V. I.

Lenin

The fifth international congress for the suppression of the white slave traffic recently ended in London.

Duchesses, countesses, bishops, priests, rabbis, police officials and
all sorts of bourgeois philanthropists were well to the fore! How many
festive luncheons and magnificent official receptions were given! And how
many solemn speeches on the harm and infamy of prostitution!

What means of struggle were proposed by the elegant bourgeois delegates
to the congress? Mainly two methods—religion and police. They are, it
appears, the valid and reliable methods of combating prostitution. One
English delegate boasted, according to the London correspondent of the
Leipziger Volkszeitung , [1] that he had introduced a bill into parliament
providing for corporal punishment for pimps. See the sort he is,
this modern “civilised” hero of the struggle against prostitution!

One lady from Canada waxed enthusiastic over the police and the
supervision of “fallen” women by policewomen, but as far as raising wages
was concerned, she said that women workers did not deserve better pay.

One German pastor reviled present-day materialism, which, he said, is
taking hold among the people and promoting the spread of free love.

When the Austrian delegate G\"artner tried to raise the question of the
social causes of prostitution, of the need and poverty experienced by
working-class families, of the exploitation of child labour, of unbearable
housing conditions, etc., he was forced to silence by hostile shouts!

But the things that were said about highly-placed personages—among
groups of delegates—were instructive and sublime. When, for example, the
German Empress visits a maternity hospital in Berlin, rings are placed on the fingers of mothers of “illegitimate” children in order that
this august individual may not be shocked by the sight of unmarried
mothers!

We may judge from this the disgusting bourgeois hypocrisy that reigns
at these aristocratic-bourgeois congresses. Acrobats in the field of
philanthropy and police defenders of this system which makes mockery of
poverty and need gather “to struggle against prostitution”, which is
supported precisely by the aristocracy and the bourgeoisie....

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Notes:
[1]
Leipziger Volkszeitung ( Leipzig People’s Newspaper )—the organ of the Left wing of the German
Social-Democratic Party, published daily from 1894 to 1933; for a Dumber of
years it was edited by Franz Mehring and Rosa Luxemburg. From 1917 to 1922 it
was the organ of the German “Independents”, and after 1922 it became
the organ of the Right Social-Democrats.