MAKING VICE EASY.

White Ribbon, Volume 24, Issue 282, 18 December 1918, Page 3

MAKING VICE EASY.

(By Miss Maude Roydcn.)

the war office and maisons TOLERES.

I have been astonished to find how many people there are who do not understand what "the system we are protesting against really implies both for men and women, and exactly what is our objection to it. Dr Helen Wilson has told us that by all who know it i> admitted to be a sanitate failure, to be in practice of no use. 1 want to make clear what is this system of regulated vice, the kind of house against whose existence within bounds for British soldiers we are now protesting, and tv hat induces people to adopt these futile methods. Let us remind you that they are said to be adopted on behalf of us women. We are continually told that it is on behalf of the innocent that these measures are resorted to; that venereal disease always goes up during or immediately after a war, and that it is foi the sake, especially of innocent women and children, that it is necessary to try these measures in order to keep soldiers from infection. I should like every woman in this country to understand on whose behalf these measures a reccing urged, and at what cost that protection, if it were a protection—which it is not —is given to her. I know many women in this country .ire willing t»> accept this protection, but I think they hardly realist* what is the fate of the women who are sacrificed for them. The system we protest against is what is known as regulated vice. The assumption is that unmarried men and men away from their wives cannot be expected to he continent, and that therefore they will go to other women. Those women in the nature of things very often become diseased. I say become diseased, because every woman suffering i'rom venereal disease has been infected by some man. Some of the women, then, a terribly large number, become infected. If a man who is not diseased goes to them, he becomes infected, and he may return and infect his wife, and pass on the disease to his children. Mr Mncuherson, Under Secretary of State for War, in the House of Commons recently said: “He was not at all sure, human nature being what it is, that it was such a bad thing to have certain houses in which

women were registered by the police and kept clean” ; that is to say, are examined at frequent intervals by the doctors, removed if they are found io he diseased, and guaranteed health} it the disease is not discovered. In a tolerated house, such as that in Laveux sur-Mcr, the women arc all kept under stint medical supervision, and if disease is discovered in them the} are removed and treated, and other women take their places. I‘his house at Laveux is within hounds for British soldiers, in it are fifteen women, sonv* of whom appear to be quite young, and it is visited by jbo men every day. Therefore each of the fifteen women receives between twenty and twenty-five men even day. The -lOrt of lives these girls lead d<v> not require any description from me; but t: . effect it has upon them—to be not only prostituted, which is hor rible, but registered as prostitutes and medically examined at intervals in ord< r to be guaranteed jit for prostitution, I should like to describe in the \\( rds, not of those who criticise, but of those who defend the syst f m. Here is a description by a French dm tor, who was officially employed in administering the system, and defended it: “ The obligat on <»t these medical examinations is prodigiously degrading, debasing, and terribh. Th** system regularises and legitimates the sorrowful industry of the prostitute. It is, in fact, the sinister stroke by which the woman is cut off from Society, after which sh* ceases to belong to herself, and laconics the chattel (or thing) of the administration.” Another writes like this: “The inscription of ihc woman’s name is pun Iv an administrative act. None the less does it indict on the woman a patent of infamy and degradation, and exercises a disastrous and fatal influence on her future life.” Dr. Mireur says: “The girl of the brothel is the type par excellence of the public woman. She is the modern slave who, having sacrificed her personality, has become the tool of the brotlH-kccrcr and the prooerty of the public.” Again I remind you that this gentleman was defending the system. Another doctor says: “The authorities have here, as ir. other business transactions, the right to see that the merchandise delivered is of a quality demanded by the customer.” 1 do pot know if it is necessary to point

out how inevitable it becomes that a woman who is treated as the “chattel or thing of administration” is in a paragraph or two desrrihed as the merchandise which must be supplied according to the demands of the < us. tomer.” “When oner the woman has entered the brothel,’ says another, ‘•she bids adieu to heavin, to I'berty, to honour, and to tin* world.” These are the descriptions of tiie people who for the most part know the administration through having themselves taken part in it. and who believe it to be necessary. That is the price at which our supposed protection is bought for us the price of women like themselves. Dr. Helen Wilson, who 's not given to exaggerated statements, has analysed the lig lies of prostitution, and she points out that the la'ge majority of women on the streets come from had houses, and are between sixteen and eighteen, sometimes younger, wh*n they take to this lib*. \ girl under eighteen, brought uo in a had house, does not, because sh< ha** become a prostitute, deserve to le treated as though she were no longer a human being. The result of regulation on her is described very vividly by tlm chaplain to the Lock Hospital, W'csfbourne Park, London who some time ago, when a Commission on the subject was sitting, wrote: “It is obvious to anyone almost at lirst sight that tin' Government patients, that i*», the women in tolerated houses, arc horribly alike, at one dead, dull, level. The ordinary patients, that the women of the streets, are v ry mixed, some of more and some of less refined appearance; but the Government patients are brutalised beyond description in manner and in apo< arante. It is not difficult to see why. If you treat a worn in worse than you would dare treat an animal, no wonder she becomes horribly brutalised in manner and appearance. A woman who becomes like this soon ceases to he attractive tr> the men who are induced in one way or another only to visit the regulated houses. If the women there are brutalised beyond description,” they will orefor to go to other houses, where the women are at l°ast a grade higher; and since the whole object of the system is to get men to go to the regulat'd houses, very quickly the places of these women h ive to be supplied bv others. At this moment there are is women

