Atlanta Georgian. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1912-1939, 1913-07-01
Written for The Georgian
By REV. DR.. JOHN E. WHITE,
Pastor Second Baptist Church.

The feature most apparent IS
the masculine helplessness in
front Of it.
There are a few Mrs. Parting
tons of the male variety, but not
many.
A few gentlemen are sitting in
the middle of the road "cussin,"
but most of the gentlemen are
waiting to see the procession in a
quizzical frame of mind. Bye and
bye the majority of men will fol-
low the illustrious example of the
leader Of the French Commune.
He rushed into a restaurant, but
was scarcely seated before he
leaped up excitedly, looking at the
procession of the mob passing
the door.
Let me 60" he cried. The
people are moving. am their
leader and I must follow them"
Feminism and Suffragism.
The air will clear before the
masculine mind somewhat when
men understand that the woman
movement is a wider and deeper
matter than the woman suffrage
movement. Most men and many
women confound them.
The noisy agitation of the suf-
fragette is really an embarras-
ment to those profound expoa
nents of feminism who fear the
neglect of the larger causes of the
female advance through over
emphasis on one of its phases.
Some pronounced feminists
have ventured to question wheth-
er the agitation for votes for
women should not be postponed
until the woman movement shall
reach its second stage.
The real movement, however,
will not suffer serious arrest
through the excessive suffragism
of the hour. 1t will rather be
promoted by the divisions it is
provoking in the ranks of the
women themselves.
The suffragist movement
among women is to be encour-
aged. The assertive woman,
whether for suffrage or against
suffrage. Is the interpreting fact
and the charging force upon
which the movement depends.
The women who are zealously
organized against votes for wom-
en- are merely feminists in con-
ira action and their influence Is
manifestly stimulating to the con-
sciousness Of female selfhood,
which is the handspring of the
woman movement.
What Women Want.
When the opportunity Of the
ballot is accorded TO women, as II
will be, the main object Of their
movement will only be in process
of achievement. What women
really desire is the removal of the
arbitrary hxedness of woman's
sphere.
The protest is not against the
unkindness Of man, but against
the assumption that she is or.
dained to be a creature Of patron
age. 1t is not against d rough
and cruel boss she revolts, but
against the idea of having a boss
at all.
The woman movement aims for
the leveling of the sexes. It is
the uprising Of personality. 1t is
the challenge of a benevolent des-
potism.
The question is not that wom-
ans lot is bitter and hard, but
that she is condemned to q state
of favored subsection. The read
justment to be achieved is mental
rather than material.
The situation of woman as 70
comfort is fair enough. II is the
attitude of the social mind which
regards her as a sexual non-eoual
that is the trouble.
1t is against the tradition Of
masculine ownership that the
woman movement makes war.
The elemental principle of indi-
vidualism is at work.
l predict that the time will
come when the stigma of inferior
sex caste is removed and women
viii of their own election sacred
~ cherish all those natural func-
tons and exclusive responsibiIi-
ties which mark her distinction
as mother wife and sister. but it
Will be on new basis-the basis
of individualism and freedom.