t used to mind it much — but the women did. You see, what women like has to be considered now.”
“It always was considered!” I broke in with some heat. “The women of America were the most spoiled, pampered lot on earth; men gave up to them in all ways.”
“At home, perhaps, but not in public. The city and state weren’t run to suit them at all.”
“Why should they be? Women belong at home. If they push into a man’s world they ought to take the consequences.”
Owen stretched his long legs and looked up at the soft, brilliant blue above us.
“Why do you call the world “man’s?” he asked.
“It was man’s; it ought to be. Woman’s place is in the home. I suppose I sound like ancient history to you?” and I laughed a little shamefacedly.
“We have rather lost that point of view,”
Owen guardedly admitted. “You see “ and then he laughed. “It’s no use, John; no matter how we put it to you it’s a jar. The world’s thought has changed — and you have got to catch up!”
“Suppose I refuse? Suppose I really am unable?”
“We won’t suppose it for a moment,” he said cheerfully. “Ideas are not nailed down. Just take out what you had and insert some new ones. Women are people — just as much as we are; that’s a fact, my dear fellow. You’ll have to accept it.”
“And are men allowed to be people, too?” I asked gloomily.
“Why, of course! Nothing has interfered with our position as human beings; it is only our sex supremacy that we have lost.”
“And do you like it?” I demanded.
“Some men made a good deal of fuss at first — the old-fashioned kind, and all the worst varieties. But modern men aren’t worried in the least over their position. ., .
See here, John, you don’t grasp this — women are vastly more agreeable than they used to be.”
I looked at him in amazement.
“Fact!” he said. “Of course, we loved our own mothers and daughters and sisters, more or less, no matter how they looked or what they did; and when we were ‘in love’ there was no limit to the glory of ‘the beloved object.’ But you and I know that women were pretty unsatisfactory in the old days.”
I refused to admit it, but he went on calmly.
“The ‘wife and mother’ was generally a tired, nervous, overworked creature. She soon lost her beauty and vigor, her charm and inspiration. We were forever chasing fine, handsome, highly desirable young girls, and forever reducing them to weary; worn-out women — in the name of love! The gay outsiders were always a fresh attraction — as long as we couldn’t have them. . . . See here, John, can’t you understand? Our old way of using women wasn’t good for them — nor for us, either, by the way — but it simply spoiled the women. They were hopelessly out of the running with us in all human lines; their business was housework, and ours was world work. There was very little real companionship.
“Now women are intelligent, experienced, well-trained citizens, fully our equals in any line of work they take up, and with us everywhere. It’s made the world over!”
“Made it ‘feminist’ through and through, I suppose!” I groaned.
“Not a bit! It used to be ‘masculist’ through and through; now it’s just human,) And, see here — women are more attractive, as women, than they used to be.”
I stared at this, unbelieving.
“That’s true! You see, they are healthy; there’s a new standard of physical beauty — very Greek — you must have noticed already the big, vigorous, fresh-colored, free-stepping girls.”
I had, even in my brief hours of observation.
“They are far more perfect physically, better developed mentally, with a higher moral sense — yes, you needn’t look like that! We used to call them our ‘moral superiors,’ just because they had the one virtue we insisted on — and we never noticed the lack in other lines. Women today are truthful, brave, honest, generous, self — controlled; they are — jollier, more reason
able, more companionable.”
“Well, I’m glad to hear that,” I rather grudgingly admitted. “I was afraid they would have lost all — charm.”
“Yes, we used to feel that way, I remember. Funny! We were convinced on the one hand that there was nothing to a woman but her eternal womanliness, and on the other we were desperately afraid her womanliness would disappear the moment she turned her mind to anything else. I assure you that men love women, in general and in particular, much more than they used to.”
I pondered. “But — what sort of home life do you have?”
“Think for a moment of what we used to have — even in a ‘happy home.’ The man had the whole responsibility of keeping it up — his business life and interests all foreign to her. She had the whole labor of running it — the direct manual labor in the great majority of cases — the management in any case. They were strangers in an industrial sense.
“When he came home he had to drop all his line of thought — and she hers, except that she generally unloaded on him the burden of inadequacy in housekeeping. Sometimes he unloaded, too. They could sympathize and condole, but neither could help the other.
“The whole thing cost like sin, too. It was a living nightmare to lots of men — and women! The only things they had in common were their children and ‘social interests.’
“Well — nowadays, in the first place every body is easy about money. ( I’ll go into that later.) No woman marries except for love — and good judgment, too; all women are more desirable — more men want to marry them — and that improves the men! You see, a man naturally cares more for women than for anything else in life — and they know it! It’s the handle they lift by. That’s what has eliminated tobacco.”
“Do you mean to say that these women have arbitrarily prevented smoking?” I do not smoke myself, but I was angry nevertheless.
“Not a bit of it, John — not a bit of it. Anybody can smoke who wants to.” “Then why don’t they?” “Because women do not like it.” “What has that to do with it? Can’t a man do what he wants to — even if they don’t like it?”
“Yes, he can; but it costs too much. Men like tobacco, but they like love better, old man.”
Complete Works of Charlotte Perkins Gilman Page 41
