Paths of Loneliness: The Individual Isolated in Modern Society 9780231887762

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PATHS

OF

LONELINESS

PATHS

OF

LONELINESS

The Individual Isolated in Modern Society

by MARGARET MARY WOOD

NEW COLUMBIA

YORK

UNIVERSITY

PRESS

Copyright © 1953 Columbia University Press, New York Columbia Paperback Edition 196O Second printing in Columbia Paperback Edition, December, Manufactured in the United States of America

IQ6O

To Marjorie and her daughter ¡Catherine Ann a niece and a great-niece in whom I am well pleased

PREFACE Paths of Loneliness has been written in the hope that it will bring more sharply into the foreground of social thought the problem of the individual who feels unrelated to others of his own group. That this problem of isolation merits special study is shown by the frequency with which we meet it both among the people whom we know and the people in books. "The one alone," the man who has no second, has long been a favorite subject for poetry and fiction. Nor has he been overlooked by the social scientist. Although only a few specific studies of aloneness have been made, there is a wealth of material in which the subject has been given some incidental consideration by writers who were primarily interested in the pursuit of other objectives. The fact that the loneliness of the individual who feels unrelated to his own group has not emerged clearly as a problem for sociological study, as have the problems of the stranger, the outsider, and the marginal man, cannot be attributed to neglect to note its existence and to appreciate its significance. It is harder to discover and evaluate the factors, both social and personal, that contribute to isolation within a group than it is to judge the degree of isolation of an outsider who is not a member of the group. In a society in which loneliness to some degree is the portion of all, the distinction between the isolated individual and one who is not is not easily made. There is no ready definition of isolation, in the sense with which this study is concerned, that is at once broad enough to be inclusive and exact enough to be meaningful. Sociologists interested in the problem of aloneness have been concerned for the most part with the more general implications of "in-

viii

PREFACE

g r o u p " isolation for the welfare and solidarity of the group. Psychologists, on the other hand, have been more specifically concerned with the effects of this isolation u p o n individuals. Significant contributions have been made in both areas, b u t this knowledge has not as yet been adequately synthesized. Furthermore, other factors which are rooted in the culture of the group, and therefore lie within the province of the anthropologist, must be considered. T h u s , the problem of the individual isolated within the group requires the integration of contributions drawn f r o m all three sources—sociology, psychology, and anthropology. In this book, an attempt has been made to achieve this integration. T h e materials used in the discussion have been largely drawn f r o m studies in these three fields in which different aspects of the problem of aloneness have been considered. These materials have been f u r t h e r supplemented by the author's own experience a n d observations of people in a wide range of isolating situations. T o interpret and synthesize this sizable body of data drawn from diverse sources has been in a sense a pioneering project, a n d the author is aware that as such it may be unfinished in parts. It is hoped, however, that it will nevertheless serve a useful purpose, just as the old stone fences of the New England countryside, loosely built of stones picked u p to clear the land, are serviceable despite their roughness and the gaps between the stones. It is hoped that Paths of Loneliness will help the lonely individual to understand his problem, to see that it is not unique, b u t that loneliness is a characteristic of the society of our time. It is hoped f u r t h e r that it will help him to see the direction in which the solution to his problem lies. For purposes of presentation the material has been organized into two parts, although somewhat arbitrarily, since the line of demarcation is not always a sharp one. Part I deals with m e n and "the sundering powers," as Matthew Arnold

PREFACE

ix

has termed the forces in society which tend to isolate one man from another. Conceived more concretely, these powers are those social processes—individuation and competition are examples—which have become accentuated in modern society, and the operation of which, when related to other factors in a situation, seriously handicap many persons in their efforts to establish desired relationships. Part II analyzes some of the ways in which lonely individuals react, either consciously or unconsciously, to the isolating processes in their efforts to relate themselves to others. This work was begun under a grant from the Columbia University Council for Research in the Social Sciences, and the author wishes to thank the Council for this assistance, without which the study could not have been made. In particular she wishes to thank Professor Robert M. Maclver for his unflagging interest in the problem throughout the entire course of its development, and for his helpful counsel. T h e author wishes to acknowledge her gratitude to G. P. Putnam's Sons and Roy Chapman Andrews for permission to quote from Roy Chapman Andrews, Ends of the Earth; to the University of Chicago Press for Nels Anderson, The Hobo; to the Macmillan Company for Harry Best, Blindness and the Blind in the United States, and Robert Michels, "Authority," in the Encyclopaedia of the Social Sciences; to the American Journal of Psychiatry for Anton T . Boisen, "Personality Changes and Upheavals Arising Out of a Sense of Personal Failure"; to Henry Holt and Company for Perry Burgess, Who Walk Alone, and Robert Frost, " T h e Death of the Hired Man," from Complete Poems of Robert Frost; to the National Association for Mental Health, Inc., for Albert Deutsch, "Social Factors in Psychiatric Progress," in Mental Hygiene; to Appleton-Century-Crofts, Inc., for Julian Duguid, Green Hell; to Harcourt, Brace and Company for Oliver Wendell Holmes, Collected Legal Papers, and Vilfredo

*

PREFACE

Pareto, The Mind and Society; to the Yale University Press for Walter Addison Jayne, Healing Gods of Ancient Civilizations; to Doubleday and Company and Mrs. George Bambridge for Rudyard Kipling, "Tommy," in Departmental Ditties and Ballads and Barrack-Room Ballads, and Rudyard Kipling, "The Winners," from Songs from Books; to The Viking Press, Inc., for Emil Ludwig, The Nile: The Life Story of a River; to the estate of Edgar Lee Masters for Edgar Lee Masters, "John Hancock Otis," from Spoon River Anthology; and to Harper's Magazine for " D j o i r ^ River," by John W. Vandercook. M. M. W. Mississippi Columbus, December,

State College for Mississippi 1952

Women

CONTENTS PART

I: OF MEN AND THE SUNDERING I. The Uncompanion'd

Way

.

II. "Single Men in Barricks" III. Men of a Different IV. Men without

.

.

. .

. .

Generation

Work

3 20 37 60

V. Men in Great Place

76

VI. Men beyond the Pale

95

VII.

PART

POWERS

Victims of the Evil Eye

II: OF MEN AGAINST VIII. IX.

MORES

The Far-Wanderer The

Lonely Egotist

X. The Authoritarian XI.

THE

.112

159

Escapist.

Who Cannot Mend His Own Case

XII.

135

The Brave and Heroical.

. 200 214

CONCLUSION

223

BIBLIOGRAPHY

225

PART

I: OF MEN

AND

THE

SUNDERING

POWERS

CHAPTER

I

The Uncompanion'd Way Matthew Arnold, musing over the death of a pet canary, Matthias, with a poet's discernment reaches the heart of the problem to which this book is dedicated. Bidding the tiny Matthias, whom he feels that he has never really known, to fare for ever well "nor fear to stray down the uncompanion'd way," Arnold goes on to say that other companions more unknown than birds live beside us, but alone. If what birds suffer escapes our notice, so also does the human suffering at our side. Human longings, human fears, Miss our eyes and miss our ears. Little helping, wounding much Dull of heart, and hard of touch, Brother man's despairing sign Who may trust us to divine? Who assure us, sundering powers Stand not 'twixt his soul and ours? —"Poor Matthias" That we are often blind to the emotional needs of others, as they in turn are blind to ours, no one can question. T h e accent in modern society is on aloneness. As individuals many of us feel alone, unrelated to others, unable to communicate with those about us, unable to feel at one with them. But why? What are the "sundering powers" which stand between us and our fellow men? Why is it that in a world in which modern transportation and communication have brought us faceto-face with our fellows throughout the world we should often feel emotionally and spiritually alone? What is there in us, or in the society of our time, that makes of each of us a solitary

1

THE UNCOMPANION'D WAY

individual, separate and apart, alone, yet needing others and needed by them? T h e questions are familiar, but the nature of the sundering powers is still elusive. A n extensive literature treats of isolation both between groups and between the individual and others of his group. Each of these two general types of isolation, which it is important to distinguish, has been scrutinized by social scientists— sociologists in particular—poets, and novelists. T h e great cleavages of race, religion, nationality, class, and caste that separate men into groups more or less isolated from one another have been studied systematically and at great length. Since William Graham Sumner's classic "we-group" and "others-group" distinction in his Folkways,1 sociologists have recognized conflict between these groups, with its accompanying isolation, as a subject of special concern for their investigations. T h e members of the we- or in-group in Sumner's dichotomy have some relation to each other which draws them together and differentiates them from all outsiders or othersgroups. T h e insiders in a we-group share common interests from which they derive a sense of belonging together. T h e i r relation to each other is one of comradeship, loyalty, and peace. T h e i r relation to out-groups, in contrast, is one of hostility, war, and plunder, except, as Sumner is careful to point out, in so far as agreements have modified it. In modern, highly complex societies, mutual adjustments and the overlapping of one group by another tend to make the discernment of in- and out-group lines of demarcation more difficult than it is in the simpler, more primitive societies with which Sumner dealt. T h e distinction is a valid one in modern societies, however; differences in we- and othersgroup relations and the problems that they present can be distinguished in spite of the complexity of present-day social structures. For example, conflict between groups, if acute, i Sumner, Folkways, pp. I S - I J .

THE

UNCOMPANION'D

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5

takes the form of warfare. Conflict within a group, on the other hand, manifests itself in rebellion and crime. T h e process is an isolating one in both cases, but marked differences in the attitudes involved make it essential to distinguish these two types of conflict. Similarly, when competition and contravention occur between groups already separated by recognized social barriers, they present problems different from those arising when the same processes occur within a group ordinarily characterized by relationships of understanding and cooperation. T h e attitudes involved are not alike, and in consequence the effects upon the individuals isolated by these processes are different. T h e individual who meets opposition in his efforts to gain recognition and response from an out-group has the alternative of withdrawing to his own group to seek these satisfactions, whereas the individual rejected by his own group lacks this means of attaining emotional security. He does not have a strong line of defenses in his rear to fall back upon. There is no one to cover his retreat in good order and with honor. He stands alone. His position is more vulnerable than that of the outsider. His loneliness has a greater poignancy, a deeper, sharper thrust than the loneliness of the outsider, keen though the outsider's suffering may be. Loneliness readily lends itself to sentimental musings. T h e inner yearning of the lonely one for understanding and affection is a recurrent theme in poetry. 2 Fiction also abounds with moving descriptions of loneliness that the reader cannot forget if he would. Great novels of loneliness such as The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Silas Marner, Lord Jim, and Ethan Frome leave an indelible impression on the reader's mind. Personal records such as biographies, journals, diaries, and letters also frequently reveal a great sense of loneliness. In 2 See Sickels, The Gloomy Egotist, for a scholarly discussion of loneliness as a theme in poetry.

6

THE UNCOMPANION'D

WAY

comparison with these literary sources, research studies that deal with the problem of loneliness, either specifically or incidentally, are of special value for the scientific objectivity of their findings. For an appreciation of the finer nuances of the problem, however, it is often necessary to turn to poetry, fiction, and biography. T h e specific sociological literature on loneliness, or aloneness, although limited to comparatively few research and analytical studies, is significant in that it divests the problem of sentimentality and brings it into the foreground as a problem for objective study. Certain fundamental conclusions which constitute an important taking-off point for new studies in the field are also reached. A l l of the studies recognize the relativity of the problem; all distinguish between physical and psychic contacts and emphasize the fact that isolation need not be physical, that in most cases it is psychic; and all recognize the importance of the individual's personality traits and attitudes in determining the mental and emotional effects of his isolation. T h e study of loneliness has been approached in different ways. A century and a half ago, Dr. J. G . Zimmerman, one of the leading physicians of his time in Europe, thoughtfully debated the question "whether it is easier to live virtuously in Society or in Solitude" in a treatise quaintly entitled Solitude, or the Effect of Occasional Retirement on the Mind, the Heart, and General Society, in Exile, in Old Age, and on the Bed of Death. A strong advocate of the advantages to b e secured from periods of rational or voluntary retirement, Dr. Zimmerman was careful nevertheless to point o u t at length the disadvantages of irrational or unnatural solitude. H e recognized clearly that the effects of isolation are in a large measure dependent upon the individual's mental and emotional attitudes, thus foreshadowing the discoveries of psychoanalysis and psychiatry.

THE

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7

Like Dr. Zimmerman, Maurice H. Small was also interested in the psychical relations of society and solitude but adopted a different approach. 3 T o discover the factors leading to a solitary life, he studied in a general way the writings, biographies, and autobiographies of some five hundred solitary persons, and studied in detail those of one hundred noted recluses. His outstanding conclusion was that barely a dozen suffered neglcct and loneliness as the result of entertaining ideas too advanced for their generation. In all other cases the basic factor was an extreme egoism, the failure to realize that in society the opinions of no one person can be absolute. Another important discovery presented in Small's study is the presence of two general types among the solitary egoists: the intensively subjective who flee from others because they feel powerless to compete but who nevertheless crave sympathy and companionship, and the intensely bold who are selfapproving, self-assertive, irritable, and able to battle alone if men refuse to give what they ask. More recently the problem of isolation has been approached mathematically by means of the new sociometric method developed by Dr. J . L . Moreno to study the amount of organization within a social group. 4 By means of sociograms which show the number and kinds of relationships in which each of the members of a selected group participates, cases of isolated individuals in the group are revealed. For instance, when the method was applied at the New York State Training School for Girls at Hudson, Dr. Moreno found that there was one set of children who were not attached to any group, either of adults or of other children, and thus were in a sociometric position which he believes to mark the beginning of isolation for many individuals who eventually either crystallize apart from both »"On Some Psychical Relations of Society and Solitude," The Pedagogical Seminary, VII (April, 1900), 13-69. * For a description of the sociometric method, see Moreno, YVho Shall Survive7

8

THE

UNCOMPANIOND

WAY

groups, as in schizophrenic isolation, or develop an attitude of aggression. The sociometric method also confirms the fact, if further confirmation is necessary, that social isolation is a question of the absence of desired relationships rather than the absence of contacts.5 The girls at Hudson all had many of the same contacts, but not all succeeded in establishing equally satisfying relationships. T o a greater or a less degree the situation found at Hudson is repeated throughout modern society. Isolation in the presence of contacts is one of the noticeable characteristics of our time. One meets examples of it on all sides. T o some degree a sense of aloneness is common to all. It cannot be due solely to personality defects; isolating conditions in modern society must bring it about. The paramount question, therefore, is to discover what these conditions are. Modern man's loneliness in society is the central theme of three recent studies of distinction: Erich Fromm's Escape from Freedom, David Riesman's The Lonely Crowd, and Paul Halmos's Solitude and Privacy. According to Erich Fromm's thesis, modern man, freed from the bonds of a preindividualistic society which, though limiting his self-expression, had given him the security of a sense of belonging to the group, now finds himself alone and anxious in a world in which he is unable to establish new and emotionally satisfying social relationships. Similarly, David Riesman in The Lonely Crowd calls attention to the fact that the middle-class urban American of today never really comes close to others or to himself. T h e pressures of the highly competitive, individualistic society of today tend to make him exceptionally sensitive to the actions and wishes of his "peer-groups," and to inhibit his own spon» Good discussions of the concept of social isolation as "a condition in which certain bonds with one's fellows are lacking" may be found in a number of sociology textbooks, among them Park and Burgess, Introduction to the Science of Sociology; Duncan, Backgrounds of Sociology; and Wiese, Systematic Sociology.

THE

UNCOMPANION'D

WAY

9

taneity and creativeness. In his anxiety for the approval of others he sacrifices his own individual autonomy and social freedom. A conformist, he is fearful that he does not measure up to the role expected of him by other conformists—each of whom, if he but realized it, is isolated from all the others by the same fear. Paul Halmos's inquiry into the problem of social isolation also emphasizes man's need for social approval. It is man's biological nature to be "other-directed" and to be dependent on the primary group's attitude toward him, Halmos contends. Loneliness, with its related problems, is the result of the frustration of man's biosocial needs by the processes of desocialization in modern society, that is, by the reduction of modes and opportunities for spontaneous and unreserved social participation. These theories are provocative of further questions: Precisely in what ways does freedom bring about the isolation of the individual? What are the processes in an individualistic society which handicap the individual in his efforts to relate himself to others? In order to find answers, the social processes and relationships which characterize modern society must be scrutinized. T h e present age is in many respects one of transition. It is an age in which old ties have been discarded before the new were ready to be assumed. T h e strong authoritarian family and religious relationships which integrated the simpler society of the medieval Age of Faith lapsed before a new integration at a higher level of rationality and personal expression had been achieved. In this interim situation various of the processes that characterize an increasingly complex society, such as individualization, differentiation, specialization, segregation, stratification, competition, and urbanization, have tended to become unduly isolating. T h e processes in themselves are normal. T h e y become abnormal only in the absence of an integrative principle or process strong enough

10

THE

UNCOMPANION'D

WAY

to offset their divisive effects. In modern society their operation holds both a promise and a threat: a promise of greater opportunities for self-realization on the one hand, and a threat of isolation on the other. How the scales are tipped for the individual depends upon the manner in which these processes are interrelated with other factors in his total situation. T h a t the scales are so often tipped towards isolation is one of the major social problems of our time. T o trace the conditions under which the social processes of a complex, highly organized society become dissociative and isolating, it is necessary to understand something of the nature of the social relationships in which the members of the society normally participate. Not all relationships are equally vulnerable to divisive processes, nor are they all equally essential for the satisfaction of the individual's emotional needs. Social relationships, as Theodore Abel points out in a discussion of their nature, tend to fall into two great categories: interest relations and sentiment relations. 8 In the category of interest relations the selection of contacts is made from the point of view of the service the relations may render toward the realization of some dominant interest; thus such relations are means to other ends rather than ends in themselves. For example, considerations of personality, group membership, and social status are of secondary importance in business relations, relations between employer and employee, lawyer and client, and so forth. On the other hand, relations in which sentiment takes the place of calculation are ends in themselves. T h e y comprise the great number of relationships in which the satisfaction of the desire for affectionate response is the main purpose. T h e y are characterized by intimacy, mutual attachment, and sympathy. Such, for example, are the relationships established in acquaintance, friendship, and love. • Theodore Abel, " T h e Significance of the Concept of the Consciousness of Kind," Social Forces, Oct., 1930, pp. 1-10.

THE

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11

Both sentiment and interest relations fulfill essential though different functions, and as a social being, the adult individual normally participates in a goodly n u m b e r of both types. Sentiment relations are more difficult to establish, however, than are interest relations, although, once well established, they tend to be more enduring. In their formative stages the sentiment relations are more susceptible to the dissociative processes of a complex, speeded-up society than are the interest relations. Interest relations are relatively easy to establish, and if less permanent than the sentiment relations, they are also less difficult to replace. T h e individual is rarely without some interest relations. It is the sentiment relations which are most often lacking in the isolation of modern society, although the part played by the absence of interest relations cannot be entirely disregarded. A n individual's interest and sentiment relations are sometimes merged in such a way that if his interest relations are broken his sentiment relations will also suffer. T h e f o l l o w i n g statement of an unemployed woman weaver quoted by the Pilgrim T r u s t Report is illustrative: " 'I loved the mills . . . I loved the company and the people and everything about them. T h e mill was home to me. I'd do anything in the w o r l d if I could get back to them.' " T T h e weaver's sentiment relations were so closely bound u p with her interest relations in her work in the mills that they were profoundly affected by the loss of her position. T h i s situation is frequently f o u n d among the unemployed and among older, reluctantly retired persons. T h e r e are also other isolating situations, notably in cases of solitary confinement, in which the individual suffers the loss of both types of relationships. In general, however, it is the sentiment relations which are most seriously affected. It is, moreover, the loss of relations of this type that the individual feels most keenly. ''Men Without Work, pp. 150-51.

12

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T h e sentiment relations are highly socialized. They tend to be more sensitive to the vicissitudes of human intercourse than are the more matter-of-fact interest relations. T h e values that they involve are more truly social than are the utilitarian objectives of the interest relations. The feelings and thoughts which the sentiment relations involve are distinctly social products. Sentiment, as Charles Horton Cooley defines it in his well-known use of the term, is socialized feeling. 8 Imagination and sympathetic contact with the minds of others distinguish it from merely instinctive feeling. Thus love is a sentiment, but lust is not; resentment is, but not rage; the fear of disgrace and ridicule is a sentiment, but animal terror is not; and so on. T h e sentiment relations cannot grow without sympathetic contact between men's minds. Relations of a purely interest type, on the other hand, can be entered into without this sympathetic contact. T h e objectives of the interest relations do not lie within the other person; they are merely obtained through him. He is not asked to give of himself emotionally as he is in the sentiment relationships. The interest relations are impersonal. As they are not motivated by the desire for response and understanding, they can develop in situations in which the sentiment relations are unable to take root. Indeed, in most situations in a complex society it would be impossible for the individual to provide for his physical needs without taking part in a number of interest relationships. T h e cooperation required in earning a livelihood is largely secured through these relationships. T h e interest relationships also serve other ends which are vital to man's struggle for existence in a highly competitive age. Therefore, except in rare instances, even the most isolated individuals in modern society participate in some interest relationships even though they may be entirely without sentiment relationships—except, perhaps, for memories. » Cooley, Social Organization, 1909 edition, p. 177.

THE

UNCOMPANION'D

WAY

1)

Important as the interest relations are for the individual, their possession alone will not prevent a sense of unrelatedness to others and of loneliness. T h e pleasant attributes of the feeling that one is part of the group—such as love, loyalty, appreciation, recognition, and encouragement—are rights and obligations of the sentiment relationships. T h e y are the elements which create the binding power of these relationships. T h e interest relationships also possess unifying strength, but at a different and less stable level. T h e rights and obligations stem more from the physical needs of the persons concerned than from their socialized feelings. T h e y are less highly individualized than the rights and obligations of the sentiment relations, and can be undertaken and dissolved more readily. T h e deeper sentiment relationships within the family and between friends, unless affected by untoward circumstances, are normally terminated only by the death of one of the participants. These relationships are more limited in number, however, than the interest relationships. In the small individualized modern family the obligations of affection and mutual helpfulness are generally extended only to the members of the immediate family group. If one of these intimate family relationships is lacking or is unsatisfactory, it is difficult to fill its place. Although childless people adopt children, the widowed remarry, and older men and women for whom the romantic years have passed marry for companionship, these methods of solving the problem of loneliness created by the absence of close family relationships are not always feasible. T h e number and kind of an individual's friendship relations are not determined for him as are his kinship relations. He chooses his own friends—if he has any in the real meaning of the term. Others may choose a person's companions for him, as is often the case with children, but such companions do not become his friends unless there is mutual understanding, liking, and response. Friendship grows from within. It

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cannot be willed from without. Each of the persons entering into the relationship must desire it or it fails of its true purpose. Its mainspring is the pleasure derived from the sympathetic meeting of congenial minds. The area of congeniality need not be large at first, but it should be an expanding one if the relationship is to grow in strength. Otherwise there is danger that initial contacts which promised to lead to closer, stronger ties may prove disappointing. T h e friendship relation, one of the strongest and most enduring of all after it has become firmly established, is peculiarly sensitive to dissociative processes in its formative stages. Thus it is often difficult for a person who is socially handicapped, either by his own personality traits or by isolating factors in his environment, to establish lasting friendships. His efforts to make friends never succeed in getting past these shoals into the deeper, calmer waters beyond. The initial relationships run afoul of his handicaps on their maiden voyage and are broken up in the maelstrom of dissociative processes which swirl about them. T h e obligations and rights of the friendship relation vary with the degree of its intimacy and strength. None of the qualities of love, loyalty, trust, congeniality, consideration, and unselfishness which are embodied in the relationship is a fixed quantity. The ties of friendship, as a consequence, are not of equal strength in every instance. T h e relationship may be one in which the participants mean all the world to one another or it may be little more than an acquaintanceship in which an attitude of good will prevails. Acquaintance relations obviously do not fulfill the same function as friendship relations in preventing a sense of isolation, but they are not unimportant. The difference between a social atmosphere which is cordial and friendly and one which is antagonistic is a vital one for the individual who is alone. There are pleasant possibilities in the acquaintance relationship which cannot

THE UNCOMPANION'D

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15

be foregone without a sense of loss. Many of a person's interests are normally gratified within the circle of his acquaintances, particularly if it is sufficiently broad to afford opportunities for recognition and new experience. Acquaintance, moreover, is preliminary to friendship. It is important both in itself and potentially. Frequently an individual's failure to establish the stronger ties of friendship and marriage may be traced to his ineptitude as an acquaintance rather than to handicaps which prevent his meeting congenial people. Family, friendship, and acquaintance relationships are all highly personalized, a characteristic that distinguishes them from certain other sentiment relations in which the individual also participates. T h e ties of nationality, race, religion, class, and community involve sentiments which possess great unifying strength, particularly when they are aroused by some threat to the security of the group. T h e solidarity of the groups united by these ties rests upon the individuals' sense of mutual responsibility for the fulfillment of the obligations of the relationships, as Léon Bourgeois has pointed out in his distinguished study of this subject, Solidarité. These obligations are more apparent, however, in situations involving relations between in- and out-groups than they are in isolating situations within an in-group. They tend to remain in the background in isolating situations which arise within the in-group unless the group mores are broken. W h e n this happens these unifying sentiments are aroused, and the group, feeling itself endangered, takes steps to isolate the offender. T h e transgressor becomes, for a time at least, an outsider, an outcast, to whom the rights and privileges of membership in the group are no longer extended. Every relationship has its own special values which are reflected both in the nature of the group which the relationship unites and in the nature of the isolating processes by which the relationship may be destroyed. T h e kinds of groups united

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by the various sentiment relationships may range in complexity from the group-of-two to the nation-community. Large or small, however, each is a functional whole with which the members identify themselves in part and are identified by others. As Leopold von Wiese points out in a scholarly analysis of group structure, the group is "of such relatively long duration and of such relative solidarity that persons therein affiliated come to be regarded as a relatively homogeneous unit." 0 T h i s concept of the group does not include many kinds of associations and temporary gatherings to which the term is applied in ordinary usage. It is a more meaningful concept for the study of aloneness, however, than the more inclusive concept in customary use and has therefore been adopted in this study. Membership in certain of the more fundamental structural groups of modern society to which the individual normally belongs is acquired as a birthright or by early training. T h e individual acquires the rights and obligations of membership in the nationality, religious, class, and community groups to which his parents belong as a part of his social inheritance. He must, however, if he wishes to continue his membership, fulfill the obligations called for in the bonds that unite these groups. If he fails in this important duty, he forfeits his rights and privileges as a member of the group—and it is not an easy matter to regain them. T h e re-establishment of a basic structural relationship is at best a slow and arduous process, and at worst an impossible one. Nor is it an easy matter to establish a relationship of this type with a new group, particularly in situations in which the further handicaps of group prejudice and social distance have to be overcome. New factors are introduced and the problem becomes one of intergroup rather than intragroup isolation. Social distance, or the distance which exists between in- and » Wiese, Systematic Sociology, p. 489.

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17

out-groups, differs from personal distance, or distance between members of the same in-group. As defined by Willard C. Poole, Jr., social distance is the degree of intimacy which group norms allow between any two individuals of different groups. Personal distance, on the other hand, is the degree of intimacy which exists between two individuals "in so far as it is free from the dictates of social norms and contains merely the elements of individual welfare and satisfaction." 10 T h e norms of social distance are embodied in the mores of the group, since their purpose is to protect the group from real or fancied dangers. T h e distances which these norms demand are attempts to find accommodations between the conflicting interests of the groups which they separate. T h e group which assumes the superior role determines the distance. It is this group which maintains the greater reserve, and normally one group cannot be more intimate with another than the more reserved group will permit. T h e reserve of the superior group is constantly being broken into, however, by strivings toward equality on the part of the group which has been cast in the inferior role. There are thus two social distances representing different degrees of intimacy between groups—the distance desired by the superior group, and the lessened distance actually achieved by the inferior group. T h e difference or margin between these two distances has been termed the social distance margin by E. N. Shideler, to whom we are indebted for noting it. 11 Similar margins may appear in relations of personal distance if the desired degrees of reserve and of intimacy do not coincide. The isolate's struggle to establish a desired relationship is often a question of breaking down such a margin of personal 10 Willard C. Poole, Jr., "Social Distance Applied Sociology, Nov.-Dec., 1926, pp. "Distance in Sociology," American Journal " E. N. Shideler, " T h e Social Distance search, Jan.-Feb., 1928, pp. 243-52.

and Personal Distance," Journal of 114-20. See also the same author's of Sociology, J u l y , 1987, pp. 99-104. Margin," Sociology and Social Re-

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THE UNCOMPANION'D

WAY

distance or reserve between himself and another member of the same group. It is not essential for group distinctions of superiority and inferiority to be present, although they accentuate the distance if they are. Reserve is not identical with a feeling of superiority. It may also arise from timidity, coldness, or policy. T h e difficulties of overcoming the personal distance set by another person's reserve differ accordingly. For example, an individual whose reserve is due to timidity may crave the intimacies which his manner discourages and be glad to welcome anyone who has the courage to disregard his aloofness and offer him friendly attentions, whereas individuals whose reserve stems from a feeling of superiority, coldness, or policy would rebuff similar friendly gestures. T h e margin of distance either between groups or between individuals is a two-edged sword. It isolates equally both of the groups or the individuals that it separates. Generally speaking, however, it is only the groups or the individuals against whom barriers of distance, either social or personal, have been imposed that are thought of as isolated; the isolating effect of these barriers upon those who set them u p is less often noted. A consideration of the meaning of intimacy in personal relationships brings out by way of contrast the meaning of distance. Intimacy in personal relations, as the concept is defined by Willard C. Poole, Jr., is a situation of conscious sharing and confiding, where one takes another into his life of thought and action. It is not to be understood as mere likemindedness or knowledge of another's thoughts, as Poole takes pains to point out. Another aspect of the term is brought out by the late Robert E. Park's analysis of intimacy in relation to social distance. "We are clearly conscious," he observes, "in all our personal relations of a degree of intimacy. A is closer to B than C and the degree of this intimacy measures the influences

THE

UNCOMPANION'D

WAY

19

which each has over the other." 12 T h e r e are interesting possibilities in Professor Park's concept, but it would have to b e used advisedly. I think of several relationships that I myself have had which could hardly be called intimate, but in w h i c h I have been deeply influenced by the other person. Social intimacy in its customary use is identified with relationships in which a situation of mutual understanding, of conscious sharing and confiding, exists. Intimacy is not to be confused with familiarity, a situation which implies mutual knowledge in associative life b u t not necessarily mutual understanding and sympathy; it may mean a lack of perspective and carelessness instead. Littlenesses are exaggerated and respect is lowered—a situation tersely summarized in the well-known sayings "Familiarity breeds contempt" and " N o man is a hero to his valet." In a relationship of sympathetic understanding, on the other hand, respect for one another's privacy is an inherent characteristic. M a n y times the failure to appreciate this important difference between true sympathetic understanding and familiarity is the reason that an isolated individual has difficulty in establishing the intimate relationships that he desires. "Extreme personal knowledge and frequent contacts," to quote an hypothesis advanced by Emory S. Bogardus in his studies of social distance, "like ignorance and no contacts, are the origins of social distance." 13 Both extremes, familiarity and ignorance, are the outcome of the operation of the sundering powers that are present in the society of our t i m e — t h e dissociative processes that isolate group from group and the individual f r o m others within his group who should be his friends. 12 Robert E. Park, " T h e Concept of Social Distance," Journal of Applied Sociology, July-Aug., 1924, pp. 339-44. 1« Emory S. Bogardus, "Occupational Distance," Sociology and Social Research, Sept.-Oct., 1928, pp. 73-81. See also the same author's "Social Intimacy and Social Distance," in the N o v - D e c . issue, pp. 171-75.

CHAPTER

II

"Single Men in Bar ricks'3 T h e biological factor of sex has an important bearing on many of the individual's social relationships. Sex differentiation affects most if not all of the individual's relations with the opposite sex. T h e primary social roles within the family have evolved from fundamental differences in the biological functions of the two sexes. Although the individual's reproductive functions are unalterably determined, his social orientation in the relationships which are involved may be worked out in different ways. This orientation is by no means constant and unchanging. Different peoples, and also the same people at different times in their history, have varied the manner in which they have oriented the social relationships between the two sexes to the basic biological functions in which they are rooted. A study by the noted anthropologist, Margaret Mead, 1 of the social roles taken by men and women in three primitive tribes belonging to the same culture area in New Guinea affords some interesting examples of these variations. In two of the tribes sex has been largely ignored in defining the social roles of men and women and in establishing personality differences. Among the Arapesh the behavior of both men and women has been molded along lines which we regard as "maternal, womanly and unmasculine," while among the Mundugumor the behavior of both sexes has been shaped along lines of ruthlessness and aggression. In the third tribe studied, the Tchambuli, sex has afforded a basis for personality differentiation. Women take the dominant role and men the emotionally and economically dependent one. i Mead, Sex and Temperament

in Three Primitive

Societies.

"SINGLE

MEN

IN

BARRICKS'

21

T h e fact, as Dr. Mead's study shows, that an individual's social environment and training are responsible for personality differences which had formerly been attributed to sex differences does not, however, permit us to overlook the fundamental role which sex itself does play in the organization of society. Although the complementary sex interests of the male and female are a compelling urge toward unity, in the realization of certain other interests sex differences may separate rather than unite men and women. T h e exclusive pursuits of each sex give rise to situations in which the interests of the two are opposed rather than complementary. Both the complementary and the opposed interests of the two sexes form a basis for the erection of social barriers between them. In the case of the complementary interests the barriers result f r o m the efforts of the group to regulate the relations between men and women. T h e group seeks in this way to preserve values which it considers essential for its welfare— a legitimate concern, for instance, for the sake of the children which are born into the group. T h e group as a whole, both men and women, by concerted action places restrictions u p o n sexual intercourse except under prescribed conditions. In cases where the interests of the sexes are opposed the barriers are erected by one sex for the purpose of reserving to itself certain activities, rights, and privileges. Either sex may erect barriers excluding the other from participation in its peculiar privileges; by and large, however, in Western society males have been most active and successful in this endeavor. Despite the great progress which women have made in securing social and economic equality with men, there are still few fields of endeavor outside of those immediately centering in the home and in the rearing of children which do not present some obstacles to a woman simply because she is a woman. T h e r e are wide differences in the extent to which groups impose restrictions upon sex relations between m e n a n d

22

"SINGLE

MEN IN

BARRICKS"

women. In some groups the mores are strict in this regard. In others they are extremely lax. T h e r e is general agreement, however, among anthropologists who have made a careful study of the problem, that there is no group so primitive that it permits wholly unregulated promiscuity. 2 All place some limitations upon the individual's choice of a mate. A l l make some distinctions between the sex rights of married and unmarried persons. T h i s is true for even those primitive groups in which, according to Robert Briffault, 3 promiscuity is common both before and after marriage. In placing restrictions upon sexual intercourse the purpose has been to regulate this relationship but not to deny it. T h e survival of the group requires that the regulatory sex mores should be of such a nature that they do not deny the privileges of sex relationships and of parenthood to any considerable part of the group. In most societies, the majority of men and women find it possible to establish satisfactory relationships with the opposite sex and to gratify their sexual needs without coming into direct conflict with the group mores. There are exceptions, however; an harmonious adjustment to the sex mores of the group is not always easy to make. Situations arise in which the powerful sex impulses cannot readily be confined within the prescribed channels. T h e y seek a new outlet. Society, cognizant of the difficulties entailed in the control of the sex impulse, therefore imposes barriers to prevent the individual from making contacts which might lead to the tabooed sexual intercourse. Lapses of the code of sex morality are punished by social ostracism or by more stringent measures if the offense is serious enough to be regarded as a crime. In modern society the rapidly changing conditions of the 2 See Westermarck, Future o/ Marriage in Western Civilization, pp. 14-20, for a summary of the evidcncc which in Westermarck's opinion discredits the earlier theories of primitive promiscuity, s Briffault, The Mothers, C h . VIII.

