Communism; Industrial Workers of the World; Socialism
"Herein we have an instance of the distinction between bourgeois
morality and Socialist morality. To the first it is immoral to live in a
marital relation without having previously subscribed to certain legal
formalities.... To the second ... to live in a state of unlegalized
marriage defileth not a man, nor woman." [Ibid., page 158.]
"Socialism will strike at the root at once of compulsory monogamy."
[Ibid., page 159.]
Quotations from this base free-love book will end with the following:
"If it be asked 'is marriage a failure?' the answer of any impartial
person must be 'monogamic marriage is a failure'--the rest is silence.
We know not what the new form of the family, the society of the future
in which men and women will be alike economically free, may involve, and
which may be generally adopted therein. Meanwhile we ought to combat by
every means within our power the metaphysical dogma of the inherent
sanctity of the monogamic principle." ["Outlooks From a New Standpoint,"
by Ernest Belfort Bax, page 160 of the 1891 edition.]
"Outlooks From a New Standpoint," from which these quotations have been
taken, was advertised in the price list of the Social Democratic
Publishing Company of Milwaukee; and though it was sold for a dollar a
copy at Victor Berger's establishment, it has never been used by the
Socialists of America to prove to the world that they do not advocate
free-love.
In view of the fact that "Outlooks From a New Standpoint" was sold at
Berger's own publishing company, it is somewhat surprising to see him,
in the August 10, 1912, edition of his paper, the Milwaukee "Social
Democratic Herald," attacking, in a party squabble, "the men in control
of the 'International Socialist Review,' ... who publish books in
defense of what our enemies call free-love." Further on in the factional
quarrel he writes: "I shall leave out the Christian Socialists entirely.
Many of them are honest in this fight. But these Christian
Socialists--who are only a handful--are being used by cowardly assassins
and practical free-lovers as a cat's paw." Perhaps the Socialist
publishers would be a little more free with their love for each other,
if there was less competition for the silver dollar.
Ernest Belfort Bax in another book, "Religion of Socialism," thus
denounces the present form of family life: "We defy any human being to
point to a single reality, good or bad, in the composition of the
bourgeois family. It has the merit of being the most perfect specimen of
complete sham that history has presented to the world." ["Religion of
Socialism," by Ernest Belfort Bax, page 141 of the 1891 edition.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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