[Democracy and Social Ethics by Jane Addams]@TWC D-Link book
Democracy and Social Ethics

CHAPTER IV
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She would be in line with the industrial organization of her age.

Were she in line ethically, she would have to believe that the sacredness and beauty of family life do not consist in the processes of the separate preparation of food, but in sharing the corporate life of the community, and in making the family the unit of that life.
The selfishness of a modern mistress, who, in her narrow social ethics, insists that those who minister to the comforts of her family shall minister to it alone, that they shall not only be celibate, but shall be cut off, more or less, from their natural social ties, excludes the best working-people from her service.
A man of dignity and ability is quite willing to come into a house to tune a piano.

Another man of mechanical skill will come to put up window shades.

Another of less skill, but of perfect independence, will come to clean and relay a carpet.

These men would all resent the situation and consider it quite impossible if it implied the giving up of their family and social ties, and living under the roof of the household requiring their services.
The isolation of the household employee is perhaps inevitable so long as the employer holds her belated ethics; but the situation is made even more difficult by the character and capacity of the girls who enter this industry.


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