"SINGLE

MEN IN

BARRICKS"

23

last few decades have tended to remove a number of the barriers which formerly restricted the contacts between men and women, particularly between single persons. Contacts today are more numerous and more varied than was possible when women's activities were confined primarily to the home. They tend, however, to be of a more impersonal and less intimate nature. They are more largely casual contacts which occur outside the home in secondary-interest groups. The relationships within these groups lack the warm emotional content associated with relationships within the home circle. Their function in the life of the individual differs from that of the sentiment relationships. A well-rounded, wellintegrated life has need for both sentiment and interest relationships between the sexes. It is a problem of society to see that opportunities are provided for the formation of both. The trend of recent social changes has, on the whole, favored the growth of interest relationships between the two sexes. Men and women now associate much more freely in the general life of the community than was true a generation ago. The field of the sentiment relationships has, on the contrary, been narrowed. The concept of the family, which is the great fountainhead of the sentiment relationships, has become more exclusive. Generally, only the more immediate kin are now included within the family circle. The obligations of kinship which formerly held the larger inclusive family structure together have ceased to function except among near kin, and even here they tend to be replaced by bonds of a different nature. In the modern family, affection and common interests are stressed more than the bonds of the marriage contract and blood kinship. As a result the modern family pattern presents two extremes. On the one hand, there is the small, closely unified family group in which the basic relationships of husband and wife, of parent and child, are strengthened and in-

24

SINGLE

MEN

IN

DARRICKS"

tensified by love and congeniality. On the other hand, there is the family which has grown apart in the absence of shared interests and mutual affection. Without these attributes the marriage and kinship bonds all too frequently lack sufficient strength to hold the family together. The individual without family ties is "kin-wrecked." He belongs to no one and no one belongs to him. He is an isolated social atom set adrift by the dissolution of the ties which bound him to the family into which he was born. Unable, or perhaps unwilling, to marry and establish a new family, he goes through life without the satisfactions of the family relationships. He has no home port to return to in case of storm and disaster. If he founders, there is no one to rescue him. The problem of his succor therefore devolves upon the community. A t such times society becomes aware of the position of the isolated individual who has no close family ties; little heed is otherwise given to the unnaturalness of his way of life. The reasons which the unmarried give for their singleness are many. Some are real. Some are rationalizations. Almost never, however, if we accept the word of the men and women themselves, is their singleness due to a lack of sex appeal on their part. No single woman of mature years is ever by her own admission single because she has never received a proposal of marriage. No unmarried man has remained a bachelor because no woman would have accepted his hand had he cared to offer it. Perhaps these men and women are right. Perhaps if the rank and file of those who have married were compared with those who have not, the two groups would be found to be about equally well endowed with sexual attractiveness. At least no definite evidence exists to show that they are not. Even in communities in which an unequal sex ratio and the practice of monogamy destine some individuals to a life of singleness, it is not safe to assume that all of those who find partners are necessarily more attractive than those who

"SINGLE

MEN

IN BARRICKS"

25

fail. There are many other factors besides the lack of sexual attractiveness which may affect the sex relationships adversely. James H. S. Bossard's analysis of the depression and predepression marriage rates in Philadelphia lends support to the supposition that conditions which deter the young men and women of one social class from marrying may not be considered obstacles to marriage by the young people of another class. He states: So far as Philadelphia is concerned, the conclusion is inescapable that the presence in large proportions of Negroes, Russian Jews, and, to a lesser extent, of Italians, among the marriageable males in the city, coincides with a rise in the marriage rate of those areas during the depression; while a preponderance of older nativewhite stock, and of northern and western European stock, coincides with a lowering of the rates.* The conclusion is that the economic depression led to the postponing of marriage in the older, better-established groups; in the newer and less secure groups the tendency was to marry regardless of the lack of economic security. Some young people are deterred from marriage by fears— that they will not be able to provide adequately for children, or that their standard of living will be imperiled. Others are not deterred by these fears. Some young people refuse their opportunities to marry because they are burdened with the responsibility of caring for dependent relatives. Others with similar obligations disregard them and marry. Some persons in whose families there is a taint of hereditary disease will remain single rather than take the risk of transmitting it to their offspring. Others will take the risk. Some persons who do not want children will nevertheless marry, depending upon the use of contraceptives to remain childless. Others, who are either unfamiliar with the use of contraceptives or are preju* Bossard, "Depression and Pre-Depression Marriage Rates: A Philadelphia Study," American Sociological Review, Oct., 1937, pp. 686-95.

26

'SINGLE

MEN

IN

BARRICKS"

diced against them, will not marry in a like situation. Such persons as Catholic priests and nuns have chosen a life of celibacy for religious reasons. On the other hand, such deeply religious people as the Mormons have felt that it was their religious duty to m a n y and have large families. Some of the many college-educated women who are single have had a choice between a career and a suitable marriage and have chosen the former. Others, however, have pursued careers because their opportunities for marriage were so unpromising that they had little real choice in the matter. And so it goes. T h e difficulty of understanding singleness apart from the conditions under which it occurs is obvious. T h e fact of singleness remains, however, and the resultant loneliness. T h e unmarried adult in our society is frequently so situated that he has few, if any, contacts with persons of the opposite sex. His friendships are confined to members of his own sex. He has little opportunity to take part in the social activities of mixed groups. He lives in a closed masculine or feminine world, as the case may be, deprived of the pleasurable and broadening stimulation which customarily accompanies social relations between men and women. When men and women are employed together their attitudes towards one another are necessarily more impersonal than if the contact were social rather than economic in nature. On the job their emotions are likely to be hermetically sealed. T h e task of earning a living must be approached with a different emotional "set" from that of a social engagement outside business hours. This fact has an important bearing on the kinds of relationships which will most probably grow out of these two types of contacts. Social contacts are more productive of friendships and of romance than the business contacts. Men and women who have no other opportunities for knowing eacli other except through business relationships are handicapped. An evening

"SINGLE

MEN

IN

27

DARRICKS'

of dancing or one spent by the fireside will do more to further understanding and intimacy than days spent bending over ledgers in adjoining offices. This does not mean that romance is not a hardy flower. It is. It will often take root and blossom in the most sterile and unpromising environment. If the work is of such a nature that it brings marriageable young men and women together, pleasant friendships which may lead to courtship and marriage do occur in connection with the business of earning a living. Unfortunately, however, many women, and particularly well-educated women, go into occupations where there is a shortage of men.5 As for men, many of the occupations which they enter employ no women. Such young people may be deprived of a normal social life unless other suitable opportunities for meeting are available in the community. The handicap to mating of the occupational segregation of the sexes is complicated by a further factor, "the mating gradient." This is the tendency of women to seek to marry above their own level, and of men to want to marry below theirs. It operates in such a way that the educated woman at one extreme of the social scale and the uneducated man at the other are left unmarried. Neither group is of any comfort to the other. The problem of the loneliness of the single person is most acute in these two classes. The sailor, the peace-time soldier, the miner, the logger, the cowboy, the hobo, the hired man, and, in general, the bunkhouse man, wherever he is found, are all isolated types in their way. With few exceptions, all are unmarried men with but little education. As young men they are largely deprived of the good times more fortunately placed young men and women have together. When they are older, the tragedy of homelessness is borne in upon them. 5

See Paul Popenoe, "Mate Selection," American 1937, pp. 740 ff. for a discussion of this point.

Sociological Review,

Oct.,

2S

•SINGLE

MEN

IN

BARRICKS"

J o h n Steinbeck, in his u n f o r g e t t a b l e little b o o k Of Mice and Men, depicts the loneliness of the r a n c h h a n d so convinci n g l y that the reader accepts G e o r g e ' s w o r d f o r the fact that " G u y s l i k e us, that w o r k o n ranches, are the loneliest guys in the w o r l d . " ' T h e y h a v e n o families. T h e y b e l o n g no place. T h e y h a v e n o t h i n g to l o o k ahead to. T h u s fiction portrays the b u n k h o u s e m a n . T h e a c c o u n t does n o t vary, h o w e v e r , w h e n g i v e n o b j e c t i v e l y b y the sociologist. E d m u n d W . Bradwin's study of b u n k h o u s e m e n i n the C a n a d i a n camps tells a similar story: T h e situation is simple. Men, both English speaking and foreign born, are deprived during months at a stretch of the companionship of women, of home ties, and all that elevates life in man; they are starved by isolation and monotony. 7 A n o t h e r sociological study of homeless m e n , N e i s A n d e r son's The Hobo,

also emphasizes the isolation of this sexually

segregated g r o u p . In his sex life, as in his whole existence, the homeless man moves in a vicious circle. Industrially inadequate, his migratory habits render him the more economically inefficient. A social outcast, he still wants the companionship which his mode of life denies him. Debarred from family life, he hungers for intimate associations and affection. T h e women that he knows, with few exceptions, are repulsive to him. Attractive women live in social worlds infinitely remote from his. W i t h him the fundamental wishes of the person for response and status have been denied expression. T h e prevalence of sexual perversion among homeless men is, therefore, but the extreme expression of their unnatural life. Homosexual practices arise almost inevitably in similar situations of sex isolation. 8 A second u n f o r t u n a t e f a i l i n g of the m i g r a t o r y w o r k e r and the b u n k h o u s e m a n w h i c h m a y b e a t t r i b u t e d , in part at least, to their u n n a t u r a l life is the h a b i t w h e n they get to t o w n of • (New York, 1937), p. 28. • Anderson, The Hobo, p. 149.

T Bradwin, The Bunkhouse

Man, p. 163.

"SINGLE

MEN

IN

BARRICKS"

29

going on a drunken spree and blowing in the stake which they have worked hard for weeks or months to save. Without relatives or friends to welcome them and to give them the emotional outlet and response which they crave, they turn to drink as a means of escape from boredom and from the sense of aloneness which is accentuated by the town's bright lights, music, and noisy hilarity. The men themselves realize that going on a drunken debauch is not a profitable way for them to spend their leisure time and their money, but they are victims of their own inadequacies and the limitations of their environment. Like the hired man whose death Robert Frost has so feelingly described, they have Nothing to look backward to with pride, And nothing to look forward to with hope, So now and never any different. —"The Death of the Hired Man" The lot of enlisted men in the regular army and navy is also a sexually segregated one. T h e relatively small pay which the enlisted man receives and the mobility of military service even in times of peace are barriers which discourage marriage and the establishment of a home. Moreover, except "when there is trouble in the wind," the enlisted man's position has little prestige, a fact which also is isolating in effect. Without the satisfactions of home life and socially approved contacts with women, soldiers and sailors, like other sexually segregated groups of men, tend to find an outlet for their craving for emotional stimulation in ways which society condemns. Their behavior, seen as a response to a normal social environment, appears abnormal. Viewed, however, in relation to the segregated conditions under which they live, it is not. It is, on the contrary, a natural response to the particular environmental conditions which have called it forth. It is an

JO

"SINGLE MEN IN

BARRICKS"

adaptation to the isolation of a socially segregated environment which is as normal in its way as is the socially approved behavior of persons who are more fortunately placed. In this connection we are indebted to Rudyard Kipling for perceiving the tragedy and the humor of the common soldier's lot and for presenting his case to us in some memorable short stories and such favorite ballads as " T o m m y . " We aren't no thin red 'eroes, nor we aren't no blackguards too, But single men in barricks, most remarkable like you; An' if sometimes our conduck isn't all your fancy paints, Why, single men in barricks don't grow into plaster saints. If the barrack-room atmosphere does not promote the growth of such virtues as sobriety and chastity, it does not differ, as we have seen, from the bunkhouse and other sexually segregated environments. Even the cloister with its emphasis on the cultivation of these very virtues sometimes fails to achieve them. T h e spiritual ideals which motivate the religious recluse are not always powerful enough to sublimate his emotional drives and direct them into socially approved channels which do not conflict with his vows.9 Single men and women who live alone in rooming houses, hotels, clubs, or institutions established for either sex exclusively, also are frequently sufferers from a form of social segregation. Many have few contacts with persons of the other sex. Unless they have learned "to live alone and like it," they are lonely. Handicapped by their environment in establishing pleasant social relationships, they miss the pleasurable stimulation which comes from the participation in the social activities of mixed groups. T h e tendency of married couples to do things in twosomes and foursomes limits the single person's opportunities for entertainment in the homes of his married friends. A hostess is 9 T h i s point is discussed more fully in Ch. X .

"SINGLE

MEN

IN

BARRICKS"

31

often at a loss to provide a partner for the person who doesn't have one of his or her own. T h e simplest solution is to invite only persons w h o do have. T h i s happens more and more frequently as the years beyond forty are reached. It is not so easy for the hostess to find a partner for the middle-aged m a n or woman as it is for a younger person. Y o u n g people in their teens and early twenties are still largely unpaired and in the process of mate-finding. It isn't difficult, as a rule, to find party partners for them. T h e hostess w h o is entertaining y o u n g guests accepts this responsibility with readiness. T h e single person w h o is n o longer young must work out his o w n problem. Many cannot do it successfully. T h e y are left out and lonely. Many of the men and women whom Harvey W a r r e n Zorbaugh describes as the inhabitants of "the world of furnished rooms" 10 are persons of this type. T h e y have failed to overcome the handicaps of their environment, and often of their o w n personalities, and to create full and emotionally satisfying lives for themselves. Such persons are isolated to an even greater degree than the bunkhouse man and the soldier since they lack even the companionship which these men afford one another. T h e world of furnished rooms is "a world of atomized individuals, of spiritual nomads." T h e restlessness which characterizes the rooming-house world is a correlative of its isolation. T h e absence of the stabilizing influence of family responsibilities and the pleasures of close personal relationships leaves a void which the unattached person strives to f i l l — o r to f o r g e t — t h r o u g h change. His mobility is the result of his efforts to escape from loneliness. It is prompted by the hope, more often than not a futile one, that new surroundings will somehow, in some undefined way, bring h i m the satisfactions his present situation has failed to yield. 10 Zorbaugh, Gold Coast and Slum, p. 8G.

32

"SINGLE

MEN

IN

DARRICKS"

Another problem of singleness which has been provocative of much comment and consternation is that of the large number of women college graduates who do not marry. Several factors bring this situation about. T h e effect of the mating gradient has already been noted. T h e tendency of men to marry women with somewhat less ability than themselves reacts unfavorably against the college-educated woman. T h e length of their training is also a handicap. College women are older than their less-educated sisters when they turn their attention to husband-finding and there are fewer single men of a suitable age left for them to mate with. College women, moreover, are typically self-supporting. T h e i r economic independence makes it more difficult for them to find men who can provide for them as comfortably as they can for themselves. T h e occupations which educated women tend to enter also handicap them in their opportunities for meeting eligible men. These are the more obvious conditions which constitute barriers between the college woman and matrimony; Paul Popenoe has suggested the possibility of another factor of a different nature—a negative attitude toward the opposite sex on the part of the women themselves. 11 Research studies have revealed homosexuality to be prevalent enough among college women that the presence of this factor as a marriage handicap has been suggested. Are college women a selected group, not only intellectually but also from the standpoint of their sex interests? T h e statistics on the incidence of homosexuality in this group do not indicate whether it is the result of a selective process, or a consequence of the sexually segregated environment in which college women are so frequently placed. T o the writer, the environmental view seems the more probable. My own observations of college women, made both as a 11 Popenoe, Mate Selection.

"SINGLE

MEN

IN

BARRICKS"

33

student and as a teacher, have not led me to regard the young women who decide to go to college as any less normal sexually than their sisters who stay at home. If homosexual relationships between women occur more frequently in college dormitories than elsewhere, it is for the same reason that "single men in barricks don't grow into plaster saints." Their environment does not give them the emotional stimulation and outlet of heterosexual relationships. Following graduation, the business or professional career which the college woman pursues is frequently a sexually isolated one which provides few opportunities for meeting the kind of men who would be suitable marriage partners. Her mode of living is typically an urban one and also isolating in its way. A room in a hotel or woman's club, or, as she becomes more successful, an apartment of her own provide privacy and independence, but for a price. T h e Yale lock which shuts the world out and secures the room or apartment's occupant against intrusion is also a symbol of isolation in another of its forms. T o no small degree it is an effective barrier against informal, spontaneous self-expression and response. Her friends and acquaintances do not readily drop in, unasked, for a friendly chat. Social calls, like business calls, are "by appointment only." Behind the Yale lock her social life tends to become planned in advance, formalized. It loses something of its freshness and flavor. All of it calls for forethought and effort and, as a rule, money. For the single woman this often means that those times when she is most in need of companionship, at the high spots and the low spots of her busy life, she is faced by an evening alone. This is true very often even for the woman who may have a wide circle of friends of both sexes. As every woman knows, half the pleasure of a shopping expedition is showing her plunder to someone else on coming home with it. With another to admire, unwrapping and re-

34

SINGLE

MEN

IN

BARRICKS"

examining her purchases, considering the merits of each article anew, and telling the details of its purchase, add no end to the pleasure of the occasion. O n the other hand, to come home to an empty apartment, d u m p bundles on bed or table, and t u r n to the task of preparing a solitary evening meal is a sorry anticlimax for a shopping trip, or, for that matter, for any experience which is enriched by sharing. T h e single person is faced by a problem of adjustment which is different from those of married persons. T h e married person adjusts himself to someone and to something which is; the single person, to something which is not. T h e married person adjusts his interests and his emotional life to harmonize with those of his conjugal partner and his children, if he has any. T h e single person must adjust himself to a life without these important relationships. Hence there are fundamental differences in the nature of emotional problems involved in the two forms of adjustments. All of the knotty problems of adjustment and all of the failures to solve them are by no means the exclusive possessions of the unmarried. T h e n u m b e r of marriages which end in divorce, separation, desertion, an endurance contest of ill will, or an armed truce are evidence of the fact that the married state is often a lonely one. N o r is the unmarried state inevitably one of frustration and loneliness. Many single men and women lead full and satisfying lives. They develop interests and relationships which provide pleasant companionship. Or, what is perhaps more important still, they establish relationships which have responsibilities that give them a sense of being necessary to someone, a good reward for their labor. Few environments are so sterile that they do not provide some opportunities for friendship for the lonely individual who understands his problem and tries to meet it constructively. Stemming the currents of the isolating processes which are set against him calls for courage and resourcefulness, b u t

"SINGLE

MEN IN

BARRICKS"

35

the effort is worth making. In this connection, thoughtful books such as Harry Emerson Fosdick's On Being a Real Person, Joshua L. Liebman's Peace of Mind, and Fulton J. Sheen's Peace of Soul make a helpful contribution. So also do such popular books as Dale Carnegie's How to Win Friends and Influence People, Dorothea Brande's Wake Up and Live, and Marjorie Hillis's Live Alone and Like It. Although in some instances the suggestions proffered in the latter type of books may seem far fetched as means of overcoming failure and friendlessness, their underlying psychology is sound in that it calls for constructive action on the individual's part. Programs of action rather than of submission or retreat are recommended. T h e willingness of people to struggle for what they want and perhaps to take it in opposition to the traditional mores if it cannot be obtained in any other way is not necessarily a sign of moral deterioration. Instead, this behavior may be indicative of a more normal and wholesome attitude toward sex relationships than is shown by an attitude of unresisting submission to a life of sexual isolation or, in an unhappy marriage, to one of friction. A moral code which functioned satisfactorily in a simple social order may fail to do so in a more complex and highly differentiated social structure. T o meet the changed conditions of the more complicated environment, modifications may be needed. It is not an easy matter, however, to introduce new elements into a time-honored moral system. Sanctions for a departure from the accepted code are generally difficult to obtain. Nevertheless, changes can be effected if the dissatisfaction is sufficiently deep and persistent and a sufficient number of people, particularly people of prestige and influence, are affected. At the present time discontent with the sex mores of our American civilization is bringing about significant changes. T h e impact of these changes is most noticeable in the urban centers, but it is also

36

"SINGLE

MEN

IN

BA

MUCKS'

apparent in rural areas. Changes are also occurring in the conservative cultures of the Far East, as witnessed by the improving status of women. T h e rapidly increasing volume of literature, both technological and popular, which deals with sex and family relationships is objective evidence of the extent of the interest in the problems of these relationships. 12 We are still too close in time to some of the changes which are taking place to appraise adequately their import for society. It is apparent, however, that the direction of the changes in the family mores is toward the realization of new ideals of married life and not, as the guardians of the old mores have feared, toward the dissolution of the family. T h e relationships of husband and wife, parent and child, have become more specific in their nature and in their satisfactions. Today, the individual asks for a fuller realization of personality, a more complete response, in these relationships than formerly. T h e requirements are higher, hence more marriages fail to meet them. For the successful family the rewards are greater than they have ever been. T h e aloneness of the individual who is not a member of a well-adjusted family group is accentuated the more in contrast. His problem presses for understanding and alleviation. 12 T h e popularity of the "Kinsey report," Sexual Behavior in the Human Male, by Kinsey, Pomeroy, and Martin, is an outstanding example of this Interest.

CHAPTER III Men of a Different

Generation

T h e character of each of the different roles which the individual plays in the course of his lifetime—"And one man in his time plays many parts"—is the outgrowth of the experience of the group. Accordingly, as groups differ in experience, the demands of the role assumed by the individual at a given age will vary from group to group. For example, as the late Ruth Benedict points out in a discussion of the significance of puberty ceremonies, it is not biological puberty which determines the timing and nature of the puberty ceremony, but the meaning of adulthood in a particular culture. If, for instance, "the sole honourable duty of manhood is conceived to be deeds of war, the investiture of the warrior is later and of a different sort from that of a society where adulthood gives chiefly the privilege of dancing in a representation of masked gods." 1 In like manner the obligations and duties and the rights and privileges of each of the different roles which the individual plays in his lifetime are related to the culture of the society of which he is a member. If for any reason he is physically or mentally unable to fill the role which the group demands of persons of his age and sex, he is in danger of becoming isolated as a misfit. In civilized society the age at which childish things are put aside and the more serious responsibilities of adulthood are assumed tends, as a rule, to be later than in primitive societies. It also tends to be later in the well-to-do classes than in the poorer classes of the same society. T h e extent to which it is possible to adjust the demands of the group to meet the needs of the child who is an age deviate i Benedict, Patterns

of Culture,

pp. 24-30.

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has received a great deal of attention from educators and psychologists in recent years. T h e fact that there is frequently a wide divergence, either toward superiority or inferiority, between a child's mental age and his chronological age is now well recognized. In the more progressive schools efforts are made to adjust the program to the needs of each individual child rather than to expect every child to measure up to the same standards at precisely the same age. T o provide a child with work suited to his level of ability and to permit him to progress at the rate of speed natural for him are simpler matters, however, than to insure that his opportunities for social expression and response will be equally well suited to his needs. T h e segregation for special instruction of either the subnormal or the brilliant child singles him out as being different from others of his age. T h i s situation tends to heighten the barriers which already exist between him and his contemporaries. For the retarded or subnormal child to be set aside as such may result in his complete isolation from more fortunately endowed children. T h e y tend to draw away, and he is unable to attract them. In the case of the gifted child, it is he who more often draws away from the group. His withdrawal is not because he is unsocial, but because his needs are not being met. Experience has shown that the gifted child is unusually sociable when with other children of his own mental age and attainments. 2 It is not always possible, however, to provide the talented child with the companionship of his peers. Often he must find his friends among children of average ability or forego the satisfactions of the important relationships which unite friends who belong to the same age group and share the interests common to it. In the economic field, as in education, age is also an im2 See Hollingsworth, Gifted

Children,

pp. 116-49, f ° r material on this point.

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39

portant factor in determining the individual's status in reference to his responsibilities. T h e very young and the very old are normally relieved of the burden of self-support by others who assume it for them. T h e length of the periods of childhood and of old-age dependency vary widely from group to group and from class to class within the more complex groups. There is also variation among persons in the same category. Abilities, attitudes, and opportunities all affect the situation. In the main, children of the underprivileged classes become self-supporting at an earlier age than more fortunately situated children who can afford to remain in school for a longer period of training. T h e children who are forced to leave school and go to work at an early age are at a serious disadvantage. T h e i r status in the family and community is largely determined by their age and not by the fact that they are self-supporting. As a rule their earnings are turned over to their parents and they do not enjoy a much greater measure of freedom and independence than other children. T h e y carry the burden of earning a livelihood without the compensation of an independent status which the adult worker enjoys. Another anomalous and difficult situation occurs when an older person becomes economically dependent some time before the infirmities of old age make him physically dependent. During this period it is natural for the individual to strive to retain the rights of self-determination and authority which he had enjoyed as a self-supporting adult. Old people often fail to realize that the retention of these rights by an individual who no longer bears economic responsibility may greatly complicate the problem of the people who must carry his load for him; thus they cannot understand why they are a more difficult problem for their children than the children were for them. Normally there is a balance between rights and privileges on the one hand and obligations and duties on the other

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as they relate to age and economic status. If the balance is disturbed, a potentially isolating situation of tension and strain tends to develop. Age is also a factor in determining the individual's political status in the community. Certain rights, such as suffrage and the eligibility for public office, are dependent upon age. In return, certain obligations, such as military service, are set down. Here again, as in the case of the child laborer, there tends to be a lag between the age when obligations are imposed and that at which rights are granted. In the United States, for instance, young men of nineteen may be called upon to serve in the armed forces although the right to vote, and hence to have a voice in the government of the country they are defending, is withheld until they are twenty-one, except in Georgia where the voting age has been lowered to eighteen. Political power and its privileges not infrequently become concentrated in the hands of one generation as opposed to another. Unless a well-defined and articulate middle-a?ed group exists as a kind of balance wheel between the older and the younger generations, the old and the young tend to become aligned against each other, with the older and more conservative generation striving to retain its prerogatives and the younger and more radical group demanding a new deal in one form or another. T h i s situation existed in Europe in the interval between the two world wars. In those countries in which the generation that would have been middle-aged had been killed off or stupefied by World W a r I, a young postwar generation was left standing in opposition to an aging prewar generation whose imagination was seemingly incapable of grasping the nature and scope of the tremendous problems which confronted the world. Back of the conflict between the generations lies the more general problem of the relation of age to prestige. Throughout

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41

history, veneration for the aged and deference to their wishes have been enjoined upon the younger generation by their elders. The modern emphasis upon the rights of children, the "child-centered" school and home, and the various youth movements are phenomena of a new era in which former values are being scrutinized and redefined or scrapped altogether. The wisdom of the older generation is being challenged with the result that youth today are accorded a position of greater importance. It does not follow, however, that this new prominence is everywhere coincident with a greater measure of personal freedom. In those countries in which democratic ideals still survive it will be. In countries in which the ideal of the totalitarian state has become all-engrossing, youth's role, although prominent, will nevertheless be a regimented one subject to the authority of the state. In addition to the more general problems of age and status which have been discussed, there is still another set of problems into which the age factor enters. These problems relate to the bearing age has upon the more intimate relationships and the manner in which an individual may become isolated if his own development varies from the usual age norms, or if his environment does not offer persons of his age the usual opportunities for establishing such relationships. The period of infancy and early childhood is one in which the individual's relationships are circumscribed by the bounds of his nurse's arms. He is dependent upon the members of his own immediate family circle for the satisfaction of all his needs, physical, mental, and social—and his social needs are by no means the least of these. Not only does his happiness as a child depend upon the adequacy with which his natural craving for affection and response is met, but much of his happiness in later life is also dependent upon it. T h e importance of the experiences of infancy and early childhood in conditioning the individual's future behavior

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has been repeatedly demonstrated in psychological and psychiatric research. If the child's relations to the people about him engender confidence and afford him pleasure, and, further, if his contacts are not too restricted, his attitude toward the strangers he meets as he grows older will tend to be an outgoing, friendly one. He has not met with rebuffs and so he does not anticipate them. He meets people readily and makes friends easily. On the other hand, if his early relationships have failed to give him the full measure of security and affection which is his right, his reaction to strangers will tend to be timid, self-conscious, and suspicious. It will be difficult for him to make friends. The unloved child is a lonely child and all too often he grows into a lonely adult. T h e child who has received too much—the overloved, spoiled child—is also handicapped in making new friends outside of his adoring home circle. Accustomed to receiving the lion's share, he expects too much from others. He is resentful and ill-humored if he cannot have his own way and inclined to be selfish, overcritical and intolerant—the possessor of traits which will make him unpopular with his fellows if not overcome. T h e child whose early relationships have been too restricted presents another problem, particularly, as sometimes happens in the case of an only child, if his only companions have been adults. He is often ill at ease when meeting others of his own age and this awkwardness handicaps him in making friendships. Lacking the necessary techniques for initiating new relationships, he does not know what advances are expected of him, nor how to respond to the overtures of others. He feels out of things and may easily become so unless he has guidance in overcoming his handicap. There is considerable literature on the subject of the only child, most of which emphasizes the peculiarities of such children. A careful study of more than one hundred only children

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by Norman F e n t o n ' gives a somewhat different and more encouraging picture of the situation. Fenton found that only children seem to be " b u t slightly more liable than other children to become peculiar and nervous." T h e study does not minimize the problem of the only child. T h e fact that so few only children in the group studied were seriously handicapped socially, Fenton concludes, possibly is evidence of the awareness of the problem by parents and their success in handling it. From an early age, the normal child craves the companionship of other children; unless this need is gratified emotional disturbances are likely to appear. Further interesting light is thrown on children's social relationships by Dr. Schneersohn's comparative investigations of the play and group life of normal and nervous children. 4 A m o n g normal children two basic principles of collective life were observed—the group principle and the play principle. Normal children seldom play individually, but mostly play with each other in play groups, each of which has its own structure and games. T h e child who cannot fit himself into any group (and there are usually a few such children in every gathering), is therefore lonely and socially ineffective. Play requires the cooperation of creative fantasy. W i t h o u t this cooperation the emotional creative personality of the child, which finds its natural outlet in play group activities, is frustrated. A normal child who lacks play opportunities suffers from e n n u i — " a l l seems gray and empty and this may become unbearable after a time." In comparison with the spontaneous play-group activities of normal children, the behavior of two groups of abnormal children which Dr. Schneersohn observed at the Children's » Norman Fenton, " T h e Only Child," The Pedagogical Seminary and Journal of Genetic Psychology, Dec., 1928, pp. 546-54. * F. Schneersohn, "Sociability of Abnormal Children and Social Child Psychology," American Journal of Psychiatry, May, 1933, pp. 1307-37. Also, by the same author Neue Wege der Sozialpsychologie.

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Hospital in New York is significant. In the first group were girls of low mentality—idiots and imbeciles—from seven to ten years old; in the second were high-grade imbeciles and borderline children—boys and girls from five to eight years old. In the first group each child was sitting by itself, looking straight forward, and paying no attention to the other children in the room. With a few episodic exceptions, such as when one child crossed the room and touched another's hand, there was no effort at group formation. Silence prevailed. Eighty-odd children were sitting in one room, close to each other, yet each one to himself, lonely and isolated. In the second group only three of the children were sitting lonely and inactive. All of the others were shouting and running. Their activity differed from that of normal children, however, in that it had neither plan nor goal. It was structureless, chaotic playing; the groups were fluid and unorganized. Dr. Schneersohn concludes from his investigations that mentally retarded children are organically asocial or lonely according to their degree of retardedness. They have neither sense nor urge for sociability, a condition which is entirely different from the loneliness of nervous children in whom sociability is merely checked by emotional disturbances. T h e loneliness of nervous children is functional and dynamic since these children have the desire, often even exaggerated, for sociability. Their problem is an emotional one which may arise from a number of causes and conditions, such as poverty, ill health, one-sided ability, bashfulness, and social inepitude due to the lack of opportunities for participation in playgroup activities. As a child my own contacts with children other than my brother and sister were exceedingly limited. I can sympathize with children who are deprived of the companionship of playmates of their own age. T h e isolation of the Wyoming

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ranch where our childhood was spent prevented the three of us from belonging to any neighborhood play groups and we did not attend school or church. W e seldom visited at other ranches where there were children, and the people who came to our home were mostly adults. Furthermore, our father and mother believed that when company was present children should be both unheard and unseen. Consequently, when visitors came to the ranch, we children "took to the brush," as we expressed it, and stayed away until suppertime or darkness brought us back to the house. W e were accustomed to being left pretty much to our own devices after we had finished our lessons and other morning chores. W e had a fair number of books and playthings, numerous pets, and the whole ranch to roam over. Nonetheless we were often lonely, and with the active imagination of childhood we created a world of our own and peopled it with imaginary playmates. T h e n , when we were in our early teens, we were suddenly confronted with the problem of adjusting to a world of real people. T h e ranch was sold, and we moved to Vermont, my mother's home state, so that we children could go to school. Fortunately, having studied at home with our mother, we were not behind other children of our ages in our schoolwork, nor did we have difficulty in making friends with individual children; we were not lonely or isolated in that sense for long. W h e n it came to taking part in games and other similar group activities, however, we were out of it. And to a certain extent none of us has even been wholly successful in overcoming this handicap. O n e little episode of our childhood illustrates our need for a broader social experience. My sister and I suddenly decided one day that we would go visiting. W e didn't ask for permission—we knew we wouldn't get it—but we set off for the home of the Griffins, our nearest neighbors, below us on the creek about two miles. I t was a hot day, I remember, and the dust

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was deep in the rutted road, but we trudged optimistically onward. W e were very young, not more than five and six, and this was a bold adventure. Our courage took wings, however, when just as we came in sight of the Griffin ranch we met a team coming towards us. It was Mr. Griffin, and in the big lumber wagon with him were the five Griffin girls whom we had come to see. They stopped and invited us to get in with them, but we were too frightened to answer. Unexpectedly faced by the very social situation which we had been anticipating so joyfully, we did not know how to meet it. W e turned and ran for home. T h e Griffins called to us, trying to reassure us, but to no purpose. Mr. Griffin did not feel that he could drive on and leave us so far from home, so the three oldest Griffin girls got out and tried to catch us. W e had the start, however, and the greater urge, and we gave them a run for their good intentions. Dodging in and out through the sagebrush along the roadside, we were able to elude them until we came to the fence which separated the Griffins' ranch from our father's. Here Mr. Griffin had driven ahead and blocked the gateway. When we got down on our stomachs to wriggle under the barbed-wire fence at another point the girls caught us. W e were too winded to put up much of a struggle and they bundled us into the wagon and drove us home. Kindly Mr. Griffin did not tell our mother the whole story. He simply said that he had picked us up at the gate; and, as this was within bounds, we escaped without a scolding. T h e incident made a deep impression upon us, nevertheless. W e talked it over with our brother and decided that thereafter when we were on the road and heard anyone coming we would "duck." And "duck" we did like little partridges behind the nearest bush or rock. Once formed, the habit persisted until we left the ranch and a different social environment made it necessary for us to acquire more socially acceptable techniques for meeting people.

