John Stuart Mill was a very important part of the Victorian Era. He was a utilitarian and very liberal. He did not have a formal education because his father thought that the schools were not up to teaching adequate education. He was very smart and knew more by the time he was twenty than scholars who had gone to the best schools did. This knowledge came at great cost though. He was a ulitarian and the creed of this was to be happy at any means necessary. It was a scientific way of making decisions of making you happy. In his book The Subjection Of Women, Mill explores the rights of women and what laws were equal for them when in areas of divorce and legal matters. Mills served as a member of Parliament and he married Harriet Taylor after her husband died. She was a great influence on him when writing this book. He was getting first hand knowledge of how unfair the women in society were being treated. He states:
And the case is that in which the desire of power is the strongest: for everyone who desire it most over those who are nearest to him, with whom his life is passed, with whom he has most concerns in common, and in whom any independence of his authority is oftness likely to interfere with his individual preferences.
He understands clearly that women have no power or say, but they should because without them what type of life would there be? He uses his wits and smarts to argue the equality of women. He continues to write in the book the "wrongs" of women who are English. All of the laws are designed to help the husband. He lists the many "wrongs" that English laws have set up in the name of women.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Tamica,
ReplyDeleteSome good factoids and observations on Mill, here. I am confused by the passage you quote, though. It doesn't really seem connected to anything you analyze, and in fact it seems to state the opposite of Mill's own theories on equality of men and women.
I like the fact that your rationalize with the writer,and I loved the fact that though he knew that women had no power that they should hold some. Nicely done.
ReplyDeleteWhen I read "The Subjection of Women" what i got out of the work was that he was talking about how the women of that time did not have alot of power, and that they pretty much had to do what their husband told them. However, I look over the passage you gave and after reading what Dr. Glance has said, I feel that he is not really talking about how women should have more power or how they have the lack there of. I think that he is just talking about the people around him, I guess like his sons or something.
ReplyDeleteGreat background information on Mills. I do think that his lack of schooling helped him to become more liberal because he wasn't in a realm where such archaic views were distinguished. Perhaps his upbringing also allowed him to be able to feel more comfortable expressing such opinions.
ReplyDeleteGood post and I agree that the power of women is important. It should not be ignored and should be respected to the point where people understand that women are just as important as men.
ReplyDelete