IX
Special Sex-instruction for Maturing Young Women[ToC]
Parents would limit knowledge of daughters.
It was my original plan to make this lecture parallel with the preceding one for young men, but much discussion with parents and with scientifically trained women whose suggestions and criticisms I value has shown me that there is no consensus of opinion as to what should be taught to young women between eighteen and twenty-two years of age. I have found many fathers and mothers who think that their boys of fourteen or fifteen should be informed as suggested in the preceding lecture; but concerning some of the facts for boys these same parents were doubtful whether their daughters ought to know before twenty, and some of them have said twenty-five and even thirty. Some of them have said that they see no reason why an unmarried young woman of the protected group should know much more than a very limited amount of personal hygiene; but most of these people were decidedly hazy as to how the young woman about to marry may be sure of getting belated knowledge. In short, all along the line I have found intelligent parents and others who believe in very thorough sex-instruction for boys, but that "nice" girls should be kept as ignorant and innocent as possible. With such disagreement existing, it is evidently not possible to make such specific recommendations as have been made for boys.
§ 39. The Young Woman's Attitude towards Manhood
Women should have ideals.
Among those who agree heartily with the proposition that by education the young man's attitude towards womanhood (§ 30) should be cultivated I find, to my surprise, many who object to any parallel attempt to influence young woman's ideals of manhood. I say that I am surprised because it has long seemed to me that many of the faults of men are largely traceable to the fact that women as a sex have not been able to hold a high standard for manhood; and, therefore, I wonder when some thinking women question the desirability of trying to influence young women by organized instruction. Of course, we must not forget that before the coming of the economic and social freedom of women there were very few of them who were able to maintain a stand for their ideals of manhood; but this is no longer true in a great and rapidly increasing group of the individualized and educated classes. Therefore, it seems clear that if the better groups of women want a higher type of manhood capable of better adjustment in marriage, it is important that they consider ways and means of molding the minds of young women with reference to ideal manhood.
Ideals and disappointment.
Occasionally I have met a strange view of life in some men and women who have grown pessimistic from revelations concerning the sexual-social problems and who think that true manhood is so rare that emphasizing it with young women will lead to ideals that can rarely be realized in actual life; and therefore, for women so influenced there will be increasing discontent and disappointment in marriage or deliberate celibacy. No doubt this is in part true, as witness the many highly educated women who have written or said that there seem to be few attractive marriageable men of their own age. However, it is rare indeed that such women say that life would have meant more without the higher education and its resulting ideals that have stood in the way of marriage such as might be happy for uneducated women. This is in line with the fact that many cultivated men and women find that education has given unattained ideals and unsatisfied ambitions and strenuous life and disappointments, but it is rare that they long for the care-free and animal-like happiness of the tropical savage. We must remember that education gives us keener feeling for life's pains, but it also compensates by giving soul-satisfying appreciation of its joys. So it seems reasonable to believe that while educating young women to believe in and demand a higher ideal of manhood in its natural relations to womanhood will certainly make disappointments more heart-pressing for some, it will just as surely make realization the supreme happiness of others. And as adjustment of manhood and womanhood through the larger sex-education becomes more and more abundant and more and more perfected, the sum total of human happiness will increase.
Looking thus towards the ultimate good, I must refuse to accept the hopeless and depressing view that all young women should be kept ignorant of their relation to men and life in order that the absence of ideals of manhood may protect some women against possible disappointment by men.
§ 40. The Young Woman's Attitude towards Love and Marriage
Reasons not same as for men.
In the preceding lecture to the parents and teachers of young men I emphasized the importance of developing the young man's ideals of love and marriage primarily because such ideals have so often helped men morally in character-formation and character-protection. I feel sure that this is not the chief reason why the ideals of young women should be developed along parallel lines. On the contrary, it seems to me that those representative women are right who think that the first reason why ideals of young women should be influenced is that there is need of a radical change in the attitude of a very common type of young women who are flippant and disrespectful concerning love and marriage, and whose influence on the morals of men is decidedly bad because they often give unguided young men their first and strongest impressions concerning women. A second reason, which is equally applicable to both sexes, is that advance understanding of the relations of love and marriage is likely to lead to happy and satisfactory adjustment in marriage.
