The Sexual Question Part 36

For educational reasons, the natural family may be imitated in these artificial ones, by giving to each couple children of both s.e.xes and different ages. The result is perfect: I have seen in Vienna artificial families of ten children formed in this way. This shows again the rule confirmed by the exception; it would be better for the good seed to be more fruitful and the bad sterile.

The normal condition must, however, always be for parents to bring up their own children. But here the State and the school should come to their aid, and even intervene with authority; for society is under the obligation of educating its children to a certain degree of culture, and maternal or paternal authority should not have the right to prevent or even attenuate this social work. Obligatory and gratuitous education is thus a duty of the State which is becoming more and more recognized everywhere, although it is still very incomplete and often badly carried out.

The State should, moreover, protect the children by restricting the power of parents more than is done at present. The child should not be allowed to become an object for exploitation by its parents. It has also the right to be protected against all unmerited punishment and ill-treatment. Corporal punishment, which is still practiced in some schools, is a relic of barbarism which ought to disappear.

The State should severely enforce the duty of the procreators of children to nourish their offspring. Rich or poor, no father or mother should escape this duty, whether the child is legitimate or illegitimate. In our imperfect social condition, it is still much too easy for the man to escape and abandon his child to the mother, or to public charity. He should be compelled to provide for the life and education of his children, whether legitimate or illegitimate, if he does not bring them up himself. If unable to provide money, he should do the equivalent in labor. Such measures, strictly enforced, would be more efficacious than all the complicated laws on s.e.xual relations, in maintaining monogamy and fidelity.

I repeat, that these measures should apply to all unworthy parents from whom we are obliged to remove the children. These parents are not always of the poorer cla.s.s.

It may be objected that I am unjust in charging such duties to poor people who can often hardly keep themselves. I agree that in the present state of society it is quite impossible for many parents to undertake such important duties. But duty means right, and it is evident that we must place rights by the side of the duties which we impose on parents.

True justice in this question can only be attained by the essential progress of socialism. By socialism, I do not mean certain vague communistic doctrines, nor the Utopias of anarchists who imagine that "man was born good," but simply an essential social progress in the struggle against the domination of individual capital, that is to say, usury applied to the labor of others owing to the possession of means of production, which is now left to speculators. Men should be enabled to enjoy the product of their labor, so that they can lead a human life worthy of the name, in s.e.xual matters as in others. But this is not all.

From the social point of view, it is absolutely unjust that men who procreate children should alone bear the burden of the future generation. We know the egoistic proverb of the celibates, who say: "I have the right to take life easily, to enjoy myself and be idle, if I renounce the happiness of having children, either of my own accord or from necessity." This proverb, which may be transposed into "after me the deluge," cannot be recognized by any healthy social legislation.

It is the duty of the State to relieve large families, to facilitate the procreation of healthy children, and to impose more work and taxes (for instance, artificial families) on sterile individuals. The old laws were better than ours in this respect.

I have mentioned above the excellent custom, which exists at the present day in Norway, of only charging half-price on the boats to married women and other female members of the same family. I cannot here enter into the details of this question, but if such reforms are some day realized, if universal compulsory education, pensions for old age, orphans and invalids, etc., are introduced, then no man will have valid motives for escaping the duty of feeding his children and bringing them up decently in family life. This will be left only to the idle and vicious.

Moreover, I can support my propositions by facts. If we compare the nature of delinquents, abandoned children, vagabonds, etc., in a country where little or nothing has been done for the people (Russia, Galicia, Vienna, etc.), with that of the same individuals in Switzerland, for example, where much has already been done for the poor, we find this result: In Switzerland, these individuals are nearly all tainted with alcoholism or pathological heredity; they consist of alcoholics, incorrigibles, and congenital decadents, and education can do little for them, because nearly all those who have a better hereditary foundation have been able to earn their living by honest work. In Russia, Galicia, and even in Vienna, we are, on the contrary, astonished to see how many honest natures there are among the disinherited, when they are provided with work and education.

This fact speaks more than the contradictory statements which the fanatics of party politics hurl at each other's heads.

=Inquiry into Paternity.=--It will be objected that inquiry into paternity is often very difficult and dangerous. I do not deny this; but, when women have obtained their natural rights, and when the education of young girls is guided by the principles which we have enunciated in Chapter XVII, the matter will become much easier.

Moreover, even now, we can with energy and good will determine paternity in most cases. Although the great improvement in means of transport a.s.sists fugitives, it also favors the discovery and arrest of individuals all over the world. International relations between all civilized states are improving from day to day. When the world is more completely conquered by civilization, we may hope that it will become increasingly difficult for evildoers to escape their duties.

