4. SEXUAL ETHICS WHERE THE SEXES HAVE
EQUAL RIGHTS
WHERE the sexes have equal rights, sexual ethics
are characterised by complete equality of sexual
rights and duties for the two sexes. The duplex morality
met with under monosexual dominance is replaced
by a code which is precisely the same for men
and for women. Now, sexual equality can manifest
itself in either of two ways. Every phase of equal
rights for the sexes is preceded by a particular phase
of monosexual dominance. The transition from one
phase to another is not sudden but gradual. One
phase develops out of the other. When, as to-day, a
society where men hold sway is yielding place to one
in which men and women have equal rights, attentive
observation will show that there are two distinct
trends in the evolution of sexual morality. The
starting point in each case is the demand for the
abolition of the sexual privileges of the male, but two
ways of achieving this present themselves. Women
may be granted like sexual freedoms to those which
men already possess, or the rigid canons of sexual
behaviour which are already imposed upon women
may be imposed upon men also.
Both these trends are conspicuously in evidence
to-day. The remarkable fact is that the former trend
has more champions among women, the latter among
men. Pre-eminently it is women who seek to realise
sexual equality through the extension of masculine
sexual freedom to women. Women's standpoint in
this respect is manifestly an outcome of the hitherto
prevalent condition of male predominance. A subordinate
sex will invariably attempt to win for itself the
same rights as those of the heretofore dominant sex;
it will not endeavour to impose upon the latter the
code that has up to now regulated its own conduct.
It is less easy to understand why men would rather
see the restrictions of female sexual morality imposed
upon their own sex, than see the sexual freedoms of
men granted to women also. If future events should
confirm the supposition that this is so, we shall at
least be able to infer that men think it more important
to restrict the sexual freedom of women than to
preserve their own. We cannot venture to say
whether the uncertainties of paternity play their part
in determining such a masculine outlook.[1]
It is obvious, however, that, under monosexual
dominance, monogamy must always be fictitious. The
monogamic code is continually being infringed owing
to the perpetual resurgence of the duplex morality
inseparably associated with the sway of one sex over
the other. Schopenhauer[2] writes: "It is futile to
make a contentious matter of polygamy. We must
accept it as a universal fact, and our task is merely to
regulate it. Where are genuine monogamists to be
found? We are all polygamists, for a time at least,
and most of us always." Schopenhauer is right for
every phase of monosexual dominance. This, owing
to the duplex morality that characterises it, invariably
[1] Of course there are numerous exceptions to the foregoing generalisation:
women who demand monogamy for both sexes; and men
who demand sexual freedom for both sexes.
[2] Parerga und Paralipomena.
leads to polygamy. But Schopenhauer is wrong in
believing monogamy to be impossible. It is only
impossible where monosexual dominance prevails.
Where the sexes have equal rights, monogamy is provided
with opportunities for a genuine development,
in virtue of the disappearance of the trend towards
duplex sexual morality. It has not hitherto been recognised
that equality of rights for the two sexes is the
essential prerequisite to true monogamy. The general
belief has been that monogamy is the outcome of the
refinement of the amatory life which attends the
higher stages of civilisation.[3] Some have taught
that monogamy arose through an increase in paternal
authority (Lewis Morgan, Engels, etc.). But
such forces are quite incompetent to bring genuine
monogamy into being. There is only one factor that
can do this—equality of rights for the sexes. It is an
essential factor, though not the only factor. We shall
learn that polygamy sometimes exists even when the
sexes have equal rights.
Equality of rights is of such fundamental importance
in relation to monogamic morality, that perhaps
the former has to be regarded as the real originator
of the latter. Nations wherein the idea of monogamy
is conspicuous have unquestionably passed through a
phase in which the sexes have had equal rights; the
monogamic principle is a vestige of such a phase. We
shall see in due course that the phase of equal rights
for men and women creates the economic conditions
that are the indispensable antecedents of monogamy.
For the strict carrying out of monogamy there are
two requisites: premarital chastity in both sexes; and
faithfulness after marriage in the case of both parties.
[3] See, for instance, Reitzenstein, Urgeschichte der Ehe.
Waitz[4] tells us that among the Creeks, a Red Indian
tribe, both the men and the women could be chiefs.
The sexes held equal sway. Strict monogamy prevailed.
