104 TABOO AND GENETICS 



immediately begin to be considered. A poor 

 race-contribution, not worth paying for, would 

 certainly be prevented as far as possible. 



Some well-meaning radical writers mistakenly 

 suppose that the emancipation of women means 

 the withdrawal by the group of any interest in, 

 or any attempt to regulate, such things as 

 the hours and conditions of female labour. That 

 would simply imply that the group takes no 

 interest in reproduction — in its own survival. 

 For if the group does not make some equation 

 for the greater burden of reproduction upon 

 women, the inevitable result will be that that 

 particular service will not be rendered by those 

 most desirable to be preserved. 



Given the fundamental assumption that the 

 group is to survive — to be perpetuated by the 

 one possible means — if it withdraws all solicitude 

 about the handicap this entails to women as a 

 whole, introducing a spirit of laissez-faire com- 

 petition between men and women, the women 

 with sense enough to see the point will not 

 encumber themselves with children. For each 

 one of these who has no children, some other 

 woman must have six instead of three. And 

 some people encourage this in the name of 

 democracy ! 



The most involved problems must inevitably 

 centre around the women who, to quote Mrs. 

 HoUingworth, " vary from the mode," but are 



