Men wreck marriage because they are promiscuous; and women wreck it
because they are parasites. Woman has been for long centuries an
economic inferior, and she has the vices of the subject peoples and
tribes. Now there are some who want to keep these vices, while at the
same time claiming the new privileges which go with equality. Such a
woman picks out a man who is sensitive and chivalrous; who knows that
women suffer handicaps, pains of childbirth, physical weakness, and who
therefore feels impelled to bear more than his share of the burdens. She
makes him her slave; and by and by she gets a child, and then she has
him, because he is bowed down with awe and worship, he thinks that such
a miracle has never happened in the world before, and he spends the rest
of his life waiting on her whims and nursing her vanities. I note that
at the recent convention of the Woman's Party they demanded their rights
and agreed to surrender their privileges. There you have the final test
by which you may know that women really want to be free, and are
prepared to take the responsibilities of freedom.
CHAPTER XLIV
THE DEFENSE OF MONOGAMY
(Discusses the permanence of love, and why we should endeavor to
preserve it.)
So far in this discussion we have assumed that love means monogamous
love. We did so, for the reason that we could not consider every
question at once. But we have promised to deal with all the problems of
sex in the light of reason; and so we have now to take up the question,
what are the sanctions of monogamy, and why do we refuse sanction to
other kinds of love?
First, let us set aside several reasons with which we have nothing to
do. For example, the reason of tradition. It is a fact that Anglo-Saxon
civilization has always refused legal recognition to non-monogamous
marriage. But then, Anglo-Saxon civilization has recognized war, and
slavery, and speculation, and private property in land, and many other
things which we presume to describe as crimes. If tradition cannot
justify itself to our reason, we shall choose martyrdom.
Second, the religious reason. This is the one that most people give. It
is convenient, because it saves the need of thinking. Suffice it here to
say that we prefer to think. If we cannot justify monogamy by the facts
of life, we shall declare ourselves for polygamy.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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