Pendragons Princess

http://psychclassics.yorku.ca/Hollingworth/children.htm

SOCIAL DEVICES FOR IMPELLING WOMEN TO BEAR AND REAR CHILDREN
Leta S. Hollingworth (1916)
Bellevue Hospital, New York City
First published in American Journal of Sociology, 22, 19-29.

Excerpt:

But once the young are brought into the world they still must be reared, if society’s ends are to be served, and here again the need for and exercise of social control may be seen. Since the period of helpless infancy is very prolonged in the human species, and since the care of infants is an onerous and exacting labor, it would be natural for all persons not biologically attached to infants to use all possible devices for fastening the whole burden of infant-tending upon those who are so attached. We should expect this to happen, and we shall see,’ in fact, that there has been consistent social effort to establish as a norm the woman whose vocational proclivities are completely and “naturally” satisfied by child-bearing and child-rearing, with the related domestic activities.

There is, to be sure, a strong and fervid insistence on the “maternal instinct,” which is popularly supposed to characterize all women equally, and to furnish them with an all-consuming desire for parenthood, regardless of the personal pain, sacrifice, and disadvantage involved. In the absence of all verifiable data, however, it is only common-sense to guard against accepting as a fact of human nature a doctrine which we might well expect to find in use as a means of social control.

Since we possess no scientific data at all on this phase of human psychology, the most reasonable assumption is that if it were possible to obtain a quantitative measurement of maternal instinct, we should find this trait distributed among women, just as we have found all other traits distributed which have yielded to quantitative measurement. It is most reasonable to assume that we should obtain a curve of distribution, varying from an extreme where individuals have a zero or negative interest in caring for infants, through a mode where there is a moderate amount of impulse to such duties, to an extreme where the only vocational or personal interest lies in maternal activities.

The facts, shorn of sentiment, then, are: (1) The bearing and rearing of children is necessary for tribal or national existence and ,aggrandizement. (2) The bearing and rearing of children is painful, dangerous to life, and involves long years of exacting labor and [p. 21] self-sacrifice. (3) There is no verifiable evidence to show that a maternal instinct exists in women of such all-consuming strength and fervor as to impel them voluntarily to seek the pain, danger, and exacting labor involved in maintaining a high birth rate.

We should expect, therefore, that those in control of society would invent and employ devices for impelling women to maintain a birth rate sufficient to insure enough increase in the population to offset the wastage of war and disease. It is the purpose of this paper to cite specific illustrations to show just how the various social institutions have been brought to bear on women to this end. Ross has classified the means which society takes and has taken to secure order, and insure that individuals will act in such a way as to promote the interests of the group, as those interests are conceived by those who form “the radiant points of social control.” These means, according to the analysis of Ross, are public opinion, law, belief, social suggestion, education, custom, social religion, personal ideals (the type), art, personality, ‘enlightenment, illusion, and social valuation. Let us see how some of these means have been applied in the control of women.

Personal ideals (the type). — The first means of control to which I wish to call attention in the present connection is that which Ross calls “personal ideals.” It is pointed out that “a developed society presents itself as a system of unlike individuals, strenuously pursuing their personal ends.” Now, for each person there is a “certain zone of requirement,” and since “altruism is quite incompetent to hold each unswervingly to the particular activities and forbearances belonging to his place in the social system,” the development of such allegiance must be –
effected by means of types or patterns, which society induces its members to adopt as their guiding ideals….. To this end are elaborated various patterns of conduct and of character, which may be termed social types. These types may become in the course of time personal ideals, each for that category of persons for which it is intended.

For women, obviously enough, the first and most primitive “zone of requirement” is and has been to produce and rear families large enough to admit of national warfare being carried on, and of colonization. [p. 22]

Excerpt:

There is one further class of devices for controlling women that does not seem to fit any of the categories mentioned by Ross. I refer to threats of evil consequence to those who refrain from child-bearing. This class of social devices I shall call “bugaboos.” [p. 28] Medical men have done much to help population (and at the same time to increase obstetrical practice!) by inventing bugaboos. For example, it is frequently stated by medical men, and is quite generally believed by women, that if first child-birth is delayed until the age of thirty years the pains and dangers of the process will be very gravely increased, and that therefore women will find it advantageous to begin bearing children early in life. It is added that the younger the woman begins to bear the less suffering will be experienced. One looks in vain, however, for any objective evidence that such is the case. The statements appear to be founded on no array of facts whatever, and until they are so founded they lie under the suspicion of being merely devices for social control.

One also reads that women who bear children live longer on the average than those who do not, which is taken to mean that child-bearing has a favorable influence on longevity. It may well be that women who bear many children live longer than those who do not, but the only implication probably is that those women who could not endure the strain of repeated births died young, and thus naturally did not have many children. The facts may indeed be as above stated, and yet child-bearing may be distinctly prejudicial to longevity.

A third bugaboo is that if a child is reared alone, without brothers and sisters, he will grow up selfish, egoistic, and an undesirable citizen. Figures are, however, so far lacking to show the disastrous consequences of being an only child.

