Visual Rhetoric Assignment

The primary message in this cartoon is that suffrage for women is dangerous to men's lifestyles. Passage of the 19th amendment giving voting rights to women would negatively change women's roles in the household. The intended audience is anyone who is against suffrage for women. The cartoon is attempting to persuade people that women voting would have a very negative effect on everyone in the family, but mostly husbands.
In this cartoon you see the woman going off to vote while the man in this cartoon has to stay home and watch his own children. It is basically saying that if women get the right to vote, then they will not want to take care of their home responsibilities anymore. They will throw away the whole idea of being a "housewife,"-- no taking care of children, no cleaning, no cooking. These jobs will be left to the man. The cartoon is attempting to scare men into believing suffrage is bad. Women, who believe that a women's place is at home, may also be persuaded by this cartoon that suffrage is something that will destroy domestic life and maybe even marriage.
Another message in the cartoon is that suffrage might make women too independent, which might affect her abilitiy to act femininely. So, not only will the woman not be interested in domestic chores, but she may even begin to take on manly qualities. In the cartoon, the wife looks very in control, like she means business. Women who mean business are usually not very attractive to men. The type of woman pictured in the cartoon is not one who acts girly or shyly or cares about her looks. Her interest is in getting things done, politically outside of the home.
The clip persuades men that voting will emasculate them. The clip persuades women against voting that they are "real" women and the other women just want to ruin families and act like men.

This clip was created before 1910 and is copywritten by E.W. Gustin