Woman under socialism. Bebel August
Читать онлайн книгу.
impossible case be imagined that the representatives of the movement for the civic rights of woman carry through all their demands for placing woman upon an equal footing with man. What then? Neither the slavery, which modern marriage amounts to for numberless women, nor prostitution, nor the material dependence of the large majority of married women upon their marital lords, would thereby be removed. For the large majority of women it is, indeed, immaterial whether a thousand, or ten thousand, members of their own sex, belonging to the more favored strata of society, land in the higher branches of learning, the practice of medicine, a scientific career, or some government office. Nothing is thereby changed in the total condition of the sex.
The mass of the female sex suffers in two respects: On the one side woman suffers from economic and social dependence upon man. True enough, this dependence may be alleviated by formally placing her upon an equality before the law, and in point of rights; but the dependence is not removed. On the other side, woman suffers from the economic dependence that woman in general, the working-woman in particular, finds herself in, along with the workingman.
Evidently, all women, without difference of social standing, have an interest – as the sex that in the course of social development has been oppressed, and ruled, and defiled by man – in removing such a state of things, and must exert themselves to change it, in so far as it can be changed by changes in the laws and institutions within the frame-work of the present social order. But the enormous majority of women are furthermore interested in the most lively manner in that the existing State and social order be radically transformed, to the end that both wage-slavery, under which the working-women deeply pine, and sex slavery, which is intimately connected with our property and industrial systems, be wiped out.
The larger portion by far of the women in society, engaged in the movement for the emancipation of woman, do not see the necessity for such a radical change. Influenced by their privileged social standing, they see in the more far-reaching working-women's movement dangers, not infrequently abhorrent aims, which they feel constrained to ignore, eventually even to resist. The class-antagonism, that in the general social movement rages between the capitalist and the working class, and which, with the ripening of conditions, grows sharper and more pronounced, turns up likewise on the surface of the Woman's Movement; and it finds its corresponding expression in the aims and tactics of those engaged in it.
All the same, the hostile sisters have, to a far greater extent than the male population – split up as the latter is in the class struggle – a number of points of contact, on which they can, although marching separately, strike jointly. This happens on all the fields, on which the question is the equality of woman with man, within modern society. This embraces the participation of woman in all the fields of human activity, for which her strength and faculties are fit; and also her full civil and political equality with man. These are very important, and as will be shown further on, very extensive fields. Besides all this the working woman has also a special interest in doing battle hand in hand with the male portion of the working class, for all the means and institutions that may protect the working woman from physical and moral degeneration, and which promise to secure to her the vitality and fitness necessary for motherhood and for the education of children. Furthermore, as already indicated, it is the part of the working-woman to make common cause with the male members of her class and of her lot in the struggle for a radical transformation of society, looking to the establishment of such conditions as may make possible the real economic and spiritual independence of both sexes, by means of social institutions that afford to all a full share in the enjoyment of all the conquests of civilization made by mankind.
The goal, accordingly, is not merely the realization of the equal rights of woman with man within present society, as is aimed at by the bourgeois woman emancipationists. It lies beyond, – the removal of all impediments that make man dependent upon man; and, consequently, one sex upon the other. Accordingly, this solution of the Woman Question coincides completely with the solution of the Social Question. It follows that he who aims at the solution of the Woman Question to its full extent, is necessarily bound to go hand in hand with those who have inscribed upon their banner the solution of the Social Question as a question of civilization for the whole human race. These are the Socialists, that is, the Social Democracy.
Of all existing parties in Germany, the Social Democratic Party is the only one which has placed in its programme the full equality of woman, her emancipation from all dependence and oppression. And the party has done so, not for agitational reasons, but out of necessity, out of principle. There can be no emancipation of humanity without the social independence and equality of the sexes.
Up to this point all Socialists are likely to agree with the presentation made of fundamental principles. But the same cannot be said on the subject of the manner in which we portray the ultimate aims to ourselves; how the measures and special institutions shall be shaped which will establish the aimed-at independence and equality of all members of the sexes, consequently that of man and woman also.
The moment the field of the known is abandoned, and one launches out into pictures of future forms, a wide field is opened for speculation. Differences of opinion start over that which is probable or not probable. That which in that direction is set forth in this book can, accordingly, be taken only as the personal opinion of the author himself; possible attacks must be directed against him only; only he is responsible.
Attacks that are objective, and are honestly meant, will be welcome to us. Attacks that violate truth in the presentation of the contents of this book, or that rest upon false premises we shall ignore. For the rest, in the following pages all conclusions, even the extremest, will be drawn, which, the facts being verified, the results attained may warrant. Freedom from prejudice is the first condition for the recognition of truth. Only the unrestricted utterance of that which is, and must be, leads to the goal.
PART I
WOMAN IN THE PAST
CHAPTER I.
BEFORE CHRISTIANITY
Woman and the workingman have, since old, had this in common —oppression. The forms of oppression have suffered changes in the course of time, and in various countries. But the oppression always remained. Many a time and oft, in the course of the ages, did the oppressed become conscious of their oppression; and such conscious knowledge of their condition did bring on changes and reliefs. Nevertheless, a knowledge, that grasped the actual feature of the oppression by grasping its causes, is, with woman as with the workingman, the fruit of our own days. The actual feature of society, and of the laws that lie at the bottom of its development, had first to be known, before a general movement could take place for the removal of conditions, recognized as oppressive and unjust. The breadth and intensity of such a movement depends, however, upon the measure of the understanding prevalent among the suffering social layers and circles, and upon the measure of freedom of motion that they enjoy. In both respects, woman stands, through custom and education, as well as the freedom allowed her by law, behind the workingman. To this, another circumstance is added. Conditions, lasting through a long series of generations, finally grow into custom; heredity and education then cause such conditions to appear on both sides as "natural." Hence it comes that, even to-day, woman in particular, accepts her subordinate position as a matter of course. It is no easy matter to make her understand that that position is unworthy, and that it is her duty to endeavor to become a member of society, equal-righted with, and in every sense a peer of man.
However much in common woman may be shown to have with the workingman, she leads him in one thing: —Woman was the first human being to come into bondage: she was a slave before the male slave existed.
All social dependence and oppression has its roots in the economic dependence of the oppressed upon the oppressor. In this condition woman finds herself, from an early day down to our own. The history of the development of human society proves the fact everywhere.
The knowledge of the history of this development is, however, comparatively new. As little as the myth of the Creation of the World – as taught us by the Bible – can be upheld in sight of the investigations of geographers and, scientists, grounded as these investigations are upon unquestionable and innumerable facts, just so untenable has its myth proved concerning the creation and evolution of man. True enough, as yet the veil is far