Men naturally lead in love.
Perhaps the flippant and disrespectful attitude concerning affairs of the heart develops in many young women because they do not consciously feel in advance of experience the demand for affection which comes so naturally and spontaneously to many, possibly to all, normal young men whose views of life have not been artificially twisted. I fully realize the treacherous nature of the ground on which walks one who tries to compare the two sexes concerning their relative attitudes towards love, but certain it is that the novelist's descriptions of men as the leaders and aggressors in love is not fiction but the common fact of real life. Man's tendency towards leadership in love is not scientifically explained by any superficial assumption that established social conventions have repressed an original spontaneity of women. On the contrary, there are the best of physiological and psychological reasons for believing that the social conventions have arisen as an expression of masculine aggressiveness and natural tendency towards leadership in affairs of the heart. The accepted fact is that many young women have no understanding of or demand for affection until experience has taught them its place in life. In the records of real life, as well as in fiction, many a young woman's possibilities of happiness have been lost because she did not understand herself when love came into her experience.
Affection in marriage.
Another side to the problem of the young woman's relation to love and marriage is brought to our attention by the lamentable fact that many wives lose interest in devoted husbands when the children come. This is probably true in at least half the families; and many matrimonial disharmonies are the result. This is really one of the greatest problems of marriage which cultured women should consider seriously; for even more than in most other sex problems, it is one for the solution of which women are in a position to take the leading part. This problem is especially important in these days when the household inefficiency, personal extravagance, and desire for social position of numerous young women of eighteen to thirty are having an enormous influence in advancing the age of marriage because many of the best types of young men pause and consider seriously the impossibility of adjusting a small salary to the ideas of their women friends as to what is the minimum of a family budget. Add to such facts a growing pessimism of young men regarding inconstant affections of wives with children, and the need of special educational attack is evident.
The duty of parents.
From whatever side we look at the question whether the larger sex-education should somehow try to mold the ideals of young women with regard to love and marriage, we see reasons why parents should encourage their maturing daughters to get some advance understanding of such relation. If parents are themselves unable to help their daughters to this understanding, they can at least exert great influence by their own attitude, and they can approve the reading of books, and perhaps there may be opportunity for hearing lectures by women who understand life.
Books.
With regard to good literature that will help in this line, there are chapters in many of the books mentioned at the end of this lecture, and in more or less indirect form in the general literature suggested in the preceding lectures concerning young men, and in § 12 which deals with the general educational problem of marriage.
§ 41. Reasons for Pre-marital Continence of Women
Many women do not need reasons.
Many women who have lived protected lives have declared themselves unable to understand why a young woman should need reasons for pre-marital continence; and these women are probably right so far as the great majority of the daughters of families in good social conditions are concerned. As pointed out in earlier lectures, there is abundant evidence that the average adolescent girl who is protected against external sexual stimuli and influenced constantly by the prevailing ideals which demand chastity of women, is not likely to need any arguments why she should avoid pre-marital incontinence. Moreover, there seems to be little danger that the average girl with good social environment will ever question her ideals of chastity unless under the stress of overwhelming affection; in other words, there is little possibility that such women will be interested in the strictly mechanical, non-affectionate, and unsentimental sexual relations which must inevitably characterize the common prostitution of men.
Unprotected girls.
Note that I am referring to the average young woman in good social environment, and for the moment omitting the vast class of so-called "unprotected" girls. Moreover, I am speaking of the "average," and I am not forgetting that medical journals and books record many exceptions. Nevertheless, we must not be misled by medical literature, for naturally the physician sees the women whose lack of health leads them to seek professional advice, and it is well known that in sexual lines women commonly become decidedly unhealthy before they consult physicians. As testimony concerning the average normal women, I have the greatest confidence in the statements of thoughtful women with sound scientific attitude; and such are my authority for the view that maintaining pre-marital continence is not one of the serious problems for the average young woman with good domestic and social environment.
