Life, 1912-05-02 · page 18 of 58
Life — May 2, 1912 — page 18: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page satirizes a fictional "Pessimists' Club" that excludes women—despite the obvious irony that women, according to the text, are natural pessimists. The humor relies on misogynistic stereotypes: the author argues women cannot be *real* pessimists because their "main business is to deceive everybody" into thinking they can make men happy. The accompanying illustration titled "A Belle of Thirty Years Ago" shows a woman in a park, likely depicting an idealized romantic figure from the past. The cartoon at bottom—a man asking about a barrel labeled "Barrels of Gunpowder"—appears to be unrelated humor about curiosity. The piece mocks men's paranoia about women while simultaneously perpetuating the very stereotypes it pretends to satirize: women are manipulative, deceptive, and impossible to reform. The tone suggests early 20th-century cynicism about both gender relations and marriage.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
cnough money to abolish a tariff for revenue These are only samples of a few of the mottoes for banners that have been submitted. Others are welcome. One of our members, who has ap- parently been married four or five times, writes in as follows: “TI do not understand why you have no woman members of the Pessimists’ Club, Is it possible that you consider that there are no women pessimists i the country, or haven't you rec any applications? “Tf you think there are no women pessimists, you should have met my third wife. She taught me all the pessimism I know. It is quite different learning pes- simism from being a pessimist cne's self. We assure this gentleman that his third wife was nv pessimist. There are no real women pessimists. When you see a womat. you think is a pessimist, you will discover that she is A BELLE OF THIRTY YEARS AG secretly having a grand time making as much trouble for other people as she can, That is one reason why there are no lady members to the Pessimists’ Club. Another reason is that there have been no applications from women. Why should any woman acknowledg that she is a pessimist, when her main business is to deceive everybody into the belief that she can make them happy? Bah! We should like to state that no men will be permitted to take part in the parade against women unless they are regular members of this club. We have received a great many appli tions from husbands who wish to join us on this occasion. Unless they can demonstrate that they are out-and-out pessimists, in all directions, and are teady to become regular members, we cannot grant them the desired per- mission, We are not attempting to reform the women, We realize too well that this is hopeless. E, 1 WONDER WHAT THERE 1S 1? THIS BARREL?”