AN OPEN TALK WITH 
MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
Presenting Some Present Day Prob- 
lems in Social Hygiene 
By 
Lee Alexander Stone, M. D., 
• * l 
Regional Consultant, U. S. Public Health Service, 
Late Official War Department Lecturer and Instruc- 
tor to troops located in cantonments and flying 
fields in Social Hygiene and Venereal Disease Con- 
trol; Major M. C. U. S. R.; former Lecturer Medical 
Sociology, University of Tennessee College of Medi- 
cine (Memphis); late Division Gas Officer, 28th 
Division, U. S. Army; former Trustee Juvenile 
Court, Memphis, Tenn.; former Secretary Associated 
Charities, Memphis, Tenn.; Member American Social 
Hygiene Association; Member International Lyceum 
and Chautauqua Association; former Member Vice 
Commission, Memphis, Tenn.; Author, “Eugenics 
and Marriage,” “The Woman of the Streets,” “The 
Hidden Menace,” “Sex Discussion,” etc. 
With a Foreword by 
Major General Leonard Wood 
Kansas City, Mo. 
BURTON PUBLISHING COMPANY 
Publishers Copyrighted 1920, by 
BURTON PUBLISHING COMPANY To my Uncle 
DR. JOSEPH HOPSON, 
who, when I needed a friend, stepped forward. FOREWORD 
Dear Doctor Stone: 
I have read with great interest your 
manuscript, “An Open Talk with 
Mothers and Fathers; Presenting Some 
Present Day Problems in Social Hy- 
giene.” The subject is one which is of 
vital importance to our people, because 
it affects profoundly national health 
and morals. 
I am very glad indeed that you have 
taken up this matter, and that you have 
presented it in such a helpful and use- 
ful form. The Public needs education 
in the subject, for it little appreciates 
the far-reaching and undermining in- 
fluence upon the physical and spirit- 
ual efficiency of our people of condi- 
tions that are far more dangerous than 
7 8 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
pestilence and many times more costly 
in human life than War itself. 
I am particularly glad that you have 
brought out and are emphasizing the 
falseness of the view that a certain 
amount of sexual indulgence is neces- 
sary to health. There is nothing more 
false or misleading than this argument 
of the ignorant or morally loose-fibered 
who seek to find some excuse for im- 
morality. 
Our people are to be congratulated 
on the measures which were adopted, 
largely through the work of American 
women, to send our army overseas 
clean and sound in body and clean in 
soul. We cannot tolerate vice in the 
Army. If the mothers of America had 
felt that their sons must go to victory 
through the arms of vice they would 
have declared that a civilization de- 
manding this sacrifice was not worth 
saving. 
In our conversation you referred to 
the maintenance of prostitutes with an 
army and under supervision of its of- MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
9 
ficers. In my opinion officers who en- 
dorse the assembling and maintenance 
of prostitutes in the vicinity of an 
army and their control and manage- 
ment under the commissioned and 
enlisted uniformed personnel are unfit 
to wear the uniform of their country, 
as such conduct indicates a fatal lack 
of a proper sense of morality and char- 
acter, and a regrettable ignorance as 
to what is and what is not necessary 
for the maintenance of men in good 
condition. 
If we can only bring to the attention 
of our people the far-reaching and ter- 
ribly destructive effect of venereal dis- 
eases not only upon the actual victims 
themselves, but those with whom they 
come in contact and those who come 
after them, and if we succeed in es- 
tablishing better conditions, a great 
work will have been accomplished for 
the betterment of our people physically 
and for the upbuilding of their morals 
and character. 
Many a life will be saved and many 10 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
a man and woman saved from despond- 
ency, insanity and a living death, and 
there will be more happy families, 
greatly increased birth rate and all 
around sounder and better people. 
Sincerely yours, 
LEONARD WOOD. 
Chicago, 111., 
Oct. 24, 1919. 
Dr. Lee Alexander Stone, 
1416 North Dearborn St., 
Chicago, Illinois. PART ONE 
At the time of America’s entry into 
the war many unforeseen things pre- 
sented themselves for settlement. Those 
in charge of military affairs faced the 
mobilizing of troops and the problem 
of handling great numbers of men 
who were to become a part of the large 
army the United States expected to 
raise. In the past, soldiers, except 
when in action, were permitted certain 
privileges after their day’s work was 
over that proved disastrous in many 
instances to their moral, physical and 
mental well being. They were con- 
sidered free-lances, and as such came 
into contact with many things that 
were demoralizing and vicious as well. 
It was believed by many that a 
soldier could not measure up to tht, 
standards expected of him as a fighter 
11 12 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
unless he caroused, associated with 
prostitutes and drank a little too much 
at times. All one has to do is to re- 
call to mind the actions of the troops 
during the Spanish-American War 
when “license” was the pass-word, and 
to remember how drunken soldiers 
took, in some instances, complete 
charge of segregated districts near 
their camps. The inmates of these dis- 
tricts combined to turn midnight rev- 
elries into orgies of the most awful 
depravity. Soldiers drunk, lost com- 
plete control of themselves and threw 
aside caution and yielded to lewd and 
lascivious practices that in their sober 
moments they would have disdained as 
being beneath them. As a consequence 
of this license the usual happened. 
Venereal diseases with all of their at- 
tendant horrors flourished. 
Many a young man may trace the 
cause of a disability he may be suffer- 
ing from to a type of licentious indul- 
gence engaged in by him when he went 
as a soldier to the Mexican border in MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
13 
1916. Prostitution flourished in El 
Paso and other small cities wherever 
soldiers were stationed. Apparently 
no attempt was made to stop it. And 
boys who left homes of purity were 
forced to witness depravity in its most 
awful phases. (See report of Dr. M. 
J. Exner on conditions on the Mexican 
border.) 
“Through long and shattering pain I gave 
you birth; 
It would have been far easier to have died, 
But you, my baby, drew me back to life 
By love and joy and pride.” 
“And when God called on me to lay aside 
My dreams for you and give His cause 
my boy, 
I sent you out to fight—perhaps to die— 
With pride and love and joy.” 
“You have not died—you have not even 
fought— 
Today I suffer more than all the pains 
Your being cost. My pride, my joy, are 
gone— 
Nothing but love remains.” 
“For all the service that you might have 
given, 
And all the honour that you might have 
won 14 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
You squandered for a harlot’s poisoned 
kiss— 
My son, Oh God! my son!” 
—“A Mother to a Son,” 
by Amelia J. Burr. 
It is stated that when one expedition 
went into Mexico that prostitutes were 
brought along and that when a perma- 
nent camp was finally located, that a 
stockade entirely surrounded with 
barbed wire was built and stocked with 
a choice (?) selection of women. This 
stockade is said to have been located 
within 700 yards of the Commanding 
General’s headquarters. The women 
were kept for the use of the men of 
this expedition and made a uniform 
charge of $2.00 (two dollars) for the 
use of their bodies. 
Very little is known about this fa- 
mous “remount station,” as it was 
called by the men, or pen for females 
because of a rigid censorship that for- 
bade any information coming out of 
Mexico relative to the actions of the 
Army there. MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
15 
It seems a pity to be forced to open 
up out of the past that part of army 
life which was repugnant to hundreds 
of commanding officers, yet because 
of the custom of turning soldiers loose 
to do as they pleased, with absolutely 
no surveillance being placed over them 
after drill periods, they hesitated or 
absolutely refused to notice the ac- 
tions of their men for fear of being 
considered meddlers or mollycoddles. 
Those who believed that the soldier 
should become as depraved as he de- 
sired, as long as his actions apparently 
did not affect him in the performance 
of his duties, were apparently in au- 
thority. 
The world had been at war three 
years before President Wilson saw fit 
to call to the attention of the Congress 
of the United States the fact that mat- 
ters had become so unbearable that it 
became necessary for him to recom- 
mend a declaration of war against 
Germany. 
When Congress declared war, as 16 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
has been said, those men upon whose 
shoulders devolved the putting into ac- 
tion the orders of the Senate and 
House of Representatives were puz- 
zled. Were they to adhere to the old 
ideas so long in vogue or must they 
blaze for themselves a new trail that 
might in all probability bring criticism 
on them from those who believed in 
license, for establishing a new order of 
things that would so conserve the man- 
hood of the proposed army as to send 
it fit in every particular—morally, 
mentally and physically—to win the 
great battles the leaders knew must 
be fought before victory could be won ? 
The latter course was chosen. Men 
known to have spent their lives in cer- 
tain professions which had the welfare 
of the nation at heart were sent for 
and a great conference was held, with 
the result that the United States 
forged ahead of every nation in Christ- 
endom as far as the looking after the 
welfare of her soldiers were concerned. 
Cordons were thrown around every MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
17 
cantonment and post where soldiers 
were being prepared for duty over 
seas. Men in uniform were not per- 
mitted any alcoholic beverages, nor 
were saloon-keepers, hotel proprietors, 
or even friends allowed to serve or sell 
them under penalty of a fine and im- 
prisonment. 
All houses of prostitution were closed 
in the region of camps, and the mili- 
tary police were instructed to arrest 
men seen associating with women sus- 
pected of belonging to the underworld. 
Athletic sports were provided to di- 
vert the minds of the men in training. 
Theatres were built in all of the camps 
by the War Department. First class 
talent came to these houses of amuse- 
ment and put on good shows. The Y. 
M. C. A., Knights of Columbus and the 
Y. W. C. A. provided in the buildings 
they constructed, meeting places for 
the men where they could obtain sta- 
tionery for their correspondence free, 
and also where they might witness 
good moving pictures at least twice 18 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
weekly. These organizations are de- 
serving of great credit. This chapter 
would be incomplete were the Y. W. 
C. A. not mentioned specifically. This 
organization, composed entirely of 
women, provided means whereby en- 
listed men and officers might meet 
their female relatives and lady friends 
and sweethearts. The work they did 
made it possible for many a mother to 
see her boy, and for sweethearts to 
greet their soldier lovers. Many wives 
of the men also enjoyed the hospital- 
ity of these good women. Too much 
cannot be said in praise of the mag- 
nificent efforts they put forth to aid 
this country to win the war and of the 
“Hostess House.” 
Schools were started wherein the en- 
listed man might become mentally ef- 
ficient, thereby eliminating in a large 
measure idleness after drill periods 
were over. It was amazing how very 
little loafing was observable around 
cantonments that in some instances 
housed as many as 50,000 men. MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
19 
All of the above agencies revolution- 
ized antiquated methods of the past 
and drove to cover those who formerly 
had preached the doctrine of license. 
In the face of the elaborate scheme 
developed, as stated, something was 
lacking. It was discovered that the 
men were hopelessly ignorant as to the 
processes involving reproduction and 
the dangers attending if their repro- 
ductive organs were mal-treated and 
not used as they should be to beget 
children as the result of marriage. 
It fell to the writer’s lot to be called 
upon along with four or five others to 
address large bodies of men in camps 
on the more intimate things life had 
in store for them. It was his privilege 
to address approximately 1,000,000 
soldiers and to give them a type of in- 
struction that should have begun in 
their babyhood. The ignorance of the 
men and of their officers was in many 
instances pathetic. Many officers and 
men came up after the lectures were 
over to ask questions and also to ask 20 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
the almost universal question which 
was: “Why didn’t my mother or my 
father explain to me the things I have 
heard today? If they had, I should 
have been a better man.” 
One American general, who at one 
time in his life had been a physician, 
stated at the beginning of the war be- 
fore the entry of the United States, 
when he was urging “preparedness” 
from the public platform, that in the 
future wars must be fought by men 
clean in body and in mind. He further 
stated that unless mothers could re- 
ceive a guarantee that the moral and 
physical welfare of their boys was to 
be looked after, they would not be will- 
ing to give them to their country. No 
mother wants to know that, when her 
son leaves her side to fight for his 
homeland, he and his associates in all 
probability will be drawn into the web 
of sensuality and lasciviousness. Gen- 
eral Wood has always maintained that 
the existence of prostitutes around 
military camps was not necessary to MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
21 
the well being of the soldier. He has 
been ready at all times to defend his 
position and to protect his men from 
the pernicious influence of the old 
school. Camp Funston where he com- 
manded two divisions and prepared 
them for overseas duty (he was never 
allowed to command them in France) 
boasted of the fact that the young men 
camped there were safer than if they 
had been at home. 
