Sex, Drugs, and the Right to Vote I BETWEEN 2 WARS I 1920 Part 4 of 4 - YouTube (2)
But the customs of the nations' armies make for different ways of handling
the inevitable fact that young fighting men facing potential death will do whatever they can
to get some comfort and solace in the arms of another.
The French have already been issuing condoms to the troops to combat decease
and stop unwanted pregnancies as a standard part of equipment since the end of the XIX century.
The Germans, the Russians, the Austrians, the Italians - all of them are handing out condoms.
The only nations to not do so, for reasons of morality,
are the nations of the Commonwealth and the United States, with catastrophic consequences.
During the war, 416.891 British soldiers are admitted to hospital for treatment of venereal decease.
That's roughly 5% of all men enlisted in the entire British forces.
Compare that to 74.711 cases of the more talked about condition - Trench Foot.
Canadian soldiers, who are better paid than their English counterparts, for example, and thus can afford
more visits to the joyhouses, and also can not go home to their sweethearts on their leave, are even worse off.
In 1915 they have a VD infection rate of 22%.
Consider also the amount of cases of VD that were not treated.
Some deceases like chlamydia or syphilis present little or no symptoms initially.
Then there is the embarrassment, the shame that stops many from even seeking treatment.
And although many other armies are handing out condoms, that's still not a perfect solution.
First of all, you actually have to use them, and even if you do, in the 1910s condoms are less than perfect.
So, they bring the deceases back home, with predictable results. But that's not the only thing they come back with
Wounded, psychologically scarred and treated by liberal prescriptions of heroine and cocaine,
they return home addicted to what is still at the time viewed as acceptable prescription pain medication.
Now, the use of heroine and cocaine for recreational purposes has been widespread for decades already,
but with masses of soldiers hooked, usage spreads like an epidemic. The authorities around the world realize
they've created a serious problem, killing and disabling young people by the thousands.
Already in the year 1920, US lawmakers pass more laws on the prescription of opiates and cocaine,
and heroine is banned outright in the US in 1924.
Now, think about this for a moment: here we are, in 1920, and there's a young generation who have lushed
millions of their generation die in the war, and of the Spanish Flu,
the young man have lost their innocence on the frontlines and in the brothels of Europe
the women have discovered that they can be an equal contribution to the workforce,
they are, as Hemingway put it, The Lost Generation, but also The Resilient Generation.
Many of them will now change the way the world works, and launch a decade that is characterized
by an uninhibited celebration of lust and a right to individual self-determination.
Sex is right at the center of this youth revolution, or, as Samuel D. Schmalhausen will put it
in the article "Sex among the Moderns" in the "Birth Control Review" of October 1928
Well, perhaps that was a bit over the time, but you get the idea.
Sadly, this youth revolution will not end well. It will take until the 1960s
and the introduction of the contraceptive pill for it to truly take off and achieve significant change.
In 1920 for many it's an outrage, a violation of the natural order,
they see it as one of the root causes of all the troubles in the world.
The more benign reactions in that direction will create a new social conservative surge in The West.
In the more extreme cases, it will provoke a violent reactionary drive
to return to a society, where a man is the provider, the woman takes care of the household
and breeds children for the advancement of the race,
or, as the Nazis will put it, to produce a child for the Führer.
That very Führer will not only attack the freedom of youth, women, political opponents and
other enticities, but also subjugate entire nations by war. The first of these will be Poland.
That's where we'll go back to in our next episode, where we look at the underlying conflicts
between Germany and Poland, that lead to war in 1939.
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"WWII Week by Week" starts September 1st 2018.
Now, if you've missed the episode of Between 2 Wars about the Spanish Flu, then click right here for that.
And as Spike Milligan said, "contraceptives should be used at every conceivable occasion".
That's funny, right. Here is to you, Spike.
See you next time.
