Women's Associations in Lebanon

More than thirty years ago, when woman in Lebanon began to feel something of social duty and national consciousness, ladies called upon one another to form women's associations and to cooperate in opinion and in work, feeling that woman would never attain the reform she seeks in Lebanese society unless she formed a bloc homogeneous in aims and upbringing, striving and working as one hand. There is no doubt that to the forming of associations belongs all the credit for the works woman has accomplished; for the mentality of that day was not so advanced as to accept what a woman proposed on her own. But when society was confronted by a number of women working together, it was compelled to recognize this body, then to study its demands and to carry some of them out.

Woman began the work more than thirty years ago, and she is still toiling and striving, and the number of associations still grows year by year. Among them are the associations that care for the child, the homeless, and the orphan; those that encourage national industry and combat illiteracy; those that open national schools and found women's magazines; those that support the poor and teach them; those that run the free dispensaries and hospitals and work to raise the standard of health; those that fight vice and prostitution and concern themselves with the prisoner; those that work for the protection of the girl; and others and others.

Love of work and concern for the public good drove woman to establish branches in Lebanon of world organizations, such as the Women's Union, the Young Women's Christian Association (YWCA), the Red Cross, and the Young Women's Muslim Association; and woman also joined some of the youth organizations in Lebanon and entered the mixed associations, working with man to better conditions.

This is the world of the women's associations in Lebanon—a world in which many women meet day after day and cooperate to reach their goal. Like every world, it has its virtues and its faults. Yes, we err at times; yet after we stumble we try to stand, and we are helped in this by our faith in the loftiness of our aims and our certainty that the country will never reach the rank we hope for it except through the cooperation of man and woman.

Work in the associations has abundant benefits, the first and most important of which is the growth of the spirit of cooperation and the training in working with others. And this is what we need most urgently; for we in the East live each in her own narrow circle, since we were not accustomed from childhood to work with others and to submit to the bonds of the group. In the associations, however, our working women have been trained in this and have come to understand the spirit of cooperation better than others. Then there is order, which the individual feels bound to observe: the order of keeping time, the order of the rules in force, the rule of the majority. All this confronts the member from the first minute, and she submits to it under compulsion at the outset; but after a short while she comes to love order, to demand it, and to recoil from disorder. And there is altruism, which combats selfishness: we find that a woman, after she has worked for a time in an association and acquired the spirit of altruism, forgets herself and sacrifices her time and her energy in the work.

Cooperation, order, and altruism: three things that rule the atmosphere of the associations, and they are sacred pillars that every lady must understand well before thinking of joining an association. She who finds in herself no inclination toward them; she who wants to attain through the associations what she imagines to be prestige and pomp; she who does not respect the time of others; she who wishes to create around herself a little world of which she alone is the pivot; and she who cannot be tolerant and forbearing before a colleague's mistake or a harsh word—let all these keep away from every association, for they will benefit no one in it, and their affair and their aims will not remain a secret, since every member understands them perfectly.

As for the offices in the associations, they are a coveted goal around which the crowding is great; for some see in them a ladder to prominence. But such people will accomplish nothing useful, for they have not well understood that the officer is a servant of the whole, entrusted with a task for a period of time, and bound to perform what has been entrusted to her. The president, her deputy, the treasurer, and the secretaries have all received work in order to serve by it. Let every lady know that offices are not the preserve of one set to the exclusion of another, and that there are no ranks among offices. And let her who wants to monopolize a post, or who accepts one and refuses another in the belief that one is higher in rank than the other—let her know that she is in error, that everyone who deals with her understands her perfectly, and that every lover of justice and of the good of the work will resist this crookedness in her.

This is a picture of some of what is seen in the associations, which I have set forth in all frankness. Yet I declare with all pride that there are many working women in the associations of whom we are all proud: they entered with service and work as their aim, out of love of service and work. They seek no office, they aspire to no prominence, and they put the good of the work above all else. They work diligently behind the curtains, and they uphold law and right regardless of friendships and enmities. These rise above every sectarian fanaticism and offer opinions and counsel unstained by the filth of personal and factional motives, of malice

and selfishness. And these respect time and order and appreciate responsibility.

This is a glimpse of the women's associations in Lebanon. Though they have not reached the degree of perfection, they are on the road, and they will arrive, God willing, through the efforts of the devoted woman who sacrifices time and rest for the benefit of the homeland and the rising generation, instead of spending the hours around the gaming tables.

I have one wish that I hope we shall one day attain: the unification of most of the associations that work for a single aim. I know very well that what obstructs this unification is not material or economic difficulties; what obstructs it is the sectarian fanaticism that ravages us so murderously, and the selfishness and love of prominence rooted in this generation of ours. Let us then raise the young generation in love of others, in cooperation, in love of peace, in the rendering of help, in self-denial, and in contempt for display and pomp, so that by these virtues it may attain what we have all failed in, men and women alike.

We are working for the future and for the coming generation, having despaired of reforming this generation of ours. The burden of working for the coming generation falls mostly upon woman; she appreciates it at its true worth, and she will reach her lofty goal, God willing.