Regarding this question from all points of view it is impossible for us to give up this primordial condition for the preservation of human society, which consists in making parents responsible for the nourishment and education of their children.

The famous ideas of phalanstery and promiscuity, so often advanced, originated in theoretical and dogmatic minds which had lost their instinctive sense of human nature, and ignored what natural science and ethnology have revealed to us.

But the responsibility of parents extends to another domain--the duty of not procreating children who are unhealthy in body and mind. We shall return to this question later on.

=Guardians.h.i.+p.=--An excellent inst.i.tution of our present legislation is that of the guardians.h.i.+p of orphans, lunatics, etc. It requires to be developed extensively and with care. On the contrary, an evil custom is the right accorded by certain countries to parishes charged with poor and abandoned orphans, of delivering them by public tender to the man who offers the lowest pension--and only requires them for work. This system results in odious abuse, such as neglect, mendicity and ill-treatment.

The fate of illegitimate children who are "farmed out" is still worse.

A tacit alliance is established between rapacity on the one hand and social s.e.xual hypocrisy on the other. A number of infanticides and abortions result, either from poverty, or from sentiments of shame due to our moral customs. Here, civil law and penal law should combine and take energetic humanitarian measures to put a stop to this sad abuse.

An excellent inst.i.tution is that of homes in the country established for unmarried mothers and their children, and for abandoned mothers in general.

=Free Love and Civil Marriage.=--When all the propositions we have drawn up have been realized by social legislation, the difference which now exists between marriage and free love will be little more than a form. The consequences of these two kinds of union will become the same, both for parents and children; the only distinction will consist in the existence or non-existence of official control. True monogamy will lose nothing, but will gain much.

We shall not then have obligatory monogamy as at present, absolute in form, artificially maintained by the aid of prost.i.tution, that is by the most disgusting form of promiscuity which renders monogamy illusory; but we shall have in its place a relative monogamy much more solidly built on the natural rights of the two s.e.xes, it is true more free in form, but fundamentally much stronger in the natural and instinctive duties dictated by a truly free and reasoned union, as well as by the duties by which parents will be bound to their children.

=Form and Duration of Civil Marriage.=--Although it may be true that monogamy const.i.tutes the most normal and natural form of family union, and offers the best conditions for lasting happiness, both for parents and children, we must be blindly prejudiced not to admit that it is unnatural to consider it as the only sheet anchor in s.e.xual relations.h.i.+p, the only admissible form of marriage, and to make it a straight-jacket. History and ethnography show us that polygamous races are strongly developed and are still developing; on the other hand, it is true that polyandrous races degenerate.

Again, impartial observation of our Christian monogamy shows us that it depends to a great extent on appearances, that it is full of trickery and hypocrisy, and that to legally enforce it for life must be considered as absolutely impossible.

In Catholic countries which prohibit divorce, the latter has been replaced by separation, and this becomes the most constant source of adultery. The more the laws of a country impede divorce, the more one must close one's eyes to promiscuity or prost.i.tution, which has even been regulated by the State by the aid of proxenetism, all the while preaching monogamy in a loud voice.

These bitter lessons which practice has given to the partisan, of obligatory monogamy, prove the absurdity of attempting to restrain the natural appet.i.tes of man by force and by artificial obstacles. That which succeeds, not without difficulty, with some strong characters, and more easily with naturally cold temperaments, is impossible to realize in the ma.s.ses.

Polyandry is usually the result of poverty, and the polyandrous races are little fecund and tend to disappear. The normal man is instinctively more polygynous than the normal woman is polyandrous.

There are, however, cases where polyandry is justifiable. There are women whose s.e.xual appet.i.te, more or less pathological, is so insatiable that a normal man is incapable of satisfying it.

If such women were served by several Don Juans by means of a free contract, this would be better than giving themselves in despair to prost.i.tution (there are some prost.i.tutes created by nymphomania). This system would also be better than the seduction of normal young girls by the Don Juans in question.

Polygyny is still more indicated when the sterility of the woman or her repugnance to s.e.xual intercourse cause family disturbances.

In speaking of polygamy in Chapter VI, we have shown that it exists in several forms, and that these are not all so humiliating for the women as people think, who only know of the shameful abuses of the Mussulman's harem. What lowers the moral level of polygyny is especially the barbarous system of marriage by purchase, by which the women become slaves burdened with heavy labor, and are in a state of legal dependence. We have seen that polygyny has a higher moral character among certain Indian tribes where matriarchism rules, and where the wife is mistress of the house and family. The danger of degradation of the woman ceases when she is equal to the man as regards rights and property. In fact, in such a social state, polygyny can only const.i.tute an exception. It is here entirely free and becomes all the more innocent because divorce is facilitated and strict laws on the feeding and education of the children limit the male s.e.xual appet.i.te.