Now, while I admit in advance that the problem of pre-marital continence is not of great significance in the personal lives of the great majority of the type of women who are likely to hear or read this lecture, I do believe that this is the type of women who ought to think over the problem as it concerns the atypical girl of good social groups and the "unprotected" girl of more unfortunate groups. I cannot see, therefore, why it is not best and safest that all girls should learn from parents or reliable books or teachers the main reasons for pre-marital chastity.
The girl who needs help.
The atypical girls of good social groups who need guidance regarding pre-marital continence are of two types: either one with intensive sexuality which is often modifiable by medical or surgical treatment; or one of probably normal instincts but with radical sexual philosophy. The first type needs not only emphatic instruction regarding continence, but more often medical help, either for general health or for correction of localized sexual disturbance. The second type must be treated exactly as suggested for young men, because they are the women whose anarchistic repudiation of laws and convention in general has led to their acceptance of a single standard of morality for men and women, but one of freedom from monogamic ideals. This type of women, long well known in the student groups of Paris and in Russian universities, is becoming more and more evident in America, especially among some well-educated young women who have dropped their ideals of chastity because they have found attractiveness in more or less superficial studies of radical socialism. Many of these radical women frankly say that they would like to marry the "right man," but failing to find that rare species, they claim their right to sexual freedom in more or less capricious liaisons. Others of these women are so highly individualized that marriage is beneath their contempt, either because it will "interfere with a career" or because the legal aspects and ecclesiastical ceremonies still suggest the old-time subjection of the wife to the husband. Women who are in a position to know from personal knowledge of radical people declare that there are still relatively few educated women who deliberately cut loose from monogamic standards; and that they are most commonly found among certain intimate and unconventional groups of students and professional workers, especially those who are united in "Bohemian life" by artistic or literary interests. But while such sexually anarchistic women are not common in America, there is reason for fearing that, unless some unexpected check comes to this undercurrent towards sexual freedom, it may be found ten or twenty years hence that a surprisingly large number, but never a majority, of unmarried young women have fallen into the sexual promiscuity that is so common among unmarried men of the same ages.
Radical sex literature.
Chief of the influences that lead a certain number of well-educated young women towards sexual freedom is radical printed matter. We are now getting in America a wide distribution of bold literature of the "free love" type, some of it with a scientific superficiality that will convince many beginners in the study of sexual problems. Much of this literature is translation or adaptation of books and articles by European authors; and I have previously remarked that abroad the ideals of sexual morality—and judging from the Great War, of morality in other lines—is frankly quite different from that upheld here. But some of this radical literature is American in origin. In addition to certain books and pamphlets, which might be advertised by giving names, I think of two New York medical journals, with a popular circulation, edited by a successful but much criticized physician, which rarely publish an issue without frank approval and even arguments for extra-marital relations other than prostitution, particularly for those who for one reason or another, unwelcome or voluntary, are leading celibate lives. The influence of such writings on young women who are inclined towards radicalism in all things is probably enormous, and it is unfortunate that vigorous opposition literature is not published and widely circulated.
Same instruction as for men.
In conclusion, it is clear that the problem of pre-marital continence is not limited to young men, for the "unprotected" girl from a low-grade home and environment, and the uninformed girl from the best of homes, and the radical girl from the most educated circles may, innocently or deliberately, select the pathway to unchastity. For these kinds of young women the educational problem is the same as for young men. They should have essentially the same instruction. And, in the case of both sexes, it is only by contrasting the good and evil that education can point out the worth-whileness of chastity.
Indirect responsibility.
