goal of every girl, but as thousands of
girls cannot marry, our stupid social customs condemn them either to
a life of celibacy or prostitution. Human nature asserts itself
regardless of all laws, nor is there any plausible reason why nature
should adapt itself to a perverted conception of morality.

Society considers the sex experiences of a man as attributes of his
general development, while similar experiences in the life of a woman
are looked upon as a terrible calamity, a loss of honor and of all
that is good and noble in a human being. This double standard of
morality has played no little part in the creation and perpetuation
of prostitution. It involves the keeping of the young in absolute
ignorance on sex matters, which alleged "innocence," together with an
overwrought and stifled sex nature, helps to bring about a state of
affairs that our Puritans are so anxious to avoid or prevent.

Not that the gratification of sex must needs lead to prostitution; it
is the cruel, heartless, criminal persecution of those who dare
divert from the beaten paths, which is responsible for it.

Girls, mere children, work in crowded, over-heated rooms ten to
twelve hours daily at a machine, which tends to keep them in a
constant over-excited sex state. Many of these girls have no home or
comforts of any kind; therefore the street or some place of cheap
amusement is the only means of forgetting their daily routine. This
naturally brings them into close proximity with the other sex. It is
hard to say which of the two factors brings the girl's over-sexed
condition to a climax, but it is certainly the most natural thing
that a climax should result. That is the first step toward
prostitution. Nor is the girl to be held responsible for it. On the
contrary, it is altogether the fault of society, the fault of our
lack of understanding, of our lack of appreciation of life in the
making; especially is it the criminal fault of our moralists, who
condemn a girl for all eternity, because she has gone from the "path
of virtue"; that is, because her first sex experience has taken place
without the sanction of the Church.

The girl feels herself a complete outcast, with the doors of home and
society closed in her face. Her entire training and tradition is
such that the girl herself feels depraved and fallen, and therefore
has no ground to stand upon, or any hold that will lift her up,
instead of dragging her down. Thus society creat