I even venture to maintain that the stability of monogamous marriage, which should be based on mutual sentiments of respect and love, would be much better guaranteed than hitherto by legal liberty of conjugal ties, and by duty to children such as I have proposed. If this became recognized as conventional, men and women fit to understand each other and love in a lasting manner, would find suitable mates more easily, and would become united more permanently when their chains were voluntary.

If marriages on trial became more frequent in the form of short unions, ending with separation, this would not be a great evil, for similar unions occur every day in a much baser form. Moreover, the effect of legislation with regard to children would put a curb on immorality and pa.s.sion, which cause their worst effects.

If the objection is raised that this would lead immoral people to avoid the procreation of children so as to enjoy more varied s.e.xual pleasures, I reply that this would be beneficial, for this anti-social cla.s.s of individuals would be eliminated by sterility, by a kind of negative selection. We thus place two natural appet.i.tes in antagonism; that of procreation on the one hand, and s.e.xual enjoyment on the other. Whoever inclines to the first, which is the higher and tends to preserve the species, is obliged to restrain himself in the second, without, however, falling into unnatural asceticism.

=Consanguineous Marriages.=--To avoid injurious consanguinity, it is sufficient, in my opinion, to prohibit the procreation of children between direct and collateral relations, especially between parents and children and between brothers and sisters. Anything more than this is only useless chicanery. Laws which prohibit marriage between relations by alliance are absurd, for instance those which forbid a widower to marry his sister-in-law (deceased wife's sister), etc.

Among some peoples such unions are ordained by law!

There is also no valid reason to prohibit unions between first cousins or between uncles and aunts, with nephews and nieces. There is nothing to prove that such marriages are injurious to the offspring. What is harmful is the acc.u.mulation of hereditary taints, whether they occur in relations or persons who are strangers to each other. Nevertheless, the _perpetuation_ of consanguineous unions in the same family is not as a rule advisable.

=Restriction of Personal Liberty in s.e.xual Life Among Harmful or Dangerous Individuals.=--The inability of men to distinguish, among the motives of the acts of their fellows, what is abnormal, unhealthy, impulsive or obsessional, from what is healthy and normal is one of the most deplorable phenomena in social life, and greatly hinders the action of reformatory civil legislation and rational administrative measures.

The pa.s.sionate, confused and unreasonable sentiments of the ma.s.ses give expression, according to the impulse of the moment, to two contradictory absurdities and injustices. On the one hand, they cry out against arbitrary constraint of individual liberty, against illegal restriction or detention, when competent judges or experts try to limit the movements of dangerous individuals affected with mental disorders, but who appear sane to the incompetent public; or when, to insure social safety, they send these individuals to a lunatic asylum, or limit their dangerous liberty in some other way. On the other hand, when such an individual goes free, thanks to the intervention of incompetent meddlers, and commits a.s.sa.s.sination, violation, incendiarism, or all kinds of sadic atrocities, or even only terrorizes his own family, these same people, suddenly animated by contrary sentiments of vengeance, imperiously demand an exemplary expiation and all possible reprisals. This sometimes goes as far as torture of the culprit or burning at the stake, as with the lynchers in America.

It is very difficult for the psychiatrist, who is the competent expert in these matters, to make truth and impartiality prevail. He is nearly always suspected of seeing madness everywhere, and of being afflicted with a mania for sending sane persons to asylums! In reality, he desires to take measures which are at the same time humane for the insane and protective for society, so as to treat as equitably and reasonably as possible the unfortunates who are more or less irresponsible for their acts; he wishes to see established laws and organizations which will efficiently protect the insane against themselves and against the exploitation and abuse of others, at the same time preventing them from doing injury to society.

On the other hand, society and with it the old style of jurist, in their ignorant dread of psychopathological matters, endeavor to take all possible measures to protect the sane public against the alienists, thus completely neglecting the true interests of the insane as well as those of society, while fighting against a phantom! The anxiety and mistrust of the public in this matter are continually kept up by "brigand stories" related by certain insane or semi-insane persons, which are spread by the press, always eager for scandal, or by pamphlets which the cheapness of printing places within the reach of the poorest!