There is a special aspect of the problem of pre-marital chastity of men that young women should understand, and that is their indirect responsibility for the unchastity of many men. In discussing dancing (§ 35) and extreme dress (§ 36), it has been indicated that women as a sex have a tremendous responsibility for the temptations of men. The same is true in the case of flirting or more extreme familiarities with men. However sure a young woman may feel of her own power of self-control, she should not consider lightly her possible part in a chain of events which may lead men to unchastity with other women. Many a man driven into the white heat of passion by thoughtless or deliberate acts of a pure girl has gone direct to seek relief of tension in the underworld. Of course, the girl in this case is not directly responsible for the downfall of the man; but I wonder if there is not moral, if not legal, responsibility for one who knowingly leads or helps another to the brink of a precipice from which he voluntarily falls.
I am perfectly well aware that many good people will be horrified by the very suggestion that young women should be taught their responsibility for their men associates. Some will declare that the advocates of sex-education propose to destroy the innocence and romance in young women's lives. Others of the horrified ones will remain complacent because they believe that unchastity is caused by "innate depravity" of men. I am sorry to disagree with such people who are sincere, but the established facts point clearly to the conclusion that it is the duty of the mothers and teachers of girls to make them understand their relations to men and their responsibility for helping young men avoid sexual temptations. This is necessary when innocence stands in the way of the maximum safety and happiness of young people.
§ 42. Need of Optimistic and Æsthetic Views of Sex by Women
Many women pessimistic concerning sexuality.
The most significant point in the sex-education movement at present is the fact that numerous women of the most intelligent groups are tending rapidly towards accepting an optimistic and æsthetic view of sexual relationships so far as these are normal and ethical and guided by affection. However, this higher philosophy of sexual life is still very far from being universal among educated women, and it is probably true that to the great majority of them sexuality has no æsthetic meaning but is simply a very troublesome physical function and an animal method for perpetuating the human species. That such an attitude should be common is not surprising, for in recent years numerous educated women have gained abundant information concerning abnormal sexuality, while very few have caught glimpses of the higher possibilities of the sexual functions. The truth is that it has been and still is difficult for most women to get well-balanced knowledge of sexual normality. There are hundreds of books and pamphlets that deal with amazing boldness with the sexual mistakes of human life, but there is not in general circulation to-day any printed matter which deals with normal sexual life with anything like the frankness and directness that is common in widely circulated literature on social vice and its concomitant diseases. Likewise, it is difficult for women to get the true view of sexual life from personal sources, for the vulgar side of sexuality is the one usually discussed by most people, some of whom revel in obscenity, some have had personal experiences that have caused ineradicable bitterness, and some more or less sincerely believe that knowledge of vice is of value as a safeguard or an antidote. The bright side of the sexual story is rarely told in conversation, either because it is unfamiliar or because it is the sacred secret between pairs of individuals who together have found life in all its completeness.
Æsthetic outlook.
Fortunately, this depressing emphasis on sexual abnormality is beginning to disappear, and we see sure signs of coming attention to sexual health rather than to disease and to purity rather than to vice. Leading women are beginning to give, through the impersonal medium of science and general literature, some definite and helpful testimony concerning the pathway to the essential good that is bound up in sexuality. It is especially important that young women of culture should be helped to this point of view, and as far as possible before they learn much concerning the dark problems that have originated from failure to keep sexual functions sacred to affection and possible parenthood. The educated women of to-day who have acquired and retained faith in the essential goodness of human sexual possibilities, and who at the same time have an understanding of the mistakes that weak humans are wont to make, are sure to play a most important part as teachers and mothers and leaders in the movement which is already guiding numerous intelligent men and women to a purified and noble view of the sexual relationships. As I see the big problems that demand sex-education, the future will depend largely upon the attitude of women. It is an essential part of the feministic movement. In the past there have been many alarming signs of a destructive sex antagonism that charged men with full responsibility for existing sex problems. But the advance guards of feminism are beginning to recognize that there are all-essential relationships between the sexes, and that only in sex coöperation can there be any permanent solution of the great questions. It is a great advance from the sex hostility of Christabel Pankhurst's "Plain Facts on a Great Evil" to the co-working attitude of Louise Creighton's "Social Disease and How to Fight It," of Olive Schreiner's "Woman and Labor," of Ellen Key's "Love and Marriage," and of Gascoigne Hartley's "Truth About Woman," all of which give us hope that women with optimistic and æsthetic interpretation of sex are coming to take the lead towards a better understanding of the relations of sex and life.
