The Future of Women.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXXV, Issue 6, 12 August 1905, Page 59

The Future of Women.

HAS THE EMANCIPATION MOVEMENT PROVED A FAILURE

Lucas Malet’s magazine article on the re-subjection of women has brought “Rita” into the lists with an article contributed to the ‘‘Daily Chronicle. She says: —

“The change in the English girl of modern days is appalling. She is bold, self-confident, self-assertive. She openly rebels against anything so old-fashioned as parental control. Besides, she has great ideas of independence. She is quite sure she can ‘do something.’ Hence we are constantly presented with the sight of weak and miniature efforts in art and literature, and various other

phases of work by women workers. The modern girl hails with joy the opportunity of university contests. She is invading every province of man’s activity, and utterly disregarding the fact that there is no one to take up the role she has relinquished. I have always maintained that woman, once given her head, would dasli off at break-neck speed, regardless of havoc or the inevitable ‘smash’ at the end of her bolt. For, by nature, she is impetuous and illogical. She rushes at ideas, especially when they possess the charm of novelty, and never pauses to look ahead for results.

She has shown this failing in a very marked manner by the way she has taken up sports and games and every athletic pursuit of man. The meaning of moderation is unknown. She never seems to consider that nature has given to woman a different physique from that of man; that she is handicapped by laws relegating her to care of her person and her health under severe penalties. She would rather brave the penalties than pretend to prudent consideration of physiology. The laments over a decreasing birthrate and increasing dislike of the restrictions of marriage are at present a topic of social interest on both sides of the Atlantic. Lucas Malet is right in saying that the gospel preached by the President of the United States is one that is sane and sound, and an appeal to reason and common sense. But the question remains, are women capable nowadays of reasoning on so important a subject as present martyrdom for future good? For “martyrdom”" is what they call the dull housewifely maternal routine of half a century back. They have left all that behind, tnrown it to the winds of heaven, along with parental authority and wifely obedience. So poor

distraught man can only shrug his shoulders and denounce them in his heart, as President Roosevelt has done by word of mouth. And there is another gross evil apparent, as result of woman’s dominance and independence. It is the lessening respect man shows for her, the manner in which he permits her to do for herself the countless little offices once accounted as his privilege. Seldom does he trouble to offer her a seat in crowded bus or train, to open a door, to offer a ehair, to attend to her needs and save her from rough sights or shocks. She has plainly shown him she requires no care, that she is quite capable of looking after herself. He, therefore, stands aside and permits her to do so. Love, poetry, chivalry, romance cannot flourish in an atmosphere of cigarette smoke, or be inspired by a snorting motor, or a tough golf contest. The more woman intrudes upon man’s province. the less he regards her from any point of sentiment. He is less careful of his manners and his conversation. He tells her stories that once would never have passed his lips out of his club smoking room. And she, in her own club sanctum, retails them before women with whisky and sodas at their elbow’ and their favourite brand of cigarette tainting breath and room in the sickening modern fashion. If Lucas Malet expects women such as these to bring up a generation of “femininity” she must possess a singularly hopeful mind.

One can only trust that the supply will meet the need; that the generation, or generations, to come will suit their own environment; that the equality of the sexes once proved, will form a satisfactory solution to its present riddle; that the doubtful blessing of overeducation which tempts girls from home to the delusive freedom of college life, and, later, on to latchkey and “flat” and “work,” may prove the boon it certainly is not—at present. That marriage, having ceased to be desirable, some less arduous institution, based on Mr Meredith’s plan, may prove more successful. That our young modern Amazon may show herself fitted for her country’s defence as well as for its — limited—population. That the Utopia to which the world is progressing may do one or two things—either relegate woman to the old simple natural life ordained by nature and by God, or make hei so far man’s superior that he will cease to struggle for supremacy. But when she has taken everything from him —his stature, his vices, his ambitions, his duties, his professions, his amusements, his freedom and his

power—what place is he to have in the new future? If she is ruler he must be slave. If she is the breadwinner, he must content himself with domestic duties. If her flagrant vanity has set her upon a pinnacle of pre-eminence, what power or persuasion of mere man will ever make her step down and sit at his footstool as of old, and know no greater bliss than his praise, no sweeter guerdon than his love? But will there be love in those new days? How is it to be fostered when all poetry art and imagination have been killed out of man by the emancipated female victor—She will be his comrade, his equal, perhaps his superior, but never again queen of his heart and soul, the inspiration of chivalry, the fair and cherished ideal of youth an I manhood.

Let her pause and think before she sets such trifles as these at naught! One day she may need them, seek them even with tears, and need and seek in vain!

The woman’s movement can no longer be laughed at. It has to be reckoned with. But the danger attending on the

resolute efforts at independence is one to which she is apparently blind. Sue sees the open door, and rushes to its promised freedom, but does she see what lies beyond, what man has tried to save her from experiencing—the daily drudgery, the heartbreaks, the trials, the tricks and shams, the dishonesty and dishonour of the world of trade and labour, the disillusions of the w’orld of art ? And with all these no life o home. No pure and simple peace; no blessed rest; no sympathy of strong nature for weak, since, if she has chosen to assert herself the stronger, she must in very self-defence show no weakness. She has professed herself tired of shelter and deference and subjection, but it will need more than a generation to quite eradicate some lingering longing for these things. They are co-existent with her own place in the scheme of creation, and they are hard to kill. She is unfair to herself in trying to kill them, for the most beautiful thing in humanity is the little babe in its mother’s arms, and the divinest is —motherhood.