It is unquestionably possible to address a mixed audience, large or
small, of any social status, on these matters without offence and to
good purpose. But certain terms must be avoided and synonyms used
instead. There are at least three special cases, the recognition of
which may make the practical difference between shocking an audience and
producing the effect one desires.
Reproduction is a good word from every point of view, but its
associations are purely physiological, and it is better to employ a word
which renders the use of the other superfluous and which has a special
virtue of its own. This is the term parenthood, a hybrid no doubt, but
not perhaps much the worse for that. One may notice a teacher of
zoology, say, accustomed to address medical students, offend an audience
by the use of the word reproduction, where parenthood would have served
his turn. It has a more human sound--though there is some sub-human
parenthood which puts much of ours to shame--and the fact that it is
less obviously physiological is a virtue, for human parenthood is only
half physiological, being made of two complementary and equally
essential factors for its perfection--the one physical and the other
psychical. Thus it is possible to speak of physical parenthood and of
psychical parenthood, and thus not only to avoid the term reproduction,
but to get better value out of its substitutes.
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