Simple necrophilia should be treated in the same way by penal law. But this perversion is more dangerous on account of its relationship with sadism. There are some sadists who are only necrophiliacs for fear of becoming assassins. Such individuals are very dangerous and should be kept in confinement.
The fetichists are, on the contrary, generally very innocent. At the most they might be prosecuted for theft when they take away their fetiches. One of their worst misdemeanors is that of cutting off the hair of young girls.
Concubinage. Prostitution. Proxenetism. White Slavery.—We have already seen that concubinage should never be punishable in itself, although it is so in some countries. We shall not again return to the question whether prostitution should be the object of judicial and penal actions. Proxenetism and white slavery, on the contrary, cause grave injury to the rights of many individuals and should be made criminal offenses; for they are crimes against society and the individual, and committed for lucre. It cannot be legal to do commerce with the body of one's neighbor: this is a crime which is closely related to slavery and similar abuses. (Vide Chapter X.)
The law should punish all public solicitation, obscenity or sexual brutality, but the punishment should take a milder form. The sexual act and everything connected with it should be absolutely free, but a man has no right to provoke or annoy his neighbor by indecent sexual invitations if the latter does not wish to respond to them.
It is, however, extremely difficult to fix the limits of what is licit, for prudery may also go too far and regard the most innocent allusions as provocations. It is absolutely necessary to leave a margin for normal sexual invitations. All that is required is that they should not overstep the limits of recognized propriety, so long as there is not mutual agreement between the two parties. (Vide Flirtation, Chapter IV.)
Lewdness. Pornography.—The question naturally presents itself of knowing how far it is permitted to proceed publicly with a mutual agreement without causing offense or injury to other parties. On the whole, our customs are free enough in this respect, and a greater liberty in public flirtation would be inconvenient. For instance, lewd exhibitions, coitus, etc., could not be allowed in public places. Children especially should be protected against such excitations of the sexual appetite, and it is necessary to fix a legal distinction between what is offensive and what is not offensive to public propriety or modesty.
Simple police regulations are sufficient for this purpose, but they are very necessary to protect women and children, and occasionally young men, against importunities or sexual obsessions, against sexual solicitation, or even against assault or other offenses, such as incitement to masturbation, obscene words and gestures, etc.
It is, no doubt, very difficult to define the limits. Our modern customs have left a large margin for pornography, which they treat like a spoiled child. The most dangerous form, however, is not that which flaunts itself in shop windows, by advertisements and placards, in public kiosks and dancing rooms; but the refined and æsthetic pornography which appears in the form of elegant engravings, erotic novels and dramas, under the cloak of art and even under that of morality.
Unfortunately, the public is a very bad judge of these things. Certain books have openly and fearlessly described the sexual vices of our time—for example, Zola's novels and the dramas of Brieux—and these have been stigmatized as pornographic. As a matter of fact their authors in no way merit such a reproach. Such works in no way encourage immorality; on the contrary, they inspire disgust and a healthy and holy terror at the perversity of our sexual customs. No doubt such works may have an erotic action on ignorant and low-minded persons. The Tyrolean peasants, in their moral indignation, have been known to destroy the marble statues of women erected in public places. Such acts serve no purpose, for prudery will never rid the world of eroticism; it will only increase it by leading to hypocrisy. We have something better to do than persecute and insult true art and men of talent or genius who expose our social perversions.
Pornography is quite another thing. It is not contented with representing the æsthetic, licit, and normal side of natural eroticism. It does not depict sexual vice so as to emphasize its ugliness and its tragic consequences, but to glorify it. Whether it is represented as brazen nudity unadorned, or enveloped in a transparent veil which reveals everything it pretends to hide; whether it reels in bacchanalian orgies; whether it appears in brilliant fancy dress illuminated by electric lights, or in the discreet light of a fashionable boudoir; whether it is clearly revealed or equivocal, perverted in one way or depraved in another; in all its forms its aim is to tickle, to excite, to seduce, to allure, by arousing lewdness and inflaming its lowest passions.