Severe punishment was visited upon all married
persons, of either sex, who permitted themselves
any sexual license. Among the Cingalese, during the
period when the sexes had equal rights (and according
to Friedenthal's description sexual equality was
thoroughly established in the case of this people),
both polyandry and polygamy were forbidden. There
were two kinds of marriage. In some cases the wife
took a husband to herself; in other cases the wife
entered the husband's house. We see that in this
instance, as the outcome of sexual equality, Men's-State customs and Women's-State customs had an
equal vogue. In Egypt, during the days of sexual
equality, monogamy seems to have been likewise
strictly enforced. The same statement is true of the
early Teutons. At the time when, in all probability,
the sexes had equal positions among this people, a
strictly monogamic code regulated sexual relationships.
Premarital chastity and fidelity in marriage were demanded
of both sexes alike. St. Boniface reports of
the Saxons that seducer and seduced were both punished
with death. Among the ancient Teutons marital
infidelity was visited with the same punishment whatever
the sex of the offender. Among the Babylonians
in the days of Cyrus and Cambyses the sexes were
equal, and according to Kohler[5] at this period strict
monogamy was practised. Some parts of the Judaic
law, where sexual morality is concerned, remind us
of the period when the sexes were on an equal foot-
[4] Op. cit., pp. 101 et seq.
[5] Zum neubabylonischen Recht.
ing, inasmuch as they treat both sexes alike. Thus we
read in Deuteronomy 23, 17: "There shall be no
harlot of the daughters of Israel, neither shall there
be a sodomite of the sons of Israel." According to
the laws of Moses, those who were found in fornicatory
intercourse, must marry. The ordinance that
every man visiting a harlot was punishable with forty
lashes seems to date from a period when the transition
from equal rights to masculine dominance was in
progress. Very characteristic of the suggestive influence
which monosexual dominance exercises upon the
view taken of other phases in the sociology of sex
relations is the fact that Reitzenstein,[6] who strongly
favours monogamy for both sexes, draws from the
before-mentioned sections of the Judaic law the
conclusion that at this period "virginity was made the
ideal of the unmarried woman. Esteem for virginity
was inculcated as the best bulwark against extramarital
sexual intercourse." But Reitzenstein has not,
a word to say concerning the interest in masculine
chastity which is equally manifest in the laws we are
now considering. He applies to this phase of sexual
equality a yardstick belonging to the phase of masculine
dominance—the phase to which he himself belongs.
For this reason, even where the monogamic
ethic of equal rights is conspicuous, he can see nothing
but the customary duplex morality characteristic of
masculine predominance, with its one-sided esteem for
female chastity.
Conversely, in the transition to the simpler ethic of
sex equality, the polygamic principle which represents
the other trend of the duplex morality characteristic
of monosexual dominance, may gain the victory over
[6] Op. cit., pp. 85 et seq.
the monogamic. Then we have a simultaneous prevalence
of polygamy and polyandry. Among many
primitive folk, when first discovered, this type of
equal sexual rights was in full force, as for instance
among the indigens of Venezuela, in the Sandwich
Islands, and elsewhere[7] Westermarck[8] tells us that
many savage peoples allow complete freedom to both
sexes before marriage. Strabo relates of the Medes
that every man had five wives and every woman five
husbands. We shall subsequently consider the fate of
this passage in the hands of translators imbued with
the Men's-State ideology.
The polygamic principle can also exist side by side
with the monogamic principle in this way, that both
sexes may be perfectly free before marriage, whereas
as soon as marriage has taken place monogamy becomes
a strict obligation.
Apparently, in the phase of equal sexual rights, the
monogamic principle has a better chance of success
than the polygamic principle or the mixed polygamic
and monogamic. The probable explanation is that in
human beings the monogamic trend is stronger than
the polygamic. Elsewhere the present authors have
proved this as regards males.[9] Moreover, it is probable
that the intensity of the monogamic trend runs
parallel with the development of the understanding—
a relationship to be further considered in the sequel.
This gives us some reason for hoping that in the coming
days of sex equality the prospects of a victory of
the monogamic principle are greater than those of a
[7] Cf. Lewis Morgan, Ancient Society. 1877, pp. 409 et seq.
[8] Origin and Development of Moral Ideas, 2nd ed., vol. ii (1917),
p. 423.
[9] Die monogame Veranlagung des Mannes, "Zeitschrift für Sexual
wissenschaft," 1917.
victory of polygamy. But no practical decision of the
problem is possible to-day. We live in the transitional
phase, when the various principles are fighting the
matter out. On the one hand we have a struggle going
on between the old duplex morality of monosexual
dominance and the unified ethic that springs from the
new sex equality. On the other hand the monogamic
principle wrestles with the polygamic principle for
victory within the domain of the newly unified sexual
ethic.