Practically every cantonment was a 
better place for the soldier than his 
home city. 
No wiser thing was ever done by 
any government than that which the 
United States attempted when it began 
instructing the young men in its army 
to respect their bodies and view them 
as being temples erected in the image 
of God, and not to be defiled. Four 
million men were benefitted by the in- 
struction they received, and many a 
boy was saved from errors he would 
have committed through ignorance. 
The majority of those, who slip into 22 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
what society calls sin, do so because so- 
ciety is to blame, it having permitted 
the iniquity of ignorance to exist, and 
been swayed by the teacher of a doc- 
trine that refused to recognize the 
sacredness of the procreative act. Mock 
modesty is the curse of the nation. 
Mock modesty is a deadly sin. Mock 
modesty is a disease that has infected 
with its prurience and hypocrisy more 
men and women and mothers and 
fathers than has any ailment to be 
found in the world today. The mock 
modest person is usually the one who 
taboos as being nasty anything that 
has to do with the functions of birth. 
This same mock modest individual will 
blush and hide behind a fan or behind 
the hand, at the mention of the natural 
functions of the body, always, however, 
making it possible to look over the one 
and through the other. 
It is the proud boast of those who 
know that as a result of the things 
taught in the army to its soldiery, that 
never before in history had there been MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
23 
such an aggregation of men gathered 
together who were as morally and phy- 
sically fit to go into battle. It can 
be said without fear of contradiction 
that the United States army was the 
cleanest army in all the world, and 
that there never had been such a clean 
lot of men in uniform before. 
Of the 4,000,000 men under arms in 
the United States and abroad there 
were only 227,000 cases of venereal 
disease up to February, 1919. Five- 
sixths of all the gonorrhoea and syph- 
ilis in the army was (to the shame 
of the communities from whence the 
soldier came) contracted before the 
men entered the service and was 
brought into it by them. Approximate- 
ly 38,000 cases were contracted after 
the troops went into training. This 
number is very small indeed when it 
is taken into consideration that in the 
French army alone, according to Pau- 
trier, there were 200,000 cases of syph- 
ilis. At one time in the Austrian 
army, according to Hecht, there was 24 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
the equal of sixty entire divisions out 
of action because of venereal diseases. 
The English, Belgian and Italian 
armies were infested with these agen- 
cies that are rightly called racial 
poisons. 
No man belonging to the United 
States forces (if it was known) was 
allowed to go to the front line if he 
was found to be infected. Inspections 
were held regularly and any man dis- 
covered to be diseased was locked up 
in a detention hospital and there kept 
until such time might arrive when he 
would no longer be a menace to his 
fellows. A man with venereal disease 
; mong the American forces was con- 
sidered a slacker. His pay was taken 
from him and he was not allowed to 
enjoy any of the privileges his com- 
rades were enjoying. He went before 
a summary court-martial and was sen- 
tenced. 
Every true American should feel 
pride surge in his bosom when he con- 
siders the actions of the boys who did MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
25 
their bit in the World War. Men free 
from the blight of the most terrible of 
all the plagues that human flesh is 
heir to, faced the fiendish Hun and 
drove him back across No-Man’s-Land 
and whipped him at every point. When 
the final crash came, Germany could 
not stand up against men whose bodies 
had never been burnt by the fires of 
venereal disease. 
Thousands of the bodies of these 
men are still somewhere on the fields 
of France; the souls that once in- 
habited them have “gone West.” The 
souls of these immortal men, who in 
the heroic hour proved themselves men 
in the greatest sense, are crying aloud 
and asking now the war is over, that 
America redeem herself again and 
throw around her civil population the 
same protection she threw around her 
fighting men. 
There is a crying need for a type of 
publicity for gonorrhoea and syphilis 
in civil life that will bring them into 
the light of day. The “Hidden Men- 26 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
ace” in society is venereal disease, and 
just so long as racial poisons are al- 
lowed to remain in stygian darkness, 
and, like the thief in the night, to dart 
out and steal that which is most to be 
desired by man—his health—and then 
dart back again where it cannot be 
seen and remain unmolested until it is 
ready to strike again, men and women 
will go down and the welfare of future 
generations will be jeopardized. 
770,000 young men reach the age of 
21 years in the United States every 
year. It is conservatively estimated 
that of this number 60 per cent, or over 
450,000, will contract either gonorrhoea 
or syphilis, or may be both, before they 
reach the age of thirty. Is not a state- 
ment of this nature enough to rouse 
thinking men and women to action? 
The innoculating of 450,000 young men 
with the virus of syphilis or gonorrhea 
means that in all probability an equal 
number of young women will become 
infected. All of these young men con- 
template marriage, and in the nuptial MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
27 
embrace, unless their treatment has 
been very thorough, they will almost 
surely infect their wives. The infect- 
ing of the wife particularly with syph- 
ilis means a syphilitic offspring, 
while gonorrhoea may blind the baby 
as its head emerges from the soft parts 
of the mother. A guarantee of health 
must be given the child of the future. 
Many claim that a young man should 
sow a crop of wild oats, “paint the 
town red,” and associate with prosti- 
tutes before he marries, and that un- 
less he does, he is not rightly entitled 
to the cognomen man. If the average 
man who teaches such a doctrine could 
only reckon the consequence of the 
sowing of a crop of wild oats, he would 
hesitate before advising their sowing. 
If the sower could be made to realize 
that whatever he sowed must some day 
be reaped—no seed falls to the ground 
except that a harvest of some kind is 
reaped from it. The harvest of the 
crop of wild oats is usually reaped 
with the flail of pain, agony and dis- 28 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
aster, not alone to the sower but to 
those to whom he should have brought 
purity. The wife and her offspring 
are most usually the ones to reap the 
full harvest. Seventy-five per cent to 95 
per cent of all diseases in the female 
pelvis are due to gonorrhoea. Thus 
does the wife reap; blindness in the 
newborn is in 80 per cent of all cases 
produced by gonorrhoea; the child 
truly harvests the crop of its father’s 
wild oats that will last it throughout its 
life; it must go through its existence 
in darkness, a living rebuke to him 
who should have gone to his mother 
free from taint. 
Gonorrhoea produces an arthritis 
commonly called gonorrhoeal rheuma- 
tism, that is very painful. This con- 
dition frequently develops into a heart 
trouble. Thousands of men are sterile 
because of gonorrhoea and blame their 
wives for not giving them babies when 
they themselves can trace the cause to 
a time when they chose to violate their 
own chastity because they had been MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
29 
told the age old lie that continence was 
harmful. Just a word by way of di- 
version: Continence is possible. It is 
just as healthful for a man to refrain 
from sex indulgence until he marries 
as it is for a woman. Men demand 
chastity of the women they marry and 
declare they would not wed those who 
were unclean morally. They refuse to 
see how inconsistent they are but in- 
sist that sexual intercourse is necessary 
to their well being and that unless they 
indulge their health will be impaired. 
No man should demand more of a 
woman than he is willing to give in 
return. His failure to give proves 
him a weakling and the woman the 
stronger of the two. Sexual inter- 
course indulged in by single men is ab- 
solutely not necessary to keep up man- 
ly vigor. Men have been known to ab- 
stain for years from indulging in sex- 
ual relationships and still maintain 
their virility. Continence has been 
proven healthful by scientists. 
The time must come in the affairs 30 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
of men and women in this country 
when a single standard of morals will 
exist, and anything which will inter- 
fere with putting into force such a 
standard should meet with the disap- 
proval of all those who feel that the 
greatest thing after all is the conserva- 
tion of the race in order that a greater 
and mightier civilization may grow out 
of the present. 
To return to the original matter un- 
der discussion. Syphilis, like its broth- 
er gonorrhoea, unless carefully treated 
may destroy; syphilis is more deadly 
to the human economy than gonorrhoea 
because its virus may penetrate to the 
most remote corners of the body. No 
disease known to man is as capable of 
as much physical destruction. It may 
attack the nervous system and produce 
locomotor-ataxia, or cause hemorrhage 
in the brain of the young man under 
40 and bring about paralysis, or cause 
paresis (softening of the brain). All 
of these conditions are produced by 
syphilis alone. Rotting ulcers of the MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
31 
body, decay of bones, even to produc- 
ing deformity through their being eat- 
en entirely away, are the frequent re- 
sults of a failure to properly treat this 
disease. These effects are noticeable 
in the individual who has contracted 
the disease either through illicit sexual 
union, or through the use of a dirty 
drinking cup, face towel, razor, shav- 
ing brush, etc., used by a syphilitic, or 
sometimes through inheritance, and 
has failed to take treatment. 
If the effects of syphilis stopped with 
the individual first infected, and he or 
she could receive treatment that would 
be curative (curative measures require 
years of administration), all might be 
well, but unfortunately syphilis may be 
transmitted to the next generation 
born after the one in which the sower 
of wild oats had his fling. To go 
through maternity hospitals where 
hundreds of babies are born yearly 
and there witness the mark of this 
scourge on the bodies of innocents 
who should have been born with a clean 32 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
heritage and inherent strength from 
their parents, should be enough to 
force strong men and women into a 
fight that would have as its goal the 
whipping of venereal disease. 
Eighty per cent of all syphilitic chil- 
dren die within a few days or months 
following birth, while of those who 
live (20 per cent) may die before they 
reach puberty; those who live usually 
become weaklings either mentally or 
physically. Inherited syphilis is a great 
cause for idiocy, and many a girl who 
offers her body for sale on the streets 
is what scientists call a moron, or a 
high grade idiot, she having inherited 
in most instances from a syphilitic an- 
cestor causes for the mental deficiency 
that made her a moral delinquent. 
For the benefit of those who may 
doubt the statement that the average 
prostitute is feeble-minded, the follow- 
ing statistics should prove helpful: 
Chicago Morals Court— 
639 habitual prostitutes examined. 
85.8 per cent feeble minded. 
104 sexually immoral girls in Illinois— MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
33 
Training School for Girls— 
97 per cent feeble minded. 
Massachusetts Vice Commission— 
Examined 300 prostitutes in 3 groups of 
100 each. 
1. Young girls just beginning. 
2. Street walkers. 
3. Old offenders. 
(51 per cent of all were so mentally defi- 
cient as to warrant confinement. They came 
from degenerate families.) 
Massachusetts Reformatory for Women— 
Of 243 women in their care: 
49 per cent defective mentally. 
I6V2 per cent very dull. 
Out of the remaining 84 women, 47 had 
other defects as epilepsy, hysteria, and psy- 
chopathic defects. 
15 per cent normal appearance. 
Bedford State Reformatory— 
647 prostitutes studied by Dr. Katherine 
B. Davis. 
29.8 per cent feeble minded (20 of whom 
were classed insane). 
107 distinctly feeble minded. 
193 insane or insane tendencies. 
New York Probation Association— 
500 delinquent girls. 
47 per cent mentally defective. 
Also of Illinois prostitutes under same care— 
35 per cent mentally defective. 
26 per cent (included in above). 
35 per cent feeble minded. 34 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
Massachusetts Reformatory— 
Dr. Edith R. Spaulding. 
205 sex offenders. 
50 per cent mentally defective. 
40 per cent segregable to prevent propa- 
gation of undesirables or degenerates. 
Massachusetts Reformatory for Women— 
Dr. Catherine Brammick, Psychologist. 
Of 260 women admitted in 11 months, 178 
were for sex offenses. Of the remainder, 
practically all have been guilty of sex of- 
fenses, but were committed for other crimes, 
as drunkenness, larceny, etc. 
149 committed as prostitutes. 
42 per cent classed as feeble minded. 
A. F. Treadgold says— 
“My experience is that about one-half girls 
admitted into Magdalen Homes on account 
of first fall are feeble-minded.” 
Social Service Department of Michigan De- 
partment of Health— 
Detroit report of Joseph S. Davis. 
60 prostitutes arrested. 
21 feeble minded. 
13 subnormal. 
1 feeble-minded and defective. 
1 epileptic. 
3 insane. 
8 paranoid trend. 
2 psychopathic. 
11 non-psychopathic. 