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T h e ability of adults to bridge the chasm of years and enter into the child's world varies widely. Some do it successfully. Others, even with the best intentions in the world, fail miserably. A young child obviously cannot enter the adult's world. T h e responsibility f o r a close bond of affection and understanding between the two generations rests on the shoulders of the older generation. It is one of the gravest obligations which parents assume, and many times it is the one which they are least able to fill. T h e y fail to gain the child's confidence in his early years, and as he grows older the distance between them tends to widen, particularly d u r i n g adolescence. T h e changes in status which occur d u r i n g the transition from childhood to maturity are accomplished in a relatively short time and without serious conflict in some groups, as Margaret Mead noted among the Samoan Islanders. 5 In others, this period may be extended until it brings about a definite segmentation in the life history of the individual, and one fraught with special problems of a highly emotional character.® In either case, however, important changes occur in the individual's relationships, as the following quotation from Jessie R . R u n n e r shows: T h e opening of the adolescent period finds the child a dependent and subordinate individual within the parental family group. His role is simple and irresponsible; his status is correspondingly inferior. At the end of the adolescent period the individual is found independent of the parental group and ready to assume the responsibilities upon which the superior status of his own new family group depend. Thus the process of adolescence involves a relatively rapid shift from one group to another and a diametric reversal of status. This process necessitates a new relationship to every individual within the social environment. 7 0 Mead, Coming of Age in Samoa, passim. • See E. B. Reuter, "The Sociology of Adolescence," American Journal of Sociology, Nov., 1927, pp. 414-28, for an elaboration of this point. 1 Jessie R. Runner, "Social Distance in Adolescent Relationships," American Journal of Sociology, Nov., 1937, pp. 428-40.

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Emotion is generated when a relationship is undergoing change, and this is accentuated if the interjection of obstacles prevents the change from proceeding naturally and smoothly. In modern civilized societies the lengthened period of adolesence tends to create friction and a feelinsr of frustration. T h e youth's remaining in a dependent status in his parents' home beyond the time when he is biologically ready to choose a mate and to establish a family of his own is often trying. His urge for the freedom to be his own master conflicts with the restrictions imposed upon him by his position. T h e delicate problem of reconciling the two falls upon his parents. If they solve it rightly, new bonds that will grow richer and deeper with the years replace the old. If they fail, the ties between them are weakened and both generations are losers. Another unfortunate situation for the child which may develop d u r i n g the period of changing adolescent relationships is that in which a selfish, overloving parent absorbs the child's life into his own to such an extent that it becomes impossible for the child to form other close relationships or to marry. Later in life when he finds himself alone after the death of the parent he is at a loss. N o other person can take the place of the adoring, and adored, father or mother. No other relationship satisfies. T h e changes in the individual's adolescent relationships with members of the opposite sex are correlated with specific physiological changes which prepare him for his f u t u r e roles of mate and parent. T h i s correlation is a crucial one. If the individual's attitudes in relationships involving sex are not in harmony with his own physiological needs and with the obligations, rights, and restrictions which society imposes u p o n the sex relationships, he will not be able to participate happily in them. H e will be deprived of the most rewarding of all relationships. None of the many factors which may enter into the complex problem of sex adjustment is perhaps of greater

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significance than the manner in which the individual's attitudes are conditioned by the nature of his first sex experiences during the adolescent period. As the youth emerges into young manhood, his relationships, which had formerly embraced only his family, his friends, and his acquaintances, are extended to include much larger groups—his nation, his race, his church, his political party, or his cause. H e owes an obligation of loyalty to innumerable people, to millions even, whom he has never seen and of whose existence he may be only remotely aware. Such relationships are difficult to envisage, and in order that they may be more easily grasped, men tend to create symbols for them. T h e flag, the cross, and the party slogan are examples of symbols of relationships between men, or between men and God, to which the emotional values of the relationships themselves have been transferred. T h e youth feels an enlargement of his own personality as a participant in these new relationships with their responsibilities and prerogatives. T h e i r preservation becomes to him a matter of his personal honor for which he is willing to lay down his life if need be. Within the present century millions of young men have given up their lives on the battlefields of two titanic world wars in the faith that they died to preserve these larger relationships. Young manhood is an age of ideals and of the courage to defend them. It is at this time of his life that the individual learns to think for himself, if ever; hence, it is the period of greatest radicalism and nonconformity. It has also become, particularly in the United States, the period of the greatest antisocial activity. T h e reasons for this unfortunate situation are multiple and their discussion is reserved for a later chapter. In brief, however, they represent the failure of the delinquent youth to identify his interests with the interests of the community. T h i s failure is due in part to the prolongation of the

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transition period. T h e youth continues to enjoy the freedom of childhood without an appropriate balance of responsibility to sober his judgment. T h e specialization of the interests of the different age groups and the consequent widening of the gulf between them have proceeded with such rapidity thit the relation between the rights and the responsibilities of vouth has not as yet been properly adjusted in all cases. There is also another, less pronounced break between the middle-aged generation and their elders. In both situations the responsibility for trying to solve the problems of transition rests on the middle generation. This generation also has its own peculiar problems, but they tend to be overlooked in the welter of problems of the older and younger groups on either side of them. As an adult the individual plays the role for which his earlier experiences have prepared him. His status in the groups to which he belongs and his relations to the people about him, whether pleasant or otherwise, have been largely determined. His attitudes have become more or less stabilized. His reactions to others are a reflection of his earlier social experiences. If he comes to maturity well adjusted, the probability is that this adjustment will continue unless some exceptional crisis disrupts his life completely. On the other hand, if social barriers have begun to develop between him and his fellows before maturity, the chances are that they will become more pronounced and rigid. Changes of attitude during middle age are by no means impossible, but they are more infrequent after the freshness and flexibility of youth have passed. Middle age, for the most part, is the fulfillment of earlier promise. T h e importance of the kind of preparation which the individual brings to the tasks of his full maturity cannot be overestimated. T h e responsibilities of this period are heavier than those of any other; the middle-aged carry on their shoulders the burdens of the younger generation which is growing up

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and the older generation which has retired. Often it is not the younger or the older generation, but they themselves, who are "standing in the need o' prayer." T h e problems of the younger generation, including the ever-increasing expenditures required during the lengthened period of dependency, press them for attention on one hand. On the other, those of the older generation who can no longer provide for their own needs clamor for attention. One can hardly wonder that the middle-aged sometimes balk, as did a Bohemian friend of my ranch days when asked to contribute to the relief of the Armenians who were then being persecuted: "Give! Give. All the time give. What is for self?" It is difficult for many of the present middle-aged group to grasp the social theory of group responsibility. T h e y themselves were reared in an age of rugged individualism when the frontier theory that there were equal opportunities for all still prevailed, at least in out-of-the-way places. T h e sentiment that every tub should stand on its own bottom is a part of their philosophy. They look on unemployment as the failure of the individual rather than of society; hence, there is a stigma attached to unemployment relief. T h e point of view of relief recipients who marched during the Depression with banners demanding more relief as a right, not a privilege, is incomprehensible to them. T h e present middle-aged generation hesitates to trust to the provisions of a possibly beneficent, paternal government for security in their old age or to such fantastic Utopian schemes as the Townsendites and the Downey Ham-andEggers have urged them to support. Yet, in view of today's changing attitudes towards family responsibilities, they seriously question whether their own children, if they have any, are going to be willing to provide for them. Caught in the maelstrom of two changing systems of responsibilities, familial and governmental, the middle-aged men and women of today

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find themselves paying the costs of both systems while they are doubtful that they will reap the benefits of either. Their plight has been symbolized by cartoonists in the bedeviled, barrel-clad taxpayer who has nothing left for himself after everyone else has made demands upon him. T h e sense of power and of control over the affairs of their lives which mature men have enjoyed in less hectic times has been swept away from this generation by the cataclysmic changes of the present era. They have lost their footing, as it were, and are being buffeted about by powerful currents which they are unable to stem. At the mercy of forces which they do not understand or know how to control, they find themselves asking much the same question that an old Negro woman put to her young employer who was giving her her first automobile ride. As the speed at which they were going became alarming to her, she leaned forward and called to him, "Say, Cap'n Bob, how do you holler 'Whoa' to this here thing?" There are many forces at work in the world today to which the middle-aged generation would like to holler "Whoa" if they but knew how to do it. T h e point at which middle age merges into old age is indeterminate, even as young adulthood merges imperceptibly into middle age. It is often said of some people that they never grow old. Others, on the contrary, begin to acquire certain of the characteristics which are associated with old age, and more especially to demand the privileges which are customarily granted to old people, before they are fifty. For a number of practical reasons, however, age sixty-five has been generally taken as the milestone marking the boundary at which old age begins and the responsibilities of middle age are laid aside. Not all persons heed the signal to change at this point. There are many who continue to fulfill their usual obligations, and possibly to assume new ones, for a much longer period. There are also others who have made the transfer before this

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age. From fifty on, men and women begin dropping out of the active struggle of life and accepting a more passive part, not in most instances because they wish to do it, but because economic conditions force them to the sidelines. Fifty is in many respects a crucial age. It is approximately the mid-point between full maturity and old age, and, if one accepts the opinion of W . R. Brown, 8 British psychologist, there is no turning back beyond it. A t fifty a man is what he is. If he is satisfied with his position in life, all is well. If he is not, then the realization that he has reached an age where it will be difficult to start all over again may have seriously psychological consequences. W i t h women, biological and psychological changes associated with the menopause still further aggravate the situation. T o the writer, Dr. Brown's view that there is no turning back at fifty seems unduly pessimistic. Admittedly, the difficulties of making a fresh start at this age are tremendous, b u t they are not necessarily unsurmountable in every case. M a n y persons have made a successful new beginning at fifty or even later. T h e adult education movement has demonstrated the ability of the middle aged person to acquire new skills that will increase his efficiency or add to his enjoyment. Some doors, it is true, are definitely closed at fifty, or even m u c h earlier, but not all. T h e person of fifty who has courage and resourcefulness can, more often than not, improve his situation or even make a fresh start. T h e problem of helping the middle-aged generation to meet some of the difficulties peculiar to their age group needs attention no less than do the problems of young people who are starting out on life's journey and those of life's alumni who are nearing its end. O l d age is a normal stage in the life of the individual, and s From an address before the British Association for the Advancement of Science, Cambridge, August 18, 1938. Reported in the New York Times, Aug. 19, 1938.

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has its own special privileges and prerogatives and its own distinct obligations. Though often a period of maladjustment, it need not be. Many of the most beloved and socially useful people are old in years. However, the old people themselves, as well as their associates, must employ understanding and consideration if the relationships of the evening of life are to be happy ones. T h e sympathy naturally evoked by the frailties of the aged tends to place too much of the responsibility for their happiness upon the shoulders of the younger generations. Old age, unfortunately, is often a convenient alibi used to cover a multitude of social shortcomings which could with greater fairness be traced to other sources. As the self-centered person grows older, he tends to trade either consciously or unconsciously upon the tolerance generally accorded the aged. Age gives him an excuse for self-indulgence and for permitting such tiresome and unpleasant traits as garrulity, untidiness, peevishness, possessiveness, curiosity, and intolerance to grow upon him. If he exhausts the patience of his family and friends and they take him to task about his ways, he reminds his accusers of his age. His physical handicaps thus become the weapons of a subtle form of tyranny. And tyranny, no matter what the source of its power, does not beget affection. An egocentric old person who indulges his whims and fits of temper may gain certain ends, but he defeats others. He is listened to but not loved. T h e love and veneration which all old people covet must be secured by other means than trading upon the mere fact that they have lived three score years and ten. Neither the authority with which custom has invested the aged nor the pity called for by their helplessness affords an adequate basis for warm personal relationships. Nor do kinship ties, despite their strength, guarantee affection in family relationships. Affection is an emotional response which sets its own terms. T o be loved and respected the elderly person must

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continue to bring something to his relationships with younger people which they need and which gives pleasure. He must be more vigilant than ever in his consideration of the rights and feelings of others. Even though the mores of a group may allow old people to tyrannize over the younger members of their households and to demand companionship during tedious empty hours, the realization that they are being borne with as a duty deprives the relationship of its deeper satisfactions. Unless the older person has something still to give either spiritually or materially, unless mutual pleasure is produced by his relationships, his demands become irksome to the hurrying younger generations. And if love is lacking, it is futile to complain about it. Care and kindly consideration may justly be claimed as obligations which youngsters owe their elders, but affection is of a different order. It is a sentiment which is dependent upon the reactions of personalities. It cannot be willed or commanded no matter how greatly it is desired, but it can be earned by the loving and considerate oldster. Old people who have cast their bread upon the waters in their youth have every right to look for some of it to come back to them in their old age, provided, of course, that they continue to navigate the same waters. However, the mobility of the present era often results in their spending their last days in new surroundings and among strangers. Through no fault of their own, or of anyone, they find themselves alone at a time of life when it is difficult to make new attachments. They are no longer persons of "intrinsic importance" to others or to themselves. This unfortunate loss of status has been found to be one of the major discouragements of elderly people.9 » For further material on this point, see Randall. "Meeting the Discouragements of Elderly People," in Proceedings of the National Conference of Social Work, 1937, PP- 5 2 3 _ 2 8 ; and Ernst, " T h e Use of Friendly Visiting," pp. 5 1 7 -

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Charles F. Ernst reported that in 1937 20 percent of the persons receiving public assistance in the state of Washington were living alone, with family ties almost forgotten. He attributed this situation, in part at least, to the state's pioneer past. T h e settlers had made little or no attempt to keep in touch with their kin while they were seeking their fortunes. In old age many were without family ties and without financial security. Further, poverty and the helplessness of old age had made it difficult for them to keep up community contacts. In their loneliness, many felt that they had "nothing to get up for in the morning and still nothing to make the day worthwhile." Mr. Ernst also reported 10 that the recent interest shown in recording the early experiences of these old pioneers as valuable historical material greatly improved their morale. T h e i r pride in their own contribution to the development of the country was aroused. They felt that after all they were persons of importance in the community—which is the thing that matters. I lived in Washington myself from 1 9 1 2 to 1919, with the exception of the years 1 9 1 5 and 1916, which were spent in Alaska. I have known a good many old pioneers personally and in my own way I have been something of a pioneer myself. I can appreciate the deep satisfaciton it gives these old people to have their experiences regarded as important and to be asked to describe them so that they can be written down and preserved. It is unfortunate that the psychological and physiological problems with which aging persons are faced, and which are serious enough in themselves, should frequently be complicated by the further difficulty of financial dependence, but such is the case. T h e Twentieth Century Fund's survey of the 23 of the same volume. See also Rosenthal, Social Adjustment a comprehensive bibliography on the subject. 10 Ernst, " T h e Use of Friendly Visiting," in Proceedings Conference of Social Work, 19)7.

in Old Age, of

the

for

National

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problem of old age security in the United States during the Depression found that from one third to one half of the seven and one half million persons then over sixty-five were dependent. 1 1 Of these aged dependents, according to Abraham Epstein, 12 the number who were alone is about four times the number reported married. These statistics give a rough indication of the prevalence of the problem of aloneness among the aged in the United States during the past decade. Some 1947 statistics for New York State, as reported by State Senator Thomas C. Desmond, chairman of the joint legislative committee on problems of aging, show a marked increase since 1900 of the percentage of unmarried persons over sixty-five in the state. 13 T h e number of bachelors rose from 5.9 percent to 12 percent, and of spinsters from 7.9 percent to 14 percent. On the other hand, the percentage of elderly married men fell from 64.8 percent to 50 percent and of married women over sixty-five from 31.8 percent to 22 percent. T h e number of persons over sixty-five rose 298 percent. T h e rapid increase in the proportion of elderly persons in the population presents many problems. Some of these are financial and can be met, in part at least, by more adequate programs of old age insurance and old age benefits. Others are physical and emotional and cannot be solved by financial security alone. T h e r e are lonely old men and women among the rich as well as among the poor. T h e loss of loved ones whom they have outlived, physical infirmities, unfortunate personality traits which have become accentuated with age, and a different outlook on life from that of the younger generation are isolating conditions which are not confined to the aged of any single economic class. Financial security lessens the impact of i 1 Schneider, More Security for Old Age, pp. 72-73. Epstein, Insecurity, p. 502. 1 3 Thomas C. Desmond, "Report of the New York State Joint Legislative Committee on Problems of Aging," quoted in the New York Times, July 25, '947-

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these factors but it cannot altogether forestall them. This security to be genuinely effective must be accompanied, as John Dewey suggests,14 by changes in the cultural social structure which will give the group of older persons a status of moral security and social value as well. T o insure that old age shall be a period which "hath yet its honour and its toil" is one of the urgent problems of modern society with its rapidly increasing proportion of elderly people. T h e records of the older men and women who were called into industry to meet the labor shortage during the recent war demonstrated that in many kinds of work they were as efficient as younger workers, and their accident rate was no higher. If it were possible for these still capable older workers to continue to be usefully employed in normal times, it would lessen the period of their dependence and greatly help their morale. A few industries have already assumed this social responsibility and reserve a proportionate number of suitable positions for the aged and the handicapped workers in the community. Adequate provision for the physical care of the aged presents another problem. Many have no close relatives or friends who can assume the responsibility, and old people often are fearful of any kind of institutional care. This fear has perhaps been fostered by tales of the horrors of the old-fashioned county poorhouse, which certainly was not a happy solution to the problem of caring for the homeless aged. But better institutions have been devised; there are many fine public and private homes for the aged. Social workers are studying the likes and dislikes of old people and trying to plan institutions in which they will feel at home. 15 Denmark's communities for the aged, "Life's Alumni Villages," somewhat like our Children's Villages, have interesting possibilities. No Foreword to Problems of Ageing, ed. E. V. Cowdry, p. xxvi. " For an interesting description of one of these new homes for the aged, see Randall, "Meeting the Discouragements of Elderly People," in Proceedings of the National Conference of Social Work, 19)7.

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stigma is attached to living in these villages; instead, to be one of Life's Alumni is an honor. That institutions for the care of the aged are needed even with a pension system is shown by the fact that numbers of old people who left public homes to accept pensions under the Social Security Act later returned to them. Alone in the world, they missed the companionship of institutional life. For most old people, possibly for all, some measure of loneliness is inevitable. It does not follow from this fact, however, that the last role which man plays is necessarily a tragic one. A great army of socially useful, beloved old men and women have demonstrated that much depends upon the old people themselves and their ability to adjust to the changes thrust upon them. "It is the individual personality and not the age that sets the final limit," Walter R. Miles concludes from a careful study of the psychological aspects of aging.14 Joseph K. Folsom and Margaret Morgan reach a similar conclusion in their study of social adjustment. "Old people," they state, "are not homogeneous any more than are people at any other age level." 17 It is evident that there can be no single, simple formula for solving the problem of the loneliness of old age; differences in the personalties of the aged and differences in their circumstances must both be taken into account. What is perhaps the best surety against the vicissitudes of old age is suggested by a comment made by one of America's best-loved actors, Richard B. Harrison, "de Lawd" of The Green Pastures, on the occasion of the celebration of his seventieth birthday. "It's a glorious thing to have lived long," he observed, and then added: "It is a great satisfaction to know that you have lived so people will recognize something in you that is worth while." 1« See Walter R. Miles, "Psychological Aspects of Ageing." in Problems of Ageing, ed. E. V. Cowdry, p. 570. " Joseph K. Folsom and Margaret Morgan, "The Social Adjustment of 381 Recipients of Old Age Allowances," American Sociological Review, April, 1937, pp. 1x3-29.

CHAPTER

IV

Men without Work When the problem of unemployment in the United States first became acute at the beginning of the Depression of the j 930s, the unemployed formed an amorphous aggregation of persons for whom no recognized place in the social structure existed. Able and willing to work, they had formerly been self-supporting and had enjoyed the recognized status of their occupations; consequently they did not feel that they belonged to those classes of the population—the unemployable—who are more or less habitually dependent upon others. T h e i r selfrespect led them to resist identification with these dependent classes, and they struggled to retain their former status in the community despite the loss of its base, the work by which they earned their livelihood. T h e community, although not wholly unaware of the differences between the unemployed and the unemployable, did not find it easy at first to assign the unemployed a different and higher status than that of other dependent groups. Because of the magnitude of the problem, in the beginning the simplest method of handling it was to assign the unemployed the same status as other dependent groups which were a recognized part of the social structure; adjustments toward people receiving public or private assistance had already been worked out and community attitudes and behavior patterns established. T o clarify the distinction between the new unemployed and other dependent groups required time; changes in the social structure of a community do not come about without some growing pains, nor can new social classes be brought into being without birth pangs.

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With the advent of New Deal policies in federal administration an effort was made to distinguish between the new unemployed and other dependent groups and to provide a different program for meeting the needs of depression victims. A program of work relief instead of home relief was instituted, with the result that a new social class began to emerge in American life—a class dependent upon the community for support but rendering some service for the public good in return. The status of this class was superior to that of the class on home relief but inferior to that of the worker in private industry, even though the latter was often no better paid and possibly worked harder for what he received. T h e public unfortunately tended to regard men on work relief, particularly the employees of the Works Progress Administration, as "a bunch of loafers," and at times perhaps had reason. Work relief, although superior to direct relief, is not an adequate substitute for a position to which no stigma is attached and which demands the best effort of which a man is capable. T h e tendency to regard a WPA project as "made work," no matter how valuable the project actually was, had a deadening effect on men's normal ambition to finish a job because it is needed and worthwhile. Two other powerful incentives to hard work—competition and promotion—were also lacking. In the absence of these customary incentives, the fact that dalliance and indifference throve on many work relief projects is not surprising. The fault did not lie so much with the workers as it did with their supervisors and, in the last analysis, with the community that tolerated the loafing rather than correcting the conditions that brought it about. Employers became prejudiced against hiring men who had been employed by the WPA for any considerable length of time, arguing that they had formed poor work habits. T h e worker's status in the community also suffered still further. T h e fact that a very creditable list of WPA projects was completed

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each year was frequently overlooked, as also was the bitter price in personal prestige which the W P A worker had been forced to pay for the assistance his critics begrudged him. T h e things which touch the pride and undermine morale vary widely from person to person. Unemployment did not mean an equal loss of face for everyone confronted by it during the depression years of the 1930s. A considerable group of those who had been recipients of aid before the industrial crisis actually found their status improved when they became merged with the new unemployed. For the great majority of the unemployed, however, the loss of their economic independence was a crushing blow to their pride and morale. As most of the unemployed came from the less skilled and less well paid occupational groups, they had prized their economic independence all the more dearly. When their one claim to social equality was swept away they felt themselves to be socially submerged. Their status, never a high or secure one, was gone, and they were left floundering without either a recognized position in the social structure of the community or a sense of unity among themselves. T h e unemployed were, to quote Bohan Zawadzki and Paul Lazarsfeld's exceptionally illuminating study of the problem, "a mass numerically, but not socially." 1 Isolated from each other and from the community, they lacked a basis for unity of action until the establishment of work relief projects provided a nucleus for the development of class consciousness and for their possible organization as a pressure group with definite power. As this point was reached and the question of the status of the unemployed had begun to be a matter of concern for the nation as a whole, the situation was suddenly changed by the outbreak of the Second World War. T h e unemployed, so recently unwanted, suddenly found themselves urgently needed both in 1 Bohan Zawadzki and Paul Lazarsfeld, " T h e Psychological Consequences of Unemployment," Journal of Social Psychology, May, 1935, pp. «24-51.

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the armed forces and on the home front. In its hour of peril the nation had work for all of its citizens. For the average man the loss of his job is a disaster which destroys his social bearings and leaves him adrift in the community. He can no longer hold to the course which he had charted for himself; he must reorient himself psychologically. He may respond in several ways to this difficult requirement. Zawadzki and Lazarsfeld noted four common types of response recorded in the autobiographical data which they collected: the unbroken, the resigned, the distressed, and the apathetic. 2 These same attitudes were also observed in Paul F. Lazarfeld's Marienthal study in which an entire village that had been out of work for three years was studied. 3 Hopelessness, bitterness, hatred, outbreaks of rage, gloominess, flight into drunkenness, and often thoughts of suicide, appear as typical attitudes. Resignation, as evinced by apathy and hopelessness, is marked. Even the Christmas lists made out by the children had been diminished by one third. T h e people were no longer interested in politics or reading, and time had lost its value for them. Attitudes similar to those observed by Lazarsfeld were displayed by groups of men on relief of whom Melvin J. Vincent made a study. 4 T h e r e were the apathetic and fatalistic, men whose courage had been "blown to pieces"; the bitter, who held society responsible; the irritable, whose irritation extended to the whole social order, to relief workers, and to relatives; the resigned, who accepted relief with philosophical rationalizations; and the unbroken, whose faith and hope still enabled them to see the problem with sanity. These same 2 Bohan Zawadzki and Paul Lazarsfeld, " T h e Psychological Consequences of Unemployment," Journal of Social Psychology, May, 1935, pp. 224-51. 3 Paul F. Lazarsfeld, " A n Unemployed Village," Character and Personality, Dcc., 1932, pp. 147-51. * Melvin J. Vincent, "Relief and Resultant Attitudes," Sociology and Social Research, Sept.-Oct., 1935, pp. «7-33.

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general attitudes were also noted by Howard B. Woolston in a study of 300 relief clients. 5 Some were glad of any help to tide them over and received it gratefully; others, well accustomed to relief, had the critical air of old customers; while a third group, the broken and cynical misfits, took whatever was offered with no show of either resentment or satisfaction. In the various attitudes noted among the unemployed, original differences of temperament and the cumulative psychological effects of their situation are both discernible. A man's attitudes differ in the first period of his unemployment from those which tend to develop as time elapses and disappointment, humiliation, anxiety, fear, and want sap his courage and destroy his confidence in himself and in humanity. A state of apathy or one of marked emotional instability is the end product of a process; it does not come upon an individual immediately, but as the later result of his unemployment. Many men who faced courageously the first weeks or months of looking for work ultimately broke under the strain and became irritable, bitter, fatalistic, or apathetic. 6 Not only does the unemployed man lose status in the community; his family relationships feel the impact of his misfortune. Mirra Komarovsky, in discussing the social life of 59 families which she studied in detail, comments that they did not attend church, belong to clubs, or have social contacts outside the family for months at a time. 7 But unfortunate as this situation is, it is less tragic than the isolation which many times occurs within the family itself as a result of unemployment. T h e married man with a wife and children often finds that his position is changed %vhen he is no longer able to fulfill s Howard B. Woolston, "Psychology of Unemployment," Sociology and Social Research, March-April, 1935, pp. 335-40. • For an excellent bibliography, see Paul F. Lazarsfeld and Philip Eisenberg, " T h e Psychological Effects of Unemployment," Psychological Bulletin, June, 1938, pp. 358-90. * Komarovsky, The Unemployed Man and His Family, p. 122.

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his obligations as the head of the family. H e is humiliated before them, for he has failed them. It is difficult for h i m to keep his self-esteem and to hold his family's respect when they must turn elsewhere for even the barest necessities of life. A s needs and tensions increase, his family loses faith in h i m and he loses faith in himself. Accusations and self-accusations undermine his morale and threaten his authority with his family. T h e attitude that unemployment is in some way a person's own fault is a persistent one. Since there are others w h o do have work, unemployment, it is felt, must somehow be d u e to the person's own unfitness. T h i s c o m m o n feeling fosters resentment toward the man w i t h o u t work. T h o s e w h o must assume the burden of caring for his family are also inclined to condemn him. If the c o m m u n i t y is bearing the expense of either home or work relief, the expenditures of the family are watched with suspicion. A n y t h i n g w h i c h they may have above the bare subsistence level is resented. Even the leisure of the unemployed, if enforced idleness can be called leisure, is resented. If the family is not b e i n g supported by the community but by the efforts of the wife, older children, or other relatives, the problem is merely transferred from the community to the smaller group of the family. T h e family as a whole maintains its status in the community, b u t the members w h o are carrying the increased load very often feel resentful toward the unemployed person for his inability to meet his own responsibilities. R u t h Shonle Cavan and Katherine H o w l a n d R a n c k conclude from their painstaking study of 100 families whose history before the Depression was k n o w n to them that the ability of families to adjust to a crisis has both psychic and social factors. 8 T h e family's ability to meet a crisis successfully is in proportion to its members' ability to adjust to each other. s Cavan and Ranck, The Family and the Depression, p. viii.

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A n x i e t y , excessive worry, nervous breakdown, and suicidal thoughts or attempts, as well as changes in standards of living, in family roles, and in familial and personal objectives were evident in the cases they studied. T h e Philadelphia studies of 150 cases tell a similar story. 9 T h e r e were a few instances of families w h o were drawn closer together by their misfortune; in most, however, family morale was lowered by prolonged u n e m p l o y m e n t of the breadwinner. Family relationships suffered. T h e r e were cases of temporary desertion, increased drinking, cruelty toward the wife and children, crimes such as stealing and forgery, juvenile resentment and delinquency, and attempted suicide. W h i l e the inability to provide for his family can be a grave threat to the authority of the husband and father, it is not necessarily the decisive factor. Besides the fact that he is the principal provider, his normal position in economic life, the family background with its tradition, laws, morals, and religion, and the personality of the man himself—his intellect, moral qualities and character, and physical superiority—are also important factors in determining the authority of the father, as well-known studies by M a x Horkheimer and others have shown. 10 Further evidence of the importance of these other factors in determining the extent to which the unemployed man loses authority with his family is found in the hypotheses presented by Samuel A. Stouffer and Paul F. Lazarsfeld in their study of the family in the Depression: An unemployed father will probably lose authority with his children when he loses authority with his wife. He will lose authority with an adolescent daughter more frequently than with a son who is earning some money; also, he will lose authority more easily if the mother takes a job, if a son returns home after a period of • Marion Elderton, ed.. Case Studies of Unemployment, M a x Horkheimer, ed., Studien über Autorität und

passim. Familie.

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employment, and if his authority was based on categorical orders and punishment rather than on intimacy and an attempt at mutual understanding.11 Other hypotheses suggested by these same authors are: first, the attitudes of women toward their unemployed husbands are changed only in so far as certain pre-existing attitudes are emphasized to the exclusion of others; second, the shock of unemployment varies with the kind of aspirations which the family had before its occurrence; third, the probability of the husband's losing prestige with his wife and authority with his children varies inversely with the proportion of unemployed fellow workers in the same occupation; and fourth, irritation in the home increases with the length of time on relief, and also with the amount of time the unemployed man spends idling at home. 12 T h e unemployed husband has a double problem—his lack of work and the strained relationships with his family. His presence in the home during the day is a source of irritation, yet he dreads to leave the house on aimless errands. He feels superfluous, degraded, inferior. He does not want to meet people. His pride suffers when he is with men who have work, but he hesitates to align himself with others who are also unemployed. The lack of solidarity among the jobless is one of the psychological consequences of unemployment which Bohan Zawadzki and Paul Lazarsfeld discovered which belies the popular idea that revolutionary mass action is generated by mass unemployment. T h e experiences of unemployment, they found, "can easily lead to outbreaks of distress in the form of single acts, but they leave the mass inert, since they lead to ever-increasing mutual estrangement, isolation, dispersion, destruction of solidarity, even to hostility among labor11 Stouffer and Lazarsfeld, Research Memorandum pression, pp. 116-17.

on the Family in the De12 ibid., pp. 88-g*.

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ers, and in this way deprive the mass of its power." 13 Because of their apathy, the uncritical lean toward fascism rather than c o m m u n i s m because it seems to promise them an easier way out of their distress. T h e y criticize the government, but they are not revolutionaries. T h e y are too isolated i n d i v i d u a l l y — too m u c h alone, too lacking in social status and a sense of w o r t h — f o r concerted action. T h e single man or w o m a n w h o has n o dependents is spared the tragedy of being unable to care for loved ones if he is without work. H e can take some small comfort in this fact, although it is a negative kind of satisfaction. T h e married man, despite his loss of family status, still has a home while the family remains together. Its members still belong to each other. N o matter what accusations of unfitness may be laid at his door by a nagging wife and disappointed children, the married m a n is not altogether alone. Even if the relationships within the family are tense and recriminatory, he has someone to consider besides himself and in return he receives some consideration. In the face of the disintegrating forces of the Depression, most families held together and struggled to maintain a home. It was only in the more extreme cases that the unemployed man was deserted by his family or deserted them. Difficult and discouraging as his problem is, the unemployed man with a family is usually spared the sense of utter isolation which is the lot of the single man w h o has neither work nor money. T h e relationships of the single man, particularly if he belongs to the laboring classes, are largely those which grow out of his w o r k . H e loses these w h e n he becomes unemployed. H e has n o t h i n g now to talk about with his old companions and he tends to lose contact with them. If he belongs to secondary interest groups, these activities have to be discontinued when 13 Bohan Zawadzki and Paul Lazarsfeld, " T h e Psychological Consequences of Unemployment," Journal of Social Psychology, May, 1935, pp. 224-51.

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he no longer has the necessary money or clothes to participate in them. It is also more difficult for the single man to get relief or work than for the married man. 14 Without money he is finally obliged to give up the only semblances of a home which he has, a rented room, and to join the army of homeless men who spend their nights on park benches or in municipal lodging houses from which they are turned adrift in the city streets each morning. No one would miss him if he did not return at night to his sleeping place. His existence is of no particular moment to any other person. In the midst of many, the man in the bread line is as alone as Prometheus chained to his rock, and may be inwardly torn by who knows what tormenting thoughts throughout his aimless days. The continual rebuffs to his pride which the unemployed person meets have a numbing effect and serve to increase the dull indifference which comes in time to be a characteristic attitude. This attitude is a protective device, a form of ego encystment. T h e jobless man wraps his personality in a protective envelope of apathy somewhat as certain protozoans, when they come upon hard times, enclose themselves in a protective sac or cyst which enables them to withstand the vicissitudes of an unfavorable environment. When fortune again smiles upon them, they emerge and take up life anew. The apathetic individual, given work which makes it possible for him to have good food and enough of it, new clothes and some spending money, finds that life once more becomes interesting and worthwhile, if his inner isolation has not become so complete and his health so impaired that he cannot make a fresh start. Experience has shown that continued unemployment eventually leads to a condition of unfitness for employment which is irremediable. T h e individual becomes psychologically unemployable. Peter A. Speek's study of floating workers showed 1« James Mickel Williams, Human Aspects of Unemployment, p. 25.

