「既婚」女性が経済的独立を獲得する方法
もちろん,女性の主張(cause)をとりあげる政党を見つけることは,少々困難である。なぜなら,(英国)保守党は家庭を愛し,(英国)労働党は(男性)労働者を愛しているからである。にもかかわらず,今や女性が選挙民の多数派(注:majority 過半数)を占めているので(注:now that 今や~なので),女性が永久に,甘んじて背景にひっこんでいるとは考えられない。もしも,(彼女たち)女性の主張が認められたなばら,家族(制度)に甚大な影響を及ぼしそうである。 既婚女性が経済的独立を獲得するには,異なる方法(やり方/道)が二つある。一つは,結婚前に従事していたのと同じ種類の仕事を続ける方法(道)である。これには,子供を他人の世話にまかせることが含まれているので,託児所(crechesや保育所が大幅に拡張されることになるだろう。その論理的な帰結は,父親ばかりではなく,母親も,子供の心理に占めていた重要性が全て取り除かれるということになるだろう。 もう一つ(の方法)は,幼い子供をかかえた女性が,我が子の世話に専念するという条件で,国から賃金(手当)をもらうことである。もちろん,この方法だけでは十分ではなく,子供がある程度大きくなったら女性は普通の仕事に復帰することができるという条項を付け加える必要があるだろう。しかし,この方法には,女性が一人の男性に屈辱的に頼ることなしにみずから子供の世話をしてやれるという利点がある。 そして,この方法を採用する場合は 今日ではますますそういう状況になっているが,次のことを認めることになる。(即ち)子供を生むことは,以前は,ただ単に,性的満足の結果にすぎなかったが,いまは慎重に企てられる仕事であること,そして,その仕事は,親の利益というよりは,むしろ国(家)の利益に帰するものである以上,父母に重い負担をかける代わりに,国(家)がその費用を持つべきだ,ということである。 この最後の点は,家族手当(family allowances)を支持するということで認められつつあるが,子供に対する支給(養育手当)は,母親だけになされるべきだ,ということはまだ認められていない。けれども,労働者階級のフェミニズムは,このことが認められ,また法律に具体化されるところまで成長すると想定してよい,と私は考えている。 |
Chapter XV: The Family and the State, n.5There is another powerful force which is working in the direction of the elimination of the father, and this is the desire of women for economic independence. The women who have been most politically vocal hitherto have been unmarried women, but this state of affairs is likely to be temporary. The wrongs of married women are at the moment much more serious than those of unmarried women. The teacher who marries is treated injust the same way as the teacher who lives in open sin. Even public maternity doctors, if they are women, have to be unmarried. The motive for all this is not that married women are supposed to be unfit for the work, nor is it that there is any legal barrier to their employment ; on the contrary, a law was passed not many years ago explicitly laying it down that no woman should suffer any disability through marriage. The whole motive for the non-employment of married women is a masculine desire to preserve economic power over them. It is not to be supposed that women will submit indefinitely to such tyranny. It is, of course, a little difficult to find a party to take up their cause, since the Conservatives love the home, and the Labour Party loves the working man. Nevertheless, now that women are a majority of the electorate, it is not to be supposed that they will submit for ever to being kept in the background. Their claims, if recognized, are likely to have a profound effect upon the family. There are two different ways in which married women might acquire economic independence. One is that of remaining employed in the kind of work that they were engaged upon before marriage. This involves giving their children over to the care of others, and would lead to a very great extension of creches and nursery schools, the logical consequence of which would be the elimination of the mother as well as of the father from all importance in the child's psychology. The other method would be that women with young children should receive a wage from the State on condition of devoting themselves to the care of their children. This method would, of course, be not alone adequate, and would need to be supplemented by provisions enabling women to return to ordinary work when their children ceased to be quite young. But it would have the advantage of enabling women to care for their children themselves without degrading dependence upon an individual man. And it would recognize, what in these days is more and more the case, that having a child, which was formerly a mere consequence of sexual gratification, is now a task deliberately undertaken, which, since it redounds to the advantage of the State rather than of the parents, should be paid for by the State, instead of entailing a grave burden upon the father and mother. This last point is being recognized in the advocacy of family allowances, but it is not yet recognized that the payment for children should be made to the mother alone. I think we may assume, however, that working-class feminism will grow to the point where this is recognized, and embodied in the law. |