I’d like to share a very modest proposal, written in a book of”Essays in Socialism” back in 1907 by one E. Belford Bax. The author opens by stating the general principle that “equality before the law, as it is termed, is the first condition of liberty”.
However, he finds the judicial system to be remarkably biased in favour of women, quoting various examples in support of his proposition:
“From the beginning of the nineteenth century, of course, whilst flogging, the tread-mill, and other brutal forms of punishment have been retained for male offenders, they have been abolished for females…”
—
“Mr. Labouchere made it his business in Truth to hunt up every obscure case of girl-flogging in the country, and to trumpet it forth in his journal as though it were a crime compared to which common murder were a venial affair. But now, had Mr. Labouchere one word for the brutal floggings of boys, not by private individuals, but in national institutions, such as reformatories and training ships? Not one. What he expressly denounced was not flogging, but girl-flogging.”
—
“A little while ago fifty women refused to carry out an order made by the Governor of Wormwood Scrubbs for bringing coke into the laundry. If men had refused to obey any regulation they would most probably have got the lash till they yielded. But what was the lot of these women. The Governor at once politely cancelled his regulation and ‘order was restored’!! Such is the farce of penal discipline in the case of women.”
And so, he demands equality for all.
“I am met by this argument – ‘Are you not in favour of abolishing all forms of brutal punishment?’ I say yes, in common with most Socialists and Democrats, I am… It is then argued: – ‘But surely the abolition of these things in the case of women is better than nothing’; it is at least a step. My answer is that in the first place it is not a step, but generally a shirking of the whole question.”
Indeed. And how refreshing to read such a forward-thinking feminist tract!
I have always believed that flogging females should be accepted around the world. Tied to a whipping post the naughty woman should be stripped completely nude below the waist, then given 25 lashes of a birchrod, cane or whip upon her bare bottom. One such candidate that I would wish to have flogged in this humiliating manner is Sarah Palin.
I never realised that Wormwood Scrubbs had such a large problem with the smuggling of cocaine at that time.
It always amazes me how bloodthirsty the ruling British classes could be right through to the inter-war period.
@Master Retep: This probably refers to the coal product rather than cocaine, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coke_(fuel)