Eleemosynary institutions of one 
type or another, jails, penitentiaries, MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
35 
insane hospitals, homes for the feeble- 
minded, etc., are all monuments erected 
to the wild oats sower, and in them 
their inmates may trace in most in- 
stances the causes for their incarcera- 
tion to inherited or acquired syphilis, 
which, while maybe not actually pro- 
ducing the discrasias of the disease 
itself, leaves a weakened brain or body. 
An awakening of the public con- 
science is necessary, if this country is 
to overcome the effects of venereal 
diseases. Unless something is done and 
at once, syphilization will replace civili- 
zation, and the citizens of this nation 
will become decadents totally unfit to 
carry on the affairs of state or to breed 
a race that should have in its blood an 
inherent power sufficient to make it- 
self felt the world over. 
The world war has made this country 
a World Power. No longer will the 
United States be able to sit back com- 
placently and speak of its isolation. 
Her sons, by their valorous actions on 
the fields of France, proved to the 36 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
world that a new and vigorous type 
of manhood was to be found in the 
nation that boasted of its broad de- 
mocracy. 
A new Democracy was born out of 
the womb of War, a democracy that 
really teaches brotherhood. Across the 
seas where men fought and died to- 
gether no question was raised as to 
caste or to the possession of wealth; 
the one qualification asked for and de- 
manded was an ability on the part of 
men to stand up and deliver. The man 
who delivered the goods, whether he 
was the son of a washerwoman or the 
scion of a house of wealth, was the 
man most sought after. So it is to- 
day, the man or the woman who can 
do the greatest good for society and 
who can stand up and deliver the goods 
is the one society is looking toward to 
bring about the change that must come 
and make order where chaos has been. 
Education must be more sought af- 
ter than it has been in the past. More 
attention must be paid to the develop- MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
37 
ing intellects of children and of young 
men and women. If instruction along 
lines of social and sex hygiene was of 
aid in making the United States army 
of 4,000,000 men the healthiest and the 
strongest in the world, certainly the 
oncoming generation will be benefitted 
by similar teaching in order that it, 
too, may be strengthened and fore- 
warned and forearmed against the 
deadliest menace known to man. By 
proper instruction of the next genera- 
tion it will be prepared to give battle 
to the evils of darkness and drive them 
into the light of day, where they may 
be viewed and treated accordingly. 
Children must receive a type of in- 
struction that will enable them to know 
better how to overcome the possibility 
of falling into error. Ignorance is the 
blighting curse of humanity. Ignor- 
ance with regard to the powers of re- 
production has sent many a girl into 
the dark chamber of despair (she would 
have been spared, had her parents 
been honest with her), to be kicked and 38 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
stoned by a mob who, had it met the 
Nazarene, would have cringed under 
the same rebuke He uttered to the one 
which brought before Him the woman 
who had sinned: “Let him who is 
without sin among you cast the first 
stone at her.” No men or women can 
ever throw stones until they themselves 
have been purged by the fires of knowl- 
edge and have become teachers of new 
ethical standards. 
Children should not be lied to when 
they ask questions, but should be told 
the truth in a plain manner that will 
cause them to have a wholesome re- 
spect for that which called them into 
being—the reproductive impulse. 
If the parent instructs the child in a 
proper manner and the child goes 
wrong, it may do so deliberately, and 
the father or mother will feel no need 
for self-blame. While, on the other 
hand, if the parent does not instruct 
and the child errs, then the blame may 
be placed entirely on the shoulders of 
the ones who should have safeguarded MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
39 
its interests by eliminating the curse of 
ignorance from its life. 
It should be the proud boast of par- 
ents that they have so thoroughly in- 
structed their children in the vital 
things of life as to cause them to know 
that if ever they are tempted, their 
chances of falling will be minimized. 
If daughters who are to be the future 
mothers of the race could be made to 
see the reason for their demanding 
clean bills of health from sweethearts 
who may propose marriage to them, 
again there would be a reduction in 
the causes for racial decay. Men should 
feel proud of women who would ask 
for a guarantee of good health from 
them. These women would be fulfill- 
ing in the greatest measure natural 
laws that define motherhood as being 
that something which, when brought 
to the highest development, will give 
to the world children who will develop 
into greater beings than the mothers or 
fathers who called them into existence. 
High-minded citizens and scientists 40 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
are fighting for better babies. Better 
babies can be born only through the 
exalting of motherhood and father- 
hood. Only through the enforcement 
of a single standard of morals, and the 
development of greater ethical stand- 
ards for men and women in their sex- 
ual relationships, can the future salva- 
tion of the race be guaranteed. 
Just so long as racial poisons are al- 
lowed to permeate the warp and woof 
of the fabric from which civilizations 
are made, just that long will weaklings 
be born who can never expect to forge 
ahead and make this country the great- 
est nation in the world. Not until the 
things mentioned before have been put 
into practice will society see the elimi- 
nation of the wrecks lust and licen- 
tiousness have made of those who have 
lived lives of sensuality and contracted 
disease in the living. Just so long as 
women are considered the lawful prey 
of men and are made to become prosti- 
tutes in order to gratify the lustful 
appetites of brutes (prostitution is a MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
41 
man made institution; the human fam- 
ily is the only one wherein even a sem- 
blance of prostitution exists), civiliza- 
tion will remain at a standstill, and the 
after results of venereal disease—early 
insanity, perversion, degeneracy, men- 
tal aberration and other mental and 
physical defects—will be apparent, and 
racial decay will stalk through the 
aisles society had made for it through 
the neglect of those high principles 
enunciated by nature. 
Every year in the autumn fairs are 
held in different states in the union. 
Pedigreed animals of all kinds are 
shown and valuable prizes given for 
the fine physical qualities they are cap- 
able of displaying. Not one of the 
animals shown but has a long pedigree, 
its mother and father are known to 
have been bred right, and the process 
of fine breeding may be traced back in 
some instances six and eight genera- 
tions. 
The United States Department of 
Agriculture spends millions of dollars 42 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
yearly bringing up to standard ani- 
mals and plants, and its published re- 
ports are full of the results obtained 
through selection of the fit and the 
elimination of the unfit. If such things 
are possible with animals, why are they 
not possible with humans? Why can- 
not men and women be brought to see 
the advantages of bringing into the 
world children of quality? 
If the more intelligent men and 
women would look around them when- 
ever they leave their own homes, they 
could not help seeing on the streets 
many hopeless and helpless beings 
whose pedigrees may be traced back to 
degenerate ancestors. It is not an un- 
usual sight to see a poor mother, who 
is not only ignorant and illiterate, but 
apparently mentally deficient, with 
four or five weak and puny children 
hanging onto her trying to lead them 
along. No attention has ever been 
paid to her ability to breed a type of 
offspring of which society should feel 
proud; she is merely a machine of faul- MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
43 
ty construction capable only of manu- 
facturing faulty material to reflect 
discredit on its maker. No attempt is 
ever made to aid her to improve her- 
self and her surroundings. She is re- 
garded as being an unfortunate and 
consequently is forgotten by society. 
When one goes into the slums of a 
great or small city, they usually draw 
their skirts aside from poor individuals 
for whom they themselves are respon- 
sible. There they see nature at its 
lowest ebb. 
Attention must be paid to the rear- 
ing of children, and men and women 
in whose bodies lies a cause for racial 
decay must not be permitted to call 
into existence beings who are bound to 
become a drag on humanity. Men and 
women who are unfit should be steril- 
ized. 
Homes for the incarceration of the 
feeble-minded must be built, and all 
morons and those suffering from 
weakened mentalities, that make them 
unfit to fight life’s battles, should be 44 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
placed in them. These individuals 
should be sterilized at once in order 
that their seed might not bring forth 
a weakened offspring. 
As has been intimated before, the 
only way possible for the present gen- 
eration to win its fight against ven- 
ereal diseases and their attendant ter- 
rors will be by education of the public 
to familiarize it with all the dangers 
of syphilis and gonorrhoea; the educa- 
tion to be left in the hands of sane 
medical men and equally sane laymen 
and laywomen who at heart are more 
interested in the future of the race 
than they are in dollar gain and in 
inquisitorial methods of reform. 
To carry education to a fitting con- 
clusion, those suffering from venereal 
diseases must be made to see the ad- 
vantages of medication and long treat- 
ment. To this end clinics, where those 
who cannot afford to pay for treat- 
ment from specialists may receive it 
free, must be established. These must 
be manned by competent individuals MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
45 
who are entirely familiar with the 
treatment of gonorrhoea and syphilis, 
and at the same time they must in- 
spire the confidence of the patients 
who attend the clinic, in order that 
they may carry to others a knowledge 
of the careful treatment they are re- 
ceiving. A clinic to be properly run 
must inspire confidence; patients at- 
tending it must be made to feel that 
everything known to medical science 
is being done for them, and that the 
end in view is to develop them into 
being good citizens again as free from 
disease as treatment will make them. 
Hospitals, wherein men and women in- 
fected with venereal disease may be 
sent and detained, must be built in or- 
der that treatment may be forced on 
those who are careless. 
The United States Public Health 
Service, through an appropriation 
made by Congress, has been able to 
give every state in the Union that has 
laws looking toward the treating and 
quarantining of venereal diseases, suf- 46 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
ficient money, which, when doubled by 
the Legislatures of the states, has 
made it possible to carry on a vigorous 
fight for the control of gonorrhoea and 
syphilis. 
“The distinction between today in 
action and the days gone by is that 
the unit is no longer the sick man but 
the community and the people affected 
—or likely to be affected—considered 
as a whole. We do not mean that the 
individual is disregarded. We do mean 
that the regard had of him does not 
stop within the confines of his sick 
room but envisages him rather as a 
risk, a focus of conflagration—than a 
cause. It is symptomatic of a new 
era. And the distinctive mark of the 
new era is education of the people, not 
only education but enlistment as a 
fighting corps against preventable dis- 
ease. Inspection, a pitiless publicity, 
freedom of discussion, recognition that 
mock modesty is intolerable—these are 
part of the new measures.”—Louisville 
(Ky.) Herald. MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
47 
The following statements sum up all 
of the arguments made in this chapter 
and express in plain language results 
to be expected if society does not 
awaken to a full realization of its re- 
sponsibility and pledge itself to elimi- 
nate race poisons from its midst. 
Syphilis is declared by Osier to be 
the greatest destroyer of the human 
race. 
At least eight to twelve per cent of 
all deaths are caused by syphilis. Most 
of such deaths are reported as heart 
disease, apoplexy, paralysis, locomotor- 
ataxia, insanity, disease of the arteries, 
kidney disease, liver diseases, etc. 
The investigations of the most com- 
petent experts show that fully ten per 
cent of the total population of this 
country are syphilitic, either active or 
latent. 
Syphilis is directly heritable. It 
causes nearly one-half of all abortions, 
miscarriages and still births. Eighty 
per cent of the children of syphilitic 
parents die in early life. 48 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
Syphilis is the one racial poison, re- 
ducing the race standard by the breed- 
ing of mental delinquents, moral de- 
generates and physically impaired. It 
is probably the greatest causative fac- 
tor in inefficiency, insanity, pauperism 
and crime. Thousands of persons, 
while supposing themselves cured, are 
harboring latent syphilis, causing de- 
generate progeny and the death of the 
victims themselves in middle life. In 
many cases death will be preceded by 
paralysis, insanity or some chronic ill- 
ness in which syphilis might not be 
suspected. 
Insurance companies have found the 
death rate among people supposedly 
cured of syphilis to be double the rate 
of those who never had it. 
Fully twenty-five per cent of the in- 
mates of institutions for the insane and 
feeble-minded show active syphilis, 
and many more are there because of 
syphilitic ancestry. 
Gonorrhoea is the most common of 
all diseases except measles, and by far MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
49 
the most common counting only cases 
which are at present infected. 
Gonorrhoea is responsible for 80 per 
cent of blindness of the new-born and 
for 25 per cent of all blindness. 
Gonorrhoea is directly responsible 
for about 80 per cent of the appallingly 
great number of abdominal operations 
on women, and for a large percentage 
of all so-called female troubles. The 
woman is usually an innocent victim of 
the husband’s earlier indiscretions. 