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that p r i v a t i o n a n d h u m i l i a t i o n h a d b r o k e n the spirit and exhausted the energy a n d w i l l p o w e r of these men. T h e y w e r e childish and ineffectual a n d u n a b l e to concentrate. A n aversion for w o r k , a fondness for d r i n k , and a passion for wanderi n g appeared as substitutes for the n o r m a l pleasures they had b e e n denied. 1 5 T h e single m a n , homeless and alone, breaks m o r e readily u n d e r the strain of u n e m p l o y m e n t than the marr i e d m a n . H e becomes the m a n in the b r e a d l i n e , o n e of the u n e m p l o y a b l e for w h o m there is n o r o o m in the e c o n o m i c structure even in times of prosperity. T h e position of the u n e m p l o y e d w o m a n w o r k e r is similar b u t not identical to that of the jobless m a n . O f the two mill i o n w o m e n seeking w o r k in 1931, c o m p a r a t i v e l y few sought shelter in m u n i c i p a l l o d g i n g houses or slept o u t o n park benches. Several reasons may be o f f e r e d in e x p l a n a t i o n : a w o m a n tends m o r e than a m a n to k e e p in t o u c h w i t h her family, if she has any near relatives at all, a n d can more o f t e n t u r n to someone in time of e x t r e m e n e e d ; a place w h e r e she can at least earn her b o a r d and r o o m in r e t u r n for h o u s e h o l d services or the care of c h i l d r e n was o f t e n a v a i l a b l e ; it was easier for the single w o m a n to o b t a i n m o n e t a r y relief to pay r o o m rent than it was for the single m a n , a l t h o u g h she was also s o m e w h a t discriminated against in this respect in comparison w i t h w o m e n w i t h dependents. F o r the w o m a n w h o was the head of a family the p r o b l e m s w e r e similar to those of the unemp l o y e d family m a n , e x c e p t that in a p p l y i n g for relief she lost less prestige. A s L o r i n e P r u e t t e p o i n t e d o u t in her study of the p r o b l e m . " A q u e s t i o n of prestige w h i c h is a definite handicap to w o m e n d u r i n g prosperity becomes a definite advantage in times of depression." 16 T h e federal w o r k relief p r o g r a m s i n a u g u r a t e d d u r i n g the is Peter A. Speek, " T h e Psychology of the Floating Workers," Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, January, 1917, pp. 72^79. 1» Lorine Pruette, ed., Women Workers Through the Depression, p. 35.

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1930s proved an asylum for many unemployed women whose slender resources had become exhausted. Work relief, however, did not solve the unemployment problem of the ambitious woman any more than it did that of the ambitious man. Although welcomed as a temporary expedient, the W P A offered no security, no prestige, no future, no vacations, no sick leave, and no recommendation. 1 7 Work relief, and such later measures as unemployment compensation, are at best but stopgaps for the man or woman of ability. T h e question of getting back into regular work is always troublesome. In meeting it, Dr. Pruette's advice "to come out into the open and keep circulating" is sound. It is difficult to follow, however, for the unemployed woman or man whose wardrobe is depleted and who must save every penny for food and room rent. T h e unemployed woman is usually too proud to continue to accept courtesies and hospitality she cannot return. She is fearful of incurring obligations, and often suspicious and resentful of well-meaning efforts to help her for fear they have been motivated by pity. Ashamed and depressed by her shabby surroundings, her vitality lowered by insufficient food, she becomes supersensitive, easily offended, and furtive. She avoids people, shutting herself within herself and withdrawing into her past. Like the man in the bread line, she becomes nervously exhausted and largely unemployable without a process of rehabilitation. In the lower-income brackets, no age group escaped the psychological havoc wrought by the prolonged world-wide economic disaster of the 1930s. T h e old, the middle-aged, and the young suffered alike. 18 It is easier, however, to observe the 1 7 This point of view is well brought out in an article, " I Am on the W P A , " in the New York Times Magazine, Nov. 27, 1938. is See Frieda Wunderlich, "New Aspects of Unemployment in Germany," Social Research: An International Quarterly of Political and Social Science, Feb., 1934, pp. 9 7 - 1 1 0 , for a good account of the effects of unemployment upon different age groups.

12

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psychological damage done to the older groups than to the children. T h e full effects of the experiences of childhood often do not appear until years later. T h a t the insecurity, privation, frustration, and humiliation which the children of the Depression suffered left deep wounds there can be no doubt. T h e full costs of the depression years have unfortunately not yet been paid. We do know, however, that large numbers of the young men classified as 4F in the Second World W a r were casualities of the Depression. It is a frustrating experience for young men and women just leaving school and eager to become self-supporting not to be able to get work. T h e i r position is not unlike that of an innocent man condemned without trial. T h e y have never had an opportunity to prove their worth, yet they find themselves regarded as liabilities to their families and to the community. T h e y feel unwanted—that there is no place for them. T h a t certain minimum amount of security without which Franz Alexander 19 insists a social conscience cannot develop is lacking. If they react to a situation of this kind by growing bitter and refusing to conform to the accepted group mores, it is not surprising. It is only natural that they should seek excitement on the streets and in places of doubtful repute with other young people like themselves. In the early 1930s many young people, both boys and girls, took to the road as tramps. 20 T h e r e is a certain zest in thus matching one's wits against a none-too-friendly world, a cer1» Franz Alexander, "Psychoanalysis and Social Disorganization," American Journal of Sociology, May, 1937, pp. 807-8. 20 See Minehan, Boy and Girl Tramps of America, passim. See also the following articles: A. Wayne McMillen, " A n Army of Boys on the Loose," Survey Graphic, Sept., 1932, and "Migrant Boys—Some Data from Salt Lake City," Social Service Review, March, 1933, pp. 64-83; George E. Outland, "Sources of Transient Boys," Sociology and Social Research, May-June, 1935. pp. 419-34; Pauline V. Young, " H u m a n Costs of Unemployment," Sociology and Social Research, March-April, 1933, pp. 361-69; and T o w n e Nylander, "Wandering Youth," Sociology and Social Research, July-August, 1933, pp. 560-68.

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tain romance and adventure, which appeals to the spirit of youth. It is, however, a life full of hardships and physical and moral dangers. A n d for the boy and girl tramps, most of whom were not such hardened young vagrants that they had ceased to be conscious of the need for adult protection and affection, it was also a life of pathetic loneliness and insecurity. T h e day's spoils were shared around the campfire at night; but except for this mutual aid they were without the benefit of the kindlier human sentiments. T h e y had ceased to be a part of those groups in the community which are characterized by relationships of affection and reciprocal obligations. Theirs was a socially isolated existence which was not so much antisocial as it was nonsocial, at least in its incipience. As the nation awoke to the problem of vagrancy among the young, definite efforts were made to combat it. T h e Civilian Conservation Corps was organized to provide decent living conditions and useful labor for young men in camps throughout the country. T h e National Youth Administration held out a helping hand to other boys and girls. Schools offered vocational courses to meet the needs of unemployed young people. Welfare agencies offered recreational programs. Each of these was important in helping to relieve an acute situation, but none solved the problem permanently. Transiency was one of the most difficult problems brought into focus during the Depression. T h e federal transient program established in J u n e , 1933, was discontinued in September, 1935, not because the need no longer existed but because of the difficulties of handling the situation. N o adequate relief measures were taken for the homeless older men and women, who did not fit into the programs designed for young people, or for the migrant families who were ineligible for local relief because they could not meet the residence requirements. Communities, struggling with their own relief load, usually handled the problem by giving aid for a day or two and then

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passing the wanderers on to the next community. T h i s fate was especially hard on the children of the migrant families, who were not only undernourished and ill cared for, but who were also deprived of the opportunity to remain in school. Of all the children of the Depression, those of the homeless migrant families were its most neglected and pitiful victims. 21 In contrast to the more aggressive boys and girls who became rebellious and antisocial, or who "took to the road," many less aggressive youngsters became apathetic and accepted their fate with a weary resignation tragically unlike the cheerf u l expectancy normally characteristic of youth. 22 These resigned young people are less apt to annoy the community than are their more aggressive fellows with their petty depredations. T h e i r attitude, nevertheless, is an unfortunate one from the standpoint of their future value to the community. Acceptance of depressing living conditions as an inevitable evil which must be borne rather than resisted is to be deplored; passivity promotes the continuance of the evil itself. T h e privations of the unemployed during the Depression were not due to the niggardliness of nature. T h e r e was food to burn literally. T h e difficulty was one of economic distribution. It was social and man-made and therefore within the power of society to correct. Unfortunately, the very qualities—courage and foresight, and a fair measure of faith in the integrity of one's fellows and in one's self—needed to unsnarl the knotty social and economic problems of unemployment are qualities which tended 21 In pointing out areas of neglect, it is only fair to say that vast sums of money were spent to assist the unemployed. The grand total of the relief expenditures from all governmental sources combined for the five-year period 1933-37, as compiled by Mrs. Dorothy Fahs Beck for the Senate's Special Committee to Investigate Unemployment and Relief, amounted to more than 19 billion dollars. See United States Senate, Unemployment and Relief, II, 1191-1214. 22 Good examples of children's attitudes toward relief and unemployment are given by Bessie Averne McClenahan in "The Child of the Relief Agency," Social Forces, May, 1935, pp. 560-67.

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to be dwarfed during the Depression. T h e timid child, who lost his courage and resigned himself to his lot, tended to bring a negative, nonconstructive attitude to the work of the future. T h e bolder, more courageous child, who resisted the thwarting of his ambition, tended, on the other hand, to take a more positive, but often embittered and selfish, attitude toward the social problems he was to face later in life. Both are attitudes which lead toward social isolation within the group rather than toward the cooperation and understanding which are essential if future generations are to enjoy a greater measure of social and economic security than the present generation has known.

CHAPTER

V

Men in Great Place From time to time in great fiction one comes upon a passage which immediately strikes home with its deft portrayal of a problem, the revelation of its inner meaning. In a few brief sentences bearing within them the ripened fruits of a perceiving eye and an understanding mind, the novelist has succeeded in disclosing the heart of the problem. Columns of statistics or pages of scientific argument would convey the idea less well. One such meaningful passage is the following one from Joseph Conrad's Typhoon, a story of men and the sea: Jukes was uncritically glad to have his captain at hand. It relieved him as though that man had, by simply coming on deck, taken most of the gale's weight upon his shoulders. Such is the prestige, the privilege, and the burden of command. Captain MacWhirr could expect no relief of that sort from any one on earth. Such is the loneliness of command.1 T h e unbridgeable chasm between the position of the man in command and that of his subordinates flashes in clear perspective in this passage. T w o men are caught in the toils of an angry sea, fighting desperately against terrific odds, and yet, because of their relationship as captain and mate, it was possible for one to experience a feeling of relief at the appearance of the other which was not reciprocal. T h e responsibility for directing their course in an unfamiliar and desperate situation rested on Captain MacWhirr's shoulders by virtue of his position; there was no higher authority to whom he could transfer his burden, nor could he share it equally with his inferior officer. By the rules of the sea the responsibility was his, 1

Conrad, Typhoon

and Other Stories, pp. 39-40.

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and his alone; the burden of it was the price he must pay for the prestige, the privileges, and the emoluments of his position. Positions of authority characteristically confer power of action along certain lines, but at the same time, though perhaps less obviously, they curtail it in others. This fact is inimitably brought out in Francis Bacon's essay Of Great Place: Men in great place are thrice servants—servants of the sovereign or State, servants of fame, and servants of business; so that they have no freedom, neither in their persons, nor in their actions, nor in their times. It is a strange desire to seek power and to lose liberty, or to seek power over others, and to lose power over a man's self. The rising into place is laborious, and by pains men come to greater pains; and it is sometimes base and by indignities men come to dignities. The standing is slippery, and the regress is either a downfall, or at least an eclipse, which is a melancholy thing. T h e power to command the fate of others is weighted with responsibility. He who has it sacrifices his own freedom in the service of others if he seeks to promote their interests. On the other hand, if he seeks to promote his own ends at their expense, he is still not free; fear and hatred dog his steps. H e is a slave to the enmity of the men whom he has despoiled and persecuted. T h e number of rulers both good and bad, constitutional and dictatorial, who have met violent deaths is indicative of the precariousness of high place. T r u e freedom is inconsistent with fear. Persons whose movements must be protected by bodyguards and secret police cannot enjoy freedom in the fullest sense. T h e i r sense of ease and liberty are inevitably curtailed by the knowledge that they may be shot at by the mentally deranged with fancied wrongs, or by some Brutus from a patriotic motive. Responsibility knows no definite working hours. It is not taken up and laid down at the blowing of a whistle, nor does it

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p u n c h a time clock. M o r e o f t e n than not, those w h o bear it feel its b u r d e n heaviest in w a k e f u l n i g h t hours w h e n their m o r e carefree fellows are at rest. It is thus that responsibility steadies a m a n and ages h i m , p a r t i c u l a r l y if the times are such as try men's souls. T h e u n t i m e l y d e a t h of many men in h i g h office has b e e n b r o u g h t a b o u t by the strain of their positions. N o t a b l e examples are the deaths of the w a r t i m e Presidents, R o o s e v e l t and W i l s o n . In President W i l s o n ' s case, the physical b r e a k d o w n w h i c h presaged the e n d c a m e on his s p e a k i n g tour of the W e s t to u r g e the election to Congress of m e n w h o favored the T r e a t y of Versailles and the p a r t i c i p a t i o n of the U n i t e d States in the L e a g u e of Nations. Friends w h o suspected his fatigued condition u r g e d h i m n o t to u n d e r t a k e the trip, b u t he dismissed their solicitude w i t h the reply: " I k n o w that I am at the end of m y tether, b u t m y friends on the H i l l say that the trip is necessary to save the T r e a t y , and I a m w i l l i n g to make whatever personal sacrifice is r e q u i r e d . " 2 Perhaps the wisdom of the sacrifice may b e q u e s t i o n e d b u t n o o n e c a n fail to admire the spirit in w h i c h it was made. President Roosevelt also realized that he was p l a c i n g his l i f e in j e o p a r d y w h e n he undertook a f o u r t h term of office; b u t , like President W i l s o n , he was w i l l i n g to make the sacrifice. H i g h officials a n d rulers are never free f r o m the pressure of w o r k , b u t some are better able than others to delegate authority a n d to protect themselves f r o m m a n y demands w h i c h exhaust time and energy and yet are n o t actually essential for the well-being of the people they serve. T h e fact that Q u e e n V i c t o r i a ' s life was a l o n g one can doubtless be attributed in part at least to her g o o d sense a n d firmness in r e f u s i n g to accede to many of the d e m a n d s m a d e u p o n her to speak at p u b l i c gatherings a n d to entertain n o t a b l e foreigners. H e r letters contain protestations of o v e r w o r k a n d a plea to be 2 Joseph P. Tumulty, Woodrow Wilson As I Know Him, p. 435.

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spared any unnecessary demands on her strength. In one letter to Mr. Gladstone, she says, "Complete rest, the Queen (perhaps the only person who cannot do so) never has." 3 Again, in a later letter, she protests vigorously and at length about the perils to which her health is subjected by the demands put upon her. She states that her beloved husband and several others whom she names have been killed by overwork and that this will be her fate too if she does not exercise care.4 Men in high public office are not the only ones who suffer from overwork and loneliness entailed by their responsibilities; business and professional men who hold responsible positions often share the same fate. T h e welfare of others is affected by their judgment. If their decisions do not meet with the approval of their clientele, they are subject to criticism, loss of prestige, and possibly to financial ruin. T h e business executive is by no means the free person that his employees, who do not share his responsibilities, typically assume him to be. T h e y envy him the rewards of his position without considering the price he pays for them. T h e executive has to foresee contingencies of which they are unaware and to grapple with all aspects of a many-sided situation. T h e y are concerned primarily with but one, their particular job and its remuneration. T h e criticism that the barriers which isolate great leaders of industry from the rest of mankind have been reared by their greed for gain, that they could easily remove them if they wished, is not the whole truth. T h e problem is by no means so simple. Even if the profit motive were removed from industry and the remuneration of its leaders were merely nominal, the responsibility for the development and administration of the vast industrial projects of modern civilization would still impose a barrier between the executive and the workingman. T h e executive's concern is for the success of the 3 Guedulla, The Queen and Mr. Gladstone,

p. 158.

* Ibid., pp. 898-300.

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enterprise as a whole, the worker's primarily for his own livelihood, a narrower and more immediate interest. T h e executive necessarily gives more of himself, more of his personality, to his task than do the men under him. T o o , subordinates are spared the self-criticism and the criticism by others which are the lot of the leader whose venture fails. T h e fact that the man in authority gives more of himself than do his subordinates to the relationship between them has been pointed out by Georg Simmel as basic to the structure of a society in which a single person rules and the great mass obeys. 5 Such a society, Simmel says, is to be understood "only through the consideration that the mass, that is, the ruled, includes only a portion of the personality belonging to the individuals concerned, while the ruler invests his whole personality in the relationship." T h e masses, according to Simmel, "lack the resources, adaptabilities, the accommodations, the developments of power which the whole individual possesses through the unity and presence of his total psychical energy." T h e disproportion between the contributions of leader and follower is frequently overlooked; the assumption is generally that the subordinate, particularly if his position is markedly inferior, gives more because much is demanded of him in comparison with what he receives. T h e obligations of the subordinate are actually of a different order from those of his superior and do not positively involve his personality to the same degree. In the case of a slave, for instance, the conditions of his servitude may suppress his personality and reduce him to little better than an automaton in so far as his relations with his superior are concerned. T h e comparative abilities of the individuals concerned have no bearing upon the measure of personality which each puts » Georg Simmel, "Superiority and Subordination as Subject Matter of Sociology" (tr. by Albion W. Small), American Journal of Sociology, Sept., 1896, pp. 167-89, and Nov., 1896, pp. 392-415.

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into the relationship. T h e subordinate may be a better man than his superior, b u t the latter by virtue of his position gives more of himself, good or bad. A dictator, for instance, may be a person of very ordinary attainments; but, because he throws the whole force of his personality into his role, he is able to dominate others with superior talents. T h e s e abler men do not oppose him with an intensity and singleness of purpose equal to his. T h e dictator must give himself unreservedly to the task of maintaining his position; a halfhearted dictator w o u l d be an anomaly that could not survive for long. Indeed, he could not have risen to power in the first place without p u t t i n g the f u l l strength of his personality into the undertaking. T h e readiness with which men have often relinquished their rights and privileges of self-government in order to be relieved of the obligations and responsibilities of self-direction in times of trouble is evidence of the weight of responsibility for choosing a course of action. If responsibility were not burdensome, the normal person would not yield it so willingly to the strong and aggressive. O n the other hand, if positions of responsibility did not have compensations of power and prestige, few w o u l d seek them. M e n want the rewards to which their services entitle them. Differences in the responsibilities of those w h o command and those w h o obey provide the basis for the distinctions of social distance which exist between the two positions and, further, are whatever justification there may be for the unequal distribution of the fruits of common endeavor. T h e social distance which isolates the man in command f r o m his subordinates is an essential condition of their relationship. W i t h o u t it authority could neither arise nor be preserved. 6 T h e well-known quotation, "Familiarity breeds con« For a discussion of this point, see Robert Michels's article " A u t h o r i t y , " Encyclopaedia of the Social Sciences.

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tempt," summarizes the consequences of removing the barriers of restraint. Familiarity reveals the superior's weaknesses and he stands forth as an ordinary human being, perhaps no wiser or better than his subordinates. T h e respect or fear which gave weight to his commands has been dissipated, and without one or both of these his position is vulnerable. T o exercise authority the leaders must be either respected or feared. He must be isolated in some degree by these attitudes of social distance or his commands will lack force and be disregarded. T h e element of fear may be eliminated only if the person in authority is able to command respect because of his superior attainments. If his abilities are not outstanding, fear must be retained as a weapon. Simplicity is a prerogative only of those whose sure knowledge or natural dignity protects them from undue familiarity. For all others in authority, steps must be taken to maintain the requisite measures of social distance. The means of securing the social distance necessary for the functioning of authority are varied, but generally include an extensive use of ceremonial behavior and symbolism. T h e regulation of conduct toward superiors by the observance of conventional forms of etiquette, such as the use of titles, terms of address, obeisances, and so forth, emphasizes distance and surrounds the superior with a certain privacy even when he appears in public. Irksome as this formal behavior frequently becomes to the person in authority, it is a barrier that can hardly be removed without subjecting him to an unwelcome familiarity harmful to his prestige. People in public life particularly need the protection of conventionality. Their duties bring them into contact with all kinds of people and all that they do is open to criticism. In public life, to quote Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt, "one develops a dual personality, the personality that is really one's self and the personality that is an official representative doing

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an official job." 7 A comment of Miss Margaret Truman's about the adjustment of her public and private lives indicates her development of this dual personality. "In the beginning when total strangers called me 'Margaret,' I sort of reared back," she said, "now if they don't I think something is wrong." 8 T o the American public, Miss T r u m a n is officially "Margaret," but this familiarity does not intrude on her private life. Formality in personal intercourse promotes distance in two ways, through the avenues of servility and of self-respect. These feelings, according to E. A. Ross, give rise to two contrasted efforts—"the effort of the servile to control others by propitiating them, and the effort of the self-respecting to control others by impressing them." 8 T h e deference felt for authority is manifested by such acts as saluting, bowing, uncovering the head, kneeling, and so on, and by forms of address, such as "Sir," "Your Honor," "Your Excellency," "Your Highness," and others. Gifts, too, play an important part in ceremonial behavior, both as propitiatory offerings to a superior person and as tokens of kindness or condescension bestowed on an underling by his superior. Acts of ceremonial deference are acknowledgements of social distance which should receive gracious recognition. Superiority also has its obligations. Professor Ross's observation that the gateway of ceremony is the entrance to duties, not the exit from them, 10 applies to those in authority no less than to those whom they control. Formal dress is another important means of indicating status. Military rank, churchly office, judicial position, and high educational achievement are all indicated by uniforms, robes, or other insignia which lend dignity to the wearer. In •' Eleanor Roosevelt, "My Day," New York World-Telegram, July 1, 1937. s Bess Furraan, "Portrait of a Young Career Woman," the New York Times Magazine, June 19, 1949. » Ross, Social Control, p. 249. Ibid., p. 254.

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contrast, the penitent's sackcloth bespeaks his humility before God and the convict's stripes point the finger of shame at him. A m o n g primitive peoples extensive use is also made of ceremonial dress and ornamentation. Positions of prestige were also signalized by distinctive costumes in ancient and medieval times. T h e elaborate ritual and magnificent costuming with which the British coronation ceremonies are celebrated, for instance, are symbolic and of medieval origin. I n modern times, awakening masses of long-underprivileged people tend to decry and even to destroy all the symbols of superiority in an effort to bring all classes to a common level. Only the militaristic trappings of the dictatorship are retained as symbols of authority. These militaristic symbols have persisted because of their function in inspiring fear. Intimidation preserves the distance necessary for the exercise of authority since other procedures which formerly commanded respect have been set aside. Everywhere the restraining hand of fear may be detected in the symbols and ceremonies which militarism utilizes in what H e r b e r t Spencer has termed "the government of observances" by which decisively governmental actions are usually prefaced. 1 1 Spencer's findings have been corroborated by other writers who have investigated the m a n n e r in which authority is sustained. Vilfredo Pareto says in his Theory of Residues: In virtue of the persistence of abstractions the sentiment of authority may to a greater or lesser extent become disengaged from the person and attached to the symbol, real or assumed, of authority. Hence the importance for those in authority of "keeping up appearances"—the outward semblance of superiority. The detachment may be complete, and the sentiment o£ authority may attach itself to inanimate objects, as in the reverence felt by many people for anything that is written or printed, and in some countries for anything written or printed on paper bearing a seal or an official stamp.12 11 Spencer, Principles of Sociology, II, 5. 1» The Mind and Society, II, 1157.

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F u r t h e r c o n f i r m a t i o n is f o u n d in R o b e r t Michels's studies of authority. H e writes: All social relations, whether they be those in the army and navy, in the civil service, in schools, or even in the family circle, show how necessary to authority is the maintenance of distance—if only through the assumption of an imposing bearing. . . . Another means of preserving authority is the symbol, which forms a link between the masses and the distant personal or impersonal authority which it represents. Conventional meanings develop about such objects as banners, emblems, coats of arms, flags, images, which when displayed, stimulate the faithful and thus serve to maintain the hold of authority upon the mind of the masses.13 T h e rapid changes in status characteristic of a m o b i l e society often call for a d j u s t m e n t s in the individual's attitudes toward authority and the means of preserving it which involve emotional strain. It is n o t unusual for the individual, who, as a subordinate, has strongly advocated d o i n g away with all of the e x t e r n a l trappings of c o m m a n d , to find that o n achieving a superior status he wants the kudos of his new position. Yet he feels that he should b e consistent, that he should disclaim the trappings; c o n s e q u e n t l y he c a n n o t e n j o y them fully. I recall that when I received my doctoral degree I wanted the distinction of the title a n d the gold tassel. I felt a l i t t l e resentful when the college where I taught shortly afterwards decided the use of the title was u n d e m o c r a t i c — a t least for w o m e n . T h e m e n , as a rule, c o n t i n u e d to b e addressed by the title. It was suggested, moreover, that the gold tassel s h o u l d o n l y b e worn by administrative officials and recipients of honorary degrees. W h e n I o r d e r e d my a c a d e m i c costume, I got the gold tassel anyway, b u t the suggestion had d i m m e d its luster. T o d a y the m a t t e r of titles and tassels seems insignific a n t b u t at that time it did n o t . T h e e m o t i o n a l conflict in13 Michels, "Authority," Encyclopaedia

of The Social

Sciences.

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volved—the war between my desire for the recognition I felt that I had earned and the guilty feeling that it was conceited and undemocratic of me to desire it—made it important. In the play Mister Roberts by Thomas Heggen and Joshua Logan, when the captain, driving his hard bargain with Lieutenant Roberts, shows him the commander's cap which he has bought in hopeful anticipation of promotion to that rank, I felt a moment of sympathy for the hated captain. I can understand, better perhaps that most, just how much the gold insignia on a piece of headgear can mean. The isolating effect of the responsibility of command varies widely, because it is dependent upon a number of factors which are themselves variables—for instance, the numbers concerned and the manner in which they are affected. The responsibilities of the head of a great nation or of a military leader with the fate of his army and possibly his country resting on his shoulders are obviously heavier, and consequently more isolating, than those of the industrial or professional leader whose decisions do not normally spell death and disaster for large numbers of people. T h e isolation of command is doubly felt when there is no one with whom the responsibility may be shared or to whom the leader may talk freely without fear of losing his prestige. He cannot as a rule admit his doubts or fears or ignorance to his subordinates without losing face. He must turn to some disinterested person for this help and understanding; and often there is no one sufficiently conversant with his situation to help him in this way. From the ultimate burden of decision no one can relieve him; his is the loneliness of command. In Macaulay's description of the situation of Lord Clive on the eve of the battle of Plassey we have a memorable instance of the burden and loneliness of command: Clive was in a painfully anxious situation. He could place no confidence in the sincerity or in the courage of his confederates and,

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whatever confidence he might place in his own military talents, and in the valour and discipline of his troops, it was no light thing to engage an army twenty times as numerous as his own. Before him lay a river over which it was easy to advance, but over which if things went ill, not one of his little band would ever return. . . . He shrank from the fearful responsibility of making a decision. He called a council of war. T h e majority pronounced against fighting; and Clive declared his concurrence with the majority. . . . But scarcely had the meeting broken up when he was himself again. He retired under the shade of some trees, and passed nearly an hour there in thought. He came back determined to put everything to the hazard, and gave orders that all should be in readiness for passing the river on the morrow." T h e river was passed and Plassey was won, a brilliant victory for Clive's small forces and their indomitable leader. T h e decision of the lonely hour beneath the mango trees was momentous in its consequences. Millions of people, both British and Indian, were affected by it. A n d for the hero of Plassey it meant wealth and power beyond his wildest d r e a m s — t h e n cruel criticism and a sense of isolation too great to be borne. L o r d C l i v e took his own life. A m o n g the proverbially lonely figures of men in great place none is better known than A b r a h a m L i n c o l n . A s the President of a war-torn nation, a man in whose great heart there was "malice towards none . . . charity for all," he was misunderstood, ridiculed, and reviled by the m e n of his time. H e stood alone in the midst of a tragic era, and it was only after he had fallen, to leave "a lonesome place against the sky," 1S that his true magnitude became apparent. His contemporaries failed to perceive his worth, as men too near the base of a m o u n t a i n cannot see its summit. N o w that time has given the needed perspective the loftiness of his soul is revealed in all its aloneness—the aloneness of the master w h o himself understood and n Macaulay, Lord Clive, pp. 46-47. 1 5 Edwin Markham, "Lincoln, the Man of the People," from Lincoln, Other Poems (New York, 1901).

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sympathized with the frailties and sorrows of others, but whose associates lacked the vision which would have enabled them to share his burdens. T h e late Woodrow Wilson, another wartime President, was also one of the lonely men of history. Disappointed, ill, and estranged from the men whose counsel he had valued, he ended his career amid misunderstanding and with a sense of isolation, even of bitterness, over the fact that the avenue through which he ardently believed world peace could be attained had been so persistently blocked. Even in times of peace, the responsibilities of the President's office are so great that he who carries them must walk alone. It is in this respect that Robert E. Sherwood, writing about President T r u m a n , calls him "the loneliest official on earth." 18 For the ruler whose position is hereditary, the problem of isolation is even more insuperable than that of the President of the United States. T o the usual barriers of high command is added yet another; as Shakespeare wrote, "divinity doth hedge a king." From birth the hereditary monarch lives in a closed circle within which all of his intimate social relationships must be confined. T o marry or even to choose an intimate friend or confidant outside the radius is a difficult matter: such a marriage may necessitate the renunciation of the throne. T h e monarch is indeed fortunate who finds among the eligible few someone who can give him the response he needs and in whom he can confide the problems of his burdensome position. T h e double duty which the marriage relationship may assume in the life of a royal sovereign is feelingly brought out in one of Queen Victoria's letters after the death of the Prince Consort. In writing to Earl Canning, who has just lost Lady Canning, the Queen says: 1« New York Times Magazine, Jan. 16, 1949.

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T o lose one's partner in life is . . . like losing half of one's body and soul, torn forcibly away. . . . But to the Q u e e n — t o a poor helpless w o m a n — i t is not only that—it is the stay, support and comfort which is lost! T o the Queen it is like death in life! Great and small—nothing was done without his loving help and advice — a n d she feels alone in the wide world, with many helpless children (except the Princess Royal) to look to her—and the whole nation to look to her—now when she can barely struggle with her wretched existence! 17 T o lose n o t only a b e l o v e d husband b u t also one's sole supp o r t and c o m f o r t in m e e t i n g the obligations of a high posit i o n creates a lonely situation indeed. It is beside the p o i n t to a r g u e , as m e n might, that it is lonely because the sovereign is "a poor helpless w o m a n . " Seventy-five years later, it was a great-grandson of Q u e e n V i c t o r i a w h o r e n o u n c e d the same t h r o n e because he f o u n d its b u r d e n s too heavy to bear w i t h o u t the s u p p o r t of the w o m a n he loved. In its straightforward simp l i c i t y , the farewell message of E d w a r d V I I I to his people is the a p p e a l of a lonely m a n w h o asks to be understood a n d , if n e e d be, f o r g i v e n for choosing love rather than duty since the t w o c o u l d n o t be reconciled. T h e storybook adventures of princes and princesses w h o h a v e escaped f r o m their royal b o n d a g e in disguise and w h o travel a m o n g their p e o p l e i n c o g n i t o have little basis in fact. T h e c a r e f u l l y g u a r d e d childhood of royalty affords f e w opp o r t u n i t i e s for such t h r i l l i n g contacts with the w o r l d b e y o n d the palace gates. A n incident of the c h i l d h o o d of Q u e e n Elizab e t h II a n d Princess Margaret Rose suggests this. T h e little princesses, so the story goes, l o o k i n g f r o m a w i n d o w in their cottage o n the grounds of Balmoral Castle, discovered a small b o y outside the gate gazing in their direction. T h e y c a u g h t his eye a n d he w a v e d to them. T h e y waved in return, w a v e d The Letters of Queen Victoria, ed. A r t h u r Christopher Benson and Viscount Esher (New York, 1907), III, 608-9.

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enthusiastically, it is said. T h e n the inevitable attendant appeared and asked the little boy if he would kindly go away and not intrude on the privacy of the royal family during their vacation. T h e boy withdrew, no doubt feeling humiliated, and the little episode was closed. Nor are the delights of adventures like those of T o m Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn among the prerogatives of royal children. Adventures there may be in times of revolution but they are of a different order, characterized by fear and tragedy. T h e extreme of royal isolation was found, however, in the old Ottoman Empire where the young heir to the throne, if he were fortunate enough to escape being slaughtered as a potential rival of the sultan, was kept a prisoner in close confinement. A number of the Turkish sultans spent long years as prisoners within the palace before they came to the throne, at which time, under a decree of Mohammed II, they were legally authorized to execute their brothers. 18 A maxim of the late Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes—"Man must face the loneliness of original work"—illuminates another situation which is in some ways similar to that of great place, but different in others. It is apparent that the man who thinks beyond a point to which his associates can accompany him must be alone in that respect at least. As a thinker ahead of his time, he has no way to escape his loneliness. Men cannot give him an understanding beyond their powers even if their will toward him is the best in the world—and often it is not. Men tend to look upon new ideas with skepticism and hostility, particularly if these ideas contain a threat to the established theories upon which the security of their own positions rests. T h e antagonistic attitude of some religious groups toward scientific discoveries which tend to undermine the authoriis Hammer, Das Osmanischem Reichs. See also Lybyer, Government of Ottoman Empire, pp. 93-97, and Hidden, The Ottoman Dynasty, p. 26.

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tarian sources of their doctrines and power is an outstanding example of the opposition to which new ideas and their protagonists may be subjected. Religious groups are not the only ones, however, who have failed to be receptive to new truths. Characteristically, any group which is already well entrenched will resist any new theory which, if accepted, would weaken the systems from which they derive their power and material advantages. T h e original thinker has always to reckon with such vested interests, especially in government and business, should his theories run counter to theirs. The attack on David Lilienthal, Chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, affords a striking example of the distance which so frequently separates the creative thinker from the mass of mankind. Here the divergence of opinion was not on whether atomic energy should be further developed—bigger and better bombs are earnestly desired—but on the conditions under which the research should be carried on. Dr. Lilienthal and several atomic scientists have been suspect because of their desire for an atmosphere of scientific freedom in which to work. 19 Secrecy adds heavily to the atomic scientist's burden of responsibility and widens the distance separating him from other men. Under other circumstances—if the forces of fear and nationalism were not involved—the recognition earned by the achievements of the atomic scientists would have greatly lessened the distance that the abstruse nature of their work makes to some degree inevitable. T h e failure to secure recognition for one's creative endeavors is hard to take. Self-confidence and courage of a high order are needed to persist in an untried course in the face of such failure; to believe in one's self when no one else does is not an easy matter. A masterpiece is seldom a meteoric production of creative brilliance; more often it also represents long and For a discussion of this point, see Henry Steele Coramager's timely article, " T h e Real Danger—Fear of Ideas," New York Times Magazine, J u n e «6, 1949.

