The Sexual Question Part 46

It is unnecessary to say that it is not intended that girls and boys should sleep in the same dormitories, nor bathe together in the costume of Adam and Eve! Our remarks do not apply to boarding-schools, but to coeducation in public schools.

When we speak of coeducation, we generally meet with the argument that the nature and vocation of women differ from those of men, and that consequently their education ought to differ. To this I reply as follows: The external objects of the world, the branches of human knowledge, in fact the subjects for study and instruction, are the same for both s.e.xes. It is, therefore, both a useless waste of forces and an injustice to organize an inferior education for women.

=Instruction in Coeducation.=--A course of instruction as interesting as possible should be organized for each subject, without distinction of s.e.x. This rule should also apply to things which are generally considered as the special province of women; such as sewing, dressmaking, cooking, household work, etc. It will then be the business of each s.e.x to choose the subject most suited to its abilities.

Part of the course of instruction should be obligatory for all, while another part intended for ulterior individual development should be optional, according to individual taste and talent. In the obligatory part of instruction certain subjects might be made obligatory for one s.e.x and optional for the other; sewing and algebra, for instance. In this way each s.e.x could choose the most suitable subjects, as is the case now in universities only.

=Danger of s.e.xual Perversions.=--A very important point, unfortunately little understood in s.e.xual pedagogy, is that of congenital s.e.xual perversions. Tradition regards every s.e.xual anomaly as an acquired vice, which should be treated by indignation and punishment. The effects of this manner of looking at the question are disastrous. It gives entirely wrong ideas to youth, and shuts the eyes of parents and teachers to the truth.

It is not without a serious motive that I have described at length the repugnant phenomena of s.e.xual pathology (Chapter VIII). Teachers and parents should be thoroughly acquainted with this subject. But this is not enough, for these phenomena commence in infancy. It is a long time before the child whose s.e.xual appet.i.te is perverted has the least idea that his inclinations and desires are considered by others as abnormal. The psychic irradiations of his abnormal appet.i.te usually const.i.tute the sanctuary of his ideal aspirations and sentiments, the object of obscure hopes and struggles which are opposed to nature and the inclinations of his comrades. This is why he neither understands the world nor himself in this respect. His amorous exaltations are ridiculed, or else they inspire disgust. Anxiety and shame alternate more and more with the perverse aspirations of his mind, which slowly increase. It is only when he arrives at the age of p.u.b.erty that the pervert understands his exceptional position; he then feels that he is exiled from society, abandoned and without a future. He sees his ideal aspirations mocked by men and regarded as a ridiculous caricature or even as a culpable monstrosity. He is obliged to hide his pa.s.sions like a criminal. As his character is often weak and impulsive, and is combined with a strong and precocious s.e.xual appet.i.te, he is very easily led astray, especially if he discovers suitable objects for his appet.i.te, or perverted companions like himself.

In this way, in secondary schools, we often find groups of young inverts who succeed by cunning in seducing their friends. The mention of these phenomena, which from time to time give rise to school scandals, should be enough to make any one who is unprejudiced understand the urgency for instructing children betimes in s.e.xual questions. This is a duty which is necessary in the name of hygiene and morality.

It is evident that if parents and masters exchange ideas on this subject with children, freely but decently, they will soon bring to light the s.e.xual nature of the latter. They will discover which girls are cold and indifferent, and which are precociously erotic.

It is needless to say that one should speak and act differently in the two cases. There is no risk in instructing the first on the whole s.e.xual question, but prudence is required with the latter, who should be guarded against anything which stimulates their appet.i.te, by warning them of the dangers of venereal disease, illegitimate children and seduction.

We sometimes meet with young girls of hysterical nature with inverted inclinations, who become enamored of other girls and have a s.e.xual repugnance for men. Occasionally a s.a.d.i.s.t is discovered.

Among boys we observe a.n.a.logous differences in the intensity and precocity of the s.e.xual appet.i.te. An attentive observer will frequently discover h.o.m.os.e.xual appet.i.tes in boys, for these are comparatively common. Other perversions, such as sadism, masochism, fetichism and exhibitionism, etc., are more rarely met with.

Masturbation is common in both s.e.xes.

The great advantage of such discoveries is that children affected with s.e.xual perversions can be put under special supervision, and above all things kept away from boarding schools, where they are subject to great temptations. An invert in a boarding-school is in reality almost in the same position as a young man who sleeps in the same room as young girls, and no one thinks of the danger.

When perversion is recognized, the subject should not be treated as a criminal, nor even as a vicious individual, but as a patient afflicted with a nervous affection who is thereby dangerous to himself and others. He should be treated and prevented from becoming a center of infection for his surroundings. Inverts should be specially supervised and taken care of till adult age. When they come of age, in my opinion, it would be an innocent idea to allow them to marry persons of their own s.e.x, as they so much desire to do. Normal adults can very well protect themselves against their attentions, when they are warned by sufficient instruction in s.e.xual questions.

