Page:Alexandra Kollontai - Communism and the Family (1920).djvu/16

 breathed more freely. Beginning with this moment the intellectual development of their child ceased to be an affair of theirs. But all the obligations of the family toward the child were not therefore finished. There was still the duty of feeding the child, buying it shoes, clothing it, making skilled and honest workers of them, who might be able when the time came to live by themselves and to feed and support their parents in their old age. However, it was very unusual when a worker's family was able to fulfil entirely all these obligations towards their children; their low wages did not permit them even to give the children enough to eat, while lack of leisure prevented the parents from devoting to the education of the rising generation the full attention which it demanded for this duty. The family was supposed to bring up the children. But did it really? As a matter of fact, it is the street which brings up the children of the proletariat. The children of the proletarians are ignorant of the amenities of family life, pleasures which we still shared with our own fathers and mothers.

Furthermore, the low wages of the parents, insecurity, even hunger, frequently bring it about that when hardly ten years of age, the son of the proletarian already becomes in his turn an independent worker. Now, as soon as the child (boy or girl) begins to earn money, he considers himself the master of his own person to such an extent that the words and counsels of his parents cease having any effect upon him, the authority of the parents weakens and obedience is at an end. As the domestic labors of the family die out one by one, all obligations of support and training will be filled by society in place of the parents. Under the capitalist regime the children were frequently, too frequently, a