advocates professional participation within the context of people’s daily lives—in schools,
courts, industry, and the like. Reich still worked actively within the youth organizations of
the Communist Party. He related an incident that had moved him deeply. A fourteen-year-
old girl came from the Hitler Youth to one of the Communist youth groups Reich coun-
seled. She was pregnant and had heard that “the Reds” had doctors who would be helpful.
Reich made sure that the birth of the child occurred under good conditions. “I will never
forget the burning expression in the eyes of this girl.”^4
In addition to all his own work, Reich was also trying to influence the many fledg-
ling organizations in Germany that were devoted to sex reform. These organizations were
part of the general atmosphere of innovation and sexual permissiveness that flourished dur-
ing the Weimar years^5.
Despite their activity and their diversity, however, such organizations had little
influence on legislation. Because they sought Catholic support, the leftist political parties
were loath to affirm progressive sex legislation. The state thus continued as the stern
guardian of private morals. This puritanical policy angered many left-wing intellectuals who
perceived it as a strong weapon of the bourgeoisie; the middle class, after all, could afford
certain means not available to the proletariat, such as illegal abortions.
Even though these organizations proved ineffective in changing legislation, they
represented a considerable force in German life. Reich estimated that in 1930 there were
around 80 such groups, with a total membership of about 350,000 persons. He himself sup-
ported many of their efforts, such as trying to provide legal and moral support to persons
indicted for giving abortions, since their efforts were congruent with his own mass-psycho-
logical work.
At the same time, Reich had his differences with the sex organizations. He urged
them to take a bolder stance on basic sexual matters, especially adolescent intercourse, rather
than limiting themselves to a cautious endorsement of premarital relations for engaged cou-
ples.He also pushed them to make clearer distinctions between healthy and sick sexuality.
According to Reich,the illustrated newspapers put out by many organizations were not
sharply distinguished from pornography. Dealers in contraceptives moved around at the
public meetings,selling contraceptives at high prices.
Within the reform movement, one of Reich’s main opponents was Magnus
Hirschfeld, a leader of the World League for Sexual Reform. Reich strongly opposed
Hirschfeld’s concern that the various forms of sexual repression should not be punished,
and were moreover equally valid. What Reich advocated was a person’s right to live as he or
she wished sexually so long as it did not harm others. However, he did oppose a kind of
“democracy of sexuality,” in which all sexual expressions were “equal.” Thus, he differed
radically from Hirschfeld, from the decadent atmosphere of the Weimar Republic, and,
indeed, from many current lifestyles.
At that time the leaders of the World League for Sexual Reform wanted to avoid
political alignments,to represent their own cause independent of any particular party. But
one of Reich’s aims during the early 1930s was to unite the sex reform organizations with a
156 Myron SharafFury On Earth