girls, I might call them—at Laycux, but it is not only 15. t-'oi girls who an: visited on an average by between twenty and twcnt> five men every day, do not long retain any of the youth or attraction which will bring the men to them; hence soon their plaees have to be taken b> either girls, and thus the St.it**, the Government, ami Army Authorities, whoevei it is, heroine* the prorurer, for which in this and evei\ eiviliseel country an individual would in* punished. That kind of infamy is being perpetrated on behalf of the women of this country! To an> woman who believes the sacrifice to be necessary, 1 would say that sh** herself should volunteer. We have heard about the infamy of a man who, for whatever reason, nobh* or ignoble, allows others to go out and tight and die in his place, because, we are told, it is a rav of national necessity. This plea may be urged on behalf of regulated prostitution. The men who urge it should invite their wives and daughters to till the places left vacant when the fifteen women are worn out. I use words that sere my heart, hut su< h things should not go on without people understanding for whom and why they are done. Do not believe that it is the soldier who demands ttv*ill. lie as you or I, if we had not a certain amount of knowledge may be misled bv what looks like plausible arguments, hut if you once make a soldier understand what it is that he is demanding, or that is being demand'd in his name, he will repudiate this system. \ friend of mine of the M«»ral and Serial Hygiene, has been speaking lately in India against this system, some part of which is still in existence, and she says that wb‘*n she has addressed a big audience of soldiers and made them understand what the tolerated houses really mean to tlv* women who live in them, they with one accord demand to be allowed to sign a petition to the commanding officers that the houses should be closed. She told them she only wanted them to sign their names as men, not to give their regimental numbers, because she did not want them to get • r to trouble; but the soldiers insisted on giving th*\r regimental numbers, so that it might be seen from whom the protest came. It is so stupid to assume that human beings, whether men or women, are beasts; they are so infinitely better than we will allow

them to be. Amid all the horrors and agonies of war, and 1 associate myself with every word that has been said about toniptation and the duty of having the profound sympathy for the tempted, whether men or women, in soite of all temptation, I believe that soldiers would refuse the alleged pr<>te«tion if lhe\ understood its cost. “You invent a project, M said th** life Professor Stuart, “by which you, the State, propose to set aside a rertain number of women destined to be the slaves and the instruments of m'*n's lust. You propose, by your system of examination, to keep them in good condition. Why ? Because your whole conception is profoundly immoral and against Nature. You have no respect for the human body; you forget th" soul within. You think only of making these women serve men. You acknowledge not the humanity, the life, and the individuality of these po >r instruments. And you will fail because physically human nature refuses to lend itself to your plans.” ”It is not only an insult and .in outrage a gainst women, but it is an outrage upon men to assume that they want this sort of thing, to assume that they have no more res|*ect for the worth and beauty of a human being than it suggests by this des« rirtion of women as “merihandise!” I believe that we have onl\ to get the facts before the public in order to have the thing swept away by .1 flood of indignation. From “The Christian f Commonwealth,” March Oth, n>iK. The* meeting at whnh Miss Maude Koyden delivered this spee< h in the l.axton Hall, l.ondon, was organised by the As six iation for Moral and Social Hygiene, to protest against the establishment of a regulated house at l.avux snr-Mer, for the use of the British soldiers. It was o|»ened in the middle of the principal promenade shortly after the establishment of a convalescent camp neat bv, and in soite of the protests of th" French inhabitants, who said: “If such a place is really needed for the British soldiers, let it be put in some obscure corner near their own camp.” The following resolution was passed at this meeting: “That this meeting expresses its shame and indignation at the attitude of the British military authorities in jrermitting the establishment of brothels for the us° of British troops in France, as in l.aveux-sur Mer. where such a house

was opened and is maintained in defiance of repeated protests by th*: town people. It (.ills upon the Government and the Military Authorities to out all recognised houses of dehauchery out of bounds for British se»ldie*rs of all ranks. Th** resolution was moved by Dr. Ilele*n Wilson, onel seeoneled bv Miss Maude Rovden.