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unswerving devotion to an idea. Recognition can hardly be hoped for until the task is done, and perhaps not then. During this period some measure of loneliness must be experienced by the creative thinker; and if in the end he has no reward, his loneliness will be deepened. Genius in itself does not necessarily predispose its possessor to social maladjustment, as is popularly believed. In a study of 100 men of genius for whom adequate information on their social adjustment could be obtained, Henry Harper Hart 2 0 found only 17 who were sufficiently maladjusted to be considered fundamentally unhappy. T h e 17 are Heine, Byron, Swinburne, de Musset, Poe, Schiller and Shelley, among the poets; Rousseau and Pascal, among the men of letters; Spinoza, Comte and Schopenhauer, among the philosophers; and Mozart, Handel, Beethoven, Schubert, and Weber, among the musicians. None of the painters, scientists, and statesmen studied by Dr. Hart was profoundly discontented. An environment free from undue social distraction may well be an essential condition for creative work, and the genius who seeks it in no sense a social misfit. "Solitude is not the goal of genius, but its refuge," as Warren C. Middleton points out in his study of this problem. 21 Studies of gifted children have also shown that they are not as a group characterized by maladjustment of personality, but are normal or above normal in their play and social interests.22 The original thinker, the creative artist, is superior to his environment, yet ever sensitive to it. He creates that others may know truth and beauty. His joy is in the acceptance of his gifts, his suffering is caused by their rejection or, as in the case of the atomic scientists, the failure of others to appreciate the conditions necessary for his 20 Henry Harper Hart, " T h e Unhappiness of Genius," Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, Oct., 1934, pp. 410-29, and Nov., 1934, pp. 557-74. 21 Warren C. Middleton, " T h e Propensity of Genius to Skjlitude," Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, Oct.-Nov., 1935, pp. 325-33. 22 Burks, Jensen, and Terraan, The Promise of Youth, pp. 472-74.

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work. H e may require the continual m u t u a l stimulation of active minds working in the same or related fields or he may need to brood in solitude. M u c h of the loneliness of the genius comes from the struggle for understanding while his work is in progress. In the early pages of The Journal of Gamaliel Bradford, the sense of aloneness and the need for understanding help is repeatedly voiced by this gifted writer as a y o u n g man: Oh, that at this most important period of my life I had someone who would watch over me and guide me, someone who would understand my soul, and still more my poetry. . . . I know that the gods have made man to struggle with his own soul and live by himself, if he would live at all. But in my poetry, it is hard to write on and on, good and bad alike, with no one to commend or blame, no one to take the least interest. 23 A n d yet y o u n g Bradford was more fortunate than many struggling y o u n g poets in his environment and the ability of his family and friends to appreciate his aspirations. His environment was neither indifferent nor hostile, although it may have seemed so to a sensitive boy. H a d he possessed greater poetic gifts, his verse might have w o n recognition as did his other writing. His p r o b l e m suggests that of many other persons for w h o m a little talent, like a little learning, has been a dangerous t h i n g — d a n g e r o u s at least for his peace of mind and contentment. His achievements have fallen short of his ambitions, and, dissatisfied with himself, he attempts to rationalize his failures. Some w h o have actually done work, though of mediocre quality, take the attitude that they are unappreciated geniuses, martyrs to their art. Others, w h o have produced little or nothing, seek alibis. T h e y w o u l d have done great things, they argue, if only their circumstances had been different. For the original thinker, creative work has its compensa23 Bradford, Journal, pp. 32-33.

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tions as well as sorrows, even if recognition is delayed or never comes. T h e late Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes called attention to these secret satisfactions of the thinker, simply and beautifully, in an address delivered to Harvard University undergraduates February 17, 1886: No man has the right to intellectual ambition until he has learned to lay his course by a star which he has never seen—to dig by the divining rod for springs he may never reach. . . . T o think great thoughts you must be heroes as well as idealists. Only when you have worked alone—when you have felt around you a black gulf of solitude more isolating than that which surrounds the dying man, and in hope and in despair have trusted to your own unshaken will—then only will you have achieved. Thus only can you gain the secret isolated joy of the thinker, who knows that a hundred years after he is dead and forgotten men who never heard of him will be moving to the measure of his thought—the subtile rapture of a postponed power, which the world knows not because it has no external trappings, but which to his prophetic vision is more real than that which commands an army.-'4 2« Holmes, Collected Legal Papers, pp. 31-32.

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Men beyond the Pale As a member of society the individual is subject to regulations formulated by the group in response to needs that arise when men attempt to live together and to work together to attain common ends. His membership in the group is contingent upon his adherence to these regulations or behavior codes enjoined upon him. If he does not heed them, his own act of transgression places him outside the group—beyond the pale. He is no longer entitled to the privileges and protection which the group affords; he has stepped over or across the boundaries, as the derivation of the term transgression suggests, and has become an outsider. His status is that of a potential if not an actual enemy, since his transgression threatens, or is believed to threaten, the solidarity and security of the group. Group membership inplies that the individual identifies his good with that of the other members, that his success contributes somethingO to their well-bein?, and that he in turn O' profits by any good fortune which may come to them. If he fails, the other members will be affected adversely; if they fail, he must suffer with them. It is the prosperity or the misfortune of the individual members of the group which determines the general welfare. Realizing this fact and the benefits of united endeavor, men have felt impelled to secure the cooperation of all of the members of a community for certain tasks. T h e solidarity of the group is weakened by the opposition or noncooperation of any of its members; hence, the individual's behavior is a matter of concern to his fellows and pressure is brought to bear upon him to make him conform to the behavior norms. These norms or standards of conduct define

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the group and sustain its social structure; they are its social boundaries. 1 Within a modern complex society is a wide range of highly differentiated groups, each of which has set up its own standards for the conduct of its members. Specific sanctions to insure compliance have been attached to these codes, among which four general types may be distinguished: (1) associational codes, such as the rules of voluntary organizations, of which the punitive sanctions are the loss of esteem or of membership in the group; (2) communal codes, such as those of custom and fashion, of which the sanction is social displeasure; (3) the moral code, of which the sanctions are the individual's sense of guilt; and (4) the legal code of the state, which has the ultimate sanction of physical enforcement. 2 In the more primitive societies specialized groups with distinctive behavior codes and sanctions are largely undeveloped. T h e society functions as a unit and is delimited by the communal code of custom which is embodied in the folkways and mores. Social ostracism, loss of face, and ridicule are further sustaining forces. Although codes of behavior vary, as we have noted, among different peoples and under different circumstances, it is possible, despite this variance, to discover resemblances in the basic codes of all societies. T h e r e are a few fundamental rules which must be obeyed in all societies if men are to live together harmoniously. These minimum standards for regulating the individual's conduct toward other men are set forth in a concise and simple summary in the last six of the Mosaic commandments: respect for one's parents, for the life, the property, and the good name of another, for truth, and for the rights of the marriage relationship. Unless these rules are complied with, the group is threatened with dissension and the loss of the advantages of cooperative association. 1 For a clear and concise treatment of the social codes and sanctions which sustain the social structure in a modern complex community, see Maclver and Page, Society, Chs. VII, VIII, IX. 2 Ibid., pp. 140-41.

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In addition to the basic principles of conduct which have just been cited, the social codes of different societies and of the smaller groups w i t h i n these societies contain other, more specific rules of behavior. Each society or group has its peculiar requirements, although the ends w h i c h are sought may bear a relation to each other. For example, religious codes vary enormously in the rules of conduct w h i c h they prescribe for their followers, b u t the purpose is m u c h the same for all of t h e m — t h e propitiation of a supernatural being, or beings, to the end that the group may prosper, if not in this world, in the world to come. O f t e n , also, the codes of different groups within a larger society or c o m m u n a l group, although possessing distinctive features, also have provisions of a more general nature which are f o u n d in other codes too. In Christian societies the interrelationship between the moral and the religious codes tends to be close; each code is reinforced by the sanctions of the other. O n the other hand, in contrast to situations in which the codes of two or more of the different groups within a society supplement and support each other, there are many situations in modern highly c o m p l e x societies in w h i c h the individual is either faced by conflicting codes or, as in the case of rapidly evolving groups or segments of society, by the absence of any well-defined rules for his governance. Both of these situations tend to isolate the individual from the larger society of which the segments are a part. A m o n g the groupings or segments of modern societies whose codes are in conflict w i t h those of the society as a whole, the segment k n o w n as " t h e u n d e r w o r l d " is perhaps the most clearly defined. Between the u n d e r w o r l d and the rest of the community a conflict situation exists in w h i c h the code of the underworld demands, as Frank T a n n e n b a u m points out in his discerning analysis of the philosophy of the professional criminal, "the same ruthlessness towards enemies and traitors, the same loyalties towards companions" that are characteristic

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of a warrior's attitude. 3 T h e criminal lacks the sense of belonging to the community which entails loyalty to it and respect for its customs and commands. He regards himself as an outsider, an enemy beyond the pale of ordered society who has always been persecuted and mistreated. T h e community in its turn tends to take the attitude that the criminal in breaking the mores has deliberately and of his own free choice placed himself outside the pale. Consequently, on both sides of the relationship are attitudes of fear, distrust, enmity, and revenge. Of the criminal's code of loyalty toward his companions perhaps a word should be said. Although resembling the warrior's code in its outward manifestations, the criminal's loyalty differs in motivation. T h e warrior's code of loyalty is based on his affection for his comrades; the criminal's code, on the other hand, is based primarily on fear. Loyalty to the gang is essential for survival. T h e criminal who has been caught knows that if he betrays his accomplices he has more to fear from them after his release from prison than he has to fear from the law if he keeps silent and accepts the full penalty for his crime—even though it may be the death sentence. He has nothing to gain from a confession which implicates others. At liberty, the gang would hunt him down and kill him like the rat that they call him. Even in prison he could not feel secure against the gang's vengeance; other prisoners who knew that he had talked would be constantly on the alert "to get him." T h e fact that prisoners actually fear one another far more than they do the officers of the institution is recognized by prison authorities. 4 Fear rather than honor is the principal sanction of the underworld code of loyalty. T h e life of the professional criminal, marked by hatred and violence, distrust and fear, is not conducive to the finer sentis Tanncnbaum, Crime and the Community, Ch. VII. * See Joseph Fulling Fishman and Vee Terrys Perlman, "Some Delusions about Crime," Harper's Magazine, June, 1933, pp. 36-45.

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ments and practices in human relationships. I cannot, for instance, recall a single outstanding case of unselfish loyalty and affection among all of the stories of gang activities and underworld life with which the newspapers have been filled in recent years, while instances of double-dealing and bitter recriminations abound. Sordid as the general picture is, however, each of the many gangs which comprise the underworld is in itself a primary group which, despite the divisive influences that it is subject to, gives its members a measure of recognition, response, and security. W i t h o u t these rewards, or at least the promise of them, the underworld gang could not exist. Its membership is recruited in large part from youths who feel, either rightly or wrongly, that organized society has denied them these rewards. T h e y crave the emotional satisfactions of belonging to a group in which they are appreciated, and neither their families nor any of the approved groups in the community have met this need. T o belong to a gang bolsters their feeling of worth; having never known the deep and abiding rewards of participating in relationships of mutual respect, honor, and affection, they fail to perceive how shallow and spurious the rewards of gang relationships are apt to be. A n d , if they surmise the truth after they have broken the community's codes and have sworn allegiance to the underworld, the difficulties of turning back are so great and the rewards for which they can hope seem so meager in comparison, that only a few attempt to struggle back. T h e majority continue their criminal activities, a class outside the pale of society. N o t all of the criminals who prey upon modern society are confined to the underworld, however, as Edwin H. Sutherland points out in his epoch-making paper on this subject. 5 T h e white-collar criminal also violates the criminal law, as does » Edwin H. Sutherland, "White-Collar Criminality," American Sociological Review, Feb., 1940, pp. i - ) 2 . See also the same author's White-Collar Crime, and his article "Crime and Business," in Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, Sept., 1941, pp. 112-18.

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the lower-class or underworld criminal. T h e fact that the white-collar criminal is not stigmatized for his crimes like the underworld criminal and excluded from the normal life of the community is due to the favored position of the business and professional classes to which the white-collar criminal belongs.8 T h e prestige of his class—some of which tends to cling to him despite his crime—shields him from the full force of public opinion and, perhaps, of the law. He enjoys relative immunity from these penalties by "benefit of business or profession," to borrow Sutherland's apt phrasing, just as churchmen in medieval society secured relative immunity by "benefit of clergy." This unfortunate situation results from a lack of social integration in the community. Groups and individuals of the white-collar class, like those of the underworld, are more concerned with their own special interests than they are with the welfare of the community as a whole. Crime flourishes because the community is divided within itself and does not present a solid front against it. In addition to the protection which the segmentation of society tends to afford the criminal, it also often tends to facilitate the learning of criminal behavior. Studies of delinquent children, the seedlings of the underworld, have repeatedly shown that these children lack emotionally satisfying relationships with their families and with law-abiding persons in the community, whereas they do have frequent emotionally rewarding contacts with persons who practice criminal behavior. White-collar criminality is also learned behavior. Criminals of this type acquire their attitudes and methods from dishonest associates in the business and professional It should be noted that the term "white-collar" as Sutherland uses it means "respected," "socially accepted and approved," and "looked up to." It should not be confused with the customary use of the term to designate office workers, salespeople and other similar groups of sem¡professional workers whose salaries are low. T h e white-collar criminal, on the other hand, usually belongs to classes which enjoy a high socioeconomic status. 8

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world. In contrast, however, to the young delinquent and the lower-class criminal, the white-collar criminal does not as a rule suffer from a sense of isolation. He is usually well adjusted to other persons in his intimate relationships, although complete intimacy of confidence is perhaps wanting. Often his family and friends may be unaware of the criminal nature of his business activities; such secrecy is made possible by the segmental nature of modern society and modern social relationships. Complete intimacy of confidence, as Georg Simmel observed in his penetrating analysis of secrecy,7 becomes increasingly more difficult as men become more highly differentiated in complex modern societies. Their personalities become too individualized for a complete reciprocity of understanding, and in consequence they incline more to relationships which involve only one facet of the personality at a time. These differential friendships, as Simmel terms them, demand that friends refrain from obtruding themselves into one another's interests and feelings not included in the special relationship. T h e failure to observe this limitation would seriously disturb the friendship. Within the segment of the total personality that the relationship does involve, the feelings, although limited at the periphery, are not necessarily shallow. They may be sincere, deep, and abiding, and centered at the very core of the individual's personality. The development of differential relationships with acquaintances, friends, and relatives, with their varied social demands, safeguards the individual's privacy and protects him against undue emotional involvement in the lives of others. Less fortunately, however, from the point of view of the community, the degree of privacy permitted by such relationships sometimes makes it possible for the white-collar criminal to t Georg Simmel, "The Sociology of Secrecy and of Secret Societies" (tr. by Albion W. Small), American Journal of Sociology, Jan., 1906, pp. 441-98.

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enjoy the esteem of law-abiding groups in the community, and at the same time to engage secretly in criminal practices. At the time that such a man begins his criminal activities, he is normally a member of a number of respected groups, to each of which he has revealed only one sector of his personality. If his crimes do not intrude upon the segment revealed to a particular group, his status in the group tends to remain unchanged. The underworld criminal, on the other hand, usually begins his career as a member of a gang of young marauders and is labeled "bad" by the community while still a child. He has never belonged to groups in the community that have prestige. His relationships are less highly differentiated and he has less to conceal from his associates than the whitecollar criminal. In this respect he is the more honest of the two. The recentness of many of the white-collar criminal's opportunities for crime give him a further advantage over his underworld counterpart. White-collar crime, as Sutherland pointed out in his studies of the problem, consists primarily of the violation of delegated or implied trust. Much of it falls into two major categories: the misrepresentation of asset values, and duplicity in the manipulation of power. Opportunities for these types of crime have increased as the economic and political structure of modern society has become increasingly complex. Many are new and unfamiliar crimes to the community at large, and no well-defined body of folkways and mores for their control has evolved, although laws directed toward this end have been enacted. Underworld crime, on the other hand, although carried out for the most part by wellorganized gangs whose relations to each other and often to law enforcement officials are intricate and difficult to trace, tends to be direct and violent in execution. The community understands the methods employed in murders and armed robberies, and a body of mores built up through long experience rein-

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forces the legal code. As a result of this difference in the supporting mores, the underworld criminal is stigmatized for his crimes to a far greater degree than the white-collar offender. This is a failure of justice which the underworld criminal bitterly resents and which weakens the effectiveness of the community's stand against crime. The denizens of the underworld are normally more aware than the community at large of the nature and extent of the white-collar criminal's activities, and their resentment of the partiality shown to this class of offenders deepens the cleavages of class differentiation. Both groups—the upper and the under worlds—emphasize class loyalties at the expense of community loyalties, and thus add the threat of increased class friction and disunity to the threat which crime itself offers to community solidarity. Each class or group is an inextricable part of the community as a whole, "a clod of the main"; hence, class differences which weaken and disrupt the sense of community also tend to jeopardize the position of the class which seeks to secure its own special ends at the expense of the common good. T h e privileged class must be constantly on the alert to defend its claims if, in securing them, it has wronged others and incurred their ill will. Any group or class whose claims to the power it wields have not been generally accepted by the community at large and stabilized by this acceptance, dares not be tolerant of others who ask disquieting questions. Fearful of their own position, power groups of this kind label as rebels or heretics, communists or capitalists, as the case may be, those who have the temerity to differ. T h e intensity of their intolerance is a measure of their own insecurity. Characteristically, also, conscious of their need for community support, they picture the dissenter as an enemy of the community rather than of themselves, and bestir the community to take action against the offender. T o use a homely metaphor, a red herring is drawn

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across the trail. Attention is directed away from the real issues involved, and the community, following this mistaken lead, draws a circle that shuts out the so-called heretic or rebel in common with the lower-class criminal. A plea for the dissenter's right to differ must not overlook the fact, however, that dissenters have played more than one role in history and that they have been responsible for confusion, division, and discontent as well as for progress. T h e dissenter may be a crackpot or a fanatic, the heretic may be gravely in error. Nevertheless, as Norman Thomas, himself a great and respected dissenter, points out, 8 the true prophet has always been a dissenter. His interest is the growing point in society and when this point is sealed off by force, society stagnates. T h e danger to society, in Thomas's opinion, is not from the honest, even if mistaken, dissenter, but from the passions of the mob and those who manipulate it in the struggle for power and profit. In this connection, however, it is important to note, as Thomas is careful to do, that "neither the Communist nor the Fascist deserves the honored name of dissenter. H e is merely the docile but often fanatic slave of his own particular group and its leaders. He wants no true freedom of dissent." In drawing a circle that shuts out the transgressor, the group acts on the age-old principle of an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. T h e transgressor puts himself outside the pale of the group when he breaks obligations which bind the group together, and the group retaliates in kind by closing its boundaries against his re-entry. T h i s may be done for longer or shorter periods and in a number of different ways, such as social ostracism, imprisonment, and exile, and, in more extreme instances, torture and death. T h e underlying principle is the same in all but the form which it assumes is, in theory at least, 8 Norman Thomas, " T h e Dissenter's Role in a Totalitarian Age," New York Times Magazine, Nov. 20, 1949.

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adjusted to make the punishment fit the seriousness of the act of transgression. As a form of punishment, social ostracism varies widely in the manner of its expression and in its severity. It may mean no more than averted faces and whisperings behind the transgressor's back, or it may mean being branded with some distinguishing mark of his infamy and debarred from holding office, engaging in certain occupations, and sharing in many of the customary rights and privileges enjoyed by the rest of the group. It may mean a lifelong sentence of dishonor which will be visited also upon the offender's descendants unto the third and fourth generations. Or it may be an indeterminate sentence which eventually permits the transgressor to regain his former position in the group. It is a flexible penalty, and wisely used is an effective one in securing conformity. Badly used, it promotes antisocial attitudes of defiance and despair. T h e Hester Prynnes whose characters are refined and ennobled rather than coarsened and embittered by subjection to a long, humiliating ordeal of ostracism are exceptions. As a rule, blows to an individual's pride and self-respect heal more slowly than do bodily injuries and leave scars that are more disfiguring. Imprisonment is another widely adopted means of retaliation. Armed guards, stone walls, and iron bars are interposed between the transgressor and the group for whatever length of time the offender's judges believe justified. T h e sentence may vary from a few hours to life imprisonment, and the conditions under which it is served may range from decency and humaneness to the uttermost depths of degradation and brutality, with the distribution heavily skewed in the direction of the more vindictive and inhuman kinds of treatment. In general, ordinary crime including homicide incites less fear and animosity in the community than nonconforming economic, political, or religious ideas. Much has been done to ameliorate the lot in prison of the ordinary criminal. In more

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socially progressive communities, cruel and unusual punishments have been forbidden, systems of probation and parole introduced, and opportunities for recreation and vocational training provided within the prison. T h e purpose of imprisonment is seen as reform and rehabilitation rather than retaliation. Toward the nonconformist, however, the motive is more often one of vengeance. Vengeful practices can be noted even in liberal democratic countries during periods of grave emotional stress and insecurity, and they are seemingly inevitable in a totalitarian state. T h e infamous record, for instance, of the Nazi concentration camps is perhaps the ultimate in horrors of the whole sorry history of the treatment of prisoners. Much has been written, both objectively and sentimentally, about prison life and what it does to men and women to be forcibly deprived of their personal freedom and customary social stimulation and response for long periods of time. Few have sufficient resources within themselves to endure it for long without being impaired mentally and emotionally. Prison isolation tends to dwarf or to destroy those attributes of personality which are the most truly human and to cause the prisoner's mentality to recede to a lower level. Prisoners who realize this danger in their situation often react vigorously against it, eagerly seizing anything that the poverty of their environment affords upon which they can lavish their affection or which can be used to while away the boredom of endless empty hours. Stories of prison life abound in accounts of ingenious ways which prisoners have invented to occupy their time, and of deep attachments which they have formed for some small animal or plant which may by chance have come to live in the sterile, forbidding environment of the prison. Vera Figner, for example, in her Memoirs of a Revolutionist0 speaks touch» Figner, Memoirs of a Revolutionist,

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ingly of the great and genuine sorrow which she felt when a little bird that lived in the cell with her died. She wept for a fortnight when it died but felt "only a cold, purely rational regret" when she learned of the death of a favorite uncle. In the 13 years for which she had been imprisoned at that time, the ties of relationship had weakened, memories had grown dim, and her feelings toward her relatives had been changed and distorted. Memories and feelings belonged to a different world, a "beyond," whereas the little bird had been something near, and living, and warm. It had eaten out of her hand and perched on her shoulder. Its death left a void that was real and poignant. 10 Banishment to a penal colony, like solitary confinement, is a greatly dreaded form of punishment. For the most part, groups have meted it out to prisoners whom they dared not kill for one reason or another, and yet whom they wished to destroy. Exiled, the prisoner is more easily forgotten and it is more difficult for his friends to secure a new trial or a pardon for him. If his sentence has been brought about unjustly, as in the famous Dreyfus case, his persecutors can breathe more freely with their victim banished to the deathlike oblivion of the penal colony. Only the untiring and courageous efforts of Dreyfus's family and friends, notably Zola and Clemenceau, secured a retrial for him after five years of "most awful torture" on Devil's Island off the coast of French Guiana. Although but forty when he was brought back to France, Dreyfus was described as an old, old man with silver white hair and the expression of one who had endured things unendurable. His experiences, and more recently those reported by Rene Belbenoit, 11 bear witness to the misery of prisoners banished to a penal colony. T h e prisoners exiled to Siberia under the Czarist regime, like the exiles to Devil's Island, en1° For other interesting examples, see Lawes, Twenty Thousand Years in Sing 1 1 Belbenoit, Dry Sing, pp. 315-2». Guillotine.

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dured "most a w f u l torture." A n d , at the present writing, rumors concerning the conditions in the so-called work camps instituted by Soviet Russia indicate that these camps are veritable penal colonies at their worst. H u m a n e sentiment has impelled the more democratic countries of Western Europe to discontinue this method of punishment. France, the last to do so, ordered the notorious Devil's Island colony liquidated, and repatriation of its inmates was begun in 1946. A n o t h e r widely used method by which the group in power in a state wreaks its vengeance on the individual w h o is persona non grata is to compel him to leave the country under the threat of imprisonment or death if he remains or returns. T h e penalty may be formally imposed, b u t more often the individual himself realizes the animosity directed toward him and flees from the country to avoid it. T h e exile is a familiar figure in history and contemporary life. Untold thousands of people are in exile today, refugees from the wrath of political parties with whose policies they are not in sympathy. T h e tragedy of their plight is obvious. T h e violent severance of former relationships and loyalties leaves wounds that do not heal readily. G r a t e f u l as the exile may be for the refuge which a foreign country offers him, he is nevertheless ill-prepared to begin life anew in a strange environment which is, moreover, one which he would not have chosen had he not been forced to leave his native land. His situation in this respect is u n l i k e that of the immigrant who willingly migrates to a new country, and w h o can, if he wishes, return to his former home. T h e immigrant has time to prepare himself emotionally for the break between the old life and the new. Consequently, the transition is less of a shock to him than it is to the refugee w h o is forced to make the change abruptly and against his will. T h e refugee, moreover, is frequently a none-too-welcome

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guest in the country to which he flees. He usually comes without means, his property having been confiscated, and aid must be given to him, possibly by a nation already overburdened with the care of its own needy. Sheltering him may also be regarded by the refugee's own government as an unfriendly act, and may cause controversy. Again, and this is perhaps the most difficult factor of all to cope with, the guest country may also feel unsympathetic towards him or his cause. I was in Istanbul at the time that Trotsky sought asylum there after his flight from Russia, and I well recall the consternation by his unexpected and unwelcome arrival. T h e T u r k s did not wish to offend their powerful neighbor to the north by harboring him, nor were they in sympathy with his cause, yet they felt obligated by the customs of hospitality to shelter him until he could find asylum elsewhere. France finally accepted him, but not for long, and eventually he reached Mexico, whither his enemies followed and killed him. In recent years even the United States, with its long tradition of welcoming the oppressed of all lands, has become grudgingly reluctant to receive refugees from the totalitarian dictatorships of Europe, whether communist or fascist. T h e "haves" among us fear that the refugees may be infected with the communist virus or that they may become dependent upon relief; the "have-nots" fear their competition in the labor market. T h e exile who realizes that the country which has given him asylum has done so on sufferance only, and who may be out of sympathy with his unwilling hosts, frequently experiences a profound nostalgia. As Guido de Ruggiero observes," his native land in contrast with the world in which he now lives seems a sort of idyllic Eden, and "the distance that separates in his mind those countries, the idealized and the real, 12 Ruggiero, "Exile," Encyclopaedia of the Social Sciences.

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often causes him to fail to recognize the one in the other." His love of country is no longer "the peaceful and legitimate love of the citizen; but a love censorious and contentious and therefore capable of suggesting the extreme measure of violence." T o regain the citizenship that he has lost the exile often conspires against his native country, or at least against the group in control. Many exiled monarchs and political leaders have engineered plots for their return, and sometimes have succeeded. Not all exiles, however, devote their time to conniving for their return. Many accept the fact that in all probability they will never return, and they direct their energies to making new homes for themselves and becoming a part of whatever country will afford them asylum. They make an effort to adjust and to be of service. History abounds with instances of the valuable contributions made by exiles, either as individuals or as groups, to the culture of countries which have received them. The contributions made by the French Huguenots to English industry, especially the manufacture of woolen textiles, is a familiar example. Similarly, the talents of many gifted refugees, of whom Einstein is perhaps the most outstanding, are enriching American life today. For the exile, the hope that the conditions which brought about banishment will someday change and that he will be able to return with honor to his native land is a normal sentiment. Even if he has been able to strike new loots and to form new loyalties which bring him happiness, the desire to be free to return if he wishes tends to persist. The sentiment expressed by Dr. Alice Salomon, distinguished social worker and refugee, in speaking of her native Germany, tells this story: "It is still my country. And it will remain my country. They can't take away my past—only my present and future." Perhaps had Dr. Salomon been a younger woman she would not have felt that her future had been taken from her. In-

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stead, she might have looked forward to becoming in time a beloved and useful citizen of the United States, where, as she said, if one is awakened in the early morning by the sound of someone at the door, there is nothing to fear. It is only the milkman on his rounds, not the police.

CHAPTER

VII

Victims of the Evil Eye Why the blue beads? T h e traveler in the lands of the ancient Near East is repeatedly moved to ask his guide this question by the sight of camels, donkeys, horses, and the radiator caps of cars decked out with strings of blue beads. T h e guide too is probably wearing blue beads somewhere about his person and his children most certainly are. T h e answer, if the question is not deftly ignored, is usually vague and noncommittal and the traveler, if he is tactful, will not attempt to probe further into the matter. T h e efficacy of blue beads in averting the baneful influence of the evil eye is not a subject which is open to question and debate; it is a matter of belief. And, the guide reasons to himself, it does not behoove one to argue matters of faith with skeptically minded foreigners who are totally incapable of appreciating the finer nuances of the problem. Nor is the guide's attitude an unusual one where matters of faith are involved. Attempts to debate with a Christian Scientist friend certain tenets of her belief which to me seem obviously controversial have been met by the statement, "Science doesn't argue," spoken with an air of finality which definitely prohibited any further intrusive questioning. T h e desire to protect matters of faith from desecration is a natural one. Not to come to the defense of beliefs pertaining to health and well-being would be, in the eyes of the true believer, to court disaster. And to decline to discuss a belief is frequently the most strategic way to defend it. T h e guide knows this fact as well as my Christian Scientist friend, and he directs the traveler's attention elsewhere as the donkeys, each with his necklace of blue beads, jog along over the Anatolian hills. T h e blue beads, like similar charms and amulets, are sym-

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bols of a superstitious belief concerning the nature of disease that is as widespread as the human race and as old. In a study of this problem, Walter Addison J a y n e says: In ignorance of the operation of natural laws, disease was ascribed to spiritual beings or superhuman powers; the malevolence of demons; magic influences, enchantments, and spells of the black art exercised by a sorcerer, wizard, or witch; the evil eye or the act of an enemy; or, possibly, the malady was believed to be superinduced by the gods; and, as religious conceptions reached a higher level, it was regarded as a visitation of the wrath of a deity in revenge for some act of omission or commission, neglect or impiety, until finally it was held to be a punishment for sin. T h e individual fell prey to disease in consequence of these supernatural onslaughts, while the community, in similar fashion, was visited by epidemics.1 Attribution of the causes of disease to supernatural sources has profoundly affected both the manner in which diseased persons have been regarded by their fellows and the attitudes which afflicted individuals have taken toward their own condition. Diagnosis is of small importance in religious healing, since the causes of all diseases are believed to be the same. T h e sufferer, as Dr. Jayne points out, has "either to appease the gods and win their favor or to exorcise the malignant authors of disease; to appease, frighten, or coax them, or to offer a substitute victim, and thus to be rid of them." 2 Disease was believed to be prevented by the wearing of amulets and talismans and cured by prescribed magico-religious formulas. In the light of these beliefs, disease became a matter of the relationship between the individual and supernatural beings or forces. It was believed that the sick person had in some way incurred the ill will of the gods or had neglected the precautions necessary to keep the forces of evil in abeyance. 1 Jayne, Healing Gods of Ancient Civilizations, p. xxxiii. 2 Ibid., p. xxxiv.

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In either event, the responsibility for his illness rested upon his shoulders or upon his father's, since the iniquities of the fathers were visited upon the children even unto the third and fourth generations. A sense of guilt was thus injected into the situation. T h e ill person was at fault if the gods had turned their faces from him. He was blameworthy both in his own eyes and in the eyes of his fellows. His condition was therefore one for censure rather than for sympathy. Because the individual was held directly responsible for his plight, emotions were evoked which are not called forth by illnesses which are traced to impersonal natural laws even though the individual has knowingly broken these laws. One may blame himself, or be blamed by others, if he finds himself in the hospital because he failed to observe certain precautions—to obey traffic rules in crossing the street, or to wear his rubbers in wet weather—but his emotions would be very different if he felt that he were the victim of the ill will of some supernatural power with whom he had failed to maintain friendly relations. T h e r e is no point in becoming emotionally perturbed over the operation of an impersonal natural law, which, unlike spiritual beings, is not susceptible to pleading bribery, cajolery, or curses. But if understanding and response are attributed to spiritual beings, both good and evil, then prayer and sacrifice might conceivably soften the heart of an angry god and achieve a cure, or magic formulas, "words of power," might induce the demons of disease to cease from troubling. In the magico-religious interpretation of the nature of bodily ailments the problem of the sufferer's affliction did not lie wholly between the victim and the unseen powers; it was also a matter of concern to everyone in the group. T h e r e was danger, others believed, that they might also become contaminated if they associated with an individual who was in disfavor with the gods. His sufferings therefore prompted atti-

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tudes of repulsion and withdrawal rather than of sympathy and helpfuless. With the growth of scientific knowledge concerning the nature of disease and the methods of combating it, the attitudes occasioned by illness have undergone radical changes. Medical science has taken the healing art out of the hands of the gods. At its bidding the demons of disease have assumed material forms which, although infinitesimal in size and baffling in their manifestations, are nevertheless subject to natural laws and to man's control in so far as he understands these laws. T h e more advanced religions have accepted the discoveries of scientific medicine and have enjoined the care of the sick as an obligation upon their adherents. T h e belief that sickness is a means by which an angry Deity punishes sinners has not been entirely banished, however. T h e stigmata of certain diseases tend to persist: a conspiracy of silence, now being broken by energetic educational campaigns, long retarded progress in caring for the sufferers from venereal diseases; the cry, "Unclean! Unclean!" which has followed the leper down through the ages still echoes; and to some extent the mentally afflicted still cower under a shadow of shame. All of these unfortunates are in a sense outcasts of society, the untouchables of mankind, isolated both by the nature of their illnesses and by the popular notions that are attached to them. T h e ancient disease leprosy, known in medical circles as Hansen's Disease, is the most isolating of all physical illnesses. T o be told that one is leprous not only means that one has contracted a serious and long-lasting malady but it also means, as Paolo Zappa stresses in his study of the disease, "that he can no longer frequent the society of other men, that he must separate from parents, wife and children, from all who are near and dear to him. It is a sentence, and when the victim hears it he foresees—to call things by their right name—arrest

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and i m p r i s o n m e n t . " 3 U n t i l the recent encouraging advances in the treatment of leprosy with sulphone drugs brought the new hope so feelingly described in Betty Martin's story of her recovery, Miracle at Carville, the system of compulsory segregation generally adopted meant lifelong confinement in a colony or house for lepers. T h e sufferers f r o m n o other chronic infectious disease have been isolated in this tragic manner. T h e leper, however, has borne the curse of uncleanliness throughout the centuries. T h e O l d T e s t a m e n t edict, " H e is unclean; he shall dwell alone; without the camp shall his habitation be," has never been rescinded. 4 T h e leper's sentence, even w h e n carried out in the most h u m a n e way possible, is a f r i g h t f u l one. T o feel that all men shrink from one with loathing is the epitome of loneliness. Dr. Victor Heiser, w r i t i n g of his work a m o n g the lepers of the Philippine Islands, stresses their loneliness. 5 T h e leper's terrible mental anguish far exceeds his physical suffering. A v o i d e d by everyone, the leper sits idle and broods, a h u m a n b e i n g devoid of hope, "the most terrible object in the world." From my o w n contacts in the O r i e n t with lepers, most of w h o m were beggars, I k n o w the feeling of horror and revulsion which the sight of these unfortunates arouses almost instinctively in others. T h e memory of my first experience of this k i n d is particularly vivid. Shortly after c o m i n g to the Philippines, I was awakened from a midday siesta by a weird w a i l i n g and m o a n i n g c o m i n g from the courtyard beneath my w i n d o w . L o o k i n g out, I saw that the heavy street gate leading into the high-walled courtyard had been accidentally left ajar and a motley g r o u p of beggars had slipped in. Friday is Beggar's Day in the Philippines, but this institution was new to me at the time. I had never before been accosted by beggars s Zappa, Unclean! Unclean! p. 145. * Leviticus xiii. 35. »Heiser, An American Doctor's Odyssey, pp. 211-34. For an account of the leper colony at Culion in the Philippine Islands, see Perry Burgess, Who Walk Alone.

