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THE NEW GENERATION London, England June 1927 (page 65)
PASSING COMMENTS
TABU.
The letter from Mr. A. J. Ellison, M.A., LL.B., in the May N.G., is a tragically comic example of the mediæval-mindedness which is the chief psychological bar to all social advancement. Like his esteemed colleagues, Bishop Gore and the Chief Rabbi, he is a tabu-man; all priests, religious and social, have this tabu-code in common. Hence, doubtless, arose The League of National Life. Its “great financial strength” is erected upon the “broad basis” of Tabu, which, upon the social plane, is the same thing as reaction.
The economic points of Mr. Ellison’s letter are fully and, in my judgment, irrefutably answered in the Editorial notes; it is the religious point wherewith I am here concerned.
According to Mr. Ellison, M.A., LL.B., self-control is moral, birth control immoral. It does not occur apparently, to the mediæval type of mind—the mind that still insists upon clinging to the effete “sheep and goats” theory—that the ideal mate of the new age will practice both birth control and self-control; birth control for the sake of the unborn, self-control for the sake of his womankind. If this be not so, what meaning has Feminism?
Negative, or Leave-it-to-Nature, checks are permissible, says the voice of the Great God Tabu, speaking through his priests. “Positive, or mechanical, checks are strictly forbidden.” Let this be applied to other matters: it is “moral” to segregate those suspected of being infected with small-pox, “Immoral” to vaccinate them; it is “moral” to hide in a cellar during a thunder storm, “Immoral” to use a lightning-conductor. These are perfect analogies. “Ah! But,” says the Great God Tabu, “In the first case morals are concerned, and that makes all the difference.” And that brings me to my point. Organised religion, driven out of science, is seeking to make a home for herself in “morals”; but morals are merely social ethics, and have no more supernatural or “divine” basis than has evolution.
Common-sense, the only safe guide mankind possesses, even in matters pertaining to mysticism, affirms, in regard to stirpiculture, that only wanted children should be born; in regard to copulation, that it should take place only when mutually desired and desirable; in regard to population, that it is immoral, brutal, and unnecessary for the feminine human to be impregnated against her will, not merely for her own sake, but for the sake of the New Generation; a generation that is unwanted being deprived of its natural heritage of joy through a joyless pregnancy.
Birth control unquestionable increases the sum of human happiness, social well-being, and domestic ease. Its chief opponents are the votaries of a decaying supernaturalism, who, on the authority of an outworn theory regarding the universe, brand it as immoral; to them the same thing as non-supernatural.
“Beware of the man whose God is in the skies”; As the caterpillar chooses the fairest leaves to lay her eggs on, so the priest lays his curse on the fairest joys.” With William Blake respectively, we take a courteous leave for the present of Bishop Gore, the Chief Rabbi, A. J. Ellison, Esq. M.A., LL.B., and the League of National Life. |