The Role Of Husbands In The Victorian Era

The Victorian Era was a period from 1837 to 1901 of “peace, prosperity, refined sensibilities and national self-confidence for Britain.” (Victorian Era, 2015) Sexuality was dominated by men. It was meant for procreation and women were only there to service their husbands. Husbands that did not insist on having sex were actually considered admirable. Anyone with sexual desire was considered lower class. Being a single mother was so shamed upon that the mother would usually end up giving away their child to hospital, or committing infanticide. Even doctors strongly supported the fact that women had no sexual desire. Although, if they were ever to show sexual desire, it was blamed on disease. “When a woman did express sexual desire, it was seen as a disease that needed to be taken care of immediately and with drastic measure-like removing sex organs.” (Pastor, Mageland, & Findley, The Victorian Era, n.d.) Within the marriage, it was the wives duty to make sure there was no sexual pleasure taking place. There was a famous book written in this era called Sex Tips for Husbands and Wives in 1894. Among the tips were ways that women could avoid chance of sexual encounters that were out
If someone was sickly they blamed it upon masturbation, and in the reverse it “…was alleged to cause a wide range of physical and mental disorders, and on venereal, diseases, especially syphilis.” (Marsh, 2015) They believed men had sexual urges and women’s were nonexistent, so it was more of a problem among men. There is even an interesting looking anti masturbation piece that was created out of tin to cover the male genitals tightly and make them unable to masturbate without removing the device. Masturbators were considered to become withdrawn, sickly. If an individual came to a doctor about their problem, they may have gone as far to perform a “penile cauterization”, and “clitorodectomy” if a women by chance had a