As if the best mother were the one whose every action and thought revolves only around her child! As if the best jurist were one who does nothing but read law books his whole life, or the best physician the one who does nothing but dissect corpses and study pharmacology. Just as surely as a one-sided study of a very narrow subject will produce nothing but obstinate scholars or scientific tradesmen, an inner life that revolves entirely around the kitchen and the children will usually produce a woman who is imprisoned by a kind of blind motherly love and a limited daze; these are of no benefit to the child, and all the more often are harmful to its body and soul.
[ . . . ]
When men speak of the female sex, they only have a very particular class of women in mind: the lady.
According to that well-known bon mot by that well-known Austrian nobleman,* human beings begin only with the rank of baron. In much the same way, it could be said that, for men, the female sex begins only when women dress up, make conversation, and display a fondness for amorous intrigue and box seats at the theater.
Go out into the fields and the factories and preach your theory of separate spheres to the women wielding pitchforks and to those whose backs are bending under the force of heavy weights! Can you create a comfortable home for all women and a husband who provides for her? No, you cannot. Are all of you worshippers of the theory of spheres married, and have all of you married poor girls in consideration of providing for the female sex? No, you have not done so. Well, then, away with you fabricators of spheres, make room and air for millions of creatures born healthy in mind and body who are wasting away because they are women. [ . . . ]
Is there any truth to your claim that the family is the woman’s vocation and that the state and its welfare rest on the basis of the family? If that is your honest opinion and not just an empty phrase, then you must malign and disdain every unmarried man as a traitor against nature and a wrongdoer against the state, and you must never again open the doors of your chambers to him. [ . . . ]
Domestic responsibilities are incompatible with political responsibilities.
How noble it is that our legislators feel such pressure to urge women to fulfill their domestic duties.
Why, however, do legislators not ensure that the man meets his private and professional obligations as well? Why do they not order each married man to be taken home by the police as soon as the clock strikes 10 p.m.? Why do they not see to it that clubs, restaurants, and other wicked places shut their doors at closing time so that a hangover, a cold, or a hypochondriac mood does not prevent the civil servant, the artist, or the merchant from exercising his professional duties the next morning?
How can one have the audacity to believe that a woman who manages to achieve freedom will have nothing better to do than neglect her duties, when one entertains no such suspicions in the case of a man?
Who is entitled to ask for reasons when stupid belief reigns supreme? Domestic and political responsibilities are incompatible.
* Prince Clemens von Metternich – trans.
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