These phenomena of public psychology greatly hinder the most urgent reforms. The public regard asylums with horror, and the path of the alienist is th.o.r.n.y, for he is exposed to continual accusations and threats whatever he may do, a situation which does not encourage him to suggest bold innovations.

Ignorant of psychology and especially of psychopathology, the public and with it the formal jurist, the slave of codes (I am only speaking of honest lawyers, and not of the number who abuse the situation to obtain oratorical and other success and crown themselves with laurels), regard themselves as the champions of individual liberty, and are unable to perceive that the net result of their efforts is, on the one hand, to condemn a considerable number of insane and crazy persons to prison, and on the other hand to a.s.sure liberty and impunity to the most dangerous individuals, always ready to commit the most atrocious crimes, or at any rate to make martyrs of a number of patient and innocent beings, hard-working and healthy in mind, especially women and children.

The alienists, who see clearly into all this misery, easily become pessimistic in their impotence against the want of sense, ignorance and unconscious pa.s.sion of the ma.s.ses, and even competent authorities.

The natural cowardice of men often makes them shut their eyes to avoid nuisances, and causes them to take no action against the most dangerous monsters, and especially against those who are most mischievous by their pens. This is why the martyrdom of unfortunate women and children illtreated by chronic alcoholics, s.a.d.i.s.ts and other neuropaths or psychopaths, never comes to an end, owing to the stupid outcry against so-called violation of individual liberty.

On this soil, s.e.xual atrocities and crimes, largely increased by drink, play an important part. Without troubling myself about prejudice and indignation I shall say in a few words what appears to me to be urgent:

So long as jurists and legislators will not study either psychology or psychiatry, and will not submit all habitual criminals and all dangerous men to an expert examination, all serious reform in this domain will remain impossible. To improve the present state of affairs a common understanding between jurists and alienists is urgent; but this can only be attained by jurists making a study of psychology, and a kind of practical clinic among imprisoned criminals. How can one judge and condemn one's neighbor without having the least idea of the state of mind of these pariahs of society? All the jurists who have the welfare of humanity at heart, should support the _international union of penal law_, and the efforts of men like Professor Franz von Liszt, Gaukler of Caen, and many other courageous reformers.[8]

It is needless to say that it is not sufficient to combat the excesses of criminal and dangerous individuals, such as s.a.d.i.s.ts, for example, by placing them under supervision and preventing them doing harm. It is also necessary to attack the cause of the evil by preventing their germs from being reproduced, degenerated as they usually are by the blastophthoria of their alcoholic parents (vide Chapter I). The first question, which is purely legal and administrative, does not concern us here; but I may be allowed to say a few words on the second.

Zealous and advanced reformers have proposed castration in such cases, which has provoked a general cry of indignation. This has been discussed in certain American states. The hyperaesthetic sentiment of our modern civilization cannot tolerate such ideas, while ancient races such as the Islamites provided, and still provide eunuchs as servants, who are free from danger for their wives, and think little of hanging or decapitating men who cause them any trouble. In the same way, we are dumb and impa.s.sive before the butcheries of war, because they are fas.h.i.+onable, especially when we do not come in contact with them. The Pope himself formerly procured eunuchs in order to have soprano voices in his church, and did not hesitate to castrate young boys for this purpose. The times change and we change with them!

For some years, however, castration has been employed as a remedy for certain disorders both in men and women, especially for hysteria in women. I admit here that, in an asylum which I superintend, I have castrated a veritable monster afflicted with const.i.tutional mental disorders, taking advantage of the fact that he himself requested this operation to relieve him of pain in his seminal vesicles, but with the chief object of preventing the production of unfortunate children tainted with his hereditary complaint.

Many years ago I also castrated a young hysterical girl of fourteen, whose mother and grandmother were both prost.i.tutes, and who had already begun to have intercourse with all the urchins in the street.

Here again, I frankly admit that the hysterical troubles of the patient served me as an excuse to prevent this unfortunate girl from reproducing beings who would probably resemble her. I am of opinion that castration, or some more benign operation, such as dislocation of the Fallopian tubes in women (which renders them sterile without destroying the ovaries, or even attenuating the s.e.xual appet.i.te) should be performed in order to prevent the reproduction of the most deplorable and most dangerous beings.

Among certain individuals, such as s.a.d.i.s.ts, whose s.e.xual appet.i.te is dangerous in itself, castration would be necessary. In my opinion, the more benign operations are indicated in all individuals whose psychopathological condition in this domain is such that they are absolutely incapable of resisting their impulses, or of understanding the dictates of reason. By this means they could go free instead of being incarcerated in asylums.