From these brief instances it seems very clear that “the social guardians” have not really believed that maternal instinct is alone a sufficient guaranty of population.

They have made use of all possible social devices to insure not only child-bearing, but child-rearing. Belief, law, public opinion, illusion, education, art, and bugaboos have all been used to re-enforce maternal instinct. We shall never know just bow much maternal instinct alone will do for population until all the forces and influences exemplified above have become inoperative. As soon as women become fully conscious of the fact that they have been and are controlled by these devices the latter will become useless, and we shall get a truer measure of maternal feeling. [p. 29]

One who learns why society is urging him into the straight and narrow way will resist its pressure. One who sees clearly how he is controlled will thenceforth be emancipated. To betray the secrets of ascendancy is to forearm the individual in his struggle with society.

The time is coming, and is indeed almost at hand, when all the most intelligent women of the community, who are the most desirable child-bearers, will become conscious of the methods of social control. The type of normality will be questioned; the laws will be repealed and changed; enlightenment will prevail; belief will be seen to rest upon dogmas; illusion will fade away and give place to clearness of view; the bugaboos will lose their power to frighten. How will “the social guardians” induce women to bear a surplus population when all these cheap, effective methods no longer work?

The natural desire for children may, and probably will, always guarantee a stationary population, even if child-bearing should become a voluntary matter. But if a surplus population is desired for national aggrandizement, it would seem that there will remain but one effective social device whereby this can be secured, namely, adequate compensation, either in money or in fame. If it were possible to become rich or famous by bearing numerous fine children, many a woman would no doubt be eager to bring up eight or ten, though if acting at the dictation of maternal instinct only, she would have brought up but one or two. When the cheap devices no longer work, we shall expect expensive devices to replace them, if the same result is still desired by the governors of society.

If these matters could be clearly raised to consciousness, so that this aspect of human life could be managed rationally, instead of irrationally as at present, the social gain would be enormous — assuming always that the increased happiness and usefulness of women would, in general, be regarded as social gain.

……………………………………………………………………………….

The entire paper is very well written and quite accurate: women who are better educated are more aware of methods used by society to hold them down and are not afraid to question the validity of these controls. It wasn’t that long ago when a woman who never married or had children were considered to be social “outcasts” because they lived differently and considered a “threat” to the social order. Naturally, women outside of the status quo were not treated well by other women who followed social expectations of them. Most of this has to do with our upbringing, though - how girls are raised, versus how boys are raised. Women in the nineteenth century were considered second-class citizens, just as African-Americans were. Girls simply followed the role model their mother and grandmother served as, while boys grew up to be first class citizens. Was it really that long ago when females were held to these social expectations?

Actually, it wasn’t. It seems even closer in time that such expectations were held. I remember my first full-time job at a fabric store, working for a female boss, who was married, with three adult kids: two sons, one daughter. Two employees, one other woman besides myself, were unmarried and favorite targets of the boss to the point where I eventually left the job. The year? 1992. Even though my boss was in her fifties, she had the upbringing that women were baby machines first and foremost. Being only in my early twenties and trying to save money to leave my family’s home, I thought it bizarre when a recent employee was getting married and the boss said about it, “It’s about time.” What a thing to say about an employee! What in hell does her marital status have to do with her performance on the job? But that’s the mentality of 1992 in the United States of America, land of the free white men, oppresser to white and minority females. Being a member of three different minority groups myself (female gender, religion [non-Christian], and economic status [not wealthy]) I know what it’s like to be on the receiving end, even though I refused to be intimidated by people like this female manager who considered women good for nothing but marriage and babies. The shocking flipside is, my present boss, a different workplace altogether, is a male, he gives me no grief whatsoever about not having kids, and he’s conservative, Republican, and Christian. Oh, plus he has a teenaged daughter. So why the discrepancy?

Again, the majority of social expectations come from role models. American society is just twisted enough to not consider men as role models for females, not as a gender issue, but as a non-gender issue. Fathers are more apt to support their daughter’s ambitions, whereas the mother wants to stick the daughter into the same mold she was immersed into. I mean, just how many fathers out there force their daughters to wear girdles? Next to none. But I still remember my mother wanting me to wear one even though I was skinny and young (aged 20). All of these boil down to social role models, or in plainer terms, “I, as a woman, fulfilled society’s expectations of me, now you have to do the same,” a mother may say of her daughter. Yes, it seems childish to practice such force upon the younger generation. But back to my opening paragraph where it says educated women question this socialization, it is this questioning that ultimately provides freedom for women. If a woman is well educated but fails to question the socialization of females in modern society, that education is worthless if she reverts back to the socialization pitfall. Why bother going to college? (They go to meet a husband, haha. Don’t worry, mommy and daddy paid $200,000 in tuition just for that purpose.) Going through the motions of life without engaging any real independent thinking at all is hardly fulfilling; all it does is perpetuate the cycle. Those who are not afraid to break away from the social mold are those who set future social standards of real freedom in society.