§ 43. Other Problems for Young Women
Concerning several other problems that have been discussed with special reference to young men, it seems best that all young women should be informed sometime between sixteen and twenty-two, the age limit depending upon maturity of the individual, home life, and social environment.
Prostitution.
With regard to prostitution, it seems important that girls should know the essential facts recommended in the lecture concerning boys. The "unprotected" girl of low-grade environment will often need some of this knowledge before she is fourteen (and in some cases, even twelve) years old. On the other hand, the average "protected" girl need not know until several years later. It seems possible that too early familiarity with the existence of sexual vice might tend to make some young women accept it as part of the established order of things; and, hence, the girl whose environment is protective and whose moral training has been complete will be perfectly safe without knowledge of vice and will be more likely to take an opposition attitude if she learns the facts concerning prostitution when she is approaching maturity. Even then the essential information should be given in such a way that the young woman will see the gravity of the social situation and, at the same time, not develop a spirit of sex hostility. Here, again, I must recommend Louise Creighton's "Social Disease and How to Fight It" as not only pointing out the nature of the great evil, but also recognizing that the existing situation can never be improved except by the sympathetic coöperation of the best men and women.
Dancing.
With regard to dancing, young girls should be taught that certain forms of this exercise are not approved by the most refined people. Before maturity, they should not know the physiological reason for this disapproval. In fact, I know many men and women who think it best that most women, even mature, should not have their attention called to the sexual dangers of dancing. For my part, I cannot see how women with such ignorance can coöperate with the best men in reducing the admitted dangers to a minimum.
Dress.
With regard to dress as a sexual problem, some mothers think they can handle the problem with their young daughters by emphasizing modesty and without further explanation; but the drawing power of fashions is so great that most young women are quick to revise their ideas of modesty to suit the latest style. Is it too much to hope that large numbers of young women would accept such facts as were stated in the lecture for young men (§ 36), and would be sincere enough to dress so that their attractiveness may appeal more to the æsthetic and less to the physical natures of men?
Merely a man's views.
In this lecture concerning the special teaching of young women, I have attempted nothing more than an outline of the impressions that I have gained from books and from representative women who are interested in the larger sex-education. I have not tried to make the discussion as extensive as that for young men, first, because I cannot believe that young women in general need so much special instruction; and, second, because only women can adequately advise concerning the sex-educational problems of young women. However, since the women who might be expected to know the truth about women have failed to agree on so many points, it may be worth while for a man to contribute some suggestions based on the most scientific information offered by some very reliable women.
Books.
Among the books which touch the special problems for young women, I am most favorably impressed by the following: Hall's "Life Problems" in the first thirty-two pages is adapted for girls of twelve to fourteen, and the remainder for older girls. Some parents are not enthusiastic about the story form, but the facts are well selected and presented. The last chapter of Smith's "Three Gifts of Life" is worth reading, but the first chapters are unscientific. For almost mature young women, there are chapters of Rummel's "Womanhood and Its Development," of Wood-Allen's "What a Young Woman Should Know," of Lowry's "Herself," and of Galbraith's "Four Epochs of a Woman's Life." The last two are decidedly medical in point of view. The part for girls in Scharlieb and Sibley's "Youth and Sex," and some chapters of March's "Towards Racial Health," are good. The last two chapters of Geddes and Thomson's "Sex" will be appreciated by many intellectual young women. Hepburn's sentimental little story "The Perfect Gift" (Crist Co., 3¢) has helped many young people improve their æsthetic outlook. There are some helpful ideas in Henderson's "What It Is To Be Educated" (Houghton Mifflin Co.). While disagreeing (§ 46) with Dr. Richard Cabot's extreme emphasis on a mystical religious solution for problems of sex, I recognize that many young women have been helped by his "The Christian Approach to Social Morality" (Y.W.C.A.), and by his "What Men Live By."