“Why not?” she challenged.
“It’s as natural as sunrise,” he said. “We’re all controlled through bread and butter channels.”
“Other classes of workers are testing out ways of controlling their own bread and butter. Bread and butter freedom is precisely what the world now needs and seeks. Are university professors less capable of thought than button-cutters?”
“No,” said Clark. “But less capable of concerted action. We’re too confoundedly jealous and individualistic to work together.”
“How do you know that?” Vida demanded. “Have you ever tried it? With things as they are you certainly can’t fulfil your social function. You’ll either have to get together and secure your freedom or remain in a position where you cannot really influence your students.”
“But they do influence them!” protested Mrs. Guthrie.
“About all the students look to us for,” said Clark, “is credits. A credit costs on the average so much time and attention. A little more and they resent your overcharge, a little less and they gloat because they’ve been able to underpay.”
“Imagine their having such an attitude toward a live man dealing with live ideas!” exclaimed Vida. “Toward Bernard Shaw, for instance, lecturing on the necessity of extending to unmarried women the right to have children!”
Mrs. Guthrie looked apprehensively at Lucy and then at the young Bohemian girl who was bringing in the dessert. “Fortunately,” she said, “our professors do not care to deal with things like that.”
“No,” said Vida, “they prefer to let society continue unwarned its present insane treatment of illegitimacy.”