SOCIALISM AND SEX RELATIONS.
WE have dealt on previous occasions with the question of Socialism and the family, but have hitherto avoided the problem of the relations between men and women, and of the marriage-tie, considered in connexion with the principles of Socialism. The subject is one exceedingly difficult to treat in a newspaper. But in spite of this fact, we feel that it must be faced, for those who are now attempting to make up their minds in regard to Socialism ought clearly to understand all that is involved thereby. In writing on this subject we are most anxious not to say anything which may seem unjust to the Socialists, or which may unfairly prejudice their case. We do not wish to lay ourselves open to the accusation of creating a bogey out of the sex question in order to scare people away from a creed which we consider dangerous, and likely to cause the degradation of human society for other reasons, economic and political. We also desire to state that we are fully aware that at the present moment Socialists as a whole lead quite as well-regulated lives as other sections of the community. Further, we have no doubt that the majority of those who call them- selves Socialists are personal upholders of the Christian religion, or at any rate of Christian morals, and have no thought of subverting either the one or the other. Never- theless, we may feel certain that the triumph of Socialism must mean the overthrow of the Christian moral code in regard to marriage and the relations of the sexes, and must end in free love and promiscuity. Probably many modern Socialists dream, like Plato, that the relations of the sexes may be regulated by the State, and that men and women will submit to a kind of communal time-table for the maintenance of the population. The notion that the system of the State breeding of children laid down in the "Republic" could possibly be maintained in practice is, however, nothing but a fantasy,—" a wild enormity of ancient magnanimity."
The clearer-eyed Socialists realise that Socialism, if triumphant, will not leave the relations of the sexes as they are.- For example, we find Mr. Wells in his novel, "In the Days of the Comet," making free love the domi- nant principle for the regulation of sexual ties in his regenerated State. The romantic difficulty as to which of the two lovers of the heroine is to be the happy man is solved by their both being accepted. Polyandry is "the way out" in this case, as polygamy might be in another. It is only fair to say that in a letter published in the Clarion of the 18th inst. Mr. Wells declares that the book is "a beautiful dream," and that he has never advocated free love or the destruction of the family. Still, no one who has studied Socialistic literature, and has taken the trouble, not merely to find out where the Socialists say they are going or think they are going, but where the road must inevitably lead, will feel that there is anything unjust in the declaration that wives in common and husbands in common will follow goods in common. This, of course, is no discovery of the present age. When during the Revolution in France, and after it in England, men's minds were for a season full of Socialistic schemes, their originators and apologists never succeeded in avoiding the rock of promiscuity. Canning, for example, stigmatised their aspirations in the Anti-Jacobin in vigorous verse. We even find in an earlier age the satirists of the Restoration making enthusiasts denounce the wickedness of "enclosing the common" of free woman.
Instinctively most Socialist theorisers have realised that the family is inimical to Socialism, owing to the desire which it creates for the possession of private property, private life, and an existence based on individualism. Therefore the family must be destroyed. But the family cannot be destroyed without also the destruction of marriage, for once let a man and woman bind themselves for life and bring up their children in a home and you have an institution which is bound to shatter the Socialistic ideal. The easy talk about the State being nothing but a great family is based on the falsest of false analogies. But though this instinctive dread of the family as bound to oppose Socialism, if it is allowed scope, may be the chief reason why Socialism has always resulted in the advocacy of some 'form of promiscuity, open or covert, it is not the only reason why sexual communism has been advocated, and is advocated. Though the fact is not admitted or realised by most Socialists, the demand for Socialism is in reality a throw-back to primitive idea's and primitive instincts. The organisation of the savage tribe is largely Socialistic and communistic. It is tru'e that we also find in the primitive community the beginnings of very strong family institutions, but these are the growing instruments destined to emancipate mankind from the savagery of Socialism. The family was primitive man's path of escape from communism. When, however, mankind wearies of the struggle towards the light of true civilisation, as he does periodically, the idea surges up in his mind that he must retrace his steps. Though he gilds it with the name of progress, what he really means and desires is to get back to his old savagery in which all things were common and nothing unclean.