Men should know they are cured—not 
just think so. In men gonorrhoea 
causes sterility, rheumatism, heart dis- 
ease, bladder trouble, stricture, pros- 
tatic trouble and other complications. 
Syphilis and gonorrhoea cause more 
suffering and death than smallpox, 
diphtheria, infantile paralysis and tu- 
berculosis combined. PART TWO 
In every city in the United States the 
“masher” or “male flirt” is to be seen 
on nearly every prominent street og- 
ling women. This “street cootie,” or 
“jelly bean” as he is called in certain 
sections of the country, is a barnacle 
on society and should be scraped off, 
he being of no value to civilization. 
He attempts flirtations because of his 
lack of respect for women. He views 
every woman as being a purveyor of 
sensuality and as his prospective prey. 
He is at all times ready to pounce on 
innocence and to take advantage of its 
ignorance in order to accomplish his 
vile ends. 
Many assert that flirting is an in- 
nocent pastime. It is, if the usual 
result of flirting—seduction, is con- 
sidered proper. The average “mash- 
50 MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
51 
er,” “street cootie” or “jelly bean,” is 
more anxious to attack the virtuous 
girl or woman than he is to seek the 
company of those who sell their bodies 
for money. If parents would realize 
this and would warn their daughters, 
there would be fewer “brands to be 
plucked from the burning.” If philan- 
thropists and good men and women 
would understand this, hundreds of 
girls who from economic reasons have 
no parlors where they may entertain 
their sweethearts and must use street 
corners to meet men would be saved 
the degradation of being forced into 
prostitution which in nearly every in- 
stance follows seduction. 
Many times a girl in a spirit of fun 
will return a look or smile from a 
“masher” who may approach her with- 
out realizing her danger. Too fre- 
quently these flirtations ripen into 
what may be mistaken for friendship 
or even love before she finds out the 
character of her supposed admirer too 
late to save herself from being burned 52 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
by the scorching flames of sensuality 
and misplaced confidence. 
Men who seek to take advantage of 
girls or women are usually diseased 
with either gonorrhoea or syphilis or 
both contracted in the sowing of their 
wild oats. These individuals become 
the most prolific source for the spread 
of venereal diseases. They infect dur- 
ing the first sexual embrace women in- 
to whose ears they whisper words of 
love and promises of marriage. These 
misguided females when they discover 
that they have become the victims of 
misplaced confidence through their ig- 
norance of the wiles of their seducers 
and learn that society’s hand, to its 
shame, is turned against them, become 
social avengers. Thousands of women 
who are selling their bodies are getting 
a type of revenge on the institution 
that sent them into the “dark corners” 
that is sapping at the very vitals of 
civilization itself. The vendetta car- 
ried on by them is destroying its mil- 
lions. They feed the flames of lust and MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
53 
burn with the fires of disease, bodies 
that might have remained pure and 
clean but for them. 
Because of its failure to fully appre- 
ciate the necessity for destruction of 
the causes for racial decay, society has 
been for centuries paying the penalty, 
and the penalty will become heavier 
each year unless vigorous methods are 
adopted whereby lust may be torn out 
by the roots. This can only be accom- 
plished through a single standard of 
morality and through educational 
methods that will show the necessity 
for insisting upon continence in young 
men until marriage occurs. 
Results like the above cannot be ac- 
complished by conspicuous reformers 
or by the sexually frigid. Only those 
who know what it means to fight a 
dominating sex appetite can ever ex- 
pect to make themselves felt in a fight 
for a vigorous and strong race possess- 
ing inherent capacities for breeding 
strong children upon whose shoulders 54 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
will fall the mantle of their parents to 
“carry on” after they are dead. 
A vigorous campaign for the break- 
ing up of loafing places wherein young 
men congregate should be started. The 
loafer, like venereal disease, is a “social 
menace.” He is usually a teller of 
“dirty stories” to young men and an 
aid in starting them on the road down- 
ward. It is from his lips that the in- 
nocent first hear the polluted story of 
reproduction and first learn to regard 
girls and young women as being crea- 
tures put on earth for the sensual and 
sexual gratification of males. The pool 
room, as stated in a previous work 
by the writer, “The Women of the 
Streets,” is the greatest harbinger of 
sex crimes to be found in any city. 
Instead of reformers attacking the 
“Tobacco evil,” which is more or less 
of an innocent pastime, they should 
busy themselves with things which in- 
volve civic welfare, certainly the pool 
room is a civic menace and as far as 
possible should be done away with. MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
55 
The civic conscience should force the 
enactment of laws that would absolute- 
ly forbid the gathering together of 
small or large groups on sidewalks of 
the main thoroughfares of cities. Un- 
less a man or group of men are able to 
give valid reasons for stopping on the 
streets, they should be forced to move 
on by the police. New Orleans has 
such a law which has worked admir- 
ably for years. 
The masher should be arrested. His 
punishment should be imprisonment, 
rather than a fine, in fact a law that 
would refuse him bail and allow the 
judge no recourse to other than a sen- 
tence of imprisonment would go a long 
way towards his elimination. Radical 
measures are the only ones to be de- 
pended upon to clean up cities wherein 
are to be found causes for degeneracy. 
One of the chief reasons for the non- 
enforcement of laws that will regulate 
loafing, mashing, etc., is civic apathy 
and hypocrisy, too many citizens main- 
taining that sexual indulgence is neces- 56 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
sary for the physical welfare of young 
men before marriage. Another type 
of hypocrisy is mock modesty which 
has already been briefly discussed. 
Every citizen, whether he be busi- 
ness man, lawyer, doctor, politician, 
preacher or policeman, should be made 
to realize that the “wild oats sower” 
or “masher” is desirous of attacking 
the virginity of the daughter he loves 
so well. It is an obligation he owes 
himself to protect his home—by safe- 
guarding it he is doing his bit towards 
protecting the city in which he lives. 
He should see that laws that will guar- 
antee safety to his virginal daughters 
are enforced. 
The popularity of the automobile has 
made many sex crimes possible. Many 
an unprotected girl has been assaulted 
or persuaded to sacrifice her virginity 
by dissolute scions of homes wherein 
there is means sufficient to purchase 
automobiles for them. The lure of a 
“joy ride” has caused the “downfall” 
of hundreds of girls. MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
57 
Parents are not careful enough of 
the society their children keep, there- 
fore making their ruin easier to accom- 
plish. With the existence of too great 
a freedom today between the sexes and 
by the exposure of too much of the fe- 
male body through an immodesty of 
dress that is in vogue, temptations are 
thrown in the way of young men that 
should be condemned. The above state- 
ment is not intended to discourage 
women from dressing attractively, but 
is it hoped that they will in the future, 
to use a phrase made popular by long 
usage, “wear enough clothing to hide 
their nakedness.” 
The Chicago Tribune of October 3, 
1919, published a very striking letter 
from one of the many who so far have 
found themselves helpless to reinstill 
in the minds of women a desire to re- 
turn to modest attire. The letter is as 
follows: 
“Chicago, Sept. 30.—Editor of The 
Tribune: The writer is a very much 
perplexed married man, who finds that 58 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
he has a wife who professes to be of 
the modern school of womanhood. In 
her mind there is a firmly established 
idea that she can do no wrong in fol- 
lowing the dictates of fad and fashion. 
“When we were married, three years 
ago, she was a clean minded girl, in- 
nately modest, who resorted to none 
of the artifices of the demi-monde, and 
was a girl to whom many men were at- 
tracted by her sensibility and apparent 
cleanliness of mind. I considered my- 
self fortunate in being the accepted 
suitor of so desirable a girl. 
“After about the first year of our 
marriage it became noticeable that the 
first barriers of her modest restraint 
had been broken down. She began 
with the slight use of color for her 
cheeks. There followed, by gradual 
stages, the greater use of rouge, on 
cheeks and lips, until she now “makes 
up” much like a woman of the streets, 
and, which I am sure, accounts for the 
fact that she has several times been 
insulted by men upon the streets. To MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
59 
her facial “makeup” she now adds gar- 
ments that immodestly display her 
limbs with every slight upward step, to 
say nothing of filmy waists that dis- 
close her undergarments as though she 
wore no upper body covering what- 
ever. 
“We have quarreled frequently be- 
cause I have objected to kissing her 
upon rouged cheeks and lips and be- 
cause I have remonstrated with her 
on account of her wholly immodest 
dress. 
“Am not a saintly man, but am one 
of those who believe that every good 
woman should command the respect I 
have given my mother and am unwill- 
ing to concede such respect to my wife 
or any other woman whose appearance 
indicates that her soul is on the mar- 
ket for flattery or worse.” 
All men admire modesty in women. 
When they see their sisters, mothers, 
and sweethearts copying styles origi- 
nated and worn by Parisian prostitutes, 
it is perfectly natural that they should 60 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
feel a sense of revulsion and disgust 
for those things which cheapen and de- 
grade the female sex. Women old 
enough to be grandmothers are only 
too frequently seen garbed as no demi- 
mondaine would dare to for fear of 
being arrested for indecent exposure 
of person. Instead of setting an ex- 
ample for their daughters, they seem 
as mad to be called “stylish” as are the 
young and foolish. Women cannot ex- 
pect men to respect their sex when they 
themselves flagrantly display a total 
lack of self-respect. 
What has become of the chaperone 
of old, who performed her duties so 
well? The writer can remember when 
in his youth he went to call upon a 
young lady that he was constantly 
aware of the fact that in the next room 
or somewhere close by was a guardian 
whose sole interest was centered in see- 
ing that the welfare of the young lady 
he was calling upon was safeguarded. 
The young man in those days felt no 
feeling of restraint nor did the girl, MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
61 
they took it for granted that her pres- 
ence was proper. This guardian of the 
drawing room or parlor became a stu- 
dent of the characters of the young 
men who called upon the girl under 
her charge and more than once was 
innocence saved from an attack from 
sensualism by her ever watchful eye. 
A chaperone who was a diplomat and 
knew how to advise the young was al- 
ways popular. Proper chaperonage of 
young couples is to be desired. Cer- 
tainly now that the world is so vitally 
interested in the salvation of the race, 
young women and their escorts should 
be provided with a proper guardian- 
ship that would protect them from 
themselves and in many instances from 
a flaring up of sex passion which might 
be mistaken for love, thus many a false 
step could be prevented which might 
mean the ruining of their future lives. 
No normal and healthy minded young 
man whose intentions were pure would 
ever object to having his actions with 62 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
his sweetheart supervised, his very love 
would cause him to desire it. 
If the press would give publicity to 
sex crimes and would constantly ad- 
vocate editorially their punishment, a 
social revolution would develop which 
would make it impossible for the sex 
criminal to exist. The newspaper is 
the greatest agency for the disemina- 
tion of knowledge. It wields the bal- 
ance of power and can do more to- 
wards cleaning up agencies of evil that 
spread racial scourges abroad than can 
sermons, lectures or pamphlets, these 
agencies are mere drops in the bucket 
as compared to the broad and benefi- 
cent influence of the press. 
The influence of the preacher and 
the lecturer must not be decried. Their 
field of operation is broad and they 
should take advantage of their every 
opportunity to spread the gospel of the 
science of prevention abroad. 
Humanitarian sermons and lectures 
can do much to change society’s atti- 
tude toward the double moral standard MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
63 
and to bringing, through pitiless pub- 
licity, venereal diseases into the light 
of day where they may be attacked and 
destroyed. The pamphlet is a valuable 
aid in any campaign, it becomes a per- 
manent record to be kept and reread 
from time to time. Pamphleteering in 
the fight against social diseases has al- 
ready resulted in great good being ac- 
complished as can be attested by the 
United States Public Health Service 
and by State Boards of Health through 
which institutions millions of pamph- 
lets have been circulated on the subject 
of venereal diseases. The public has 
been very much interested in reading 
any literature on the subject of the 
prevention of gonorrhoea and syphilis. 
This literature is distributed without 
cost and the requests for it come in by 
the thousands. The United States Pub- 
lic Health Service or any State Board 
of Health stands ready to supply indi- 
viduals, societies, schools, universities, 
colleges or churches with pamphlets 64 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
that will enlighten, and fit them to 
spread the gospel of social hygiene. 