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or seen h u m a n beings d i s p l a y i n g their d e f o r m i t i e s as their stock in trade. 6 W h e n the g r o u p s q u a t t i n g in the c o u r t y a r d caught sight of m e at the w i n d o w , their w a i l i n g rose in a shrill crescendo. T h e n , that I m i g h t better see their scars and be m o v e d to greater compassion, the w o m e n l i f t e d the black shawls in w h i c h they w e r e muffled a n d the m e n spread apart their tattered rags. I was struck w i t h horror. E v e n to my i n e x p e r i e n c e d eyes, it was apparent that they w e r e lepers. T h e r e was no mist a k i n g the stigmata of the disease. L a t e r I learned that they w e r e old, " b u r n t - o u t " cases n o l o n g e r infective; otherwise they w o u l d have been sent to the C u l i o n leper colony. I d i d not k n o w this c o m f o r t i n g fact that day, h o w e v e r , and I felt c o n t a m i n a t e d in spite of the distance b e t w e e n us. I shrank back i n t o m y r o o m , nauseated, itchy. T h e w a i l i n g f o l l o w e d m e w i t h increasing persistence, u n t i l in desperation I got m y purse a n d threw some m o n e y o u t of the w i n d o w to them. W i t h the shower of coins, the w a i l i n g subsided. T h e lepers g a t h e r e d u p the m o n e y , a n d , s l i p p i n g o u t of the gate, disapp e a r e d — b l a c k shadows dispelled by the pitiless w h i t e glare of the tropical n o o n d a y . A f t e r they had gone, I r e m e m b e r e d that Sir L a u n f a l , as he rode gaily forth o n his quest for the H o l y G r a i l , h a d tossed a c o i n in scorn to a leper asking f o r alms at the castle gate, and I r e m e m b e r e d w h o that leper had been. I felt h u m b l e d and ashamed. A l m o s t f r o m its i n c e p t i o n the C h r i s t i a n c h u r c h has w o r k e d to alleviate the sufferings of lepers. A s early as A.D. 72 an o r d e r of St. Lazarus was f o u n d e d . L a t e r , d u r i n g the period of the Crusades, a military o r d e r of St. Lazarus was f o u n d e d by the K n i g h t s Hospitalers. L e p r o s y was the most d r e a d e d scourge of the M i d d l e A g e s in E u r o p e . E x c e p t f o r the mercy s h o w n by compassionate orders, the leper was treated as o n e • I had yet to experience the depression years in New York City. Beggars, unfortunately, are no longer a novelty to me.

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dead to this world. His property went to his heirs, his wife could remarry if she wished to, prayers for the dead were said and a shovelful of earth was thrown after him when he left to enter the lepers' refuge. 7 In modern times also much of the nursing care and spiritual comfort received by the lepers, imprisoned by their disease in colonies or sanatoriums, is given by priests and nuns who have dedicated their lives to this service. Their self-sacrifice illumines the dark chapters of the story of leprosy, which, until recent medical discoveries brought new hope and encouragement, was one of terrifying hopelessness and isolation. T h e syphilitic is another sufferer from a chronic contagious disease who, like the leper, has long labored under a ban of untouchability which immeasurably increases his burden. T h e ban expresses itself along different lines, however, from that against the leper. A sentence of moral rather than of physical segregation has been pronounced against the syphilitic. T h e moral attitude that all syphilitics are renegades, that they are morally tainted, and that their affliction is a just punishment for their sin is widespread and has served to debar the victim of syphilis, or of other venereal diseases, from the assistance and sympathy which are customarily regarded as the rights of an ill person. Rightly or wrongly, justly or unjustly, he is alone in his misery. If others discover the nature of his disease, he becomes a social outcast and even if they do not, the barrier of his guilty secret is still interposed between him and his associates. T h e moral attitude that nice people do not have syphilis, do not talk about syphilis, and do not have anything to do with a person who has syphilis has made it more difficult for the syphilitic to obtain treatment, and increases the chances of his infecting innocent persons since he tends to conceal his trouble and does not take the necessary precautions to protect others. For, contrary to popular prejudice, syphilis * See Zappa, Unclean! Unclean! pp. 69-72.

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can be acquired in several ways. Dr. Thomas Parran estimates that one half of all syphilitic infections have been acquired innocently, one fourth from commercial prostitution, and the remaining one fourth from clandestine love affairs. 8 T o many syphilitic patients the diagnosis comes as a terrific shock. They feel depression and fear of the disease, of their infectiousness, and of the failure of the treatment. Others assume a careless, indifferent attitude, possibly to camouflage their real emotions. Both of these attitudes, the fearful and the unconcerned, have been noted by students of the problem.' A third, more moderate attitude has also been noted. Fear, however, tends to be the recurring motif throughout the history of syphilis—fear of social ostracism and of the dire physical consequences of the disease on the part of the patient, and fear on the part of society that lifting the ban of untouchability would play directly into the hands of sinners who are tempted to transgress the moral law. Fortunately, there is evidence at this writing that this fear is beginning to yield to the active measures which are now being taken to combat it. For instance, the United States Army reports that a change in their approach to the problem of venereal disease, from an appeal to the men's fear of the disease to an emphasis upon the more positive values and rewards of good moral conduct in home, community, and army life, has resulted in improved morale and in a material lowering of the VD rate. The mentally afflicted, like their companions in misery, the leper and the syphilitic, are another group of sufferers who have been subjected in the past to the ban of untouchability. It is only within the last hundred years that mental illness has s Parran, Shadow on the Land, p. 207. »See Gerald H. V. Pearson, "Syphilis: Some Psychological Aspects of Treatment," Archives of Dermatology and Syphilis, June, 1931, pp. ioii-30; B. H. Regenburg and R. A. Durfee, "Venereal Disease and the Patient," Journal of Social Hygiene, Nov., 1934, pp. 369-77; and Solomon and Solomon, Syphilis of the Innocent, p. 157.

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b e e n d i v o r c e d f r o m superstitious beliefs of various k i n d s so that m e n t a l l y ill patients m i g h t be treated as sick p e o p l e . Earlier, the treatment of the m e n t a l l y ill varied w i t h the c o m m u n i t y ' s particular superstitions c o n c e r n i n g the cause of such afflictions. A s the beliefs of a c o m m u n i t y c h a n g e d , their t r e a t m e n t of the mentally afflicted also changed. In an e x c e l l e n t article on this subject, A l b e r t Deutsch summarizes the r e l a t i o n s h i p as follows: A t different stages of human development, mental illness has been commonly regarded as demoniacal possession, as a manifestation of witchcraft, as providential retribution for sin or crime, and as a divine gift. In consequence the mentally ill have been identified as demoniacs, prophets, witches, wild beasts in human form, criminals, and finally as sick persons. As demoniacs, they have been subjected to elaborate rites of incantation and exorcism; as witches, they have been tortured, burned and hanged; as brutes and wild beasts, they have been caged, scourged, and driven from town to town; as criminals, they have been thrown into dungeons, whipped, and chained; as common paupers, they have been confined in poorhouse "strong rooms," and "auctioned off" at town meetings to persons who bid lowest for their keep. 10 E v e n at the present time, scientific k n o w l e d g e has not altog e t h e r eradicated certain mistaken beliefs c o n c e r n i n g m e n t a l illness. T h e r e are still many people w h o feel that it is a disgrace to have any form of such illness in the f a m i l y . T h e y speak in h u s h e d tones, if at all, of any m e m b e r of the family w h o m a y b e so afflicted. T o w a r d the patient himself their m a n n e r is distinctly different f r o m w h a t it w o u l d b e if his t r o u b l e w e r e of a n o t h e r kind. T h e patient q u i c k l y senses the tense, u n n a t u r a l atmosphere b y w h i c h he is s u r r o u n d e d and the g a p w h i c h already exists b e t w e e n his m e n t a l w o r l d and the 10 Albert Deutsch, "Social Factors in Psychiatric Progress," Mental Hygiene, April, 1938, pp. 265-75. S e e a ' s o George W . Henry, " T h e Care and Treatment Nov., 1929, of Mental Disease—Yesterday and Today," The Modern Hospital, pp. 1-6, and Thomas J. Heldt, " T h e Mental-Hygiene Viewpoint in the General Hospital," Mental Hygiene, April, 1932, pp. 209-17.

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world of familiar reality is widened yet further. T h e mentally ill person is thus doubly isolated; first, by his own inability "to see things steadily and to see them whole," which disrupts his relationships with others; and, second, by the tendency of others to withdraw from him and to treat him as if he were in some way a different and dreadful kind of being. Bewildered by a world which he does not understand and which does not understand him, the mentally ill person is tragically, pathetically alone. In his retreat from reality he has cut himself off from communication with the rest of the world. For, ironically, the retreat begun by many patients in an effort to escape from a situation of intolerable loneliness ends in a state of utter isolation far more fearsome. Fortunately, the damage done is not always irreparable. If the patient's difficulty is functional in nature, it is often possible for his contacts to be restored and for him to resume his former relationships. If, however, his trouble is the result of an incurable organic lesion or a baffling functional disturbance which defies psychiatric treatment or psychoanalysis, it may be impossible for him to re-establish his contacts with the world as others know it. For the remainder of his life he must live in a world of his own, a world which others cannot enter and which he cannot leave—a world, moreover, which is often so far removed from actuality that, for his own protection and the protection of others, it is necessary for him to be kept in close confinement. Whether or not the mentally afflicted patient suffers consciously from his isolation is a matter of conjecture. T h e testimony of persons who have been mentally ill, and who have recovered, leaves little doubt, however, that many mental patients do suffer acutely from loneliness. 11 T h e cry, over and over again, of one elderly patient as she walked the floor must echo the anguish of many: "Where shall I go? W h e r e shall I go? Oh, God, I ain't got nobody! Where shall I " See Beers, A Mind That Found Itself, and Ward, The Snake Pit.

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go?" T h e problem of the relationship of mental illness and loneliness is an absorbing one. We shall return to it at another point. Other categories of physically afflicted individuals upon whom the evil eye seems to have rested with particular malevolence are the deformed, the blind, and the deaf. In the Old Testament, these physically handicapped or blemished persons were forbidden to approach the altar lest they profane it: For whatsoever man he be that hath a blemish, he shall not approach; a blind man, or a lame, or he that hath a flat nose, or anything superfluous, Or a man that is brokenfooted or brokenhanded, Or crookbackt, or a dwarf, or that hath a blemish in his eye, or be scurvy, or scabbed, or hath his stones broken; No man that hath a blemish of the seed of Aaron the priest shall come nigh to offer the offerings of the Lord made by fire; he hath a blemish; he shall not come nigh to offer the bread of his God. —Leviticus XXXI. 18-21. T h e Biblical rule debarring the blemished from privileges enjoyed by others exemplifies the isolating attitudes with which this unfortunate group has had to contend from earliest times. They have been objects of curiosity, of jesting and merriment, of scorn and abuse, of fear and hatred, and, more rarely, of awe and special privilege. Sometimes they have been loved, but not often if their abnormalities were repellent or disgusting in nature. Persons with such handicaps are twice marred, for a disfiguring blemish corrodes the spirit as deeply as the flesh. It is a difficult handicap to learn to accept with equanimity a wound which never heals. In the novel Growth of the Soil, Knut Hamsun bares the elemental emotions which underlie such a blemish in the tragedy of Inger of the harelip who, knowing the anguish she has suffered

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because of her abnormality, kills her baby girl whose lip is also split. Ellie May in the play adapted from Erskine Caldwell's Tobacco Road is another instance. Theatergoers, although disgusted and repelled by the sordid depths to which the girl has sunk together with her family, can hardly fail but be touched by her misery when, goaded by her father's coarse, unfeeling remarks about her split lip or by the sight of her mother lovingly "prettying out" the curls of her attractive sister Pearl, she bursts into tears and rushes away. If the individual whose personal appearance, like Dr. Samuel Johnson's, "cannot much recommend him" becomes a misanthrope, an Ishmaelite whose hand is against every man, it is understandable. One has only to consider how deeply the average person resents any criticism of his appearance and how frequently the blemished are subjected to this kind of unfavorable attention to understand their bitterness. Even people who, by their position and advantages should realize the cruelty of their questions and comments, often do not. On the other hand, true consideration is sometimes found in unexpected places, as the following little episode illustrates: "Why don't you put that brat down and make 'im walk," asked the huge negress of the tenement when I was borne through her trap door. I cringed, expecting to hear for the thousandth time the explanation that I had not been able to walk since a victim of spinal meningitis at eighteen months, and probably never would again. It was like the twist of a knife hearing the thing put into words. I should have known my friend would spare me this pain. "Oh, I likes to carry him," said black Catherine of the white soul.12 At another point in his autobiography, Mr. Ellis points out that being forced into the limelight, rather than being unEllis, Adventure of Living, pp. 48-49.

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able to walk, was his greatest privation. T h e social problem posed by the handicap was greater than its physical inconvenience, a condition often noted among the blind and the deaf. It is the major problem for many of the handicapped. Any conspicuous deviation from the physical norm attracts attention, whether it is the result of accident or disease or is an inherited abnormality or birthmark. T h e latter types of deviations do, however, arouse a greater degree of morbid curiosity and the stigma attached to them is more pronounced. They are also a greater obstacle to marriage, since there exists the possibility that children born of the marriage may inherit the blemish. T h e superstitions are legion concerning birthmarks and other abnormalities present at birth. Seemingly, in superstition, the unborn are particularly susceptible to the baneful power of the evil eye. Erroneous conceptions, not necessarily superstitious in origin, concerning the blind increase the difficulties of social adjustment for the blind person. For instance, the popular impression that the loss of sight effects such a transcending change in the blind person as to remove him from the currents of ordinary life and ways is a grave social handicap. Of this misconception, Harry Best, an authority on the problem of blindness, says: They [the blind] are held to be of a less gross and material element than are other persons, and to possess a peculiarly spiritual temperament. They are supposed to be able to respond to certain inner promptings to which others may not, and to rise to unusual esthetic heights. They are further frequently thought of as being of an exceedingly docile or tractable disposition, and as being of singularly pure and innocent minds. At times the blind are regarded as without a sense of humor, or even as unable to laugh. . . . Occasionally they are treated as though they were physically infirm or decrepit, or even as though they were deficient mentally.18 is Best, Blindness

and the Blind in the United States,

p. «78.

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Other popular misconceptions concerning the blind relate to their achievements, which are generally either underrated or overrated. Capabilities which they might reasonably be expected to possess are denied to them or looked upon with greatest wonder; whereas abilities such as musical genius and exceptional powers of memory and touch, which only a few possess, are attributed to the blind as a class. Objective laboratory tests show no evidence that the other senses become more acute in compensation for blindness; the blind person's gains in hearing, touch, or memory are due to increased attention, the fullest use of his remaining senses. 14 Another common tendency is to look upon the blind as a class instead of recognizing that they differ among themselves in all the elements of personality, just as sighted persons do. In the development of personality, however, the hazards of introversion are greater than for normal persons. Of the blind child, Thomas D. Cutsforth says: "Despite the social flexibility of language, he is excluded from much of the give and take of the family. His is a world of personal contact of which he is the center and in which there exist no relationships outside of himself. T h e fine gradations of social meaning which the eye perceives are lost to h i m . " 1 5 T h e world of the blind child is narrowed by his inability to grasp fully any relationships which do not involve him personally and contactually. Introversion may result unless it is prevented by education and training. Another personality hazard lies in the fact that to be socially acceptable the blind child must not show that he lacks many of the goals which motivate the seeing child. Blind, he must act as though he were not blind. In consequence, he is forced at an early age into a world of unreality with its dangers to the integration of his personality. " See Hayes, "The Psychology of Blindness," in What of the Blindf pp. 88-101. 15 Cutsforth, The Blind in School and Society, p. 13. See also Paul A. Brown, "Responses of Blind and Seeing Adolescents to an Introversion-Extroversion Questionnaire," The Journal of Psychology, July, 1938, pp. 137-47.

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Both the temperament of the blind person and his particular circumstances affect the nature of his adjustment, and both are subject to wide variations. Of the effect of temperament, Richard King Huskinson, in discussing the psychology of blinded soldiers, says: " T h e man who was morose before he lost his sight will be morose afterwards; the cheerful one before will be equally cheerful when he is blind; the pessimist will look on the dreary side of things; the optimist will remain optimistic." 19 T h e blinded soldier's great fear, in common with that of blind persons generally, is that he will be forced to live apart from others. As long as he is not thrust into a special world alone, he remains his normal self. T h e tendency, unfortunately, in the education of the blind has been to train them to live in a special world rather than to live in normal society. Hector Chevigny, in the enlightening story of his own blindness, My Eyes Have a Cold Nose, makes a forceful plea for changing this tendency. He commends the Seeing Eye program and the program of the Army Training Center for blinded soldiers at Avon, Connecticut, for their outstanding work in orienting the blind to live in normal society. T h e terms "For the Blind" and "Made by the Blind" are resented by many of the blind because of their separative emphasis. T o be fully integrated in society, however, requires economic independence, and by far the greater number of the blind are either unemployed or engaged in occupations which are neither well paid nor mentally challenging. T h e number who enjoy interesting and remunerative positions is not large. For many, the tragedy of blindness is not inability to see, but the dread of dependence, poverty, and want. "It is not miserable to be blind," Milton wrote. " H e only is miserable who cannot bear his blindness with fortitude." T o Milis Huskinson, "The Psychology of the Blinded Soldier," in Victory Over ness, pp. gi 1-12.

Blind-

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EYE

127

ton's statement, Gertrude E. Brown, also blind, adds a confirming note: "It is not miserable to be blind. . . . T h e best word for it is inconvenient." 17 T h a t the blind adjust so cheerfully on the whole is a moving testimonial to the invincibility of the human spirit. T h e deaf, together with the blind, suffer from a handicap which tends to isolate them from their fellows. T h e inability to hear and frequently the consequent inability to speak constitute a social barrier difficult to overcome. Written intercourse is slow and tedious and lacking in warmth and spontaneity. T h e messages shouted to the partially deafened are if anything even more laborious and constrained. In consequence the deafened person, unable to make good social connections with those about him, becomes self-centered and sensitive. He fears that the laugh or the remark that he does not understand has reference to him and he tends to become suspicious even of his friends. His almost childish curiosity at times is an attempt to break through the wall of separation which surrounds him, 18 and to identify himself more fully with the group. As a class the deaf have been opposed to nearly all forms of legal treatment which would differentiate them. In Texas, they even made a formal protest against exemption from the payment of certain taxes. T h e burden of economic dependence which rests so heavily on the blind does not unduly oppress the deaf, although there are numerous individual instances of persons whose deafness debarred them from the occupations in which they were most interested. T h e great suffering in deafness is in the inferiority felt when among others and in the difficulties of adaptation to social surroundings. Here, as with the blind, misconceptions tend to accen« Gertrude Brown, Milton's Blindness, p. 68. is See Cora M. Haines, " T h e Effects of Defective Hearing U p o n the Individual as a Member of the Social O r d e r , " Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, July-Sept., 1927, pp. 151-56.

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tuate their isolation. T h e deaf have been regarded as somehow "unnatural," as "defective," and as morose, unhappy, and dejected, Professor Best finds.10 Others have asserted that the deaf develop a "sixth sense" or kind of intuition which enables them to judge character more accurately or grasp a situation more quickly than hearing people. This assertion is questionable. T h e deaf, however, in their effort to identify themselves with the mass of normal persons, often do give a wrong impression by pretending to understand a situation when they do not. Dreading loneliness, they refuse to admit their handicap. When the deaf are with deaf companions with whom they can converse with signs, they are under less strain and their behavior is more natural. Where both marriage partners are deaf, for instance, the divorce rate is lower than for marriages where one partner is deaf and the other a hearing person. T h e world is not against the deafened or the blind, but life would be easier for them if their social difficulties were understood and an educational program designed for them which would include training for participation in recreation of a social nature no less than in the techniques of making a living. T h e victims of lingering diseases, such as tuberculosis and cancer, and of crippling injuries or diseases, such as arthritis and meningitis, are also faced by difficult problems of social adjustment. Although there is no shame attached to these misfortunes, and other persons are usually ready with their help and sympathy when the demons of disease strike, the victim's whole scheme of life is disrupted, his sense of security is undermined, and the future ahead of him is fraught with uncertainty: The condition of the tuberculosis patient is one primarily of loss of equilibrium—first of his body chemistry, and then of his family situation, his job, and his whole mental attitude. A financial prob1» Best, The Deaf, p. 74.

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OF

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EYE

lem is almost inevitably present. All of the patient's human relationships are shifted. T h e husband or wife, the parent or child, the lover or the beloved, the friend, the business associate, the employer or his subordinates—all take on a different aspect. T h e patient must think differently not only of them, but of himself. He must literally make himself over.20 In a situation which necessitates such drastic changes in the patient's relationships and mode of life, emotional strains are inevitable. T h e patient becomes more gloomy or more cheerful, outwardly at least, than is his wont. T h e cheerfulness, in the opinion of Nurse Eyre and of other students of the problem, is a self-protective device, a disguise to conceal their basic fear and anxiety from others arid from themselves. 21 G o o d sportsmanship impels many patients to take a hopeful attitude even when badly frightened. A n o t h e r factor is the youthfulness of most of the patients. T u b e r c u l o s i s strikes oftenest among those w h o have the resiliency and optimism of youth to abet them in their struggle. T h a t tubercular patients do have their b l u e moments I k n o w from my own experience with them. As a young woman I spent a year in N e w M e x i c o where I met a great many tuberculosis p a t i e n t s — " l u n g e r s " they were c a l l e d — w h o were seeking to regain their health in that cli2" M a r y B . E y r e , " P s y c h o l o g i c a l A s p e c t s o f T u b e r c u l o s i s , " Public ing,

M a y , 1938, p p . 2 7 9 - 8 2 . S e e a l s o t h e s a m e a u t h o r ' s " T h e

i n T u b e r c u l o s i s , " American

Review

of Tuberculosis,

Health

R o l e of

A p r i l , 1933, p p .

315-29.

si See E d w a r d A . Strecker, F r a n c i s J. B r a c e l a n d , a n d B u r g e s s G o r d o n , A t t i t u d e s o f T u b e r c u l o s i s P a t i e n t s , " Mental

Hygiene,

Oct.,

NursEmotion "Mental

1938, p p .

529-43.

F r o m a p s y c h o l o g i c a l study of t w o t h o u s a n d t u b e r c u l a r patients, these a u t h o r s w e r e u n a b l e t o find t h a t e u p h o r i a is a n a c c o m p a n i m e n t o f p u l m o n a r y

tuber-

c u l o s i s per

Coun-

se. D r . A l f r e d S. D o o n e i e f , p h y s i c i a n i n c h a r g e o f M o n t e f i o r e

t r y S a n a t o r i u m , i n a l e t t e r t o t h e N e w Y o r k Times, findings and tests a t

challenges

Tulane

the inference, d r a w n

University,

that

euphoria

J u l y 18, 1949* c o n f i r m s t h e s e

from

is a

the

results of

characteristic

of

Rorschach tuberculous

patients a n d results f r o m a schizoid m e t h o d of a d j u s t m e n t c o m m o n Euphoria,

D r . D o o n e i e f s a y s , is r a r e l y

sanatoriums;

the opposite reaction

found

in

is f a r m o r e

newly

admitted

common.

to

them.

patients

If a sense of

b e i n g a p p e a r s l a t e r , i t is b e c a u s e t h e d i s e a s e h a s b e e n s u c c e s s f u l l y t r e a t e d a solution found for the patient's

problems.

in

welland

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mate. My most vivid memory of them is of the nostalgia, loneliness, and fear which they disclosed in unguarded moments. One patient in particular I shall never forget. She was my roommate one term at the State College in Mesilla Park. T h e room assigned to me was small and dark, and she had a large, pleasant, corner room which after a few days she invited me to share. She came from New England, and as I had lived in Vermont for several years, we had this background in common. She was a pleasing, cheerful companion and I was completely taken by surprise when I was awakened one night by her sobs. When I asked the reason she confessed that she had tuberculosis, an arrested case but not a cured one. She was afraid of a relapse if she returned to her home, and she was lonely and discouraged. She had been in New Mexico for three years alone. None of her family could afford to stay with her or to make the long trip to visit her. She had lived in boarding houses until, feeling stronger that fall, she had entered college. She had asked for a room alone in the fall, but had craved the intimacy and companionship of a roommate. When I came in the spring term, she had yielded to her longing. She had not told me she was tubercular, fearing I would be afraid to room with her if I knew. She had been troubled about it, however. In fairness to me, she felt that I should know. I assured her that I was not afraid, which was not altogether the truth, and I continued to room with her. Often in the nights when she thought I was asleep I would hear her crying to herself, smothering her sobs in her pillow in an effort not to awaken me. My roommate's loneliness was not unusual, I am sure. Even for a well person a long enforced exile from home has its moments of heartache and loneliness; and for one who is ill, particularly if he is trying to keep house for himself or to live in a boarding house as many patients in New Mexico did, such exile must be indeed hard to bear with fortitude. T h e patient

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131

who enters a sanatorium is less isolated. He has the advantages of regular medical care and of the companionship of others afflicted like himself. In addition, in a modern, wellstaffed sanatorium there will be social service workers, clinical psychologists, and rehabilitation experts to help him with his problem. Yet, despite these advantages, sanatorium life is an unnatural one. The sanatorium, as Thomas Mann has portrayed it so graphically in The Magic Mountain, is a little world unto itself with its own psychology—its peculiar indifference to time, its depression, its hysteria, and its strange remoteness from the world of well men. To what extent the atmosphere of sanatoriums for the care of patients with other chronic illnesses and disabilities resembles that of the tuberculosis sanatorium is a subject for further study. Every chronic disease or permanent disability presents certain specific problems of its own to which the patient must adjust, but all are alike in that they are isolating to some degree. Every chronic invalid, irrespective of the nature of his handicap or whether he receives care in his home or a sanatorium, is faced by the problem of loneliness. For the tubercular patient this problem has been greatly alleviated in recent years. With early diagnosis and good care, he may reasonably hope for a fairly rapid and complete recovery. The maimed or other incurables must face their problem without this hope. Many, if they are courageous and resourceful and if the persons about them are considerate and helpful, solve it happily. They enjoy a rich, full, and satisfying social life. Others, however, are unable to overcome their handicaps sufficiently to establish pleasurable social relationships. These invalids suffer from the emotional impoverishment which is characteristic of the socially isolated in other situations.22 They continue to haunt the shadows, embittered and lonely. 22 See Barker, Wright, and Gonick, Adjustment to Physical Handicap and Illness for a critical appraisal of the literature on adjustment to physical handicaps and for some interesting case histories.

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T o recapitulate, we have noted that all serious physical disabilities tend to be isolating handicaps from which problems of social adjustment may arise. In certain afflictions, such as leprosy, syphilis, or mental illness, social attitudes and superstitions which have persisted from earlier, more primitive periods greatly increase the difficulties of making a satisfactory adjustment. For the sufferers from less stigmatized disabilities, the p r o b l e m of adjustment is eased by sympathy and assistance. In the case of the permanently shut-in patient, however, the present trend from home care to institutional care necessitates his adjustment to a new world in many ways unlike the world outside. H o w the shut-in patient meets the problem of institutional adjustment is an area requiring further study.

PART

II:

OF

MEN

AGAINST

THE

MORES

CHAPTER

VIH

The Far-Wanderer For many men, and for some women, the call of the wild is strong and insistent, despite the fact that it must struggle for a hearing with the claims of other desires and with the constraining folkways of the families and communities to which these restless persons belong. This conflict which arises when "the red gods call" is described by Julian Duguid with rare humor and a keen perception of the truth in the opening paragraph of his tale of marvelous adventure, Green Hell: When a man yields to the urge of Ishmael, the voice of Sarah is raised at tea parties; for there is more heart-burning over the one sheep that escapes than over the ninety and nine that catch the 8:15 to town every morning. Consequently, since Sarah's favor counts for a good deal in the race for a living, Ishmael is forced to prevaricate. He becomes a prospecting engineer, a sailor, a rubber planter, or even an exploratory journalist, anything in fact which will remove the strangle-hold of a collar from his neck, and he takes care to explain that the whole glorious business of walking into the horizon is honestly rather a bore. Those who neglect this precaution are known as beachcombers. The necessity of resorting to subterfuge to escape from Sarah's tea table and yet retain "respectability" is one of which Ishmael early becomes aware. Even as a child he becomes adept at finding alibis to explain his peregrinations beyond the confines of his playground. T o say that one ran away simply for the joy of running away, of walkihg out into the horizon, would of course be incomprehensible to one's elders. Hence, a resourceful child finds more acceptable, if less truthful, reasons for his wanderings. As he grows older, this habit of concealing his real motives for escape continues, some-

136

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times as a deliberate prevarication and sometimes as an unconscious rationalization of behavior which would otherwise be criticized. Consequently, it is difficult to discover the true motives which led him to forsake his family and friends and the security and comforts of familiar surroundings for a life of loneliness and hardship beyond the horizon. Is it glory or the pot of gold at the rainbow's end which beckones him on? Or is it an ill-defined b u t powerful desire to escape f r o m something within himself or within his environment which urges him onward? These questions, in common with all questions which seek to fathom the motives of m a n k i n d , are difficult to answer. T h e motives which impel men to go forth into the wilderness not only vary from person to person, b u t frequently they are many-mingled within the individual. An instance of the manner in which the motives of men striving for the same objective have differed is well brought out by Emil Ludwig in his description of some of the men who discovered the sources of the Nile—Speke, Grant, Baker, Stanley, and Emin: How varied were the occasions which turned these men into Nile explorers, their character and motives, their end and their fame. Only their struggles and their sufferings were alike, and, in the solitude created by an age without telegraphy and wireless, heavier and darker than those of an explorer of today could be. . . . One was drawn forth by restlessness, a second by curiosity, a third by ambition, a fourth by discontent, a fifth by eagerness to discover new plants and animals. Many were moved by a misanthropy which subsided only in the presence of the Negro. For all of them defend the Negro. Stanley was the only one to prefer the company of white men to that of the black. 1 For all of these explorers the mystery of the river's sources, lying somewhere far to the south, was the lodestone which drew them irresistibly into the wilderness; b u t for each the thrill of sighting headwaters of the mighty stream was the i Ludwig, The Nile, pp. 44-45.

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answer to a different prayer. Each had a different motive for undertaking the grueling task. Nor has the whole story been told when the immediate motives of each of the explorers have been ascertained. T h e fact that some of them were misanthropic suggests that their relationships with their associates were unsatisfactory. T h e desire to escape from people whom they distrusted may have been intermingled with the more clearly defined objective of discovery. Roy Chapman Andrews, the famous explorer and paleontologist, contributes some further enlightening information on the characteristics and motives of would-be explorers. His own reply to the frequently asked question, " H o w did you start exploring and digging up dinosaur eggs in the Gobi Desert?" is simple and direct. " I couldn't help it. I happen to have been born to do it. . . . Ever since I can remember 1 always intended to be a naturalist and explorer. Nothing else ever had a place in my m i n d . " 2 T h e motives of many others who wished to go with him were less scientific, however. Among the deluge of applications which poured in, Andrews distinguished three main types: ex-army men, mostly aviators, who could not settle to the monotony of every day life; boys of fourteen to eighteen seeking adventure; and a thousand or more women, most of them serious, but some frankly asking for a bit of romance. And at least a dozen applications came from people who were obviously mentally deranged. In the men selected for the expedition, the necessary qualities included both personality and technical ability: I wanted men who would be considerate of their fellows, generous, unselfish, ready to accept the worst with the best. Men so keen on their jobs that hardships would be an incident; men with such steadfastness of purpose that nothing could turn them aside. I found them and not one has let me down. During four expeditions to the Gobi we have had from six to fifteen men on our staff 2 Andrews, Ends of the Earth, p. 3.

m

THE

FAR-WANDERER

and not a quarrel. We have lived in unity and forbearance, in mutual respect and affection. I am just as proud of that record as of the scientific achievements of the expedition.3 T h e record is indeed enviable, the more so when the trying conditions, particularly the continual sandstorms, with which the men had to contend are considered. It is a record which, like that of Admiral Byrd's expedition to Little America,4 clearly proves that not all of the men who yearn to explore the far ends of earth are misanthropes. O n the contrary, the personnel chosen for carefully planned scientific expeditions are men who possess the ability to live harmoniously with a small group of their fellows under conditions which would set most men at one another's throats. T h e y are socially minded men, keenly interested in the adventure of scientific discovery, but not in risking their lives in spectacular feats for the mere sake of thrills or publicity. T h r i l l seekers such as Richard Halliburton belong in a different category from the scientific explorers. T h e thrill seeker welcomes hair-breadth escapes; they are his stock in trade. T h e scientist with a clear-cut problem to solve prepares against adventures. As Stefansson, the Arctic explorer, says, "Adventures are a mark of incompetence." 5 Ishmael, on the other hand, is inclined to be foolhardy, and Sarah, rightfully enough, objects. Yet I can understand and sympathize with Ishmael. Usually the lone individual who wishes to gratify his thirst for new experiences by walking out into the horizon has to do it under circumstances which entail risks and possible criticism. For as long as I can remember I have enjoyed walking out into the horizon myself; but, as I have always had obligations that could not be ignored, my wanderings have been somewhat circumscribed. I have gone to far places as a teacher—in a profession which 3 5

Ibid., p. a60. « Byid, Discovery, pp. 123-26. Quoted in Andrews, On the Trail of Ancient Man, pp. 19-20.

