The daughter aspires to beauty, lovely clothes, charm, or to stardom on the theatrical or operatic stage, achievements and characteristics which mean popularity and the ultimate disposal of her wares to the highest available bidder.
Listen to a group of boys talking among themselves. You will probably add some useful knowledge to your mental equipment, for you will hear them discussing feats in civil engineering, problems in electricity, mechanics, physics, chemistry, surgery, as well as events in the world of sports. On the other hand, the conversations among girls are almost entirely on the subject of boys, men, clothes and the theatre.
The psychology of the sexes in youth is totally different. The ideas of the average young man are those of one who expects to become some day a producer or at least a worker; the ideas of the average young woman are those of one who expects and intends (for here, too, Youth sees only personal victory) to rise into the leisure, non-producing or supported class.
The small boy sent forth to play with his comrades with his hair done up in curls by a fond mama, would encounter the jeers of the whole neighborhood. From babyhood, the ribbons, curls, frills and silks are for the girls, who are thereby rendered deeply conscious of their appearance and taught above all things to keep themselves clean and "looking nice."
Nothing is sacred from the invasion of small boys, who climb in, and under and over all obstacles to discover what makes the wheels go around, while the small girls sit about and take care of their clothes and learn to count them of supreme importance.
And the matter of clothes is a vital one to the woman of today. Clothes are the frame that enhances the picture as well as its price tag; they are the carton wrapping the package in the show window, the case that best displays the jewel for sale within.
All our social institutions encourage girls and young women, and all women up to the age of ninety, or more, in believing that it is the supreme good for a woman to make the best possible matrimonial bargain. On the stage, in our press, and pulpit, in the books and magazines produced for the consumption of the young people in this country, marriage is nearly always represented as the safe, ultimate and greatly-to-be-desired haven for a woman.
Hence, young women, intent upon securing the best the world has to offer, rarely take any sort of work seriously. They regard jobs as merely temporary conveniences, or inconveniences.
The wise employer hires ugly women stenographers, when he cannot afford to engage men, because he knows they usually possess more brains than their lovely sisters, and because they remain longer. The beautiful woman sees no need for intelligence nor for understanding because she has always been able to outstrip her less attractive competitors in making the best match and securing the rich husbands. And so her neurones rarely "connect," or react, except to stimuli pertaining to things that will enhance her charms and increase her selling price.
The young man expects to accomplish something in the world, to earn much money, or "high position," in order to be able to marry the most charming girl. The "most charming girl," if she be temporarily forced to earn her own living, expects to find somebody who will marry her, give her more luxuries than she has been accustomed to, and lift her far above her companions. She hopes to become a member of the leisure class even if she never attains it.