There can be no excuse on the part 
of parents today for ignorance, and 
those who profess it are in danger of 
having harsh criticism heaped on them 
by those who are interested in the elim- 
ination of prurience, hypocrisy and 
mock modesty, and who are trying to 
raise social and ethical standards to 
a place where they may be pointed to 
with pride as being the outcome of 
education and war. 
Each city should have community 
houses located wherever large groups 
of people live. “Civic Centers” should 
take pride in seeing that they are kept 
up. These community houses should 
be fitted up as clubs with club rooms 
and also with special parlors for use 
by boys and girls where a degree of 
privacy may be had by them in their 
love-making. Games of all sorts, in- 
cluding ten pin alleys, should be pro- 
vided and a man and a woman em- 
ployed to teach men and women how MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
65 
to play. Weekly dances where the 
modern dance would be taboo and 
where the waltz and two-step would 
come back into its own should be held 
under the chaperonage of men and 
women who possess humanitarian 
spirits and a knowledge of the needs 
of young people. Picture shows and 
amateur theatricals might be put on 
every few nights in an auditorium, 
which should be a part of every com- 
munity house. The services of expert 
entertainers and lecturers could be ob- 
tained at a very small cost. 
A gathering place for boys and girls 
who have never had such a thing be- 
fore, that would guide their play, and 
at the same time provide wholesome 
amusement and the spending of a few 
hours of leisure in social communion 
would do much to minimize the com- 
mitting of sex crimes. A community 
which shows an interest in the welfare 
of its people is one wherein there is 
usually less vice. 
Every church or public building that 66 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
is not constantly in use should provide 
a means wherein a miniature commun- 
ity house can be located. Religious de- 
nominations as a rule have done very 
little for the social betterment of the 
neighborhoods wherein their churches 
occupy the most valuable property. 
A spirit of “We’ll all pull together” 
in any movement will eventually ac- 
complish wonders, and should be en- 
couraged by those who are thinking 
about the future welfare of the race. 
No city should count itself complete 
without a Young Woman’s Christian 
Association building. The Y. W. C. A. 
offers a haven of refuge for hundreds 
of girls who find it necessary to earn 
their own living. Under the careful 
supervision of the splendid type of 
women who manage these buildings, 
girls and older women are made to 
feel that their interests are being look- 
ed after. Also a type of chap nonage 
is provided that actually protects girls 
from the terrors of a form of espion- 
age that is nearly always present in MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
67 
the average cheap boarding house from 
a type of male who is unable to control 
his sex appetite and considers the 
working girl his prey. 
These boarding homes, that is really 
what they are, provide living quarters 
at a very reasonable rate to women 
who work or who may be attending 
school, or to transients who are unac- 
companied by men. Usually a very 
superior cafeteria is run in connection 
with these institutions where food is 
sold at a very low price. In Madison, 
Wisconsin, the writer has been told 
that through the careful management 
of the women who administer the Y. 
W. C. A., that the profits from their 
cafeteria which is public, have in the 
few years it has been running paid 
for their building. The Y. W. C. A. 
provides a general parlor where social 
gatherings are held and where a type 
of wholesome friendships may develop 
among women that will last a lifetime. 
These institutions make for morality in 
any community and teach a broad hu- 68 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
manitarianism to women that makes 
of them better employees, and after- 
wards, when the right man comes along 
and claims them—better wives and 
mothers. It would be impossible to 
overestimate the value of a Y. W. C. A. 
to a city. 
Any movement which has behind it 
sound principles for the improvement 
of society and the elimination of vice 
should receive careful consideration 
from parents and those interested in 
seeing the young womanhood and 
young manhood of America rise above 
mediocrity and they should fight to 
reach the highest point attainable to 
civilization. PART THREE 
A plea already has been made to 
educate children along lines that should 
better enable them to cope with life’s 
problems and fit them to resist temp- 
tations. It has seemed advisable to the 
writer to go further into the question 
of sex discussion in order that those 
who read may be more enlightened. 
There are those whose mentalities have 
never developed beyond the “dark 
ages,” who will take issue with some 
of the statements made in this chap- 
ter. They regard as being filthy any 
that has to do with that holy rela- 
tionship which should exist between 
man and his mate, which results in a 
new entity being conceived, which, af- 
ter it has drunk deep of the nectar of 
its mother’s blood, is born a living, 
breathing soul. It is their fault that 
69 70 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
the procreative function is looked down 
upon rather than deified. Their pru- 
rient minds have failed to grasp the 
real meaning of motherhood and fath- 
erhood, hence their praise of “inno- 
cence,” which term in this enlightened 
day is synonymous with “ignorance.” 
The child is as clay in the hands of 
the potter, its life can be shaped and 
moulded according to the wish of its 
parents and it is wrong for them to 
deny it its right to a full knowledge of 
self. 
The time is not yet ripe when social 
and sex hygiene may be taught in 
schools, for the reason that there are 
too few capable teachers of this most 
important subject. It will be neces- 
sary to rear an entire generation of 
men and women who have received 
careful instruction at home before it 
may be imparted to children by the 
pedagogue. Normal physiology and 
practical biology should become a part 
of the curriculum of every school to 
be taught by experts. MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
71 
Almost all parents are ignorant 
along sex lines and should be educated 
in sex hygiene before it is taught their 
children in the public schools, so that 
they will be able to think and talk in- 
telligently when discussing the subject 
with them. 
Havelock Ellis in his book “The Task 
of Social Hygiene” has this to say re- 
garding the teaching of sex hygiene in 
schools: 
“Sexual hygiene in the full sense— 
insofar as it concerns individual ac- 
tion and not the regulative or legisla- 
tive action of communities—is the art 
of imparting such knowledge as is 
needed at successive stages by the 
child, the youth and maiden, the young 
man and woman, in order to enable 
them to deal rightly, and so far as pos- 
sible without injury either to them- 
selves or to others, with all those sex- 
ual events to which every one is na- 
turally liable. To fulfill his functions 
adequately the master in the art of 
teaching sexual hygiene must answer 72 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
the three requirements: (1) He must 
have a sufficing knowledge of the facts 
of sexual psychology, sexual physiol- 
ogy and sexual pathology, knowledge 
which, in many important respects, 
hardly existed at all until recently, and 
is only now beginning to become gen- 
erally accessible; (2) he must have a 
wise and broad moral outlook with a 
sane idealism which refrains from de- 
manding impossibilities, and resolutely 
thrusts aside not only the vulgar plati- 
tudes of wordliness, but the equally 
mischievous platitudes of an outworn 
and insincere asceticism, for the wise 
sexual hygienist knows, with Pascal, 
that ‘he who tries to be an angel be- 
comes a beast,’ and is less anxious to 
make his pupils ineffective angels than 
effective men and women, content to 
say with Browning, ‘I may put forth 
angels, pinions, once unmanned, but not 
before’; (3) in addition to sound knowl- 
edge and a wise moral outlook, the sex- 
ual hygienist must possess, finally, a 
genuine sympathy with the young, an MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
73 
insight into their sensitive shyness, a 
comprehension of their personal diffi- 
culties, and the skill to speak to them 
simply, frankly and humanly.” 
He further says: “It is useless to 
attempt to introduce sexual hygiene as 
a subject apart, and in some respects 
it may be dangerous. When we touch 
sex we touch sensitive fibres, which 
thrill through the whole of our social 
organism, just as the touch of love 
thrills through the whole of the bodily 
organism. Any vital reform here, any 
true introduction of sexual hygiene to 
replace our traditional policy of con- 
fused silence, affects the whole of life 
or it affects nothing. It will modify 
our social conventions, enter our fam- 
ily life, transform our moral outlook, 
perhaps reinspire our religion and our 
philosophy. 
“That conclusion need by no means 
render us pessimistic concerning the 
future of sexual hygiene, nor unduly 
anxious to cling to the policy of the 
past. But it may induce us to be con- 74 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
tent to move slowly, to prepare our 
movements wisely and firmly and not 
to expect too much at the outset.” 
That the members of modern social 
systems have not been willing to recog- 
nize the ever ruling sex instinct is un- 
fortunate. It always has been the con- 
trolling power. Without the controll- 
ing element of sex, society and civiliza- 
tion would never have developed— 
everything would have remained just 
as it was in the beginning, cold and 
passionless. The creating of human 
beings of opposite sex caused man to 
aspire to the establishment of higher 
ideals; his ambition resulted in a fixed 
determination to excel. Men and 
women became controlled by sex hun- 
ger ; thus may sex hunger rightfully be 
charged with the invention of idealism. 
If man had never been hungry for 
woman, and if woman had never been 
hungry for man, none of the finer 
traits of human character could have 
been developed. Love, art, music, poet- 
ry—in short, all of the finer qualities MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
75 
that have gone so far towards making 
life beautiful could never have existed. 
Nothing would be known of religion; 
human beings would not have felt the 
need of the exaltation that comes with 
it had they not been controlled by sex 
hunger. 
Modern religion is the offspring of 
sex worship. The establishment of 
Deity according to some historians re- 
sulted from the act of procreation and 
its product. The worship of the gen- 
erative organs by primitive man caused 
him to conceive the god Phallus or 
Priapus and the Yoni. The Phallus 
was the symbol of the male organ of 
generation and the Yoni the symbolic 
example of female procreative power. 
These symbols were probably the first 
ones worshipped by man. Remnants of 
ancient Phallic and Yoni worship may 
be found in all religious teachings even 
today. The Bible is full of the symbols 
of Phallicism and especially is the old 
Bible full of sex discussion. It is not 
hard for the student who has a knowl- 76 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
edge of the ancient worship of Priapus 
and the Yoni to recognize in certain 
parts of the rituals of Catholic and 
Protestant Churches survivals that 
came directly from temples dedicated 
to the worship of the organs of pro- 
creation. 
Pope Constantine was far seeing in 
that he realized that a dogma, or re- 
ligious sect which took no cognizance 
of sex and procreation would be a mis- 
take, and that it would be hard to cor- 
rect such a mistake after it had once 
been made. He realized that he must 
recognize the sexual act between man 
and woman as being necessry to the 
existence of society and the church. 
He placed the control of marriage in 
the hands of the clergy, and made cer- 
tain fixed rules governing the mating 
of human beings which, if disobeyed, 
destroyed the transgressors’ chance of 
attaining heaven through the media- 
tion of the church. So throughout the 
ages man has recognized the power of MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
77 
sex and sex hunger and built his re- 
ligious ideals to conform to them. 
Today in Ireland are to be found 
remnants of Phallic worship. In cer- 
tain sections of the country may be 
found upright pillars of rock with Cel- 
tic inscriptions around their bases sup- 
posed to bear a message to the hus- 
bands of wives who have not borne chil- 
dren. Close to the top of these pillars 
is a square hole, and it is said that the 
husband shakes hands with his wife 
through one of these apertures, and 
both say a prayer for children. They 
come away fully convinced that their 
prayer will be answered. These rem- 
nants of the most ancient of all re- 
ligions may be found in every part of 
the known world. 
During the time of nature worship 
(the worship of the organs of genera- 
tion was real nature worship), a finer 
and nobler civilization in many respects 
existed than that which is being en- 
joyed today. There can be no doubt 
that when man worships at the shrine 78 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
of nature and not the idols of Mammon 
he surpasses those worshippers before 
altars wherein may be found the causes 
for race decay. More nature worship 
and less dollar worship will elevate all 
people of the world to a higher plane of 
civilization and intellectuality than 
that which they are now enjoying, and 
cause them to race towards Utopia and 
the birth of the Superman. 
The advent of ancient man into pow- 
er, succeeding as he did woman, ac- 
cording to Bachofen, marked the birth 
of sensuality. Prior to that time, when 
women and the worship of the female 
principles in reproduction were the 
strongholds of an advancing civiliza- 
tion, a finer element was present in 
their civilizing qualities than has been 
noted since man assumed the reins of 
statecraft. Whenever a nation holds 
its females in great respect, and atten- 
tion is paid to their qualifications to 
advise, that nation ascends to heights 
not to be reached by one which respects 
only the male intellect. This statement MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
79 
may be verified by viewing closely the 
causes of the rise and fall of ancient 
nations. 
