The primitive hordes were barely interested in their posterity. Connected to no territory, owning nothing, embodied in nothing stable, they could formulate no concrete idea of permanence; they were unconcerned with survival and did not recognize themselves in their descendants; they did not fear death and did not seek heirs; children were a burden and not of great value for them; the proof is that infanticide has always been frequent in nomadic peoples; and many newborns who are not massacred die for lack of hygiene in a climate of total indifference. So the woman who gives birth does not take pride in her creation; she feels like the passive plaything of obscure forces, and painful childbirth a useless and even bothersome accident. Later, more value was attached to children. But in any case, to give birth and to breast-feed are not activities but natural functions; they do not involve a project, which is why the woman finds no motive there to claim a higher meaning for her existence; she passively submits to her biological destiny. Because housework alone is compatible with the duties of motherhood, she is condemned to domestic labor, which locks her into repetition and immanence; day after day it repeats itself in identical form from century to century; it produces nothing new.
原始群体几乎不关心后代。他们并不归属于一块领土，一无所有，不体现在任何稳定的东西中，不能形成任何永恒的具体思想；他们不考虑延续生命，在他们的后裔中认不出自己；他们不怕死亡，不要求有继承者；对他们来说，孩子是一个负担，而不是财富；证据便是，在游牧民族中，杀婴行为总是很多的；许多没有被杀的新生儿由于卫生条件堪虞，在完全无所谓的冷漠环境中死去。所以生育的女人没有在她的创造中感到骄傲，她感到自己是无形力量的玩偶，痛苦的分娩是无用的甚至讨厌的事情。后来，人们渐渐给予孩子重视。但无论如何，生育、喂奶这些不是活动，这是自然的功能，不包含任何计划，这也是为什么女人在其中找不到自身存在的更高意义；她被动地屈服于生理上的命运。她投身于家务劳动，因为只有这种劳动与做母亲的负担相协调，它们把她束缚在重复性和内在性中，日复一日以相同的形式再现，这种形式世世代代延续下去，没有产生任何新知。
用户评论