Honolulu star-bulletin. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu, Hawaii]) 1912-2010, 1917-12-05
FALSE PRIDE.
BY DOROTHY DIX
The Worlds Highest Paid Woman
Writer.

49, writer.
- HE reason that SO many women
{ are failures 10 because so many
: - business women are ashamed Of
, their jobs.
Lately / have been thrown with a
woman who is well born and well edu
Gated, and until two years ago moved
IN fashionable social circles. Then
her husband suddenly died. and as
they had spent everything he made IN
! keeping up with their rich friends, she
was left destitute.
She studied stenography and was
given a place in a business office by
q man who had often been her guest
IN her palmy days, but instead of be-
ing proud that she had enough intelll'
gence, courage and independence to
/. strike out for herself instead of beeom-
ing a dependent upon the grudging
charity OF others, this silly woman was
Inundated to death because she had
20 go to work.
I think / have never seen anything
more pathetic than her false pride, a
pride that made her boast continually
OF having known this or that member
Of the four hundred and Of having
spent a week end at some million
aires palatial country home, or taken
trip on some trust magnate's yacht.
It made you want to weep to hear her
recoun. her past social triumphs In
one breadth Rnd in the. next wall be-
cause most OF her former friends AMI
acquaintances had dropped her as IL
she had been suddely smitten with the
laprosy as soon as she had become
poor and needy. .--..
This woman had no interest in her
work, no ambition to excel In 1t. Every
particle of brain and energy she had
was concentrated on hanging on to
what little social position she had left
and keeping up the fiction that she
had taken up stenography as a fad to
occupy her thoughts and keep her
from grieying too much over the loss
81 her husband, instead Of having
taken 1t up as q business by which to
make bread and butter. .'~<-
This poor lady's case stirred my
deepest compassion, not because fate
Ind forced her to become producer
instead Of just a waster and q spender
Tor believe that none but those who
work have any excuse for living but
because her false pride made the way
90 hard for her and doomed her to
ultimate failure. IS
She missed the thrill ana Joy of In.
dependence because she was ashamed
to be known as working woman.
She missed that deep satisfying exal-
fation that the craftsman has In good
work done because she despised the
labor at which she toiled. She missed
the sincere friendship and companion
ship that she might have had among
her fellow workers because she
scorned them as beings of inferior so
cial caste. She skunk into her bust
ness office as II she had been going to
some disgraceful rendezvous and were
trying 70 escape recognition, and she
tortured herself wondering what scme
brainless cad she had once known
would be saying Of her.
= Is It any wonder that such woman
holds her place only on suffrance
that will soon be worn threadbare? Or.
that her work is bad? Or that she
win nevera get dollar more salary,
or be advanced to any higher place?
No human being ever did work well
who was ashamed of 1t: It is only
pride that puts the punch in any
labor that makes it great. TO make q
success, you have to believe that the
thing you are doing is the finest and
best thing in the world and that you
are the luckiest person alive to have
been elected to dc It.
People complain that women's work
Is 90 often bad work. This Is true,
and their work is bad because they
are ashamed of 1t and have no inter
est In 1t, but the fault does not lie
with the individual woman so much
as with the false teaching of which
women have been the unfortunate VIC
tins.
Men have had the ideal OF indeperl.
dence bred into them. Men have been
taught that work was glorious, that is
was shameful thing for q man to-
mass his life In an idle round Of
Measure, and that the most admired
i,5an was the man who did his work
hest. That is why men boast Of be.
inr lawyers, doctors, merchants, manu-.
facturers, mechanics.
on the contrary, women have been
taught that IL 1t isn't actually dis
s-scefnl for q woman to work 1t is at