The Pivot of Civilization

M >> Margaret Sanger >> The Pivot of Civilization


At the present time, civilized nations are penalizing talent and genius,
the bearers of the torch of civilization, to coddle and perpetuate
the choking human undergrowth, which, as all authorities tell us, is
escaping control and threatens to overrun the whole garden of humanity.
Yet men continue to drug themselves with the opiate of optimism, or
sink back upon the cushions of Christian resignation, their intellectual
powers anaesthetized by cheerful platitudes. Or else, even those, who
are fully cognizant of the chaos and conflict, seek an escape in those
pretentious but fundamentally fallacious social philosophies which place
the blame for contemporary world misery upon anybody or anything except
the indomitable but uncontrolled instincts of living organisms. These
men fight with shadows and forget the realities of existence. Too many
centuries have we sought to hide from the inevitable, which confronts us
at every step throughout life.

Let us conceive for the moment at least, a world not burdened by the
weight of dependent and delinquent classes, a total population of
mature, intelligent, critical and expressive men and women. Instead
of the inert, exploitable, mentally passive class which now forms the
barren substratum of our civilization, try to imagine a population
active, resistant, passing individual and social lives of the most
contented and healthy sort. Would such men and women, liberated from
our endless, unceasing struggle against mass prejudice and inertia, be
deprived in any way of the stimulating zest of life? Would they sink
into a slough of complacency and fatuity?

No! Life for them would be enriched, intensified and ennobled in a
fashion it is difficult for us in our spiritual and physical squalor
even to imagine. There would be a new renaissance of the arts and
sciences. Awakened at last to the proximity of the treasures of life
lying all about them, the children of that age would be inspired by a
spirit of adventure and romance that would indeed produce a terrestrial
paradise.

Let us look forward to this great release of creative and constructive
energy, not as an idle, vacuous mirage, but as a promise which we, as
the whole human race, have it in our power, in the very conduct of our
lives from day to day, to transmute into a glorious reality. Let us
look forward to that era, perhaps not so distant as we believe, when the
great adventures in the enchanted realm of the arts and sciences may no
longer be the privilege of a gifted few, but the rightful heritage of
a race of genius. In such a world men and women would no longer seek
escape from themselves by the fantastic and the faraway. They would be
awakened to the realization that the source of life, of happiness, is to
be found not outside themselves, but within, in the healthful exercise
of their God-given functions. The treasures of life are not hidden; they
are close at hand, so close that we overlook them. We cheat ourselves
with a pitiful fear of ourselves. Men and women of the future will not
seek happiness; they will have gone beyond it. Mere happiness would
produce monotony. And their lives shall be lives of change and variety
with the thrills produced by experiment and research.

Fear will have been abolished: first of all, the fear of outside things
and other people; finally the fear of oneself. And with these fears
must disappear forever all those poisons of hatreds, individual and
international. For the realization would come that there would be no
reason for, no value in encroaching upon, the freedom of one another.
To-day we are living in a world which is like a forest of trees too
thickly planted. Hence the ferocious, unending struggle for existence.
Like innumerable ages past, the present age is one of mutual
destruction. Our aim is to substitute cooperation, equity, and amity for
antagonism and conflict. If the aim of our country or our civilization
is to attain a hollow, meaningless superiority over others in aggregate
wealth and population, it may be sound policy to shut our eyes to
the sacrifice of human life,--unregarded life and suffering--and to
stimulate rapid procreation. But even so, such a policy is bound in
the long run to defeat itself, as the decline and fall of great
civilizations of the past emphatically indicate. Even the bitterest
opponent of our ideals would refuse to subscribe to a philosophy of mere
quantity, of wealth and population lacking in spiritual direction or
significance. All of us hope for and look forward to the fine flowering
of human genius--of genius not expending and dissipating its energy
in the bitter struggle for mere existence, but developing to a fine
maturity, sustained and nourished by the soil of active appreciation,
criticism, and recognition.

Not by denying the central and basic biological facts of our nature, not
by subscribing to the glittering but false values of any philosophy or
program of escape, not by wild Utopian dreams of the brotherhood of men,
not by any sanctimonious debauch of sentimentality or religiosity, may
we accomplish the first feeble step toward liberation. On the contrary,
only by firmly planting our feet on the solid ground of scientific fact
may we even stand erect--may we even rise from the servile stooping
posture of the slave, borne down by the weight of age-old oppression.

In looking forward to this radiant release of the inner energies of
a regenerated humanity, I am not thinking merely of inventions and
discoveries and the application of these to the perfecting of the
external and mechanical details of social life. This external and
scientific perfecting of the mechanism of external life is a phenomenon
we are to a great extent witnessing today. But in a deeper sense this
tendency can be of no true or lasting value if it cannot be made to
subserve the biological and spiritual development of the human organism,
individual and collective. Our great problem is not merely to perfect
machinery, to produce superb ships, motor cars or great buildings, but
to remodel the race so that it may equal the amazing progress we see
now making in the externals of life. We must first free our bodies from
disease and predisposition to disease. We must perfect these bodies and
make them fine instruments of the mind and the spirit. Only thus, when
the body becomes an aid instead of a hindrance to human expression may
we attain any civilization worthy of the name. Only thus may we create
our bodies a fitting temple for the soul, which is nothing but a vague
unreality except insofar as it is able to manifest itself in the beauty
of the concrete.