Nearly all of the gods worshipped by 
the people of ages ago belonged, ac- 
cording to some ancient writers, to the 
female sex and were worshipped as 
mothers of creation. After the birth 
of the patriarchal age, because of man’s 
conceit and his desire to render him- 
self more important as a factor in con- 
trolling the actions of his mate, he ap- 
propriated the gods to himself, they 
were changed by him from female to 
male, and he eliminated entirely all 
trace of their female characteristics. 
Had it not been for the deteriorating 
influences of priestcraft, man would 
still be worshipping at the shrine of 
motherhood; superstition, false mod- 
esty, and prudery would never have 
existed. Prior to the advent of man 
power, it has been observed by writers 
and investigators that the opinion of 
the women was peculiarly adverse to 
all sensual indulgence and especially 80 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
that of the sexes. Although the crea- 
tive principle was adored, and the or- 
gans of sex were the gods worshipped, 
purity in mind and in thought was 
maintained and none of the vices pro- 
duced by sensuality were to be seen. 
There must be in all sex discussion 
a dissociation of the terms sexual and 
sensual. Sexual matters are the re- 
sult of physiopsychic love and a de- 
sire for offspring, with a feeling that 
there can be no peace of mind for the 
male or the female unless they can be 
joined together by the bonds of con- 
jugal joys; while the sensual marks a 
desire for erotic pleasures to be obtain- 
ed from sexual congress outside of law- 
ful wedlock without ambition for off- 
spring or marriage. Sensuality de- 
stroys love and allows only lust and a 
desire for fleeting pleasures to con- 
trol the intellect and the better and 
saner judgment. 
The sexual life is a holy as well as 
a socially necessary one, and to look 
on the discussion of those subjects that MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
81 
will produce a higher race in the fu- 
ture as being unclean, is foolish in the 
extreme. No harm can possibly result 
from discussions of sex questions if 
they are reverently entered into and 
undertaken intelligently and from a 
scientific standpoint. Hysterical discus- 
sion by those who are not acquainted 
with the subject should be forbidden. 
Fortunately, all discussions and ques- 
tions involving the development of a 
higher ideal come out from under the 
influences of radicalism and senti- 
mental hysteria unhurt. 
Sex discussion, it may be repeated, 
is the oldest of all the factors that have 
gone towards developing a strong in- 
tellectual entity in the past. It has en- 
gaged the thoughts of almost all of 
the ancient philosophers and certainly 
has interested modern writers to the 
extent of causing them to establish a 
fictional literature and drama around 
it. It is believed by some that the trend 
of the modern mind will gradually ob- 
literate, except to the curious student, 82 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
the whole literature as well as the 
drama of former generations. The 
novel since its very inception has been 
built around the relations of the sexes. 
The drama has followed closely in its 
footsteps. The play of seduction is no 
longer a vital force, and the novel with 
this theme will soon become very 
scarce. The new adjustment of sex re- 
lations should result in a literature 
purer, stronger and more uplifting 
than has ever been known. 
Within the oldest temples of Egypt 
are still to be observed sacred apart- 
ments which contained the Holy of the 
Holies, and to which in past ages, none 
might gain access but priests and 
priestesses of the highest order. With- 
in these apartments were pictured the 
mysteries of birth, together with the 
symbols of generation—emblems of 
procreation. Priests and priestesses 
were the instructors of young men and 
young women in all matters pertaining 
to sex. It is needless to say that as a 
result of this broad education their MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
83 
views of life were purified, and as a 
consequence of their early training 
they developed into physical as well as 
intellectual giants and gave Egypt the 
wonderful civilization it once enjoyed, 
a civilization mighty in its proportions. 
It is to be hoped that society is ap- 
proaching an age wherein intellectual- 
ity will reign supreme, and wherein the 
problems to be solved involving life 
will admit of no answers other than 
those based upon a scientific founda- 
tion. The Bluebeard’s closet in mod- 
ern institutions must be gotten rid of 
and light must be let into rooms in the 
brain of man that have remained dark 
for so long. 
If the progressive things that should 
live and be of benefit to all mankind 
and be of aid in the raising of higher 
ideals are to come, men and women 
must stand together and put forth 
their best efforts toward developing 
the young in order that they may 
profit by and not repeat the mistakes 84 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
their elders made by stunting their in- 
tellectual development. 
Let the lessons of the “World War” 
prove the death knell of hypocrisy in 
order that truth may appear naked be- 
fore the eyes of all mankind and not 
be offensive; “Let it be to us, as it 
was to early Christians, a flame to 
purge every value of its false accre- 
tion, in every aspect of life to show 
forth its new caught reality.” 
It may be truly said that the gods 
of yesterday are entering the twilight 
of their great day, a night of Stygian 
darkness is approaching for them. 
When the sunrise of a new day comes, 
it will be found that truth and knowl- 
edge slew them while they slept. The 
time has come when the spiritual and 
the material are ready to blend into 
one mighty whole for the good of man- 
kind. Knowledge and intellectual 
power are bound to replace tradition, 
myth, and superstition. PART FOUR 
It is a most lamentable fact that to- 
day, in the majority of states, a lewd, 
disease-ridden profligate, showing in 
his very expression just what he is, 
may go to any County Court clerk and 
obtain a marriage license to marry a 
woman who is not only pure, but 
strong and healthy as well, and whose 
normality should not be sacrificed on 
Hymen’s altar. 
There are no questions asked, even if 
the clerk who issues the license knows 
the character of the man with whom 
he is dealing, he, on account of present 
laws, is powerless to act, and must 
issue a license, knowing that the pros- 
pective marriage will cause great suf- 
fering, perhaps untold agony, to the 
woman for years and years, even until 
85 86 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
she is finally relieved by the kind hand 
of death. 
What may be expected of laws that 
compel officials to grant a license to 
a creature like the one just described? 
Is it a wonder that degeneracy and its 
evil brood exist—that women and chil- 
dren suffer as the result of them? 
Laws of this nature are frequently 
made by men who are totally incapable 
of sound reasoning, they being merely 
the tools of designing politicians, who 
are interested only in their own behalf, 
caring nothing for the future welfare 
of the nation. 
Breeders of cattle and horses, and 
floriculturists and practical farmers, 
are continually devising means of im- 
proving both animal and vegetable 
forms, and occupy hours of time in ex- 
plaining their methods; yet, when ask- 
ed to vote for a change that would 
benefit the entire social system which 
they profess to represent, turn away 
and refuse to listen. If replies are 
made, they say that what was good MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
87 
enough for their mothers and fathers 
is good enough for them. They for- 
get that, instead of standing still, the 
world is progressing, and that as time 
advances ancient methods and tradi- 
tions will be relegated to the dead 
lumber room of the past, in order that 
space may be made for improvements 
which must come as a natural result 
of progressiveness. 
The day is fast approaching when 
legislation will in every state enact 
uniform marriage laws which will be 
strict and will have to be obeyed to 
their very letter. Before a marriage 
license is issued both applicants will 
be required to produce certificates of 
health, signed by an official board com- 
posed of reputable (not political) physi- 
cians, stating that the parties to the 
proposed marriage are physically and 
mentally fit to marry and procreate 
healthy children, and that neither the 
man nor the woman ever had con- 
tracted a venereal disease. The appli- 
cant who has had venereal trouble will 88 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
be forced to submit to treatment and 
to a second thorough examination by a 
medical board and be declared com- 
pletely cured before the license can be 
granted. 
When the marriage ceremony may be 
read by any licensed minister, justice 
of the peace, or other official of the 
law, there is bound to be displayed a 
certain degree of laxity and indiffer- 
ence. This is dangerous, for many men 
and women have lived to rue the day 
they ever saw each other, as the re- 
sult of hasty marriages. 
The old method of publishing the 
“banns” should be brought into use 
again and laws passed that would en- 
force their publication. 
If the law enforced a delay, many 
persons, after due deliberation, would 
refuse to take the step that should 
mean so much to them. 
Marriages often are contracted mere- 
ly because animal passion is allowed 
to predominate over sane judgment. 
When sex emotion enters the door MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
89 
character study flies out of the win- 
dow. When passion cools it is too late 
to correct mistakes in mating. Such 
marriages could not take place under 
laws requiring a reasonable period of 
deliberation; such laws would give both 
the man and the woman a chance to in- 
vestigate each other and acquire a 
knowledge of each other’s character. 
This would frequently induce them to 
refrain from an alliance that would 
prove harmful to one or the other, and 
in the end to both. 
Man one day will be swayed by mor- 
als and calm reasoning intellect, in- 
stead of by instinct. The coming of 
that day will mark a period the like 
of which never has been seen in his- 
tory. Morality will prevail, and a com- 
plete rebuilding of the social structure 
will result. The position of the man 
who leads a pure life will be pre-emi- 
nently higher than that of him who is 
loose in his morals and leads a life of 
digusting sensuality. 
The right of the child to be well born 90 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
cannot be gainsaid. How to conserve 
lhat right is one of the most serious 
problems the world is now facing. 
Eugenists and writers on Social Hy- 
giene are devising ways and means to 
help, in order that children may be 
born healthy and free from physical 
blemishes which may lead to moral 
and mental degeneracy. 
Teachers of eugenics, as well as 
teachers of Sex and Social Hygiene, in 
their fight for race improvement, have 
not overlooked the fact that there are 
numerous anti-social classes which 
must be reckoned with. The hardened 
criminal, the moral degenerate, the 
mentally deficient, the hopelessly in- 
sane, the residents of the slums who 
breed like rats and live in unavoidable 
squalor and poverty, the beggar class 
—and they are legion—the prostitute, 
the pimp, the inebriate, cocaine and 
morphine fiends, and not a few others 
that might be mentioned—these are 
anti-social beings in that they tend to 
drag social standards down. Some MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
91 
means must be devised to prevent their 
marrying and bringing into the world 
beings like themselves. 
The operation of vasectomy—sterili- 
zation—has been suggested as a means 
of improving future generations by de- 
stroying the procreative ability of the 
unfit, who, by marrying and bringing 
into the world beings like unto them- 
selves, are doing mankind a great in- 
justice. 
This operation will in no way inter- 
fere with marriage, except that the un- 
fit man and woman will not be able to 
reproduce their kind. They will be 
able to enjoy married life without feel- 
ing that they are a menace to civiliza- 
tion. They will know when they die 
their race, insofar as they are con- 
cerned, dies with them. It will be by 
the process of elimination, and by it 
alone, that the race improvement hoped 
for will come, and sterilization is the 
most humane method of its accom- 
plishment. 
The vasectomy operation is harmless. 92 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
It does not imply castration, and in- 
volves no real mutilation and no loss 
of sex power other than that of pro- 
creation. 
There is a class of people who un- 
consciously are a cause of degeneracy 
and frequently are the cause of crimi- 
nality by arguing to their children 
when they show a desire to advance 
and really amount to something in the 
world, that what was good for their 
fathers and mothers is good enough 
for them. This mistake should be rec- 
tified, for mankind must either pro- 
gress or degenerate. 
It must be seen that the men and the 
women who accomplish things in this 
age are those who have brushed aside 
traditions and climbed the mountains 
of difficulties and have overcome them. 
Only such individuals can be justly 
classed as desirable citizens. In the 
future it should be said of children 
born into the world, that they came 
from strong and healthy families, fam- 
ilies composed of men and women who MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
93 
have really done something for race 
improvement. 
The states that have passed laws pro- 
viding for the destruction of the pro- 
creative powers of criminals and de- 
generates have taken a long step for- 
ward in race progression. 
The moment a race or nation begins 
a study of means and methods for self- 
improvement, then it is that that race 
or nation ascends to a plane of civiliza- 
tion not to be attained by a people who 
pay no attention to anything but the 
struggle for the Almighty Dollar and 
what it will bring. 
The Spartans, through a process of 
elimination, developed a race of per- 
fect men and women—perfect not only 
in body, but in mental attainments. 
They destroyed, by throwig over cliffs, 
all of their race who were imperfect 
mentally or physically. It will not be 
found necessary to throw the imper- 
fect of the present race over cliffs and 
by so doing bring about violent death; 
but it will be necessary to see that their 94 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
kind dies with them. The way to ac- 
complish this, as has been said before, 
will be to destroy their procreative 
ability. 
