It is a cold day for us poor women now, in Canada. We
have the vote. We can sit in Parliament, on juries, on
boards or commissions, or anywhere else where there are
seats; and when there aren't any seats, we can have seats
put in; and where the seats are hard, we can cushion them.
Every door is open; every bar is down; and now, though many
things are wrong, we have no one to blame—and it is
embarrassing!
It was so pleasant to be able to trace through our
votelessness the cause of all social ills. We knew it was
because we had no vote that a double standard of morals
existed, unequal pay, unequal property rights. We traced it
all back to our "political disability".
. . . Women have accomplished so much in the last few
years that they have firmly established their humanity. They
have become people. They are persons, not only 'in pains and
penalties', but also 'in rights and privileges'.
The trench has been taken, but it has to be held, and
that is sometimes the more difficult achievement. Sex
prejudice is not dead. It is still hard for some to believe
that those who are physically weaker may be equal in
intelligence. But there will come, as a result of this new
freedom for women, a great harvest of women writers. The
long, long thoughts of many weary years will be set down as
travellers who have climbed the hill rest upon the summit
and discuss the devious and windy paths by which they have
come. While they made the ascent, they naturally had not
much to say. There will be books written from a new angle
and a new method of reasoning, and surprising may be the
conclusions reached. A new era is upon us in the world of
literature!
Reprinted by permission of
Women's Press. |