Once we have accomplished the first tentative steps toward the creation
of a real civilization, the task of freeing the spirit of mankind from
the bondage of ignorance, prejudice and mental passivity which is more
fettering now than ever in the history of humanity, will be facilitated
a thousand-fold. The great central problem, and one which must be taken
first is the abolition of the shame and fear of sex. We must teach
men the overwhelming power of this radiant force. We must make them
understand that uncontrolled, it is a cruel tyrant, but that controlled
and directed, it may be used to transmute and sublimate the everyday
world into a realm of beauty and joy. Through sex, mankind may attain
the great spiritual illumination which will transform the world,
which will light up the only path to an earthly paradise. So must we
necessarily and inevitably conceive of sex-expression. The instinct is
here. None of us can avoid it. It is in our power to make it a thing
of beauty and a joy forever: or to deny it, as have the ascetics of the
past, to revile this expression and then to pay the penalty, the bitter
penalty that Society to-day is paying in innumerable ways.

If I am criticized for the seeming "selfishness" of this conception it
will be through a misunderstanding. The individual is fulfiling his duty
to society as a whole by not self-sacrifice but by self-development. He
does his best for the world not by dying for it, not by increasing the
sum total of misery, disease and unhappiness, but by increasing his
own stature, by releasing a greater energy, by being active instead
of passive, creative instead of destructive. This is fundamentally the
greatest truth to be discovered by womankind at large. And until
women are awakened to their pivotal function in the creation of a new
civilization, that new era will remain an impossible and fantastic
dream. The new civilization can become a glorious reality only with the
awakening of woman's now dormant qualities of strength, courage, and
vigor. As a great thinker of the last century pointed out, not only
to her own health and happiness is the physical degeneracy of woman
destructive, but to our whole race. The physical and psychic power of
woman is more indispensable to the well-being and power of the human
race than that even of man, for the strength and happiness of the child
is more organically united with that of the mother.

Parallel with the awakening of woman's interest in her own fundamental
nature, in her realization that her greatest duty to society lies
in self-realization, will come a greater and deeper love for all of
humanity. For in attaining a true individuality of her own she will
understand that we are all individuals, that each human being is
essentially implicated in every question or problem which involves the
well-being of the humblest of us. So to-day we are not to meet the
great problems of defect and delinquency in any merely sentimental or
superficial manner, but with the firmest and most unflinching attitude
toward the true interest of our fellow beings. It is from no mere
feeling of brotherly love or sentimental philanthropy that we women must
insist upon enhancing the value of child life. It is because we know
that, if our children are to develop to their full capabilities, all
children must be assured a similar opportunity. Every single case of
inherited defect, every malformed child, every congenitally tainted
human being brought into this world is of infinite importance to that
poor individual; but it is of scarcely less importance to the rest of us
and to all of our children who must pay in one way or another for these
biological and racial mistakes. We look forward in our vision of the
future to children brought into the world because they are desired,
called from the unknown by a fearless and conscious passion, because
women and men need children to complete the symmetry of their own
development, no less than to perpetuate the race. They shall be called
into a world enhanced and made beautiful by the spirit of freedom and
romance--into a world wherein the creatures of our new day, unhampered
and unbound by the sinister forces of prejudice and immovable habit, may
work out their own destinies. Perhaps we may catch fragmentary glimpses
of this new life in certain societies of the past, in Greece perhaps;
but in all of these past civilizations these happy groups formed but a
small exclusive section of the population. To-day our task is greater;
for we realize that no section of humanity can be reclaimed without the
regeneration of the whole.

I look, therefore, into a Future when men and women will not dissipate
their energy in the vain and fruitless search for content outside of
themselves, in far-away places or people. Perfect masters of their own
inherent powers, controlled with a fine understanding of the art of life
and of love, adapting themselves with pliancy and intelligence to the
milieu in which they find themselves, they will unafraid enjoy life to
the utmost. Women will for the first time in the unhappy history of
this globe establish a true equilibrium and "balance of power" in the
relation of the sexes. The old antagonism will have disappeared, the old
ill-concealed warfare between men and women. For the men themselves will
comprehend that in this cultivation of the human garden they will be
rewarded a thousand times. Interest in the vague sentimental fantasies
of extra-mundane existence, in pathological or hysterical flights from
the realities of our earthliness, will have through atrophy disappeared,
for in that dawn men and women will have come to the realization,
already suggested, that here close at hand is our paradise, our
everlasting abode, our Heaven and our eternity. Not by leaving it and
our essential humanity behind us, nor by sighing to be anything but what
we are, shall we ever become ennobled or immortal. Not for woman only,
but for all of humanity is this the field where we must seek the secret
of eternal life.