There is something pathetic in the way in which this throw-back towards savagery fills the minds of many Socialists who are quite unconscious of what is working in them. Take, for example, Mrs. Snowden's work, "The Woman Socialist." Mrs. Snowden is evidently at heart a lady of high principle and good feeling, possessed by a strong desire to maintain the institution of marriaee and Christian ethics. Yet even she is forced by her dreary and retrogressive creed into what amounts to a defence of prostitution. She condemns prostitution, no doubt, and hopes and believes that Socialism will lead to its abolition. "But," she adds, "if, as at present, the unfortunate woman' be regarded as a necessity it these days of advanced thought and increased opportunities, then her status must be raised She will be held to be performing a necessary social service." A more emancipated advocate of Socialism is not content with this timid and tentative handling of the problem, but boldly proclaims that in the recognition of prostitution may be found the solution of the problems of sex. Miss Florence Farr, who is a frequent contributor to the New Age, the very able "independent Socialist review" conducted by Mr. Orage and Mr. Holbrook Jackson, is very plainspoken on the matter :— "Things being so arranged, is it not as well that public opinion should be trained to take a more Imperial view of the women who live to give men pleasure? In the East, as I have said, the religious-minded can make a ritual both of marriage add prostitu- tion. Their prayers and ceremonial in one case are directed to the creative Deity, in the other to the Great Power of nature whom they feel to be symbolised in women. Among them women are sometimes said to have no souls, but this is not because they are not immortal. The Hindu, for instance, considers that woman is a part of the Immortal Mother of Life herself and to unite with a woman is to clasp the Universe in your arms and taste the ecstasy of Being quite apart from the ecstasy of creation. Feelings such as these are not English. But is it better to be an Englishman who permits himself to do what his conscience condemns ? Is it better that our Daughters of Joy' should live in the well-regulated house of a Mrs. Warren' or, worse, in insanitary little corners of their own finding than that they should be brought up as dancers in the Temple of Kali dedicated to the Goddess and kept healthy and beauti- ful in order that they may fulfil a purpose that they and their countrymen consider honourable and not degrading ? This is the crux of the whole subject. It is almost entirely due to public opinion that prostitutes are a degraded class. In civilisations under which they are treated with respect, they are often the most brilliant members of society and generous in their well doing. Some great queens have lived the life of prostitutes, but have been excellent rulers. There is every social reason why this career should not in itself be considered disgusting, for in some legitimate unions there is often far more real cause for disgust. As a matter of fact, the really degrading part both of marriage and of prostitution is the endeavour on the part of one or the other to rouse passions by artificial means ; and neither the law, nor the prophets, nor the registrar's office, nor the cathedral can make such a union holy. Men wonder when they may meet the not impossible she ' ; women dream of the awakener ; but they none of them offer up their prayers to 'the Master of Men.' God has been defined as the relation between a man and the absolute, so we take Eros to be the relation between a man or woman and Absolute Love. Like all gods he has many illusionary manifestations, but are not the Hindus wiser when they offer their prostitutes to some such idea as this than we who, like the Greeks, refuse our
worship to the son of Aphrodite? Euripides has chanted a fine chorus in 'Hippolytus' telling of the terrors of this unassuaged divinity. We see around us in every western civilisation how lives are laid waste like sacked cities because of the festering conscience which has made unclean that which might naturally have been clean. In the day of her power the church made a sacrament of war and called it chivalry. Now in the day of her weakness could she make a sacrament of love ?—Perhaps—but it is not to be expected that the church could risk her prestige on such an alliance; for love, desire, and lust are extravagant things which it has been her business to discourage. Great as the Catholic Church is, foremost among the aristocratic religions of the West, the East has a serener past and its religions a longer pedigree. Chaldea, Egypt, and India have one great message for the modern world, a message announcing that it is better for the Ministers of Pleasure that they should dance within the temple- walls, than that they should drift in painted masks through the profane discord of a city."
We apologise to our readers for quoting this passage, but we feel that it would not have been wise to have dealt with the matter as we have dealt with it without justify- ing by means of quotation what we have written. Other- wise we should have been open to the accusation of exaggeration, or of attempting to saddle the Socialists with schemes and ideals which they have never advocated. It is better that a large body of our readers should be annoyed and disgusted by the appearance of the above quotation in our columns than that there should not be a clear understanding as to the direction in which Socialism is leading us in the region of sexual morality. We feel sure that the great majority of our readers will agree with our decision in this matter, and will acquit us of any desire to exploit for purposes of journalistic sensationalism a painful and disagreeable subject.
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