Charles Maine - World Without Men

“This is more than politics, Rona It’s life and death, and you know it.”

“You’d better explain,” she said.

He explained: “It began in the second half of the twentieth century, when a chemical combine known as Biochemix Incorporated introduced a new contraceptive product called Sterilin on the market. Supported by shrewd advertising and attractive, glamorous packaging (the tablets were contained in a handbag-size gilt compact), Sterilin rapidly became the leading product of its kind, with sales rocketing to fabulous figures. Each tablet of Sterilin was capable of inducing absolute sterility in a woman for not less than six months The result was a new kind of emancipation for the female sex. Pregnancy was virtually abolished overnight. Women, slowly, cautiously at first, but later with gathering momentum, began to exploit their new found freedom from the centuries old fear of accidental conception.

“Ten years after the first Sterilin advertisement appeared in a leading woman’s magazine, an obscure government statistician produced a significant document. In Great Britain, America and Europe, and in all countries where Sterilin had been intensively marketed, according to the report, birth rates had fallen alarmingly. Worse still, there had been a snowballing deterioration in the moral standards of civilized society. Marriage was rapidly losing all meaning. Promiscuity was becoming the accepted pattern of behaviour Protected by Sterilin, women no longer saw any point in resisting the more pleasurable temptations of life, and men, who needed little encouragement anyway, stormed the collapsing barriers of feminine virtue with aggressive determination and were delighted to find their invasion more than welcome.

“The British government, disconcerted by the statistician’s report, decided to go into action, and forthwith appointed a Royal Commission to investigate the overall result on society of the introduction of Sterilin, with particular reference to the problem of the falling birth rate. Unfortunately all of the members of the Commission were themselves, directly or in directly, grateful users of Sterilin, and they never reached a finding.

“The United States of America adopted a more forthright approach: without bothering to investigate, Congress immediately slapped a prohibitive tax on Sterilin tablets. Sales dropped overnight, then slowly began to pick up. Revenue derived from the tax grew and grew to immense proportions, and when Sterilin sales eventually returned to their original level, the United States government found that they had unwittingly acquired a new and lucrative source of internal revenue even exceeding that yielded by tobacco and alcoholic drinks combined.

“The British government, followed by various European governments, promptly imitated America’s example, anxious too, to combine a superficial disapproval of Sterilin with a fabulous increase in tax revenue. The Soviet Union, never willing to copy the decadent methods of the West, banned Sterilin by government edict, but deliberately omitted to implement the ban, then compensated by imposing extortion ate fines of all convicted of purchasing Sterilin tablets in the black market. The end result in terms of revenue was much the same as if they had imposed a tax.

“Eastern races, for whom overpopulation had always been a problem, saw in Sterilin a medium by which population could be controlled and, in consequence, living standards raised. In China, Japan, Indian and Pakistan Sterilin therapy was actually encouraged by the government, who even went so far as to subsidize the drug so as to bring it within the price range of the multitude. For the truly penniless Sterilin centres were set up where prophylactic doses could be obtained free of charge.

“The truth was that the world was confused in its reaction to Sterilin. The people welcomed it; some governments were sternly disapproving; the Church was horrified, and many nations gave it authoritative backing. And as the years went by the birth rate continued to fall, and morality crumbled away In the course of a decade there was hardly a human female anywhere in the world whose ovaries had not been artificially put out of action.

“Meanwhile, as the problem of the falling birth rate be came more and more serious, governments took various in effective measures to control the use of the drug. France, for instance, nationalized the local Sterilin plant, and then, being French, not only failed to close down the factory, but proceeded to build new factories. This was because no government in France was ever able to survive long enough to oppose the desire of the people. In any case, having taken over the exploitation of Sterilin in France, the government found the venture too profitable to consider seriously restricting its commercial distribution.

“In the end the growing crisis reached United Nations level, and so began months of fruitless discussion around shiny conference tables while political leaders of the world argued on a subject they knew very little about: the ethics of contraception and what to do about it.

“The answer came from Russia, who, presumably, had viewed the situation through dialectical spectacles. The Soviet delegate pointed out that it would be impracticable to ban the use of Sterilin unless the new uninhibited behaviour pattern of male-female relationships could be banned also. Promiscuity, indeed, a pervading amorality of society, had come to stay, and if Sterilin were banned, then people would simply resort to other forms of birth control, including abortion. There would be a surge of illegal operations performed, no doubt, by quack doctors, but amorality would continue. Habits of thought and conduct, once established, are difficult to eradicate even on an individual basis; on a national or planetary basis — impossible.

“On the other hand, the delegate went on, the declining birth rate was a threat to the future of human life which had to be dealt with here and now. It was an emergency, and it called for prompt action. Governments could not dictate the morals of their peoples, but they could define the duties and responsibilities of their subjects. It was the prime duty of every woman, the delegate declared, to bear children in order to maintain the national birth rate at a stable level.

“He then made the following proposals: Laws must be created and enforced to compel every woman of mature age to spend a period in what might be termed a fertility centre, where she would be impregnated and made to bear a child; the number of children each woman would be required to bear during adult life would depend on existing birth rate statistics: it might be three or four.

“Since the family as a unit had largely disintegrated and sexual irresponsibility was the accepted order of things, governments might be required to accept responsibility for the rearing and educating of all children born at the official fertility centres. This would necessitate the establishment of State nurseries and schools.

“The entire project must be ruthlessly organized and applied. There must be severe fines, even imprisonment, for women failing to co-operate. The children born must be shepherded by the State, for the family influence was no longer effective or desirable. Only in this way could the slump in the birth rate be checked, and stability injected into the matter of human procreation.

“The Soviet delegate’s proposal had a mixed reception, mainly because the other delegates at the conference felt vaguely resentful that they hadn’t thought of it first. Pro tests were made; delegates spoke heatedly of totalitarian dictatorship, of breeding kennels, of a mechanistic approach to the sacred act of human propagation, of profane materialism, and of sheer defilement of the human spirit; but after the rhetoric and argument had blown itself out, one fact remained starkly evident; that there was no other practicable solution to the problem.