Queen Victoria, Imperial Motherhood and the British Antis

Okay, so if I've learned anything making this show, it's that context matters.

And when it came to suffrage, the way things played out in America were based in the kinds of arguments and assumptions that would make sense to Americans at that time.

That keep your government out of my home talk doesn't really get you very far in most of the world.

And so the debate around suffrage was very different in places like Japan and Switzerland.

But I can't go on talking about suffrage and anti-suffrage around the world, otherwise we'll be here forever.

But I do want to do this one comparison between the US and the UK.

So first, how big were these movements in the UK? Suffrage and anti-suffrage.

With the American antis, at one point they had the numbers on their side.

There was a point where there were more women who were organized against the vote than were for it.

But that only made them slightly less fringe than the suffragists.

And it was basically the same in the UK.

While the UK suffragists and antis would claim that they represent the interests of the majority of women, the truth is, the majority of people aren't that bothered either way.

At least not enough to be vocal about it.

They both had hundreds of thousands of signatures showing that they had support, but neither could really claim to be a massed populist movement like they'd wish.

And if you've ever tried pushing a campaign or starting a business or... making a podcast, you'll know that the overwhelming response to almost everything is indifference.

But if you're an auntie and your ideal is to largely maintain the status quo, indifference is a win.

But the problem of indifference actually brings us to one of the major differences between the UK and the US suffrage debate.

The UK suffragists had a group that were much less comfortable with the general public's indifference, and they were going to try to force people to pick a side.

They were the suffragettes.

Now, living in the UK, it seems like the suffragettes have won the battle of historical relevance.

They are the people who are remembered for securing women's vote.

They have celebrated political martyrs, they have spectacle, they have drama, they now even have a train line named after them in London, the suffragette line.

But for all the impact they made making women's suffrage a relevant political issue, let's just say, all press isn't good press.

Their tactics gave the antis and the general liberal government just one more reason to oppose the vote.

And the antis actually said that this played right into their propaganda.