The Wasp — 1879 — page 231: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

This page is primarily a lengthy opinion article rather than a political cartoon. The illustrated header shows a woman in Victorian dress discarding trash, accompanying an essay criticizing the Woman Suffrage Movement in America. The article argues that suffrage advocates (specifically naming Setlins, Theo Wentworth, Higginson, and L. L. McCould) misapply arguments applicable to men to women. It sarcastically compares their logic to defending horse abuse, suggesting their reasoning is flawed. The piece appears designed to mock suffragists as unreasonable by ridiculing their arguments through exaggerated analogy—a common satirical tactic against reform movements of the 1870s-80s era. The "trash" metaphor likely suggests the author views their arguments as worthless.