The Alleged Antagonism of the Sexes.

Otago Witness, Issue 2815, 26 February 1908, Page 73

The Alleged Antagonism of the Sexes.

By Dr Salbebt, in The Chronicle. Generalisations about the sexes, like those about races, usually strike me as unprofitable. The real variable is the mx dividual. That the mean or average male intelligence should be higher than the female, as doubtless is the case, is an interesting fact in academic psychology and for the evolutionist. It is this that is meant when we' say that "men aTe cleverer thar women," which either means that I am cleverer than George Eliot or nothing at all. The fact is as* I have stated it; the other -statement is highly misleading and inaccurate. This i 6 not merely a plea for a technical mode of expression, for half of the arguments against, for instance, women's suffrage are based upon the misstatement of the fact. Men are more intelligent than women, therefore men should vote and women be voted for ; but as long as foolish, men and! wise women exist the statement means nothing. The fact of average male superiority in this respect has no relevance •to the question, and, indeed, since it is so constantly misstatedlfor the purposes of injustice, whilst its significance is only evident to the evolutionist, it' is a pity that the fact is known outside scientific circles. "—" — Unconventional Views.— Having begun by saying that I think moat generalisations. ...about the » jsexes ab,s»rd or falsely stated or useless, and that the 'real Variable is (the 'individual—

of either sex — I will now stultify myself by saying, that "a man is braver than a woman," or " a woman is more self-sacri-ficing than a man." All statements of this order, so stated, -are palpable rubbish. When this or that quality is attributed to women as a. sex as contrasted with men as a sex, the proper reply is the remark of Lafontaine^ — I am away from my books, enduring % holiday, and quote from memory — that " a great many men are women in this respect." I believe the conventional views as to contrasts between the sexes are mainly accurate, if stated as mean or average facts'. But I "hold, like biologists in general, very unconventional views as_ to the ibistoric facts of the sexes. I believe that, as Professor Lester Ward, the greatest of American sociologists, put it, hfe is female. Species only female can and do exist ; species only male obviously cannot. The male sex ie actually scons "younger than the female, and was evolved for a special purpose. The spiders and tk© bee» illustrate for us the primary relations of the sexes — the females are the race, the workers as weH as the reproducers; the male .exists only for one purpose, arud ie disposed of by 'the female when, that is. acoomplis'hed. — Fundamental Differences. — Incomparably t^e most important of the really fundamental differences between the sexes, which, nothing will ever alter, is the fact, first 1 stated by Professors Geddes and Thomson in their "Evolution of Sex," that in the female economy the storing or building up Ot anabolic function* preponderate; but in il*e> male the spending,breaking down-,' or katabolio Junctions. This is determined, and determined for ever, by the fact of motherhood- It was true when the first sex was evolved, and will always be true. Thus, woman can rival man in the external activities of life only at a Cost of those, internal activities upon which motherhood depends. It is the fact that, in general, highly intellectual women <in the one* baad- tond female acrobats on the other tend to become incapable t>i motherhood. - They ■sannot gWultaneously- spend their energies for toft individtial life— nowever wortbuy — and conserve them for the race. It is upon

this . fact tnai the superfoi? «yyerage mate tality and muscularity of tpsti. depejrag though it do* nofc excuse, let as say, tifl male imbecile who jeers at a brave ami beneficent lady like Mrs Despard. Ii la only the student of heredity — and m$ always even he— who steadily attempts to distinguish between what is innate ana what is • acquired — i.e., the product pjt education — in human character. I agree with Mrs Gilman that many of the pointy in which the sexes are contrasted are not, proved to i>e really sexual, but are merely; educational. — A Typical Myth.-w I used to believe, as a small boy, that girls could not throw because they had shorter collarbones; until I noticed, on^ experiment, that I appeared, ' in common with other boys, to have a girl's collar* bone in my left shoulder, girdle* since? I threw with my left Hand exactly as a girj throws. In the not distant future, co> edtication will teach us what are the real facts as to the average differences betwee.A the sexes. At present almost nothing id known on the points about which most of us so readily dogmatise. The' collarbone myth* is typical of .many. I would much rather write a book than an article on this great subject, but while I omiti niiich of moment at least I may refer ip the established truth that acquired characters are not inherited. This is to say tbatl my little girl, for instance, is no worse off as regards her mental prospects because 4ox. thousands of generations most of _ he* female ancestors have been educated littlfe or not at'^all. 'In one generation a sex or race may liberate itself from^Miy such, past., -The talk about this or that habit' or aptitude or ineptitude .being " jn; r grained " in a sex or a people by the pqsti is unscientific nonsense, without warrant} in fact, and 3aily"disproved in all spheres. Lastly, I believe that mother love created l universal charity. I know that without! motherhood, caring for the young, in* stinct could not have been superseded byi intelligence in man, so- that woman is the creator of man's intelligence ; and I believe that motherhood and its conditions are, the determining factors^ in history. Thus a woman who looks at a, baby as I look at' a hearthrug is a horrible anil hideouaf spectacle.