THE

FAR-WANDERER

139

gives one respectability but which also restricts one's freedom by its traditions and conventions. 4 My own reasons for liking "to prowl," as an old colored friend of mine expresses it, are difficult to disentangle. I cannot say that I have been motivated by a desire to contribute to the world's knowledge, by the hope of writing a book of adventure, or by a desire for publicity. None of these things has ever been even a remote possibility. Since my wanderings, particularly my long hikes alone, have been looked upon with disapproval, I have always minimized the hazards and said nothing about narrow escapes. T h e r e may, however, be an element of escapism in my restlessness. I suspect there is, but I am certain it is not the sole reason why far fields have always beckoned me. As a child of seven or eight, my favorite books were Eggleston's History of the United States and Redway and Hinman's "Big Geography," to use the title by which I recall it. My favorite pastime was exploring the bluffs and deep canyons on the Wyoming ranch where my childhood was spent. My highest ambition was to go around the world. I think that there can be no question but that these early interests were goals in themselves and not the mere means of gratifying some secret escape motive. In more recent years, I realize that at times it has been the desire to escape from the boredom of some Sarah's tea table that has set me to wandering, the hope that some unusual experience might somehow lift me from mediocrity, set me apart as someone who has done something different.'' There have been other times when I have "wanted out" from some highly competitive situation in which I felt worsted. But escape has never been my only motive. T h e sheer joy, the sense of utter freedom, I have known when, like Kipling's cat in the Just So Stories, I have walked by my « For instances see the author's The Stranger, pp. 184-86. ' Byrd, in Discovery, lists this as one of the incentives which lead some men to join a polar expedition.

140

THE

FAR-WANDERER

wild lone in the wild, wet woods has been an end in itself as well as a means of escape. Had escape been my only motive, there were other less hazardous ways it could have been attained than exploring a remote Alaskan island or taking long hikes alone through the mountains and jungles of Panama and the Philippines. In understanding human behavior the question of the means an individual chooses, if he has a choice, in the satisfaction of a desire is no less important than the nature and intensity of the motivating desire itself. What traits of the far-wanderer's personality are developed or accentuated by the isolation of far places? What does it do to a man to live under the necessity of being on guard constantly against unfamiliar dangers? What does it do to a man to know that whatever contingencies may arise he has to rely on himself, and himself alone? These questions are of special interest to me. In a limited way, I have had experiences which throw some light upon them and give me a little insight into certain attitudes often displayed by men in unfamiliar surroundings. Wariness, suspicion, fear of strangers, I knew as a child on the Wyoming frontier with its rustler wars and its bitter struggle between the sheepmen and cattlemen for the possession of the open range. Every stranger was a potential enemy and his reception was a guarded one until his intentions were known. Later, as a young woman, I experienced these same attitudes in Alaska. One situation in particular frightened me no little at the time, though it is humorous in retrospect. I had come to the little native village of Ouzinkie on Spruce Island near Kodiak to relieve the teacher, Mrs. O. L. Grimes, who was going "outside" for the winter. I arrived just before Christmas and stayed with Mrs. Grimes for several days while she waited for the sea to calm so that she could row the fifteen miles to Kodiak, Avhere a steamer from Seattle called once a month for mail and passengers.

THE

FAR-WANDERER

141

The incident occurred on Christmas Eve when Mrs. Grimes and I were sitting together in the little kitchen of the teacher's quarters, which were upstairs over the schoolroom. An outside schoolroom door downstairs and the door at the top of the stairs which led into the kitchen were both open. This was not because we were fresh-air faddists but because the kitchen stove was eccentric and had to be humored in this fashion when there was a hard wind. Otherwise, it smoked so violently that no one could stay upstairs. Suddenly above the roar of the wind we heard someone enter the schoolroom and start up the stairs. Mrs. Grimes sprang to the kitchen door, slammed it shut and bolted it. Then she called through the closed door to know who was there, her face white and her voice shaking. The answer was reassuring and Mrs. Grimes unlocked the door. T w o of the native men of the village came in. They had been hunting wild ducks and had come to bring us one as a gift for our Christmas dinner, a kindly thoughtful errand, for we had no festive food, only the inevitable bacon and beans. I did not ask Mrs. Grimes why she had been so alarmed and she made no comment about it. On the contrary, she assured me I had no reason to be afraid in Ouzinkie. T h e community was a small one of perhaps a dozen families, all of whom she knew well. None of them would molest me in any way, and, because of the village's isolation, there was little danger from strangers. A small government launch, the Valdez, which made monthly trips between Kodiak and Afognak Island with mail, usually called at Ouzinkie to pick up and leave the teacher's mail, although the captain was under no obligation to do so. In the winter of 1915, this was the one contact which the little village had with the outside world except for a few occasions when the weather was calm enough for some of the men to make the long row in their dories to Kodiak for supplies.

142

THE

FAR-WANDERER

T h e people of Ouzinkie made their living by fishing and by hunting fur-bearing animals on the large island of Kodiak and on the mainland. Mr. Grimes owned a small store and fur-trading post at Ouzinkie, so that most of the time Mrs. Grimes was not alone. When I arrived, however, Mr. Grimes was away on the mainland buying furs and would not return until spring. There were no other white, English-speaking people on the island. T h e native people were the offspring of mixed marriages between Russian men, who had come into the region when Russian owned Alaska, and Aleut women. They spoke a mixture of Russian and Aleut, both equally unintelligible languages to me. Their names and many of their customs were Russian and they thought of themselves as Russians. There was a small Russian Church in the village where services were occasionally held by a priest from Afognak. T h e celebration of church holidays afforded what little social life the community enjoyed. T h e school was a recent institution and all of the children were still in the primary grades. They were handicapped by the fact that English was not their native language and by the narrow range of their experience. I had known that I would be lonely when Mrs. Grimes left; but it was not until I returned to the house after watching her dory disappear in the distance toward Kodiak that I realized I was also going to be afraid—sickeningly, helplessly afraid. And there was nothing that I could do about it, no one to whom I could turn with my fears. I had to fight them alone, and for the first few weeks it was a hard fight. Nights when the stove smoked and I had to leave the doors open until I let the fire go out at bedtime were the hardest. I did not have a flashlight and I was afraid to go down into the dark schoolroom to shut the outside door. I did not want to carry the only lamp that I had. I might fall and break it. I could feel my way down in the dark perfectly well and I made myself do it. It took only a few moments, yet by the time I was safely back upstairs, I

THE

FAR-WANDERER

143

would be dripping with cold perspiration and trembling so violently that I could not regain my composure and get to sleep for hours. And even sleep did not bring release from fear. I was haunted by a nightmare, the same one over and over again the same night, and night after night. In spite of the locked doors, someone came up the stairs, through the kitchen and living room into the bedroom, and tried to strangle me. We would fight until finally, to my great relief, I would scream and wake myself up. T h e experience was so vivid and so certain to recur that I became afraid to go to sleep. I spent long, wakeful nights listening to the wind and the rain and the sea outside—and for footsteps on the stairs. Afternoons another ordeal awaited me. A large flock of ravens made their roost on the top rails of the fences on both sides of a short, very narrow lane through which I had to pass to reach a spring in the woods from which the village got its drinking water. In January it was dusk at four o'clock when school was over and I went to get my water. T h e ravens had already gone to roost by that time, but were not yet asleep. I had to run the gauntlet between those two rows of sinister black birds who eyed me malevolently as though considering picking my eyes out with their great coffin-like beaks. I have since learned that ravens are night-blind birds and probably could not see me in the gathering dusk, but I did not have the comfort of that information in Ouzinkie. As far as I could see, their eyes, like those of Poe's raven, had "all the seeming of a demon's." T h e look in them deterred me from throwing anything at them to frighten them away. I called them all of Poe's epithets, however, and some more of my own invention. But still these grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and ominous birds "perched, and sat, and nothing more." And there was nothing more that I could do. I had to fight the thing through. I dared not run from it.

144

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J a n u a r y passed and n o mail. T h e sea had been too rough for the Valdez to stop on her monthly trip to Afognak. Watching her as she passed, standing well off from shore in the heavy seas, was one of life's darkest moments. I felt that I had come to the end of my endurance, that I had to have a break or I would lose control of myself completely. Fortunately I got the break. In the storeroom I f o u n d a few old college books belonging to Mr. Grimes. Among them were Darwin's Origin of Species and H e r b e r t Spencer's First Principles, neither oi which I had read. T h e y threw new light on my thinking, chaotic at that time, about religion and a philosophy of life. I became absorbed in trying to think through some problems which had troubled me f r o m childhood. And, as this new interest occupied my mind, my fear of the dark stairs and the ravens gradually disappeared. I slept better and my environment became less strange and uncongenial. I discovered that the people and the plant and animal life on the little island were interesting. I took long walks a n d learned to row. W h e n spring came I had won my fight, thanks to Darwin and Spencer. T o these two great thinkers I give the credit for the fact that, as R o b e r t W. Service describes the situation, I did not have to be sent "outside with an escort, raving with lips all afoam." 8 It sometimes happens to men in Alaska and other far places. I saw it happen to one young teacher in the Philippines. T h e r e were ten of us Americans at Catbalogan that year —six men, three women, and a boy of fourteen, William, the son of the superintendent of schools for Samar Province, who was a widower. Four of the men had Filipino wives and race prejudice prevented them f r o m being included in the social life of the American group. Of the other five adults, all of whom were employees of the Philippine Bureau of Education, three were newcomers, Mr. G., Miss X., a n d myself. We 8 Service, "The Law of ihe Yukon," in The Spell of the Yukon and Other Verses, New York, 1907.

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found the problem of adjusting to life in Catbalogan difficult. Our work was heavy, the tropical climate trying, and the question of our relations with the Filipino people a delicate one. T h e superintendent's attitude toward the Filipino people was friendly and he encouraged our association with them. T h e principal's attitude, on the other hand, was antagonistic and contemptuous. She scoffed at any efforts on our part to become better acquainted with the people and their customs. T h i s lack of harmony between our superior officers created frequent tensions and kept the three of us who were newcomers from getting the most out of our environment. We had but few outside contacts. In ten months we had two short trips away from the island, to Tacloban for the Fourth of J u l y and to Cebu at Christmas. Once we had American visitors, the Wood-Forbes Commission, whose coming was the high spot of the year. We had mail irregularly once or twice a month. Otherwise we were isolated and often bored and lonely. A page from William's diary—his father insisted that he keep one—is revealing. Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday

Nothing doing Ditto Ditto Ditto

And so on through the rest of that week and many that followed. As time passed the strain told on all of us. W e were irritable and, although we avoided outright disagreements, we got on one another's nerves badly. Miss X . suffered the most. She was a rather immature, dependent young woman who needed the affection and care of her family and her friends. She was not a pioneering type, and her being in the Philippines alone was a mistake. T h i n g s in my work and in the new environment which gave me pleasure failed to interest her.

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And the eagerly anticipated mail days only added to her gloom instead of alleviating it. Letters which she was expecting from a sweetheart back in the States failed to come. I was deeply sorry for Miss X . and apprehensive as she became more and more depressed and emotionally disturbed. Nights were the hardest. Miss X . did not sleep well and she would come bursting into my room at all hours with some wild idea in her head. I would have to reason with her for a good while each time before I could quiet her and get her back to bed. T h e electric lights in Catbalogan were turned off at eleven, and the darkness gave these sessions an added note of unreality. T h e next morning Miss X . would come to breakfast, heavy-eyed but seemingly quite normal, and I would sometimes wonder if the night's ordeal had been a trick of her imagination or of mine. I went to the principal with the problem, but she gave me no help. She construed the situation as a quarrel between Miss X . and myself. She disliked us both and it would have pleased her to have us quarrel. She was that kind of person. Miss X . was afraid of her and often in her nightly visits to my room she would beg me to save her from plots to kill her which she imagined the principal was devising. At other times she would get angry with me over some fancied wrong and I was uneasy for fear she would try to harm me some night. I slept lightly and I was always out of bed and on my feet the instant she entered my room. T h e r e was no lock on my door and I knew that it would upset her if I put one on. She was exceedingly sensitive. From Christmas time, when Miss X.'s nightly visits first alarmed me, until the middle of February when she broke down completely and was taken to Manila, I was under a heavy strain. T h e r e was no English-speaking doctor in the community, the superintendent of schools was away on an inspection trip, and I saw Mr. G. only at meals when both the principal and

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Miss X . were present. Miss X . rarely spoke at the table. I n fact, none of us did. W e ate in a strained silence and retired to our rooms as soon as we had finished. I knew nothing about the functional neuroses at that time. I had no explanation for Miss X.'s abnormal behavior. T h e Filipinos had a superstition that anyone who washed her hair at night and went to bed with it wet would become demented. Miss X . frequently did this, in spite of the warnings of our Filipino maid. W h e n her condition became known in the community, the reason was clear so far as the Filipinos were concerned. I did not try to disillusion them. It was as harmless an explanation as any that I could offer. I never saw Miss X . again after she was taken to Manila, but I did hear from her off and on for several years. She was in a hospital in Manila for several weeks and then was sent back to the States with an escort. Apparently her recovery was rapid after she reached home and she was married a few months later to her former sweetheart. H e had never received any of her letters written from the Philippines. She had misdirected them and they were returned to her at Catbalogan long after she had left. She wrote to me that she remembered very little of what had happened in Catbalogan and I saw no need to tell her. I shall never forget, however, my distress in watching a mind that had lost itself ten thousand miles from home groping blindly in the dark trying to find a way out of its difficulties. T h e friction between the principal and the rest of the group in Catbalogan is by no means unusual in isolated situations. T h e irritability born of monotony often makes it difficult for a small group to live together in harmony unless they have been carefully chosen for social as well as technical abilities, as Andrews's and Byrd's men were. Most groups have not been so chosen, however, and it is common for relationships to become strained. T h e following excerpt from the letter of a

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friend who taught at Fort Yukon, Alaska, a number of years ago is illustrative. Well, my time is nearing an end for pioneering, I fear. I have had about enough of this interior insecurity; you never can tell when you are to give u p your j o b to some political aspirant, or rather his relations. I left the Federal work to come here last year when the marshal's wife resigned; but he was put back in to most people's surprise and she wanted her old job back and got it but resigned—too much sentiment against her—but neither do I have it. T h i s is the joke of it. T h e r e is nothing against me but the spite is of long standing on the outside of school affairs, and I am the victim. Y o u see how it goes in the innermost places so stay away. Of course I have a few friends who want me to stay, and I may yet. I like it here in some ways. I have very small, though clean and rather cool quarters especially in the winter time, the "especially" refers to the coolness. I have taught the children to obey and to say, " G o o d morning, Miss ," which is something. I like the children real well now. School closes May 15. I was preparing a program to help the Eielson Memorial Fund but had to give it u p because the natives are out ratting and some of my pupils too. I have 24 on the books but about 16 come to school. I am telling you all this because some teacher might ask you about conditions here. T h e y are not conducive to happiness at all. T h e r e is little harmony in the place. People do not mix at all. One or two malicious gossips play hell with some of us. . . . It is very lonesome for a teacher on this account. T h e r e are seven or eight single women here and we do not get together at all, but we are friendly. I do not have anything to do with the other two teachers, but we are friendly and will get together as soon as school is o u t — just now we think that it is best not to. T h i s is a unique condition that I have never met in any other place. I presume the intense cold and isolation make some difference when people stay in here so long. As far as men are concerned, there are none eligible. Either they are out in the hills too far away or they are men who have served their time and are taking life easily if you know what that means u p here. J u s t make their living and sit tight and I do not blame

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them much. Keep what I have told you in confidence. I do not believe in gossiping up here of all places in the world. . . . T h e place is on the Yukon Flats and one can see nothing but just nothing. . . . T h e winters are big, glorious, and beautiful. I love the winters here—simply adore them—that dry cold and 50 below. But one does not want to stay in too long. T a c i t u r n i t y is another trait which is engendered by "staying in too l o n g , " whether in Alaska or the tropics. T h e disinclination to talk, fostered by the absence of people to talk with and things in c o m m o n to talk about, becomes habitual. T h i s point has been a d m i r a b l y brought out by J o h n W . Vandercook in a story of tropical A f r i c a in which the principal character is a middle-aged l u m b e r m a n w h o has spent thirty years in the tropics: He felt his taciturnity, the accumulated speechlessness of the solitary years that loomed behind him had withered all intimate, important speech. . . . Imprisoned by the rains, they had talked endlessly, and at length they had exhaused talk and fallen silent. T h e present, the drowsy, empty, waiting present supplied few incidents, few materials for thought. T h e r e were no people to gossip of, few books, no gaieties. Their pasts they found touched nowhere. His was concerned with places, hers with people the other had not known. For weeks, intermittently, she tried to draw him out and at long last realized that it was not taciturnity which slowed his tongue, but the mere eventlessness of his life. Thirty years of cutting timber in the bush. T h a t was all. 8

Thirty years of cutting timber in the bush. That was all. W h a t of the excitement, the thrills, the romance, the g l a m o r of far places? T h e truth is that these are temporary attributes of the land beyond the horizon. If Ishmael wishes to c o n t i n u e to enjoy these sensations, he must push on and ever on. T h e novelty of any single place soon wears off. T h e possibilities for »John W. Vandercook, "DjomW River," Harper's Magazine, Feb., 1930, pp. 265-80, and March, 1930, pp. 472-89.

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entertainment are soon exhausted; and, i£ one remains for long, he loses touch with the outside world. T h e life becomes monotonous, uneventful, uninspiring. Men fall silent for lack of new topics of interest to discuss. A recent letter from a friend on an isolated Wyoming ranch ends with this pathetic little note of apology: "If I had other news, I would not have written so much family history. I have been here twelve years and away on one pleasure trip one night so I see or know of little to write." Losing touch with the outside world for any considerable length of time creates a void which the far-wanderer often finds it difficult to bridge when he returns to his home. T h e threads of relationships have lapsed or been broken; and, once the excitement of his home-coming has worn off, he feels himself an outsider. He grows restless and yearns to be on the move, to go back to the bush again. I recall my mother's coming downstairs crying with homesickness for our Wyoming ranch the first morning following her return to her old home in Vermont after an absence of 16 years—16 years during which she had constantly worried my father and us children with her tearful nostalgia for Vermont. We were all irritated with her. We had supposed that once she was back in Vermont again with her family and childhood friends she would be happy, but she wasn't. She had never enjoyed the pioneer life in Wyoming, but she turned toward it when she realized that she could not readily slip back into the place which she had left as a single young woman 16 years before. T h e interval was too great. Time was needed to close the gap and loneliness was inevitable in the meantime. T h e keen disappointment often experienced on returning to their old homes after long absence is one reason why men who have cursed their isolation go back to it again. T h e United States marshal at Kodiak when I was there, an old sourdough, made a trip to his home town in Missouri after an

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absence of many years and started back for Alaska the next morning after reaching his home. And then there was the man at Baker Lake, whom Anne Morrow Lindbergh tells about in her inimitable odyssey of the air, North to the Orient, who was "bushed." He had gone outside, but couldn't stand it and had returned to the isolation of Baker Lake. 10 Baker Lake, Aklavik, Point Barrow, Karaginski, Petropavlovsk. T h e magic of aviation and Mrs. Lindbergh's gifted pen permit us to glimpse for a moment the heart of these lonely outposts of civilization in the great north lands—permit us to realize the significance of "news from home," or of any association, no matter how remote, with loved persons and places that time and distance have idealized, or of little things which we take for granted like fruit and green vegetables. Mrs. Lindbergh's frequent references to the craving of the people in the North for fresh fruit and vegetables brings to my mind this childhood incident. I had ridden out on the range with my father to a sheepherder's camp. 11 T h e herder was a Mexican, a "greaser" in the terminology of the cattle country, as were most of the herders in Wyoming. He was an old man, dirty, unkempt, peculiar—"locoed," the cowboys called it. Many sheepherders developed queer, unsocial traits as a result of the hardships and isolation of their work. T h e cattlemen and cowboys despised them, and, in the bitter struggle between the sheep and cattle ranchers for the control of the open range, the herders' lives were not safe. Often a herdsman would be killed and his sheep scattered. T h e sudden blizzards of winter also took their toll; in their efforts to save their flocks in the blinding storms, the herders themselves were often frozen to death. Heat and dust and rattlesnakes were trials of the summer months. 10 Lindbergh, North to the Orient, pp. 68-69. 11 See Dawson and Gettys, Introduction to Sociology, description of the sheepherder's way of life.

pp. 604-05, for a good

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Sometimes a herder was provided with a chuck wagon and so could move his camp as the range played out; at other times he was dependent upon a wagon man to bring him provisions and to move his camp. His provisions—"grub" in the vernacular—consisted of beans, salt pork or fat bacon, potatoes, and corn meal. Occasionally a lamb would be killed for fresh meat; otherwise his monotonous diet was unvaried. My father knew this and the day we visited the herder he took him a sack of fresh vegetables from our garden and eggs and butter as a present. The old man was obviously surprised when my father unslung the sack from the saddle and gave it to him. He squatted down on his heels on the ground and opened it rather doubtfully as though fearful some mean trick were being played upon him. When he saw what it contained, he began to cry for joy. One after another he took the things from the sack, handling them lovingly, caressingly, smelling them, and saying the names of the different items over and over again in broken English and Spanish. My father made a few comments about the condition of the range and the weather and we rode on and left him still counting his treasures while the tears dried on his dusty, weather-beaten old cheeks. Poor old man! It was no doubt the first treat and the first act of good will that had come his way in many years. And, to be honest, my father's motives in remembering him were not wholly disinterested, and the herder knew that they were not. Father was worried for fear the herder would turn his sheep to graze on land which Father used as winter range for his cattle. It was government land and the herder could not legally be kept from grazing his sheep there if he chose. Father reasoned, and rightly as it turned out, that if he won the herder's friendship, the winter range which he most needed would be spared. It was the custom of the Manila Daily Bulletin

as I first

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15}

knew this great paper twenty years before Bataan and Corregidor to dedicate the section devoted to the shipping news to " T h e y T h a t G o D o w n to the Sea in Ships." T h i s opening dedication was followed by a quotation from some poem of the sea and the heading as a whole was set off by small sketches of a modern liner, a Chinese j u n k , and global views of the Eastern and Western hemispheres. It was a pleasing heading w h i c h I have remembered sentimentally through the years. T h e subject of the loneliness of the sea is suffused by a sentiment that is as timeless as the sea itself and as deep as the great ocean trough which lies to the eastward of the Philippine Islands. T o be realistic in discussing the emotions of those far-wanderers w h o "do business in great waters" is not an easy assignment for anyone who has fallen under the spell of the sea and of the literature about it. T h e tendency to endow all seamen with one's own sentiments for the sea is hard to avoid, yet to do it would obviously be an error. T h e facts do not indicate that all seamen sentimentalize about the loneliness of their calling; they do indicate, however, that a high percentage of the men of the American merchant marine are socially unattached and therefore potentially lonely individuals. C o n c e r n i n g the sentiment of seamen for their calling, William McFee, who speaks from long experience in the engine rooms of tramp steamers, says: " T h e y have a feeling for ships that practical parents have for their children. T h e y have the familiarity with maritime matters that breeds affection without sentiment." 12 T h e sentiment for the sea with which literature has so generously endowed the seaman does not, in McFee's opinion, express the emotions of genuine seamen. It is "counterfeit money." McFee does not deny that the psychology of seamen differs in some ways, due to the nature of their calling, from the psychology of men in occupations 12

McFee, Watch Below, p. 31.

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ashore. It is the creation of a mythology about seamen to which he objects. In actuality, the isolation of the glory hole is not unlike that of the less-sentimentalized bunkhouse. T h e loneliness of the sea, although savored with its own salt and possessing its own distinctive qualities, is, at base, the loneliness common to unattached, homeless men everywhere. T h e fondness for the old sentimental tunes, noted by Robert Davis in both seamen and cowboys, is indicative of this loneliness. Writing of some of the men whom he knew aboard ship, Davis says: Gleason had a good baritone voice, and when he lay in his bunk and sang the "Wearing of the Green," or "Douglas, Douglas, Tender and True," Gager would breathe hard, Trainor would let the fire in his pipe go out, and Sullivan would close his Bible. Lively music was received indifferently, but the old tunes gripped. It would seem that in this the glory hole does not differ from masculine society elsewhere; when men have their women beside them they like music which sets their feet to beating time, but in mines or construction camps, or cattle country, it is the sentimental, the old-fashioned music which they want. Last July at a roundup in Alberta, I heard a man from Vermont sing "Loch Lomond" eleven times in a single evening to an outfit stretched under the grub wagon.13 In this connection, Davis comments that the seaman's recreation ashore, like that of the cowboy and of homeless men generally when they "hit town" after a long absence, is by no means the passive, placid affair of loafing, talking, sleeping, and reading things requiring no effort that it is on shipboard. In the play Mister Roberts, the wild celebration of the ship's crew on shore leave in Elysium highlights this contrast in recreational activities. T h e popular impression that seamen are a mobile group with few home ties or dependents is confirmed, at least in so " Robert Davis, "Some Men of the Merchant Marine," unpublished Master's thesis. Faculty of Political Science, Columbia University, 1907.

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far as the unlicensed personnel of the American merchant marine may be considered representative, by Davis's study and also by statistics collected by Jeanne G. Gilbert and James C. Healey." Davis states that few sailors are married, and adds that those who are do not publish the fact. Gilbert and Healey show how small a percentage are married. Of their sample of 326 seamen, only 1 1 . 3 5 percent were married and only 25.77 percent had any residence which might be called a home. These results agree with statistics of the United States Maritime Service, quoted by Gilbert and Healey, which show that of 2,305 enrollees only 12.67 percent were married. T h e results of another study of 199 seamen 15 are also in agreement. In Gilbert and Healey's group the average age was 38.19 years; the average age at going to sea, 23 years; and the average length of service, 13.78 years. Most of the men were American born. They came from all levels of society and their educational range was wide. Further evidence of the lack of home ties in the group of men interviewed by Gilbert and Healey is the small number of their dependents. Of the 326 men in the group, 246, or 76.46 percent, had no dependents. T h e 80 men with dependents had 1 1 7 among them, or 1.46 dependents per man. Dependents bring the seaman a saving sense of responsibility and the reward of knowing that somewhere there is someone who thinks of him and cares for him. Why so few seaman have these home ties raises the question of whether the sea attracts men who lack such ties or whether the hazards of their occupation make it difficult for them to assume family responsibilities. T h e average age at which the men went to sea, 23 years for Gilbert and Healey's group, would seem to indicate that " J e a n n e G. Gilbert and James C. Healey, "The Economic and Social Background of the Unlicensed Personnel of the American Merchant Marine," Social Forces, Oct., 1942, pp. 40-43. 15 L. C. Hutchins, "Emotional Stability of Seamen," unpublished Master's thesis, Faculty of Political and Social Science, Columbia University, 1939.

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at that time many of them had already reached the age w h e n men w o u l d normally assume family obligations. T h e f a i l u r e of these men to marry cannot be attributed to their life at sea. F o r the men who entered the service while still in their teens, the situation is different. H a d they remained ashore in occupations which offered normal opportunities f o r meeting women, the chances of their marrying w o u l d undoubtedly have been greater. T h e sea has been a factor in their aloneness, b u t not necessarily a determining factor. E v e n if the opportunity had offered, some would not have been willing to assume family responsibilities. Davis's study is enlightening on this point. W r i t i n g of seamen whom he k n e w personally, he says: But although these men emphatically did not want wives, and did not seem to want homes, they did want two things which in general society are associated with wives and homes. First, they wanted, somewhere, a headquarters; and second, they wanted some part of their lives to be connected with women. . . . They had a craving for a headquarters somewhere along the shore, a place where they could leave their trunk, if they had one; a place to which they could project their minds, wherever they might wander, and visualize the position of the furniture, and imagine just what the inmates of the place were doing at the different hours of the day; a place to which they could send a picture post card or bring back a curio; a place to which they could always return and be sure of a welcome. . . . They wanted the anchoring power of a home without its responsibilities. . . . They also had a craving, unconnected with sexual appetite, to be connected with some woman. It is a great thing for a lonely man to occupy the center of a woman's attention. 18 T h e seaman, with his yearning for a home and a woman's affection on the one hand and his desire to be free f r o m the restraining force of these responsibilities on the other hand, 1« Robert Davis, "Some Men of the Merchant Marine," unpublished Master's thesis, Faculty of Political Science, Columbia University, 1907.

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is another Ishmael struggling between two conflicting calls, Sarah's call to tea and the call of the open road. T h e s e two calls, as Ishmael the sailor sees his problem, are not compatible. If he chooses one, he must sacrifice the other. T h u s he turns a deaf ear to Sarah's call, but not w i t h o u t misgivings. If, for the present, he has his freedom together with his j o b and the companionship of his messmates, there is still the future to c o n s i d e r — w h a t of it? T h e sailor does not like to think about this question. In the sailors' "smoke talks," as Davis appositely calls the conversations in the glory hole, " t h e future is left severely alone, since none of these men has m u c h to hope from the f u t u r e and many even fear what it will b r i n g . " T h e smoke talk of the glory hole, Davis found, centers chiefly around the events of the voyage and about past experiences; "the great outside world is forgotten." M c F e e also comments on the fact that the seaman's preoccupation with his calling tends to narrow his interests. "Most of them," McFee says, speaking of the seamen w h o m he knew, " w e r e extreme conservatives in their thinking. T h e y regarded anything strange and foreign with disfavor and suspicion. T h e great intellectual movements of the age passed them by." 17 T h i s narrowness in the v i e w p o i n t of men w h o have sailed the Seven Seas and docked in all the great ports of the world, ports whose very names spell romance and adventure, may seem incredible to one who does not know the sea and ships and the m e n w h o sail them and w h o fails, in consequence, to realize the extent to which the seafarer is cut off from the kinds of contacts which stimulate and broaden thought. N e w ideas may mature in isolation and often do, but they are rarely bred there. N e i t h e r the life aboard ship nor the kinds of contacts which the sailor generally has when he goes ashore are provocative of a wider outlook on life. N o r is sightseeing, merely as such, the broadening influence it is often IT McFee, Watch Deloui, p. 31.

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believed to be. Strange new sights do provide material for thought, it is true; but this material does not become meaningful without effort on the seaman's part—or on the tourist's, for that matter. T h e sea is restful in that its demands, dangerous and arduous though they are, are limited in scope and the sailor is not forced to think beyond them. Characteristically, men do not grapple with difficult problems until the exigencies of their lives force them to. In this the sailor does not differ from his brother on land. The seaman meets the everyday demands of his life in the customary ways—given an emergency, he rises to it with courage and devotion, nobly, in the great tradition of the sea. T h e gallant chapter of the annals of the sea contributed by the men of the allied merchant marine in the Second World War will long be remembered. If, to the reader, the discussion in the foregoing chapter seems to be too inclusive and to wander rather far afield at times, the reason perhaps lies in the fact that the far-wanderer is more of an individual than a type. The motives which cause men to seek the far ends of earth and the ways in which they respond to their isolation are too diverse to be easily fitted into a few well-grooved categories from which to generalize. One common element does appear, however, amid this diversity. No matter how thrilling the freedom from responsibility and the joy of discovery may have been, all the farwanderers experienced a sense of loneliness if they had no family ties and no home to which they could look forward to returning. Without home ties there was a lack in their deeper satisfactions, an inner questing, which kept them ever restless and on the move.

CHAPTER

IX

The Lonely

Egotist

Like Koko in The Mikado, each of us no doubt has his own little list of the people whom he would never miss, the bores who exhaust his patience with their irritating mannerisms and tiresome self-centered monologues. Such persons are to be found in almost every group. Either through a lack of social awareness or a selfish desire to dominate, they impose on the tolerance and good nature of their associates until all who know them shun them if possible. Eventually they find that they have forfeited the pleasant social relationships which might have been theirs. Over and over again we ask ourselves concerning these bores, "Why can't they see that we don't like their constant complaining, or their untidy manners, or their always taking the conversation away from us and directing it to themselves, or their always doing this or that or the other thing that vexes us?" Often these social faults are minor in nature; but like the Southern chigger, which is also difficult to detect, they get under the skin and irritate and fester. If we can, we avoid coming into contact with them. If the social misfit senses his lack of welcome and asks himself "Why?" he seems rarely to find the right answer. Instead, he seems to cultivate his tiresome traits all the more assiduously. And again we ask, "Why?" Is it from sheer stupidity, innate perversity, or just pure cussedness? Or is there perhaps some more fundamental psychological reason? Obviously, to say that those on Koko's list are all extreme egotists, selfcentered and selfish, does not tell the whole story. Back of their egotism lies still a further "Why?" Why have they drawn a circle around themselves which deflects all rays except those

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which illuminate their own egos? Why have they turned their attention so exclusively in upon themselves? Has this trait developed purely as a matter of chance or are there processes in society which tend to foster it or to discourage it? In seeking answers to these questions, Erich Fromm's recent studies, Escape from Freedom and Man for Himself, pose an interesting hypothesis. It is Fromm's thesis that " T o understand the individual we must see him in the context of the society which molds him." 1 The present age, he holds, is one of transition. "Modern man, freed from the bonds of preindividualistic society, which simultaneously gave him security and limited him, has not gained freedom in the positive sense of the realization of his individual self." That is, man has not gained freedom in the expression of his emotional, intellectual, and sensuous potentialities. Modern man's freedom, although it has brought him independence and rationality, has made him isolated and, thereby, anxious and powerless. This isolation, Fromm states, is unbearable and man seeks to escape from the burden of the freedom which has brought it about. Two ways are open to him. He may retreat into new dependencies and submission, or he may advance to the full realization of positive freedom. Extreme egotism is one of the forms or characteristics of retreat. It is the response of a frightened individual who has been unable to relate himself successfully to the world about him. Alone and afraid, he centers his attention upon himself. He struggles in every way possible to build up his own ego in order to offset his feeling of helplessness and aloneness. He feels inferior but he dares not admit it to others and much less to himself. It is incumbent upon him to be ever on his guard that no chance shaft shall pierce his defenses. Hence, the more vulnerable he is the more self-centered he tends to become, i Fromm, Escape

from

Freedom,

p. viii.

