Part 66 (1/2)
[Unt.i.tled]
I gave myself to G.o.d.-- With humility and contrition, In sacrifice and submission.
”Take me! Do not refuse me!
Order me--govern me--use me!
Nothing I ask for my own-- I pray to be thine alone!--”
And G.o.d smiled.
I gave myself to mankind.-- With sorrow and sympathy deep, With pity that would not sleep.
”To serve you and save you, brothers!
To give my life for the others!
I ask no price--no place-- I seek but to help the race!--”
And G.o.d smiled.
I gave myself to Myself.-- In the knowledge that opens power; In the truth's unfolding hour; In the glory of service free; The joy that such life can be:-- My life--that is never done!
For my neighbor and I are One!-- And G.o.d smiled.
OUR ANDROCENTRIC CULTURE; or, THE MAN-MADE WORLD
VI.
GAMES AND SPORTS
One of the sharpest distinctions both between the essential characters and the artificial positions of men and women, is in the matter of games and sports. By far the greater proportion of them are essentially masculine, and as such alien to women; while from those which are humanly interesting, women have been largely debarred by their arbitrary restrictions.
The play instinct is common to girls and boys alike; and endures in some measure throughout life. As other young animals express their abounding energies in capricious activities similar to those followed in the business of living, so small children gambol, physically, like lambs and kids; and as the young of higher kinds of animals imitate in their play the more complex activities of their elders, so do children imitate whatever activities they see about them. In this field of playing there is no s.e.x.
Similarly in adult life healthy and happy persons, men and women, naturally express surplus energy in various forms of sport. We have here one of the most distinctively human manifestations. The great acc.u.mulation of social energy, and the necessary limitations of one kind of work, leave a human being tired of one form of action, yet still uneasy for lack of full expression; and this social need has been met by our great safety valve of games and sports.
In a society of either s.e.x, or in a society without s.e.x, there would still be both pleasure and use in games; they are vitally essential to human life. In a society of two s.e.xes, wherein one has dictated all the terms of life, and the other has been confined to an extremely limited fraction of human living, we may look to see this great field of enjoyment as disproportionately divided.
It is not only that we have reduced the play impulse in women by restricting them to one set of occupations, and overtaxing their energies with mother-work and housework combined; and not only that by our androcentric conventions we further restrict their amus.e.m.e.nts; but we begin in infancy, and forcibly differentiate their methods of play long before any natural distinction would appear.
Take that universal joy the doll, or puppet, as an instance. A small imitation of a large known object carries delight to the heart of a child of either s.e.x. The worsted cat, the wooden horse, the little wagon, the tin soldier, the wax doll, the toy village, the ”Noah's Ark,”
the omnipresent ”Teddy Bear,” any and every small model of a real thing is a delight to the young human being. Of all things the puppet is the most intimate, the little image of another human being to play with.
The fancy of the child, making endless combinations with these visible types, plays as freely as a kitten in the leaves; or gravely carries out some observed forms of life, as the kitten imitates its mother's hunting.
So far all is natural and human.
Now see our att.i.tude toward child's play--under a masculine culture.
Regarding women only as a s.e.x, and that s.e.x as manifest from infancy, we make and buy for our little girls toys suitable to this view. Being females--which means mothers, we must needs provide them with babies before they cease to be babies themselves; and we expect their play to consist in an imitation of maternal cares. The doll, the puppet, which interests all children, we have rendered as an eternal baby; and we foist them upon our girl children by ceaseless millions.
The doll, as such, is dear to the little boy as well as the girl, but not as a baby. He likes his jumping-jack, his worsted Sambo, often a genuine rag-doll; but he is discouraged and ridiculed in this. We do not expect the little boy to manifest a father's love and care for an imitation child--but we do expect the little girl to show maternal feelings for her imitation baby. It has not yet occurred to us that this is monstrous.