WOMEN MAKE ME TIRED BECAUSE—

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 83, Issue 32, 8 February 1939, Page 3

WOMEN MAKE ME TIRED BECAUSE—

rpHIS is why women make me tired: They have suburban mentalities and Hollywood emotions. When they say beauty they mean some film-star or other. When they say love they mean passion. When they say passion they mean sex. When they break off an engagement it is all for the best, but when the man does it it is caddish. They put a commercial value on their wounded hearts and sue for breach of promise. If they want a divorce they expect their husbands to allow them to do the divorcing. When they discuss other women they are usually scandal-mongering. When they discuss men they are usually obscene. They have a habit of referring to a creature called a “nanny”—no relation to a goat. Their minds are cluttered up with clothes like a box-room with lumber. They don't know the difference be-

tween attractiveness and good looks; sentiment and sentimentality; pathos and bathos. They yank their skirts up to their knees for no other reason than that “skirts are worn short this season.” They perch on their heads concoctions idiotic enough to make a cow jump over the moon. They pull their eyebrows out by the roots. And smell of face cream and powder and like a beauty-parlour generally. They call you "Darling,” and it doesn’t mean a thing. They smear your face all over with lipsick when they kiss you. They think they can drive cars. When they ape men they do it badly. They ape all the worst qualities in men. They wear furs in summer. And thin silk stockings in midwinter. They regard it as chic to halfundress for dinner and the theatre. • They wear shoes that cause them to

walk on the balls of their feet and throw their knee-joints out. They talk about a pretty jumper, a pretty girl, a pretty view, a pretty piece of music. Their idea of romance is a close-up of an embrace. Their idea of tragedy a man who has done them wrong. They are hysterical. And shrill. They are mawkish about outer women’s weddings, and form themselves into mobs outside churches to stare at brides. They are cruel about other women who deviate from the moral code. They lack imagination. They like their maids to wear caps and aprons and call them “Madam.” They put themselves into a uniform called “Fashion.” They cannot think straight. They cannot distinguish between thought and emotional reaction. They are the inferior sex and always betray it, but will never admit it. They are the wives and mothers of the men who will be killed in the next war, and they do nothing about it. They are their own worst enemies. Because of that, most of all. —Ethel Mannin in Lilliput.