The Forerunner Part 67

His "protective instincts" are far later and more superficial. To support and care for his wife, his children, is a recent habit, in plain sight historically; but "the pleasure of the chase" is older than that.

We should remember that a.s.sociate habits and impulses last for ages upon ages in living forms; as in the tree climbing instincts of our earliest years, of Simian origin; and the love of water, which dates back through unmeasured time. Where for millions of years the strongest pleasure a given organism is fitted for, is obtained by a certain group of activities, those activities will continue to give pleasure long after their earlier use is gone.

This is why men enjoy "the ardor of pursuit" far more than women. It is an essentially masculine ardor. To come easily by what he wants does not satisfy him. He wants to want it. He wants to hunt it, seek it, chase it, catch it. He wants it to be "game." He is by virtue of his s.e.x a sportsman.

There is no reason why these special instincts should not be gratified so long as it does no harm to the more important social processes; but it is distinctly desirable that we should understand their nature. The reason why we have the present overwhelming ma.s.s of "sporting events,"

from the ball game to the prize fight, is because our civilization is so overwhelmingly masculine. We shall criticize them more justly when we see that all this ma.s.s of indulgence is in the first place a form of s.e.x-expression, and in the second place a survival of instincts older than the oldest savagery.

Besides our games and sports we have a large field of "amus.e.m.e.nts" also worth examining. We not only enjoy doing things, but we enjoy seeing them done by others. In these highly specialized days most of our amus.e.m.e.nt consists in paying two dollars to sit three hours and see other people do things.

This in its largest sense is wholly human. We, as social creatures, can enjoy a thousand forms of expression quite beyond the personal. The birds must each sing his own song; the crickets chirp in millionfold performance; but human being feels the deep thrill of joy in their special singers, actors, dancers, as well as in their own personal attempts. That we should find pleasure in watching one another is humanly natural, but what it is we watch, the kind of pleasure and the kind of performance, opens a wide field of choice.

We know, for instance, something of the crude excesses of aboriginal Australian dances; we know more of the gross license of old Rome; we know the breadth of the jokes in medieval times, and the childish brutality of the bull-ring and the c.o.c.kpit. We know, in a word, that amus.e.m.e.nts vary; that they form a ready gauge of character and culture; that they have a strong educational influence for good or bad. What we have not hitherto observed is the predominant masculine influence on our amus.e.m.e.nts. If we recall once more the statement with regard to entertaining anecdotes, "There are thirty good stories in the world, and twenty-nine of them cannot be told to women," we get a glaring sidelight on the masculine specialization in jokes.

"Women have no sense of humor" has been frequently said, when "Women have not a masculine sense of humor" would be truer. If women had thirty "good stories" twenty-nine of which could not be told to men, it is possible that men, if they heard some of the twenty-nine, would not find them funny. The overweight of one s.e.x has told in our amus.e.m.e.nts as everywhere else.

Because men are further developed in humanity than women are as yet, they have built and organized great places of amus.e.m.e.nt; because they carried into their humanity their unchecked masculinity, they have made these amus.e.m.e.nts to correspond. Dramatic expression, is in its true sense, not only a human distinction, but one of our n.o.blest arts. It is allied with the highest emotions; is religious, educational, patriotic, covering the whole range of human feeling. Through it we should be able continually to express, in audible, visible forms, alive and moving, whatever phase of life we most enjoyed or wished to see. There was a time when the drama led life; lifted, taught, inspired, enlightened.

Now its main function is to amuse. Under the demand for amus.e.m.e.nt, it has cheapened and coa.r.s.ened, and now the thousand vaudevilles and picture shows give us the broken fragments of a degraded art of which our one main demand is that it shall make us laugh.

There are many causes at work here; and while this study seeks to show in various fields one cause, it does not claim that cause is the only one. Our economic conditions have enormous weight upon our amus.e.m.e.nts, as on all other human phenomena; but even under economic pressure the reactions of men and women are often dissimilar. Tired men and women both need amus.e.m.e.nt, the relaxation and restful change of irresponsible gayety. The great majority of women, who work longer hours than any other cla.s.s, need it desperately and never get it. Amus.e.m.e.nt, entertainment, recreation, should be open to us all, enjoyed by all.

This is a human need, and not a distinction of either s.e.x. Like most human things it is not only largely monopolized by men, but masculized throughout. Many forms of amus.e.m.e.nt are for men only; more for men mostly; all are for men if they choose to go.

The entrance of women upon the stage, and their increased attendance at theatres has somewhat modified the nature of the performance; even the "refined vaudeville" now begins to show the influence of women. It would be no great advantage to have this department of human life feminized; the improvement desired is to have it less masculized; to reduce the excessive influence of one, and to bring out those broad human interests and pleasures which men and women can equally partic.i.p.ate in and enjoy.

HIS AGONY

A Human Being goes past my house Day after day, hour after hour, Screaming in agony.

It is dreadful to hear him.

He beats the air with his hands, blindly, despairingly.

He shrieks with pain.

The pa.s.sers-by do not notice him.

The woman who is with him does not notice him.

The policeman does not notice him.

No ambulance comes ringing.

No doctor rushes out of a house--no crowd collects.