Every effort is being made to im- 
prove animal life and produce fancy 
stock that will bring higher prices. 
Human beings should demand that the 
race to which they belong be improved. 
If fancy breeding and the care which 
animals receive improves them, it is 
certainly logical to treat the human 
race in like manner and bring it up to 
a similar standard of perfection. 
Future generations that are yet un- 
born are deserving of more fore- 
thought, that their welfare may be bet- 
ter looked after. It is the proud boast 
of the American people that they are 
the strongest in the world. If the pres- 
ent laxity of marriage laws is allowed 
to continue to exist, what may be ex- 
pected of human beings who are to be 
fathers and mothers of races to come? 
Will they not be weaklings and fall, be- 
cause they are weaklings, and become MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
95 
vassals of a race of people who believe 
in their own strength and who have 
preserved their forces in order that 
they might leave a heritage of power 
to their future progeny? 
“If every man were straight, there 
would be no such thing as prostitution. 
There would be no loose women if there 
were no loose men.” 
“If every man were straight, there 
would be few suicides among young 
women, and there are a great many 
today not so named in the daily press.” 
“If every man were straight, there 
would be no illegitimate children to 
wander like Ishmael, up and down the 
earth with everybody’s hands against 
them and ofttimes with their hands 
against the world.” 
“If every man were straight, true 
love would find a place in every man’s 
life. He would respect and honor all 
women and he would love one woman 
supremely and would learn to under- 
stand her through and through.” 
“If every man were straight, there 96 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
would be no such things as venereal 
diseases. Think of the misery and un- 
happiness which might be saved— 
think of the money and human life 
which might be stopped, and then think 
of the loss to America, and then think 
that venereal diseases are absolute- 
ly preventable, if every man were 
straight.” 
“If every man were straight, there 
would be no such thing as gonorrheal 
rheumatism.” 
“If every man were straight, most 
of the chronic diseases of the bladder 
and generative organs would cease to 
exist.” 
“If every man were straight, most 
of the surgical operations on the fe- 
male organs would not be needed. Men 
marry pure, innocent girls, after hav- 
ing had gonorrhoea which they think 
is cured. Only the lowest, most con- 
temptible brute would marry, knowing 
that his venereal disease was still 
acute.” 
“If every man were straight, there MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
97 
would be fewer childless homes. Gon- 
orrhoea causes sterility in both men 
and women.” 
“If every man were straight, there 
would be only about half the number 
of abortions and miscarriages.” 
“If every man were straight, very 
few children would be born blind.” 
“If every man were straight, there 
would not be nearly so many babies 
born dead.” 
“If every man were straight, there 
would be fewer children born diseased. 
Luckily for themselves 80 per cent of 
such children die within a few days 
or weeks.” 
“If every man were straight, there 
would be fewer mentally defective chil- 
dren.” 
“If every man were straight, prac- 
tically half the amount of insanity in 
the world would be done away with.” 
“If every man were straight, there 
would be among men and women abso- 
lutely no paresis, sometimes called soft- 
ening of the brain.” 98 
AN OPEN TALK WITH 
“If every man were straight, there 
would be no such thing as locomotor- 
ataxia.” 
“If every man were straight, diseases 
of the arteries and blood vessels would 
be greatly lessened.” 
“If every man were straight, no man 
before middle life would have apopletic 
or paralytic strokes.” 
“If every man were straight, his 
earning capacity would be greater and 
industrial life would be richer.” 
“If every man were straight, it would 
not be so difficult for women to be 
pure and true.” 
The words of Old Adam are here 
most fitting: 
“Though I look old, yet I am strong 
and lusty; 
For in my youth I never did apply 
Hot and rebellious liquors in my blood, 
(These quotations are taken from a very excellent 
book, “Talks on Sex Education,” written by Oswald 
C. J. Withrow, M.B. M.R.C.S. (England) published 
by F. D. Goodchild Co., Toronto.) MOTHERS AND FATHERS 
99 
Nor did not, with unbashful forehead, 
woo 
The means of weakness and debility. 
Therefore my age is as a lusty winter, 
Frosty but kindly.” BOOKS TO READ ON SOCIAL AND 
SEX HYGIENE. 
Lee Alexander Stone, M. D. 
Following my lectures to civic audi- 
ences I am constantly being asked, 
“What must I read?” The following 
list of books has been carefully se- 
lected from a large selection to be 
found in my own library, and it is 
my belief that if read carefully they 
will serve their purpose in enlighten- 
ing the minds of those interested in 
Social and Sex Hygiene. One list 
marked—“For Advanced Readers”— 
comprises books to be read by stu- 
dents, teachers, etc. The list marked 
—“Non-technical”—will be found of 
general interest to those who are 
reading simply to inform themselves. 
Unfortunately very few of the 
many who profess to be Social Hy- 
gienists fully understand what is re- 
100 SOCIAL AND SEX HYGIENE 
101 
quired of them. Social Hygiene is 
involved with everything that looks 
toward race improvement. Those who 
expect to become proficient in this 
new phase of social science must be 
students of ethics, religion, ethnology 
and of the history, both ancient and 
modern, of the causes for the devel- 
opment of civilization. They must, 
without prejudice, read the story of 
life as it has been told by the his- 
torians of different races since the 
dawn of creation. They must pos- 
sess a broad moral outlook, and be 
willing to accord to their neighbors, 
whom ecclesiastics have termed pa- 
gans because of a difference in re- 
ligious belief, the same prerogatives 
they themselves take of believing in 
so far as their vision permits them 
to see that their teachings are right. 
Ego mania has destroyed the useful- 
ness of many who but for it might 
have become teachers society would 
have looked upon with favor. 
The social hygienist must taboo any- 102 
BOOKS TO READ ON 
thing which savors of religious big- 
otry. He must be able to put into 
practice the Golden Rule, and under 
no circumstances must he denounce 
the actions of a race or nationality 
other than his own for fear of do- 
ing harm to the cause he is espousing. 
He must be broad enough in his 
knowledge of moral ethics to realize 
that “morality” after all is largely a 
question of chronography, geography, 
and individual point of view. He un- 
der no circumstances should stand for 
a type of inquisition which is being 
advocated today by certain self-styled 
social hygiene organizations, which 
are in reality nothing more than de- 
tective agencies engaged in “framing” 
on female delinquents. These delin- 
quents become offenders many times 
because of ignorance and poverty, 
frequently they are feeble-minded. 
They are usually persecuted and pros- 
ecuted by ascetics and modern 
“Cyrils.” The student should read 
how ancient “howling dervishes” at SOCIAL AND SEX HYGIENE 
103 
the instigation of Archbishop Cyril 
“framed” on Hypatia at Alexandria. 
They in the name of the lowly Naz- 
arene scraped the flesh from her 
bones while she was yet alive. Many 
of the methods practiced by some of 
these organizations would do credit 
to the frightfulness of the “dark 
ages.” Conspicuous reformers who 
have become inquisitors knock many 
times at doors of houses they them- 
selves have built when the vigor of 
manhood was upon them. Impotency 
and lack of virility incident to senile 
decay causes these “persecutors” and 
“prosecutors” to forget the follies of 
youth and to demand the punishment 
of those for whose sins they are at 
least partly responsible. 
The following newspaper clipping re- 
peats a story from the lips of one of 
the noted (?) Social Hygienists of the 
United States who related it in a re- 
cent investigation. Her statement 
proves the assertion that the average 
Social Hygienist who belongs to the 104 
BOOKS TO READ ON 
New York ring is more interested in 
punishment than she is in measures 
that will uplift those who have fallen 
and help them on the road to regenera- 
tion. 
The following newspaper clipping repeats a story 
from the lips of one of the noted (?) Social Hygien- 
ists of the United States who related it in a recent 
investigation. Her statement proves the assertion 
that the average Social Hygienist who belongs to 
the New York ring is more interested in punishment 
than she is in measures that will uplift those who 
have fallen and help them on the road to regenera- 
tion. 
Special to the New York Times. 
Bedford, N. Y., Dec. 20.—Dr. , former 
Commissioner of Corrections of New York City 
and the Superintendent of the State Reformatory 
for Women at Bedford from 1901 to 1914, testified 
regarding punishments at that institution during her 
administration when she took the stand today in the 
investigation that John S. Kennedy, Vice President 
of the State Prison Commission, is holding into 
charge of cruelty to the reformatory inmates. 
Miss was the first Superintendent of the 
institution, and is now connected with the Bureau 
of Social Hygiene of the Rockefeller Foundation. She 
testified that under her administration a disciplinary 
building was built, and the cells were made as sound- 
proof as possible. One reason for the “ice-box” 
doors, she testified, was “because there was then no 
gallery to play to.” She added that the girls con- 
fined there liked to have an audience, even when 
hysterical. In the cells, she said, were single cots 
and mattresses, and that sometimes girls were hand- 
cuffed to the cots. She was asked whether in her 
time the soap and water treatment had been given. 
“On one or two occasions I have personally super- 
intended the washing out of a girl’s mouth when she 
had persisted in using indecent language.” She had 
found there were two classes of girls to deal with: SOCIAL AND SEX HYGENE 
105 
Those who were mentally abnormal and those who 
were “just naughty.” 
Continuing, she said, “Early in the game I realized 
that some of the girls were mentally deficient, and I 
recognized the need of a psychologist. I had one 
for a short time, and I had to pay her out of private 
funds.” 
Miss was asked whether the use of hand- 
cuffs to restrain violent girls was objectionable. “I 
never could see why it was,” she replied. “There is 
nothing to be gained by stringing girls up with their 
feet off the floor,” said the witness. “It might cause 
serious injury and is not a proper form of punish- 
ment.” 
As to dipping girls’ heads in water, Miss 
said it was a proper form of punishment in certain 
cases. In reply to another question she said that 
not all the girls were untruthful. There were some 
whose word could be relied upon. “A hysterical or 
violent girl did not always mean a psychopathic,” 
she testified. I would not send every girl who mis- 
behaved to a psychopathic ward. In my judgment 
it is a waste of money for the State to pay for an 
educational institution and then commit girls who 
are feeble minded and mentally deficient. There 
should be a separate institution for those who are 
not normally mental.” 
It would be utter folly to approach 
as hardened a woman as this noted (?) 
Social Hygienist must be with a plea 
that might cause her to desire to ele- 
vate those of her own sex who had 
fallen because of the sins of society— 
she has forgotten that she is her sister’s 
keeper. Professional reformers of her 
type are a menace to their sex. They 
are the ones who keep constantly be- 106 
BOOKS TO READ ON 
fore the eyes of man “The Woman 
Tempted Me” lie. 
The woman reformer should know 
something of the joys of motherhood. 
Such knowledge would make her more 
humane. 
Social hygiene is involved in the 
study of the causes for immorality 
which lead to the committing of sex 
crimes. It is ever mindful of the evil 
effects of the “double standard.” It 
hopes by education to eliminate the 
vice which promotes venereal disease. 
It possesses a broad moral and ethical 
outlook and realizes that the one thing 
which will enable a man “to throw 
a stone” is for him first to purge 
himself of the false teachings of cen- 
turies and don the mantle that would 
fit him so well if he kept himself 
clean and insisted that his neighbor 
did likewise. It also regards mock 
modesty as being a mortal sin. 
Havelock Ellis in his book, “The 
Task of Social Hygiene,” has this to 
say regarding sex hygiene: SOCIAL AND SEX HYGIENE 
107 
“Sexual hygiene in the full sense— 
in so far as it concerns individual ac- 
tion and not the regulative or legis- 
lative action of communities—is the 
art of imparting such knowledge as is 
needed at successive stages by the 
child, the youth and maiden, the young 
man and woman, in order to enable 
them to deal rightly, and so far as 
possible without injury either to them- 
selves or to others, with all those sex- 
ual events to which every one is nat- 
urally liable. To fulfil his functions 
adequately the master in the art of 
teaching sexual hygiene must answer 
to three requirements: (1) he must 
have a sufficient knowledge of the 
facts of sexual psychology, sexual 
physiology and sexual pathology, 
knowledge which, in many important 
respects, hardly existed at all until 
recently, and is only now beginning 
to become generally accessible; (2) he 
must have a wise and broad moral 
outlook, with a sane idealism which 
refrains from demanding impossibili- 108 
BOOKS TO READ ON 
ties, and resolutely thrusts aside not 
only the vulgar platitudes of worldli- 
ness, but the equally mischievous plat- 
itudes of an outworn and insincere 
asceticism, for the wise sexual hy- 
gienist knows, with Pascal, that ‘he 
who tries to be an angel becomes a 
beast,’ and is less anxious to make his 
pupils ineffective angels than effec- 
tive men and women, content to say 
with Browning, ‘I may put forth 
angels’ pinions, once unmanned, but 
not before’; (3) in addition to sound 
knowledge and a wise moral outlook, 
the sexual hygienist must possess, 
finally, a genuine sympathy with the 
young, an insight into their sensitive 
shyness, a comprehension of their per- 
sonal difficulties, and the skill to 
speak to them simply, frankly and 
humanly.” 