The child, on the other hand, has the right to be protected against all contamination by perversion, as against all s.e.xual a.s.sault of whatever nature, and it is the duty of society to organize its protection. But this cannot be done unless society is itself instructed on the question, and in a position to give a rational education to youth such as we have sketched above.

If dangerous congenital perversions are discovered, such as sadism and pederosis, energetic measures of protection should be taken; in grave cases, the operations we have spoken of, or permanent internment.

Apart from suggestion, there is no better remedy against masturbation than a system of education such as that in force in the Landerziehungsheime, especially continuous physical labor combined with useful and attractive intellectual occupation. When such a system of education is put in force at an early age, the s.e.xual appet.i.te develops more slowly and more moderately, and has the most favorable influence on the whole s.e.xual life of man.

In speaking of masturbation in Chapter VIII we have seen that it may be the expression of very different conditions, and we should act accordingly.

=Eroticism in Childhood.=--By giving children betimes the requisite instruction on the s.e.xual question, they are tranquilized. Many boys and girls give themselves up to despair because of the erroneous and terrifying ideas they have of s.e.xual affairs. On the one hand, they hear p.o.r.nographic remarks which disgust them, while their parents envelop the subject in mystery; on the other hand, their s.e.xual appet.i.tes evoke desire and call for satisfaction. When a young man in this state of mind has an emission, either spontaneously or as the result of artificial excitation, he is seized with anxiety and shame, often also with phantoms of disease and moral depravity. He then requires almost heroic resolution to unburden his mind to a doctor or to his father. With nervous subjects, inclined to be melancholic or hypochondriacal, such a state of mind sometimes leads to suicide.

Another advantage in the instruction of children in s.e.xual matters is that the questions of heredity, alcohol and venereal disease can be explained to them at the same time. In giving these explanations it is important not to awaken eroticism in the child by dwelling more than necessary on s.e.xual topics. Instruction in this subject should not be given too frequently; on the contrary, the attention of youth should, as far as possible, be drawn away from s.e.xual questions to other subjects, till the age of maturity.

With the same object, erotic and p.o.r.nographic literature should be condemned. Unfortunately, many novels and dramas which meet with the approbation of society, thanks to their fas.h.i.+onable or even decent form of presentation, are often full of half-veiled eroticism, which is much more exciting to the s.e.xual appet.i.te than the brutal and realistic descriptions of Zola or Brieux, or even the erotic art of de Maupa.s.sant.

A doctor once told me that in his country the country children, who observed copulation among animals, often made similar attempts themselves, while bathing or otherwise. Yet these country-people are no more corrupt or degenerate than the townspeople. Here again, proper instruction and warnings would be the best remedy, especially in the case of girls.

What is to be said, on the contrary, of certain Austrian judges who punish by imprisonment urchins of fourteen, who have copulated with girls of the same age or made them pregnant? Have they punished the real culprit? Do they imagine that they have done anything that will improve these children?

The confession of Catholics plays a deplorable pedagogic part in the s.e.xual domain. We may admit that some high-minded priests may be capable of modifying their interpretation of the prescriptions of Liguori and others which we have cited, and do little or no harm to young people of either s.e.x. It must, however, be recognized--and the most devout Catholic cannot deny it--that priests are only human, and have not all the n.o.ble spirit nor the tact to fulfill the ideal required of them in their behavior toward women. This is enough to make the confessional, in many cases, a depraved inst.i.tution from the s.e.xual point of view. On this subject, I refer the reader to what has already been said in Chapter XII on the experiences of the Canadian reformer, father Chiniqui.

The following instance is very characteristic. A very prudish man, observing children of both s.e.xes bathing together, exclaimed to them indignantly, that this was improper. Thereupon a little boy replied naively: "We do not know which is a boy nor which is a girl, because we have no clothes." This charming reply shows how certain moral intentions are more likely to attract the attention of young people to erotic subjects.

=Corporal Punishment and Sadism.=--An important fact has recently attracted the attention of the whole world, concerning certain terrible crimes. There is no longer any doubt that in some cases perverted masters and teachers find satisfaction for their s.a.d.i.s.t s.e.xual appet.i.te in the corporal punishment of children. This was the case with the German teacher, Dippold, who, to satisfy his perverted appet.i.te flogged two children confided to him by their parents, till one of them died.

The _Arbeiter Zeitung_, of Vienna, a very conscientious journal, published the case of a prince of a small German state, who, whenever a schoolmaster ordered corporal punishment to a pupil, offered to execute it himself. The journal in question attributes with good reason this fantasy to sadism.

Again, many children were at one time belabored with blows for several years by a person who pretended to be a police agent, and who threatened them with prosecution if they complained. One boy more courageous than the others finally gave information, and the affair then ended.