He screams and screams.

No one notices him.

I bear him coming again.

It is terrible--one day after another.

I look out of my window.

Yes--the same Human Being--the same agony.

I cannot bear it. I rush down--out into the street.

I say to the woman who is with him-- "Why do you not do something?"

She says there is nothing to be done. She resents my interference.

She is a hired person, hired by the owner of the Human Being.

That is why no one does anything-- We dare not interfere with the Owner.

He is a very young Human Being, That is why no one notices-- We are used to the sound of agony and the indifference of hired persons.

COMMENT AND REVIEW

The spread of social ethics among the medical profession is cause for great rejoicing. Long and justly celebrated as benefactors of humanity, and upholding with devotion the high ideals of their profession, they have now begun to widen their usefulness and extend their ideals under the general social awakening of our time.

Social sanitation is a rapidly extending process; as fast as our discoveries reveal the nature of disease or new remedies therefor, our governments, local and national, are beginning to safeguard the community.

In the general movement to lengthen and strengthen human life, doctors are necessarily most prominent because of their special knowledge. They have long been necessary. they have become more and more valuable, but their usefulness is still checked (as is true of all of us) by the persistence of conservatism and old ideas.

Very recently the advance of bacteriological science has thrown new light on a group of especially dangerous diseases; and still more recently the doctors themselves, with a splendid exertion of social conscience against tradition and habit, have begun to disseminate this new light to the general public.

Those special payments of the "wages of sin," spoken of in varying euphemisms, most commonly as "social diseases" are now better understood by physicians; and they are making n.o.ble efforts to spread this understanding among the people. Their efforts are gravely hindered by two obstacles; one the professional tradition known as "the medical secret," the other the universal prevalence of that primordial superst.i.tion--the s.e.x tabu.

This last belongs to the very deepest sedimentary deposit in the human mind. The first rules the lowest savage peoples began to make were the s.e.x tabus and food tabus. Secrecy, mystery, all manner of childish hocus pocus, were used to establish these primitive ideas; and the weight of that black past is upon its yet.

The less developed a race, the less educated a cla.s.s, the more solemn and earnest they are in preserving the s.e.x tabus; whereas with wide scientific knowledge this field of facts is seen to be like others; important and worth understanding; but not as special arcana to be concealed and avoided.

If the doctors come forward to tell us how the typhoid bacillus is disseminated, how dangerous it is, and how it is to be avoided, we are interested, grateful, and more or less willing to profit by the instruction. But when they try to tell us how the gonococcus attacks humanity, how dangerous it, and how it is to be avoided, we say, "s.h.!.+

That is something you mustn't talk about!"

To the credit of the profession they have kept on talking, many of them.

To the credit of some of our bravest and wisest editors the talk has been widely published. And right here I wish to pay a well deserved tribute to the "Ladies' Home Journal," which ought to have a n.o.bel prize for great public service.

That paper--long scorned by me as the arch-type of all small ultra-feminine backwardness, did the bravest thing a paper can do, risked its whole position by flying in the face of the public and printing the clearest, fullest, most enlightening accounts of the present status of these "social diseases," their terrible effects, and our duty toward them. It lost subscribers by the thousand and hundred thousand, but it did the work; and did it better than any other publication could; not only on account of its enormous circulation, but because it went into the homes of pious and unenlightened persons who would never have seen the information in more progressive magazines.

The negative inertia and positive resistance of the popular mind cannot forever resist the constantly increasing pressure of knowledge now poured forth on this subject.

But there is that other obstacle--the tradition of secrecy in the medical profession.

Doctors take the Hipprocratic oath. They solemnly swear not to reveal the confidences of their patients; or, more properly their innocent confidences. They are not bound like priests in the confessional; if a patient tells the doctor he has poisoned his mother or is about to poison his father, the doctor is not bound to conceal the facts.

Nevertheless, if a patient afflicted with one of these highly contagious diseases tells his doctor that he has poisoned his wife, or is to poison his child--the doctor feels professionally bound to keep silence.

What puzzles an outsider is to see why the medical mind discriminates so sharply here between the conduct required in cases of small pox or scarlet fever, and in this case. If you tell the doctor you have leprosy--there's nothing sacred about that. Off with you to the pest house, at any cost of pain and shame to you or your family. Is the whole community to be exposed to infection just to save your feelings?

So even with measles, with diphtheria, with yellow fever. The privacy of the home is invaded, families are ruthlessly separated, the strong arm of the law is reached out to protect the public against this danger; and the doctor, so far from conniving with the patient, is legally required to record all cases of this sort.

Now where is the difference?

These special diseases are more dangerous--and far more common, than most of these mentioned above; and their effects, hereditary as well as contagious, of measureless evil.

We are told that the difference is one of moral obliquity.

But surely there is no veil of secrecy about moral obliquity! If a man is a thief or a murderer we do not respect his confidence and conceal his offence. The papers justify their fierce blazonry of crimes and sins by saying that it strengthens public opinion--protects the people.

No, it is not because of moral obliquity.

It is for precisely the same reason that you must not make inquiries of a Chinaman as to his wife's health, or see a Turkish lady without her veil--it is "improper!"