The following books have been se- 
lected with the hope that they may be 
read and studied. I commend them 
to those interested in saving the next 
generation from itself. SOCIAL AND SEX HYGIENE 
109 
BOOKS ON SOCIAL AND SEX HYGIENE, FOR 
ADVANCED READERS. 
Task of Social Hygiene—Havelock Ellis. 
The very best work on the subject. Should be 
in the library of all interested in education and in 
furthering the advance of civilization. 
Essays in War Times—Havelock Ellis. 
Houghton Mifflin Co., Publishers, Boston. 
Syphilis and the Public Health—Vedder. 
A book which compares very favorably with 
Fournier’s essays on syphilis. Lea & Febiger, 
Publishers, Philadelphia, Pa. 
The Unmarried Mother—Kammerer. 
Splendid for the social worker. A study of the 
causes of illegitimacy. Little Brown & Co., Pub- 
lishers, Boston. 
Sex Lore—A Primer of Courtship, Marriage and 
Parenthood—Mrs. S. Herbert. 
A. & C. Black Ltd., London, Publishers. Bought 
through Macmillan, New York. 
The Physiology and Psychology of Sex—S. Herbert. 
A. & C. Black, Ltd., London. Bought through 
Macmillan, New York. 
Motherhood—Mrs. C. Gasquoine Hartley. 
The Truth About Woman— 
Mrs. C. Gasquoine Hartley 
These two books deal with the position of 
woman in society from ancient times down to 
modern. I know of no books on the ethical rela- 
tionship of woman to society as valuable as these. 
They are filled with a mass of interesting material 110 
BOOKS TO READ ON 
History of European Morals—Lecky. 
that will be of value to readers. Dodd Mead & 
Co., Pub., New York. 
The Great Unmarried—Gallichan. 
Psychology of Marriage—Gallichan. 
Stokes, Publishers, New York. 
The Third Great Plague—Stokes. 
A study of syphilis written for the layman. W. 
B. Saunders, Publisher, Philadelphia, Pa. 
Social Diseases and Marriage—Morrow. 
Dr. Prince Morrow was one of the pioneers in 
social hygiene. His book is a classic. It is now 
out of print. 
Diseases of Society and Degeneracy—Lydston. 
This book by Dr. G. Frank Lydston should be in 
every library. Lombroso classed it as being one 
of the most valuable contributions to science 
written in years. Riverton Press, Chicago. 
Woman, Past and Present—Bebel. 
Boni and Liveright, Publishers, New York. 
The Awakening of Spring (Drama)— 
Frank Wedekind. 
This drama arraigns society for tabooing sex 
education. Mothers and teachers should study it. 
Wedekind possesses a wonderful knowledge of 
child psychology. 
The Family—Parsons. 
Putnam, New York, Publishers. 
Romantic Love and Personal Beauty—Finch. 
Macmillan & Co. (Scarce.) SOCIAL AND SEX HYGIENE 
111 
The Bethrothal—Maeterlinck. 
Dodd Mead & Co., New York, Publishers. 
The Erotic Motive in Literature—Albert Mordell. 
Boni & Liveright, New York. 
Eros—Lucka. 
A remarkable book for the teacher of sex 
hygiene who wishes to establish a background for 
his arguments. Putnam, Publishers, New York. 
Sexual Ethics—Michel. 
Michel’s Sexual Ethics is a study of conditions 
in Europe before the war—excellent. Scribner, 
New York, Publishers. 
Sexual Life of the Child—Moll. 
This book by Moll is the best book to be found 
on the subject it treats of. Should be in every 
library. Macmillan & Co., Publishers, New York. 
Morale and Its Enemies—Hocking. 
Yale University Press. 
Sex Worship—Howard. 
A small work on the ancient custom of wor- 
shipping the pro-creative impulse. 
The Jewish Child—Feldman. 
A reliable, first hand account of all the phases 
and aspects of Jewish child life. Bailliere, Tindall 
& Cox, London. 
History of Prostitution—Sanger. 
History of Human Marriage—Westermarck. 
A scientific study of the institution of marriage. 
The best book ever published on the subject. Mac- 
millan, New York. 112 
BOOKS TO READ ON 
The Evolution of Marriage—Letourneau. 
Scribner, New York, Publishers. 
Phallicism—Hargrave Jennings. 
(Very rare.) 
Worship of Priapus—Payne Knight. 
(Very rare.) 
Ancient Faiths Embodied in Ancient Names—Inman. 
(Very rare.) 
Ancient Pagan and Modern Christian Symbolism— 
Inman. 
(Rare.) 
The History of Bundling—Stiles. (Very rare.) 
An authentic account of a peculiar custom 
which obtained in New England in the early days. 
The Life of the Bee—Maeterlinck. 
This book should be read by all students of 
Social and Sex Hygiene principally for its charm- 
ing philosophy and sound reasoning. Dodd Mead 
& Co., New York. 
The Slavery of Prostitution—Maude Miner. 
An excellent study of prostitution from the pen 
of an authority. Macmillan, New York. 
The Sexual Question—Forel. 
The Woman of the Streets—Lee A. Stone, M. D. 
An attack on present day methods of persecu- 
tion and prosecution of prostitutes. Burton Pub- 
lishing Co., Kansas City. 
Heredity in Relation to Eugenics—Davenport. 
A very valuable addition to the library of those 
who are interested in race improvement. Henry 
Holt & Co., New York. SOCIAL AND SEX HYGIENE 
113 
Adolescence—G. Stanley Hall. (2 Vols.) 
A book for students and teachers. Ranks as 
being the best book of its kind. Appleton, New 
York. 
Damaged Goods—Brieux. 
Brentano, New York. 
Social Control—Edward A. Ross. 
Social Psychology—Edward A. Ross. 
Macmillan, New York. 
Psychology of the Normal and Subnormal 
—Henry H. Goddard. 
Dr. Goddard stands at the very top as a student 
and an authority. “Psychology of the Normal and 
Subnormal” is a masterpiece. His studies of the 
feeble-minded have won him a place among the 
great scientists of the world. He knows his sub- 
ject and gives freely of his knowledge. 
The Kallikak Family—Goddard. 
Feeble-mindedness—Goddard. 
Dodd Mead & Co., New York. 
Social Studies of the War—Elmer T. Clark. 
An accurate and truthful study of social condi- 
tions in Europe during the war. This book, while 
not written for the social hygienist, is worth while 
because of its frank discussion of religious and 
moral conditions. Doran, New York, Publishers. 
The Hand of the Potter—Theodore Dreiser. (Drama.) 
This drama deals with a type of Moron only too 
frequently found in society. Worth while only to 
the advanced student. Boni & Liveright, New 
York, Publishers. 114 
BOOKS TO READ ON 
Century of the Child—Key. 
This book should be in the hands of every in- 
telligent mother. Putnam, New York. 
NON-TECHNICAL BOOKS OF GENERAL 
INTEREST TO STUDENTS OF SOCIAL 
AND SEX HYGIENE AND TO 
MOTHERS. 
Talks on Sex Education—Oswald, C. J. Withrow. 
A most excellent book to be turned over to boys 
or girls after having been read by their parents. 
F. D. Goodchild Co., Toronto, Canada. 
Plain Facts or Sex Hygiene. 
Sex Problems Solved. 
Facts for the Married. 
Confidential Chats with Boys. 
Confidential Chats with Girls. 
—Dr. Wm. Lee Howard. 
These books are from the pen of a scholar and 
are eminently superior to many books published 
on Sex Hygiene. They deserve careful reading. 
Edward J. Clode, New York, Publishers. 
The Sexual Science Series—Dr. A. A. Phillip, M. C., 
C. M., late Medical Officer of Public Health, 
Northern Division, Scotland, and H. R. Murray. 
Sexual Science. 
Knowledge a Young Woman Should Have. SOCIAL AND SEX HYGIENE 
115 
Knowledge a Young Wife Should Have. 
Knowledge a Young Husband Should Have. 
Knowledge a Young Man Should Have. 
This series is somewhat advanced, yet is written 
in a vein that may be understood by all. The five 
volumes deserve a place in the library of every 
student. Parents may read them to advantage. 
David McKay, Publishers, Philadelphia. 
Three Gifts of Life—Nellie M. Smith. 
Splendid for young girls of 14 and over. Dodd 
Mead & Co., New York. 
Sex Education—Bigelow. 
Macmillan Co., New York. 
Womanhood and Its Development—Luella Z. Runnell. 
A most excellent book for the young woman. 
Burton Publishing Co., Kansas City, Mo. 
The Way Life Begins—B. C. and V. M. Cady. 
American Social Hygiene Association, New 
York. 
Keeping in Condition—Harry H. Moore. 
Macmillan Co., New York. 
The Rational Sex Life for Men—M. G. Exner. 
Association Press, New York. 
From Youth to Manhood—Winfield Scott Hall. 
Association Press, New York. 
The Dynamic of Manhood—Gulick. 
Association Press, New York. 
The Nurse and the Knight (pamphlet.) 
This most excellent pamphlet had a great deal 
to do with keeping many men straight during the 
war. Association (Y. M. C. A.) Press, New York. 116 
BOOKS TO READ ON 
The Right of the Child to Be Well Born. 
—Geo. E. Dawson. 
Funk & Wagnalls, New York. 
The Third Great Plague—Stokes. 
A discussion of syphilis written for the layman. 
W. B. Saunders, Philadelphia. 
“Some Inf’mation for Mother,” or How One Man 
Answered the Questions of a Child About Repro- 
duction—Jno. Palmer Gavit. 
Splendid. New York Evenging Post Co., New 
York. 15 cents. 
Slavery of Prostitution—Maud E. Miner. 
An excellent study of prostitution from the pen 
of an authority. Macmillan Co., New York. 
Today’s World Problem in Disease Prevention. 
—Stokes. 
May be had free from U. S. Public Health 
Service, Washington, D. C. 
’’he Hidden Menace—Lee A. Stone, M. D. 
Free distribution. Burton Publishing Co., Kan- 
sas City, Mo., and from the author, 1416 North 
Dearborn Street, Chicago. 
An Open Talk with Mothers and Fathers, Presenting 
Some Present Day Problems in Social Hygiene. 
—Lee Alexander Stone, M. D. 
A frank discussion of the problems involving 
the teaching of Social Hygiene and Sex Truths; 
Author’s address, 1416 North Dearborn Street, 
Chicago, 111. Burton Pub. Co., Kansas City, Mo. 
The Task of Social Hygiene—Havelock Ellis. 
This book should be read by every person in- 
terested in race improvement. The very best SOCIAL AND SEX HYGIENE 
117 
book on the subject. Houghton Mifflin & Co., 
Boston. 
The Woman of the Streets—Lee A. Stone, M. D. 
Burton Publishing Co., Kansas City. 
The Moral and Healthy Community—An Appeal to 
the Clergy. 
Free from Wisconsin State Board of Health, 
Madison, Wis. 
A Step Forward to Better Citizenship. 
—Lee A. Stone, M. D. 
Free from Wisconsin State Board of Health, 
Madison, Wis. 
Racial Efficiency—Lee A. Stone, M. D. 
Free from Wisconsin State Board of Health, 
Madison, Wis. 
God’s Children—Emma Lieber. 
From Girlhood to Womanhood—Emma Lieber. 
Free From Indiana State Board of Health—Indian- 
apolis, Ind.