A STRONG INDICTMENT

Greymouth Evening Star, 29 January 1914, Page 8

A STRONG INDICTMENT

There is one thing which the "new woman." collectively considered, does not do for which men should be profoundly 71'ateful. She does not preach public . sermons on the supposed mental, moral and physical deficiencies of men, as some assemblies of the ether sex, especially eugenists, are fond of doing at the expense of women. We tremble to think \vha.t an indictment might be made out bv Mrs Pankhurst. in. England, or Miss Jane Addams, in America, if they chose to treat men's infirmities as Dr. Deesel, according to a cable message, has done those of college women before an audience of the American National Conference on Race Betterment. The exposure would doubtless be more scarifying in proportion as women's observation is keener, nnd her power of describing obliquities terser and more inspired than that of men. But Mrs Pankhurst and Miss Ad, dams are chivalrous. They content themselves with opposing and denouncing what seem to them to be the evil consequences of men's rule, and leave the evnng, mortal creature man alone, except occasionally when a British suffragette throws an axe at the Prime Minister. Dr. Deesel, on the other hand, has made a general onslaught on the whole class of American college women. Girls are turned out of colleges, 'he declares, "unfit to achieve either a livelihood or motherhood, being nervous wrecks, with their heads filled with fancy information, sounding well at a club meeting, but utterly useless for ordering the steak." He assa'ils them also for their devotion to extremes of fashion and their extravagance H the American man. as has been said is frequently a subjugated creature, who sacrifices himself unduly to hi* wife's desire to shine, the American scientist is prone to take severe revenge. Dr Deesel's accusations are not new. They have been made before by male cdu-

canonists and eugenists in America, and, less boldly, by corresponding "experts" in Great Britain. Few people will believe that .the American college girl, who plays golf and tennis just as keenly as her British or New Zealand sister, is, in other than exceptional instances,, a nervous wreck. If she is too ardently devoted to the fashions it is probable that she remembers that the "blue Blockings" of an earlier day were commonly assailed for dowdiness. She is not likely to know less about the steak than Agnes in "David Copperfield," who never went to college, knew of oysters. Time are some chairs of Domestic Economy m American Universities, as there are in those of other lands. Dr. Deesel longs to see a chair of Health set up in every college, hut such a consummation might be hoped and worked for without putting the college woman in the pillory because all the infirmities have not been given to the other