Page:Counter-currents, Agnes Repplier, 1916.djvu/132

Counter-Currents Woman Suffrage Association sent an appeal to organized suffragists all over the world, urging them to "arise in protest, and show war-crazed men that between the contending armies there stand thousands of women and children who are the innocent victims of man's unbridled ambitions."

There was no word in this appeal to indicate that any nobler—and humbler—sentiment than unbridled ambition (which, after all, is for the very few) animates the soldier's heart. There was no distinction drawn between aggressive and defensive warfare. There was no hint that men bear their full share of the sufferings caused by war. The assumption that women endure all the pain is in accordance with the assumption that men enjoy all the pleasure. To write as though battle were a game, played by men at the expense of women, is childish and irrational. We Americans are happily spared the sight of mangled 116