(1) Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences. Volume
XV.

(2) Conklin, The Direction of Human Evolution. "When it is
remembered that mental capacity is inherited, that parents
of low intelligence generally produce children of low
intelligence, and that on the average they have more
children than persons of high intelligence, and furthermore,
when we consider that the intellectual capacity or `mental
age' can be changed very little by education, we are in a
position to appreciate the very serious condition which
confronts us as a nation." p. 108.




APPENDIX




PRINCIPLES AND AIMS OF THE AMERICAN BIRTH CONTROL LEAGUE


PRINCIPLES:

The complex problems now confronting America as the result of the
practice of reckless procreation are fast threatening to grow beyond
human control.

Everywhere we see poverty and large families going hand in hand. Those
least fit to carry on the race are increasing most rapidly. People who
cannot support their own offspring are encouraged by Church and State to
produce large families. Many of the children thus begotten are diseased
or feeble-minded; many become criminals. The burden of supporting these
unwanted types has to be bourne by the healthy elements of the nation.
Funds that should be used to raise the standard of our civilization are
diverted to the maintenance of those who should never have been born.

In addition to this grave evil we witness the appalling waste of women's
health and women's lives by too frequent pregnancies. These unwanted
pregnancies often provoke the crime of abortion, or alternatively
multiply the number of child-workers and lower the standard of living.

To create a race of well born children it is essential that the function
of motherhood should be elevated to a position of dignity, and this is
impossible as long as conception remains a matter of chance.

We hold that children should be

1. Conceived in love;

2. Born of the mother's conscious desire;

3. And only begotten under conditions which render possible the heritage
of health.

Therefore we hold that every woman must possess the power and freedom to
prevent conception except when these conditions can be satisfied.

Every mother must realize her basic position in human society. She must
be conscious of her responsibility to the race in bringing children into
the world.

Instead of being a blind and haphazard consequence of uncontrolled
instinct, motherhood must be made the responsible and self-directed
means of human expression and regeneration.

These purposes, which are of fundamental importance to the whole of our
nation and to the future of mankind, can only be attained if women first
receive practical scientific education in the means of Birth Control.
That, therefore, is the first object to which the efforts of this League
will be directed.


AIMS:

The American Birth Control League aims to enlighten and educate all
sections of the American public in the various aspects of the dangers of
uncontrolled procreation and the imperative necessity of a world program
of Birth Control.

The League aims to correlate the findings of scientists, statisticians,
investigators, and social agencies in all fields. To make this possible,
it is necessary to organize various departments:

RESEARCH: To collect the findings of scientists, concerning the relation
of reckless breeding to the evils of delinquency, defect and dependence.

INVESTIGATION: To derive from these scientifically ascertained facts and
figures, conclusions which may aid all public health and social agencies
in the study of problems of maternal and infant mortality, child-labor,
mental and physical defects and delinquence in relation to the practice
of reckless parentage.

HYGIENIC AND PHYSIOLOGICAL instruction by the Medical profession to
mothers and potential mothers in harmless and reliable methods of Birth
Control in answer to their requests for such knowledge.

STERILIZATION of the insane and feebleminded and the encouragement of
this operation upon those afflicted with inherited or transmissible
diseases, with the understanding that sterilization does not deprive
the individual of his or her sex expression, but merely renders him
incapable of producing children.

EDUCATIONAL: The program of education includes: The enlightenment of the
public at large, mainly through the education of leaders of thought
and opinion--teachers, ministers, editors and writers--to the moral
and scientific soundness of the principles of Birth Control and the
imperative necessity of its adoption as the basis of national and racial
progress.

POLITICAL AND LEGISLATIVE: To enlist the support and cooperation of
legal advisers, statesmen and legislators in effecting the removal of
state and federal statutes which encourage dysgenic breeding,
increase the sum total of disease, misery and poverty and prevent the
establishment of a policy of national health and strength.

ORGANIZATION: To send into the various States of the Union field workers
to enlist the support and arouse the interest of the masses, to
the importance of Birth Control so that laws may be changed and the
establishment of clinics made possible in every State.

INTERNATIONAL: This department aims to cooperate with similar
organizations in other countries to study Birth Control in its relations
to the world population problem, food supplies, national and racial
conflicts, and to urge upon all international bodies organized to
promote world peace, the consideration of these aspects of international
amity.

THE AMERICAN BIRTH CONTROL LEAGUE proposes to publish in its
official organ "The Birth Control Review," reports and studies on the
relationship of controlled and uncontrolled populations to national and
world problems.

The American Birth Control League also proposes to hold an annual
Conference to bring together the workers of the various departments so
that each worker may realize the inter-relationship of all the various
phases of the problem to the end that National education will tend to
encourage and develop the powers of self-direction, self-reliance, and
independence in the individuals of the community instead of dependence
for relief upon public or private charities.