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as Dr. Erwin W e x b e r g points out in his penetrating study of the p r o b l e m : There is an inverse proportion between the feeling of inferiority and the social feeling. For the lower the opinion an individual has of himself, the more egocentric he is; the more self-confidence he has gained, the more he may interest himself for his fellow men and feel himself a member of their community. Only that individual who realizes he is in a position to contribute something to society is prepared to contribute. T h e essence of communal life is based on this reciprocal give and take. 2 T o cover his own feeling of inferiority, the egotist must control the conversation and keep it on topics where others cannot outshine h i m . If, in seeming magnanimity, he gives another a pat on the shoulder for some achievement, he must immediately recount some feat of his own to overshadow it. Often, too, the egotist is insistent in his generosity and hospitality. T h e more he can place others under an obligation to him, on his own terms of course, the more he enhances his own position. By means of a hospitality which it is difficult for others to refuse without seeming to be ingrates, the egotist many times achieves a popularity which is more apparent than real. Another means of attracting attention to himself, and oftentimes of dominating others who must cater to his eccentricities, is the egotist's insistence upon being different from his associates in certain ways. Even minor eccentricities are often a subtle means of enslaving others. My mother, for instance, insisted for many years upon having all of her dresses made with a high standing collar edged with white. It was impossible to buy a ready-made dress, or even a dress pattern, with a collar that she would wear, although she looked well in low collars. Nor could the village dressmakers please her, and she - Wexberg, Individual Psychology, p. s68.

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herself did not sew. As a result, I had to make all of her dresses for her. Her collars gave her a claim on my time during the years when I was busiest trying to do graduate work and also to hold a teaching position. Like many other insecure and strongly egocentric persons, she unconsciously capitalized on her weakness rather than her strength—she was a wellinformed, even brilliant, conversationalist—to dominate her family. T h e method is a familiar one. In recent years, the lonely egotist's unconscious retreat from reality has become as well known to the psychologist as the famous Retreat of the T e n Thousand to Greece and Napoleon's Retreat from Moscow are to the historian. T h e subconscious flight from reality is the most generally accepted explanation at the present writing for certain psychopathic disturbances for which no organic causes have been determined as yet. T h e possibility that organic causes do exist and are awaiting discovery is not ruled out. Our knowledge of mental illness in its varied forms is much too incomplete for the question to be considered closed. A large and ever-increasing body of evidence, however, supports the theory that the so-called functional neuroses and psychoses are the result of subconscious efforts on the part of the afflicted individuals to escape from situations which have become intolerable to them and for which they have been unable to find a solution at the level of conscious reasoning. T h e theory provides an exceedingly promising approach to the study of a baffling problem. It not only offers an explanation for the development of functional disorders which is in harmony with other facts in the life history of the patients, but it also offers a basis for therapeutic measures which have proved efficacious. Laboratory experiments with rats have thrown some interesting and confirmatory light on the flight theory. Rats placed in a situation in which they must act, while at the same time they are prevented from acting, behave like human

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beings in a similar situation—they become neurotic. Both rat and human become refugees from reality. Faced by an intolerable situation from which they can find no way out on the level of conscious awareness, each in his extremity seeks to escape from the painful realities of his position through the subterranean passages of subconsciously controlled feeling and behavior. T h e fact that other solutions are possible, at least for the human being if not for the rat, does not affect the situation for the individual who fails to see them; for him the subconsciously motivated retreat from reality is the one way out of his difficulties. T o understand why the difficulties of a situation are unbearable and insoluble for the individual who flees from them it is necessary to view them through his eyes and in the light of his experiences and capabilities. Only in this way do the values which the situation holds for him become apparent and his behavior become meaningful. Each case differs in certain respects from every other and must, in its finer analyses, be considered separately. In its broader contours, however, features resembling those in other cases are usually discernible, thus making it possible to reach some conclusions of a general nature regarding the problem. There is, for instance, a wealth of evidence which testifies to the unfortunate effects of isolating situations. Often such situations become intolerable and an escape is sought through neurotic channels. Anton T . Boisen's studies, among others, bear directly on this point: The sense of isolation is probably characteristic of the mentally disordered as a group. They are for the most part those who have been regarded as "queer" or different from their fellows. The individual who succeeds in becoming an integral part of some group, even though that group in small and peculiar, does not as a rule find his way into our hospitals. The "prophet" who obtains a following is usually left in peace, and as he succeeds in getting social support, his pathological symptoms, if he has them, tend to dis-

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appear. T h e inferior person who finds a group which accepts him and whose standards he can accept may become a criminal or a delinquent, but he seldom develops a psychosis so long as he maintains his relationship to the group. 8 I n a later study Boisen says: It is probably safe to say that no man will have mental disorder so long as he can feel himself an integral part of some group whose standards he is able to accept as final. Much social behavior is consequently to be understood only when we take into acount the desire for mutual support and justification in those matters by which individuals judge themselves.4 R o b e r t E. L . Faris offers a similar explanation f o r schizophrenia, one of the most common and baffling forms of mental disorder. It is his hypothesis that any form of isolation which cuts a person off from intimate social relations f o r an extended period may possibly lead to this disorder. T h e seclusiveness is the result of a long period of isolation d u r i n g which the isolated person has made a struggle to establish intimate relations and has failed. H e feels lonely and the "disease" acts as a protective device into which he can flee.5 Pierre Janet, in a noteworthy study of hysteria, another f o r m of mental illness, also stresses the patient's need of attracting attention and of being loved and praised as among the most marked symptoms of his illness. T h i s need J a n e t attributes to a sense of incompleteness and dissatisfaction which in its turn is an expression of the sense of isolation f r o m which the patient is suffering. 0 E r w i n W e x b e r g also finds that neurotic symptoms are a common means to the attainment of 8

Anton T . Boisen, "Personality Changes and Upheavals Arising Out of a Sense of Personal Failure," American Journal of Psychiatry, April, »926, pp. 53»-5>* Anton T . Boisen, " T h e Sense of Isolation in Mental Disorders," American Journal of Sociology, Jan., 1928, pp. 555-67. s Robert E. L . Faris, "Cultural Isolation and the Schizophrenic Personality," American Journal of Sociology, Sept., 1934, pp. 155-64. 8 Janet, The Major Symptoms of Hysteria, pp. 3 1 2 - 1 3 .

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personal goals. T h e ambitious, egocentric individual frequently seeks in this way to retain his prestige in the face of failure. Lacking the courage, inner security, and self-confidence necessary to face his failure to achieve personal significance in his relationships with others realistically and constructively, he seeks asylum in a neurosis. 7 Acting on the theory that the functional mental disorders are social in origin, an expression of a disturbance in the patient's relationships to others, Dr. L . Cody Marsh has advanced a group method of treatment. Since mental illness is a social disease caused by the group, he argues, it must be cured by the same agency. 8 T h e results to date are promising. T h e recognition of the sense of isolation as an emotional state which may become intolerable to the individual and lead to psychopathic disorders as a means of escape necessitates the consideration of two further questions: first, the nature of the conditions and processes which tend to bring about a state of isolation, and, second, the personal traits of individuals who attempt to solve the problem by retreating from reality in neurosis rather than in some other way. T h e first of these questions has been answered at least in part in the preceding chapters. W e have noted that in modern society certain processes, such as individuation, differentiation, competition, and segregation, all of which tend to be dissociative in character, have become accentuated. Caught in the swift currents of these processes, many persons find it difficult to extricate themselves sufficiently to establish enduring and emotionally satisfying home and community relationships. Swept from their moorings, they find themselves alone and frightened in a world which they do not understand. In this situation they may, as Fromm pointed out,® go down in dei See Wexberg, Individual Psychology, p. 84. »L. Cody Marsh, "Group Treatment of the Psychoses by the Psychological Equivalent of the Revival," Mental Hygiene, April, 1931, pp. 328-50. ' Fromm, Escape from Freedom.

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feat, escaping to new dependencies, or they may accept their aloneness as a challenge to greater effort and a more positive self-realization. Which response an individual makes is determined by the relation of his unique personality traits to the difficulties of the particular isolating situation in which he is placed. T h e ability of one person to overcome a serious isolating handicap which another fails to conquer is not necessarily a condemnation of the person who fails. T h e difficulties of a situation may be such that only an exceptionally well-integrated person with more than average courage and selfconfidence could hope to surmount them. Failure for a less fortunately endowed person would perhaps be inevitable. T h e extent to which an individual is the master of his fate is a debatable question. No one, however, questions the fact that the experiences which an individual undergoes as a child have an important bearing on his personality as an adult. T h e relationship which exists between an individual's early training and emotional experiences and the fortitude, or lack of it, with which he meets the vicissitudes of adulthood is familiar knowledge. If the period of childhood has been marred by emotional shocks, insecurity, and frustration, the unfortunate effects of these experiences carry over into later life in a feeling of inferiority or of guilt which robs the individual of inner security and handicaps him in his efforts to establish desired social relationships. T h e more inferior the individual feels the less capable he is of social feeling. Henry Maudsley early noted this lack in mental patients, of whom he says: " T h e effective life of the individual is profoundly deranged. . . . He has no capacity of true moral feeling; all of his impulses and desires, to which he yields without check, are egoistic." 10 In a study of the relation of personality to success of treatment of 60 mentally ill 1« Maudsley, Responsibility in Mental Disease, pp. 171-72.

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patients, 38 of whom were classified as social cases and 22 as seclusive, the unfortunate effect of the egocentrism of the seclusive cases is apparent. T h e social cases, as an average, had resisted breaking down for 1 3 years longer than the seclusive cases; and, at the end of a four-year period, but 2.5 percent of the social cases were still under care in contrast to 50 percent of the seclusive cases. 11 T h e fight against inferiority is one of the bitterest of intrapsychic conflicts. It is a terrible thing to feel inferior. T h e individual handicapped in this manner is but poorly equipped to contend with other difficulties which he may encounter in life, many of which are in fact often provoked by his own attitudes. Because of his lack of security, his emotional energies are exhausted in inner conflicts. At war with himself, he is too emotionally impoverished to give himself to others. Also, he is peculiarly vulnerable to shafts which seem to threaten his prestige. Dorothy Canfield Fisher, the novelist, gives us a homely but telling example of this point in the comments of one of her characters concerning another: "Yes, I remember that was what Grandfather always told us children . . . that we were to be extra respectful to folks that came of no-account families. Everybody's got to have some thing to be proud of as much as he's got to have vittles, Grandfather used to say, and folks like that hadn't, got hut just themselves to be proud of. 'Twas more like murder than just hurtin' somebody's feelings to slight one of them, he always told us." 1 2 T o appreciate the significance of the feeling of inferiority in mental illness it is not necessary to rule out the possibility of other factors which may also have a bearing on the situation. Nor does it seem necessary to attempt to show, as Alfred Adler does, 13 that the fountainhead of the feeling of inferiority is to be found in physical defects and weaknesses, important 11 Earl D. Bond, "Personality and Outcome," American Journal of Insanity, April, 1913, pp. 731-38. " Fisher, Bonfire, p. 217. 1» Adler, Practice and Theory of Individual Psychology, passim.

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as such handicaps may be. M o r e often than not, it is not the handicap itself b u t the d w e l l i n g emotionally u p o n it which makes it seem such a tremendous burden. T h e importance of the handicap is not inherent, b u t lies rather in its relation to other factors in the total situation. If other factors in the situation change, the significance of the handicap is also changed. For instance, to quote Dr. W i l l i a m A . W h i t e , " T h e same g e r m plasm m a t u r i n g under the influence of one cultural e n v i r o n m e n t may result in an individual highly efficient and well adjusted, and in another cultural environment the same g e r m plasm potentials may produce quite the opposite result." 14 O r , in other words of Dr. White, " T h e intrapsychic conflict is dependent upon the introjected cultural pattern as translated to the individual by his parents and his parent surrogates, and social maladjustm e n t is the expression of the conflict of the individual with the cultural pattern." 15 Since psychologists have discovered so many dangers to the personality l u r k i n g in the early experiences of childhood, one sometimes marvels how it is possible for anyone to escape the psychological perils of infancy and develop into a normal, well-adjusted adult. T h e surprising thing is not the numbers of people w h o are seriously maladjusted, large though these figures are, b u t that the numbers aren't much greater—that is, unless some of the factors have been overemphasized. Possibly they have been, or possibly the h u m a n infant has greater powers of righting his o w n keel and riding out the storm successfully than we realize. A t any rate a large majority of people are sufficiently well-adjusted to be regarded as normal. T h i s fact should not, however, be construed to minimize the unfortunate effects which may follow in the wake of experiences w h i c h destroy the child's sense of security and personal worth. T h e child is by no means a foolproof plaything; his personality 11

White, Twentieth Century Psychiatry, pp. 95-96.

is Ibid.

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can be harmed and frequently is. But again, and more often, it is not harmed, either because most parents are wiser than they are sometimes given credit for being or because the child is a hardier organism psychologically than he is often thought to be. Of the various conditions which tend to undermine the child's self-confidence and courage and to pave the way for feelings of insecurity and inferiority, the frustration of the child's cravings for affection within his own family is perhaps the most widely recognized and best understood condition. T h e significance for the child's developing personality of different factors within his entire cultural environment has been less well determined. T h e effects of these factors are more indirect and difficult to trace, requiring in many instances the integration of materials drawn from psychology, anthropology, and sociology. T h e pioneer studies of Margaret Mead, Ralph Linton, Abram Kardiner, Karen Homey, Cora DuBois, Erich Fromm, and others in pointing out the relation of cultural factors to personality development have brought this problem to the foreground of present interest. Their findings not only delineate a new area of integrative studies of the relation of society and the individual, but they also provide a useful frame of reference for much existing material. Floyd Henry Allport, for instance, contends that much of our present toll of nervous and mental disease can probably be laid to the fact that in the modern era the child is torn between too many patterns with too few opportunities for quiet and stabilizing contacts between personalities. 19 T h e various demands imposed by an overdifferentiated, overinstitutionalized society lead to individual disorganization. T h e sense of security and responsibility which sustained the individual as a member of a simple primary group organization is lost in a socially regimented, highly institutionalized 1« Allport, Institutional Behavior, pp. 314-15.

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society. 17 T h e impersonal relationships of secondary group organizations fail to gratify his need for spontaneous human fellowship. His values, moreover, are often artificial and his goals, even if attained, yield him little real satisfaction. 18 T h e continuity of purpose which is a stabilizing, integrating influence in the primary group is lost in the diverging streams of a highly differentiated, segmented society, and without this continuity a success once achieved becomes meaningless. A failure, on the other hand, tends to assume an importance out of proportion to its actual consequence. T h i s situation gives rise to a sense of unrest and futility that is difficult to combat at best and, in the case of the already insecure and lonely egotist, often produces an unsupportable tension from which some means of release must be found. T h e flight into neurosis is one such means, as we have just seen; the use to excess of drugs or alcoholic beverages is another. A n apt reference to the present century as "the age of aspirin and alcohol" calls attention to the extensive use which is made today of drugs and alcoholic beverages to secure relief from pain and emotional tension. In situations of physical or emotional distress the use of these palliatives seems to offer the suffering individual a refuge for the time being. T h e danger of this shelter, however, is its habit-forming nature. T h e sufferer easily becomes dependent upon this way of meeting his difficulties, with the result that his refuge becomes a prison house from which escape is difficult, if not actually impossible. New problems graver than the ones from which he was originally trying to escape often beset his path. Unless the pressures from which he is seeking relief are lightened through some other means the odds are against his being able to free himself from his dependence upon the drug or For interesting case studies of this loss, see W. I. Thomas and Znaniecki, The Polish Peasant in Europe and America. 1 8 For a further discussion of this point, see F. L. Wells, "Values in Social Psychology," in The Unconscious: A Symposium, pp. 201-41. 17

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drink to which he has become addicted. T h e lonely or frustrated individual who drinks "to drown his sorrow" frequently alienates himself still further in doing so. T h e group disapproves of his drinking and he disapproves of himself for it. In consequence, he is more alone, more dissatisfied than ever, and more in need of some means of relief. T o drink again, and harder, is the course most frequently adopted in this extremity. Censure does not solve the problem, but on the contrary complicates it since it adds to the feeling of guilt the drinker is striving to forget. T h e moderate use of alcoholic beverages is a socially approved custom except in certain religious groups. Drinking to excess, however, does not meet with the approval of any group and in many it leads to social ostracism. T h e reasons are too well known to need reiteration. T h e unfortunate effects—physical, mental, and moral—which follow in the wake of the excessive use of alcohol are all too familiar. T h e y constitute a strong argument for prohibiting the use of alcoholic beverages in any quantity or strength whatsoever. F o r many persons a temperate use of alcohol is seemingly an impossibility; the question is either one of total abstinence or of overindulgence with its deteriorating consequences. T h e y cannot drink in moderation. They become problem drinkers if they drink at all. Just why has been difficult to determine. Recent studies indicate that the alcoholic is an ill person whose inordinate craving for alcohol is the result of a physiological deficiency or chemical imbalance of some kind. Whether this deficiency was present before the individual began drinking or whether it is caused by his excessive use of alcohol is not clear. Nor has a specific remedy been discovered. What is significant in this research at the moment is the shifting of the alcoholic's problem from a moral to a medical category, thus opening the way for an objective treatment of the problem.

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In theory, the alcoholic who is regarded as an ill person rather than as a moral delinquent will be able to retain his self-respect» He will be less isolated socially and in consequence he will be more ready to seek the help of others which, according to students of the problem, is the first requirement in effecting a recovery. 19 In actual experience, however, J o A n n Gilliam, a social worker in an institution for alcoholics and one of my former students, reports that many of the patients scoff at the idea that their craving for alcohol is a disease and possibly amenable to medical treatment. T h e i r attitude tends to confirm my own observations which incline me to the opinion that the reasons some people are able to drink in moderation whereas others become slaves to the habit are largely psychological. T h e well-integrated, emotionally secure person whose conscience is clear in the matter is able to control his appetite for alcohol. He may drink too much at times but he does not become a problem drinker. On the other hand, an emotionally insecure person who has found an asylum in alcohol for feelings of inferiority, guilt, loneliness, or other distressing emotional states will cling to it. Inferiority, guilt, and loneliness are all powerful adversaries. It takes courage for anyone who has found a shelter from these sensations, no matter how inadequate, to leave it voluntarily and do battle with them. T h e urge to stay under cover may be stronger than the urge to leave it. Wretched as the alcoholic's plight is, he may prefer it to being healed physically unless he can also be healed psychologically. I have also noted that the drinker who knows that he has a disagreeable situation to face when he sobers up is under a much greater compulsion to keep on drinking than is the drinker who knows that he has nothing more unpleasant to dread than the morning-after headache. T h e emotionally se19

See John W. Riley, Jr., "The Social Implications of Problem Drinking," Social Forces, March, 1949, pp. 301-05.

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cure individual, moreover, since he drinks from choice rather than from some inner physiological or psychological compulsion, is also less likely to be irritable and quarrelsome when he is under the influence of alcohol. The significance of social and psychological factors as well as the physical in the treatment of alcoholism is apparent in the following bits of the histories of two alcoholics whom I met late one night on a train from New York to Washington. At one of the New Jersey stops I was aroused—I had been half asleep—by an argument in the aisle between two drunken men. T h e seat beside me was vacant, the only vacant place in the coach as it happened, and each of the men was insisting that the other should take it. T h e older of the two, a man in his late forties perhaps, was wearing a sergeant's uniform. T h e younger man, who was probably still in his teens, was wearing a discharge button with a scrambled outfit of service and civilian clothes. The argument ended with the capitulation of the sergeant who sat with me after first propping up a half-empty bottle of whiskey on the seat between us. Eddie, as the sergeant called the young veteran, wove his way down the aisle and finally came to rest on a pile of baggage. From time to time during the night he found his way back to us and asked the sergeant for a little nip. He said he had a toothache. T h e sergeant gave him a drink each time but did not take any himself. He was obviously trying hard to pull himself together. He had a good face, deeply lined by suffering, and I was glad when he finally spoke to me. "It's the ghosts," the sergeant said. " I keep seeing them. T h e ghosts of the men the Japs killed." And then he told me his story. A veteran of the First World War and a regular army man, he had been an orderly on General Wainwright's staff in the Philippines and had served with him at Bataan and Corregidor and throughout the bitter prisoner-of-war years which followed. He had been liberated with General

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Wainwright's group several months before but was still suffering from the horrors he had experienced. "When I am drunk I don't see 'em," he continued, "but I have got to quit it." He straightened himself up. "See that?" He dug a letter from his pocket and handed it to me. It was from President Truman commending him for his services to his country. "I am proud of that and I am going to fight this thing. Ever hear of Alcoholics Anonymous?" I said that I had and that I was interested in their work. The sergeant replaced his letter and took a Bible from his pocket. "They gave me that, and I'm going to read it," he explained. "They told me to find somebody worse off than I was and to help him. I'd forget that way they said. That's why I've got Eddie. He's an Okinawa Marine, he was wounded and he just got out of the hospital last month. Eddie's an orphan. He hasn't got anybody. I've got lots of kin. I am on my way to visit an aunt who has a farm outside of Norfolk. I'm taking Eddie along. Eddie's just a boy. My aunt'll be good to him. Her boy didn't come back. Of course we'll stop in Norfolk first and get straightened around and I'll get Eddie some clothes." The two got off at Wilmington, going that way to Norfolk. I watched them cross the platform in the dim dawn light. The sergeant, armed with his Bible and President Truman's letter, one hand steadying the still-weaving Eddie and the other clutching the whiskey bottle ("Eddie'll need a drop when he comes out of this"), was advancing confidently to meet his enemy. I regret that I do not know the outcome of the fight, but the prognosis was good for the sergeant and for Eddie, too. The therapeutic value of what might be termed the "helping-Eddie treatment" has been repeatedly demonstrated in similar cases. It provides a new emotional outlet for the person caught in the toils of his own troubles; and for the Eddie who hasn't got anyone of his own, the hand held out

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to h i m means that he is n o t w h o l l y a l o n e a n d u n l o v e d . H e is still a part of the g r o u p a n d as such its values c o n t i n u e to h a v e m e a n i n g f o r h i m . H e has an i n c e n t i v e f o r o v e r c o m i n g his dependence on alcohol. I n the case of the d r u g addict, the social a n d psychological i m p l i c a t i o n s of his disease are e v e n m o r e p o r t e n t o u s than f o r the a l c o h o l i c patient. T h e alleged d e t e r i o r a t i o n of the d r u g addict's character comes f r o m the social situations into w h i c h the addict is forced b y the law a n d b y the p u b l i c ' s c o n c e p t i o n of a d d i c t i o n , rather than f r o m the effects of the d r u g itself. Such is the o p i n i o n at w h i c h A l f r e d R . L i n d e s m i t h arrived after long and careful investigation: T h e individual's interpretation of his distress as withdrawal distress is a belief or attitude which exists as a cultural and psychological phenomenon. It tends to be imposed upon the addict by his social environment. . . . T h e essential process involved in this transformation and basic to it is a linguistic one. . . . He calls himself a "dope fiend" and gradually hardens himself to the fact that he has become an outcast and a pariah to respectable people. . . . He assumes toward himself the attitudes of the group or society in which he lives. His deterioration is social.20 T h a t the addict's m o t i v e in t a k i n g d r u g s is n o t pleasure, at least a f t e r the first stages w h e n a p l e a s u r a b l e inflation of personality m a y b e e x p e r i e n c e d , b u t the a v o i d a n c e of p a i n , is I^awrence K o l b ' s o p i n i o n also. 21 H e notes, h o w e v e r , in another article

22

that 86 p e r c e n t of the d r u g addicts w h o m he

studied had b e e n n e r v o u s l y a b n o r m a l b e f o r e b e c o m i n g addicts and he attributes their first use of narcotics to a psychological escape motive. L a t e r , p a i n f u l w i t h d r a w a l s y m p t o m s p r e v e n t discontinuance of the h a b i t . T r e a t m e n t f o r the d r u g addict, as for the alcoholic, must 2» Lindesmith, Opiate Addiction, pp. 165-66. »i Lawrence Kolb, "Pleasure and Deterioration from Narcotic Addiction," Mental Hygiene, Oct., 1925, pp. 699-725. 22 Lawrence Kolb, "Drug Addiction in Its Relation to Crime," Mental Hygiene, Jan., 1925, pp. 74-98.

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be social as well as physical. T h e complex interrelationship between the individual with his particular temperament and the social environment must be unraveled. Attitudes of groups toward the fundamental problem of meeting responsibility vary. In some, attitudes favorable to an escapist philosophy are common; in others, the individual grows up with no idea except that he must carry his load all the way to the end whether he likes it or not. T h e idea that he can dodge life's responsibilities or heartaches does not suggest itself to him. Whether fearful or courageous at heart, he faces life with such fortitude as he can muster; and if he falls, he falls fighting with the wounds in front. T o do otherwise would be foreign to his way of life. 23 T h e characterization of the present age as an "age of aspirin and alcohol," in so far as it is true, is an indictment of our society's attitudes toward facing disagreeable experiences. T h e egotistic individual who is unable to identify his own interests with those of some other person or group is in a peculiarly vulnerable position when faced by a situation which can only be mastered by courage, patience, or supreme unselfishness. T h e question of the worth-whileness of further suffering on his part intrudes itself. What has he, or anyone, to gain from the struggle? Why not put an end to it all? Give up, completely, unconditionally? It is a cowardly decision but it takes a desperate courage to carry it out, a touch perhaps of madness. T o hope rather than to despair utterly is the more normal attitude for an individual in distress. T h e familiar expression, " W h i l e there is life there is hope," might well be " W h i l e there is hope there is life," so vital is the relationship between the will to live and the joy of living. N o matter how dark the present, if there still remains a glimmering hope of future happiness, life is not wholly joyless. One's efforts still 23 For a further exposition of this general point, see Homey, The Personality of Our Time.

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have meaning and purpose as long as one has a goal to strive for. It is only when all hope is gone that the despairing individual in his extremity falls upon his own sword like Saul at Gilboa. Not every person who dies by his own hand is actuated by motives of despair, however. E. J . Kempf, for instance, distinguishes eight different patterns of feelings which impel suicide: the belief that religious devotion and loyalty constrain devotees to follow a king, husband, or chief beyond the grave; fanatical experiments based upon belief in a new form of life after death; the choice of suicide as an honorable alternative to execution for military dishonor; the preference of selfinflicted death to torture or slavery, or to becoming a serious incumberance to others, as in times of famine, shipwreck, or war; suicide as an impulsive act forced by delirious erotic pressure; suicides of guilt or shame; and suicides of revenge compelled by brooding, feelings of injury, or a conviction of the futility of love. 24 In most, though not all, of these categories of suicidal feelings, an escape motive is apparent. It is especially pronounced in the last two categories, which are also the two groups most definitely characterized by an overpowering sense of isolation. T h e y are, moreover, the groups to which the largest number of suicides in America belong. American mores do not condone suicide under any circumstances. Death by one's own hand is regarded with horror. T h e suicide must carry out his act in secret. H e does not share the excitement of facing death with others as does the soldier on the battlefield, nor is his passing eased by the tender sympathy customarily extended to the dying. Death by suicide has no alleviating features unless it is the hope, not always realized, that the means chosen will do the work quickly and painlessly. Suicide is a grim, E. J. Kempf, "The Meaning of Suicide," The New Republic, pp. 324-27.

May, 1927,

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forbidding step that is understandable only in the light of the tragedy which has preceded it. T h e causes to which suicide is commonly attributed, such as alcoholism, unemployment and destitution, domestic trouble, insanity, morbid mental states, ill health, disgrace, desire for revenge, and so forth, derive their significance as suicide incentives from the manner in which they are interwoven with other factors in the life pattern of the individual. Many persons similarly afflicted do not take their own lives. Indeed, one of the most interesting, and possibly eloquent facts, brought out by studies of the causes of suicide is the frequency with which the reports of such deaths read "Cause unknown." For example, Dr. Philip Piker, in a study of 1,817 cases of suicidal attempt, found that the cause was reported as unknown in 1,128 of the cases.25 Dr. Merrill Moore found the cause to be unknown in 981 cases out of 1,147 studied. 26 In some of these cases, relatives or friends may have known the causes and have preferred not to reveal them. In the majority of the cases, however, the chances are that no one knew the suicide intimately enough to appreciate the reasons for his act. In other words these "cause unknown" suicides were isolated individuals, men and women who had struggled to solve their problems singlehanded and who had gone down to their defeat as they had lived—alone. T h e proposition established by £mile Durkheim—that the rate of suicide varies in inverse ratio with the degree of integration of the religious, domestic, and political groups to which the individual belongs— 2 7 has been confirmed by other students of the subject. In times of adversity the mem25 Philip Piker, "Eighteen H u n d r e d and Seventeen Cases of Suicidal Attempt: A Preliminary Statistical Survey," American Journal of Psychiatry, July, 1938, pp. 97-115. 2 8 Reported in the New York Times, August 28, 1937. A m o n g the known causes, financial reasons were given more often by men and domestic troubles 2 7 Durkheim, Le Suicide, by women. p. 222.

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bers of strongly unified groups stand by one another with sympathy, encouragement, and, if needed, material aid. T h e y share each other's burdens and thus lighten loads that might otherwise be too heavy. T h e individual whose group ties have weakened or been broken is without this assistance. No steadying hand is held out to help him over his difficulties; no reassuring voice urges him to keep up the fight. He has lost the social man in him, as Durkheim obsei ves,28 and with this loss most of his reasons for living. It is not surprising therefore if he loses his grip on himself in some dark hour and, like Richard Cory, 20 goes home and puts a bullet through his head. Louis I. Dublin and Bessie Bunzel, in their analysis of the causes of suicide, 30 emphasize the fact that unless the individual is already harassed by a serious emotional conflict, adversity alone does not drive him to suicide. Given the entering wedge of an emotional conflict, however, hardships of various kinds tend to accelerate the process of separation from others. T h e loss of emotional contact with one's fellows gives rise to a sense of isolation. Without emotional contacts the basic desires for response, recognition, and security cannot be adequately gratified. Any condition which interferes with the development of emotionally satisfying relationships, whether in the social environment or in the personality of the individual, may be conducive to suicide. T h e two diaries quoted by Ruth Shonle Cavan in her interpretative study of suicide 31 both show unsatisfactory relationships; one was lacking in response, the other in recognition. Unless the suicide is actually as isolated as he feels himself to be, someone else will suffer if he takes his own life. He has obligations which bind him to society and hence to life itself. 28 Ibid., p. 228. 2» Edwin Arlington Robinson, "Richard Cory," in The Children of the Night (New York, 1897). 3 1 Cavan, Suicide. so Dublin and Bunzel, To Be or Not to Be.

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H e has no right to throw a shadow over the lives of others to escape from his own difficulties. T h e anguished cry of a widow whose husband had shot himself: " N o human being has any right to do this thing to another," voices this obligation. Only a narrowly self-centered person, or one temporarily blinded by his adversity, could fail to feel bound by it even though he were himself deprived of the normal benefits of the relationship. T h e unwillingness of the egocentric individual to accept the obligations and responsibilities which are an integral part of enduring, emotionally satisfying relationships is a distinct handicap in the development of these relationships. In an adult the capacity to love implies also the capacity to bear responsibility. In trying to evade responsibility, the egocentric individual runs the risk of losing love. T h e physician, according to E. J . Kempf, never finds a compulsion to suicide in people who are able to love or who cherish the hope of some day doing so.32 Other students of the problem of suicide have also commented upon the effect of egocentrism. After a thoroughgoing marshaling of the statistics of suicide, Henry Morselli observed: " I n our days suicide is the effect of egoism, of unsatisfied passions, and we are obliged to make more of pathology than of morals." 33 T h e egoistic individual goes down in defeat before obstacles which the more emotionally secure, altruistic person would find a way of surmounting. T h e egoist accustomed to offering his love with "tenderminded egotism," to borrow a phrase from Kempf, and without a saving sense of humor lays himself open to depressing reactions when he is jilted or received with ridicule, scorn, laughter, or indifference. Insecure and inferior, he is prone to stress his rights and privileges in a relationship to the neglect of his obligations and duties, with the result that his links with 32 E. J . Kempf, " T h e Meaning of Suicide," The New Republic, 33 pp. 324-27. Morselli, Suicide, p. 2.

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others tend to sag and break and he loses his emotional contact with them. Maurice Halbwachs has appropriately called the social situation which ensues when a person loses contact with the people about him a lacuna.34 It is an empty space in the social structure analogous to the spaces which occur within or between the cells of a living organism or to the empty spaces or air pockets in the atmosphere in which there is nothing for a plane's propellers to bite into. Sudden changes in the social organization of a group, like sudden changes in atmospheric conditions, tend to produce such gaps. In the rapid transition in modern society from a simple familial organization to a complex communal organization, many old ties have been ruptured before new ones were sufficiently strong to take their place. Breaks occur at these points in the social structure. T o bridge them requires the development of new responsibilities; hence, the egotist with his rcluctance to assume responsibility is caught more often than the altruist in these air pockets of the social structure. A breakdown of the general statistics of suicide shows a correlation between the suicide rate and situational factors which are isolating in character. Some examples are: the tendency of the suicide rate to fluctuate inversely with the rate of business activity; 35 the greater proportion of suicides among suspected and accused prisoners in solitary confinement than in associated imprisonment; 36 the higher rate in the army than among civilians; 37 the higher rate among single, widowed, or divorced men than among married men, and the higher rate among men than women; 38 the higher rate among married persons without children than those with children; 39 s« Halbwachs, Les Causes du suicide, p. 448. as Walter C. Hurlburt, "Prosperity, Depression and the Suicide Rate," American Journal of Sociology, March, 1932, pp. 714-19. »« Morselli, Suicide, pp. 261-65. " Ibid., pp. 256-61. 3 9 Ibid. 3« Dublin and Bunzel, To Be or Not to Be, pp. 133-34.

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and the higher rate among unskilled than skilled workers— with domestic servants at the head of the list. 40 I n evaluating the relationship between suicide a n d the individual's sense of aloneness, cognizance must also be taken of other factors which, although not directly isolating in themselves, may also affect the suicide rate. Easy access to a means of self-destruction which is not repugnant to the suicidal person is such a contributing factor. T h e possession of firearms and habituation to their use is doubtless reflected in the high suicide rate of the N e w Y o r k City Police Department. D u r i n g a four-year period which began in September, 1934 when L o u i s J . Valentine became Commissioner, the rate was 90 to 95 persons per 100,000 for the Police Department, in comparison with a general suicide rate of about 17 persons per 100,000 for the city. 41 T h e means, however, merely facilitate the act; they do not impel it. Except in cases of illness, the motives are social in origin. I n the case of the Police Department, the fact that the rate was markedly higher after Commissioner Valentine took office than it was d u r i n g the administrations of the two previous commissioners raises the question whether his efforts to clean u p graft in the Police Department did not have a bearing on the increased rate. A comparison of attempted suicides with actual suicides also gives some interesting side lights on the general problem. For instance, Dr. W . N o r w o o d East's analysis disclosed that actual suicides occur more frequently in the early m o r n i n g hours and attempted suicides in the evening; that the rates for actual suicides are highest between ages forty-five and fifty-five, attempted suicides between ages twenty to forty-five years; and that actual suicides are more affected by a loss of status in the