We thus see that sadism does not always manifest itself by a.s.sa.s.sination. Its less dangerous forms in which pleasure is obtained by blows or some other form of bodily or mental ill-treatment, are no doubt much more common. They const.i.tute a kind of complement to s.e.xual desire in pathological individuals whose appet.i.te is only partly perverted. This fact, which has. .h.i.therto not received sufficient attention, gives one more reason for the abolition of corporal punishment in schools, for the art of dissimulation and refinement of torture are unlimited in the s.e.xually perverted. A thousand hypocritical pretexts serve to conceal their morbid appet.i.te, and it has been proved by experience that they can succeed for a long time in deceiving even experts in this subject. This was the case with Dippold and many others.

Corporal punishment of schoolboys is only useless and harmful brutality. It is a disgrace to civilization that it is still maintained at a time when the bastinado has been suppressed among convicts.

=Protection of Childhood. Child Martyrs.=--Children, especially when illegitimate or of another marriage, are often exposed to atrocious treatment in which alcohol and s.e.xual pa.s.sion, inconvenienced by the presence of the child, play a great part.

I here refer the reader to the last work of Lydia von Wolfring.[14]

This author, who has made a special study of the judicial protection of children, makes the following propositions directed against parents and tutors who commit misdemeanors against children or pupils confided to them, or who incite the latter to commit misdemeanors, or who show themselves incapable of protecting them against others who abuse them in the manner indicated (this last condition applies especially to concubines, widows, etc.).

(1). Withdrawal of paternal, maternal or tutelary authority and nomination of another tutor.

(2). Complete withdrawal of children in grave cases.

(3). Nomination of a "co-tutor" in all cases where a husband who survives his wife and has children who are minors, contracts a second marriage or lives in concubinage.

(4). Withdrawal of paternal and sometimes maternal authority from all parents who leave the education of their children to public or private charity, unless compelled to do so by poverty.

Without having a direct bearing on our subject the above propositions contain the elements of an efficacious, though indirect, protection against the abuses committed toward children; for example, when parents urge their children to prost.i.tution. As regards proposition 4, I refer to what I have said in Chapter XIII. While authority over their children is withdrawn, unnatural parents of this kind should be obliged to work for their children's maintenance.

=Future Possibilities.=--Unfortunately we must admit that the programme of a s.e.xual pedagogy for the future, such as we have sketched here, is very far from being realized. The Landerziehungsheime, which should serve as examples for future state schools are still spa.r.s.ely distributed, and it seems impossible to carry out universally a rational s.e.xual education, till the state and the public are better informed on the subject and have got rid of their prejudices. This hope appears to be only the reflection of a distant future. In the meantime every one must do his best. Parents, and some masters, can do much by free initiative. It is above all things necessary that young people who are interested in social reforms should not be satisfied with empty phrases, nor "play to the gallery." They should set the example in their own s.e.xual relations, in condemning old customs which are opposed to true natural human ethics; they should show their adherence to s.e.xual reforms by action and example, by raising objections to marriage for money, to the tyranny and formality of marriage, to prost.i.tution, etc.; and they should attempt to put in force a healthy selection and a rational education such as we have indicated above.

FOOTNOTES:

[13] Vide.--Ernest Contou: _Ecoles nouvelles et Landerziehungsheime_, Paris, 1905; Wilhelm Frey: _Landerziehungsheime_, Leipzig, 1902; Forel: _Hygiene des nerfs et de l'esprit_, Stuttgart, 1905.

[14] "Das Recht des Kindes: Vorschlage fur eine gesetzliche Regelung."

_Allgemeine osterreichische Gerichtszeitung_, 1904.

CHAPTER XVIII

s.e.xUAL LIFE IN ART

=The Genesis of Art.=--Art represents in a harmonious form the movements of our sentimental life. The phylogeny of art is still very obscure; Darwin attributes it to s.e.xual attraction, through the efforts made by one s.e.x to attract the other; but his arguments have never convinced me.[15]

Aristotle recognized in art the principles of representation of the beautiful and of imitation. Karl Groos, of Giessen, refutes Darwin's hypothesis, and upholds the principle of the representation of self by sensations which relate to the subject, thus giving a tangible object to corresponding internal emotions (among animals, for example, the pleasure of hearing their own voice).[16]

The motor instinct and the movements executed in play seem to be among the most primitive autonomous creators of art. Similar play is observed in ants. In man, Groos attributes a considerable role to religious ecstasy and ecstasy in general, in the genesis of art.

"Since its object is to excite the sentiments, it is obvious that art utilizes from the first the domain which is richest in emotional sensations, that is the s.e.xual domain." He shows at the same time that erotic subjects have a much more general and definite importance in highly developed art than in what we know of primitive art.

Groos is certainly right, for primitive eroticism was too coa.r.s.e and sensual, too exclusively tactile to affect the mind as deeply and with such gradations of symphony as is the case with civilized man. This reason alone seems to me sufficient to support Groos' view, which is also confirmed by the fact that primitive works of art contain very few erotic subjects.