Women are degraded by the propensity to enjoy the present moment

Host: The evening fog rolled in from the river, low and silent, swallowing the edges of the city. A pale streetlamp flickered against the mist, its light diffused into a soft, ghostly halo. The cobblestones glistened from a recent rain, and in a narrow alleyway café, two figures sat beneath a canopy of dripping vines — Jack and Jeeny, facing each other across a small wrought-iron table.

The world was half-asleep. The air smelled of wet leaves and distant perfume. And between them, written in Jeeny’s neat script across a folded parchment, were the words of Mary Wollstonecraft:

“Women are degraded by the propensity to enjoy the present moment, and, at last, despise the freedom which they have not sufficient virtue to struggle to attain.”

Host: The candlelight on their table wavered in the breeze, casting restless shadows on their faces — Jack’s thoughtful, sharp-lined; Jeeny’s luminous, resolute. The city around them hummed like a faraway memory of revolution.

Jeeny: quietly, eyes on the parchment “It’s strange, isn’t it? How words written two centuries ago still feel like a wound we keep reopening.”

Jack: leaning back, voice rough with irony “You mean Wollstonecraft? She never did know how to pull a punch.”

Jeeny: smiling faintly “No — she threw them like thunder. She didn’t just talk about women’s virtue; she demanded women choose it. To fight for freedom, not just taste pleasure.”

Jack: “And that’s the paradox, isn’t it? She was calling for discipline in a world that denied women the right to even define what discipline was.”

Jeeny: “Exactly. She wasn’t preaching repression — she was demanding agency. She wanted women to own the same moral struggle men were allowed to have.”

Host: The rain began again, softly, as if eavesdropping. Jack’s eyes followed a droplet sliding down his glass, his reflection trembling within it.

Jack: “But that first line — ‘the propensity to enjoy the present moment.’ There’s judgment in it. As if joy itself was dangerous.”

Jeeny: “No. Not joy. Complacency. She’s not condemning pleasure; she’s condemning the surrender to it — when it becomes escape instead of expression.”

Jack: raising an eyebrow “So freedom requires restraint. That’s her argument.”

Jeeny: “Not restraint — responsibility. There’s a difference. Restraint says, ‘Don’t feel too much.’ Responsibility says, ‘Feel deeply, but direct it toward something greater.’”

Host: The wind carried the faint sound of a violin from a nearby square — the kind of melody that drifts through time like nostalgia. Jack leaned forward now, elbows on the table, his grey eyes catching the flicker of candlelight.

Jack: “So you think Wollstonecraft’s saying women degrade themselves by settling for comfort?”

Jeeny: “Yes. By mistaking comfort for liberation. She saw how easy it was — for anyone, not just women — to trade struggle for pleasure, purpose for distraction.”

Jack: “And yet, you can’t blame them. The world offered women so little. Maybe the present moment was all they had to enjoy.”

Jeeny: “True. But Wollstonecraft wasn’t condemning the women — she was indicting the system that taught them to settle for crumbs and call it a feast.”

Jack: softly “A system that told them beauty was their currency, silence their virtue.”

Jeeny: “And submission their safety.”

Host: The rain thickened, pattering against the canopy, rhythmic and insistent. A passing carriage splashed through puddles, and for a brief moment, the candlelight trembled but held its flame.

Jeeny: “She wanted women to fight for inner sovereignty. To earn freedom not through rebellion alone, but through integrity — through virtue, as she called it.”

Jack: with quiet skepticism “Virtue’s a dangerous word these days.”

Jeeny: “Only because we’ve let it be twisted. Virtue isn’t purity — it’s power disciplined by conscience. It’s the ability to say: I will not be defined by the lesser version of myself the world prefers.”

Jack: nodding slowly “So virtue isn’t submission. It’s rebellion with integrity.”

Jeeny: “Exactly. That’s the kind of woman Wollstonecraft imagined — one who could look freedom in the eye and not flinch.”

Host: The city sounds dimmed — the world seemed to narrow around the flame between them. Jack’s tone softened, stripped of its usual armor.

Jack: “You know, I think she was talking to more than just women. Men too — all of us. How many of us have despised the freedom we were too afraid to earn?”

Jeeny: gazing at him “More than we’d ever admit.”

Jack: “We say we want freedom, but what we really want is ease. Freedom’s demanding — it asks you to choose what’s hard, what’s right, what’s unfinished.”

Jeeny: “Exactly. It’s not a gift — it’s a discipline. That’s what makes it sacred.”

Host: The fog pressed closer to the windows, the candlelight flickering like an argument between illumination and shadow.

Jack: “You know, I used to think pleasure was the only honest truth — food, laughter, a kiss, a good night’s sleep. But maybe pleasure without purpose is just anesthesia.”

Jeeny: softly “And purpose without joy becomes tyranny.”

Jack: “So what, then? The balance is virtue?”

Jeeny: “No. The balance is consciousness. Virtue’s what consciousness becomes when it refuses to go numb.”

Host: Jack looked at her — really looked — as if the centuries between Wollstonecraft’s words and their lives had collapsed into this one fragile, rain-soaked night.

Jack: quietly “You ever think the world still degrades women the same way? Just with prettier chains?”

Jeeny: “Of course. Now it sells the illusion of empowerment — the freedom to consume, to flaunt, to perform. But not the freedom to define what freedom means.”

Jack: grimly “Freedom as spectacle.”

Jeeny: “Exactly. And it’s not just women. We’ve all become consumers of our own cages.”

Host: The candle guttered low now, its light shrinking to an ember. Jeeny’s face glowed soft in its final flare — the kind of beauty that doesn’t come from perfection, but from conviction.

Jack: murmuring “So Wollstonecraft was right. The real degradation isn’t in being oppressed. It’s in forgetting that you deserve to fight your way out.”

Jeeny: “Yes. And in believing that the comfort of now is worth more than the dignity of becoming.”

Host: The last of the rain eased. A hush fell — the kind that feels both like an ending and a beginning. Jack lifted his coffee, cold but symbolic, and raised it slightly toward her.

Jack: softly “To virtue — in Wollstonecraft’s sense.”

Jeeny: lifting her glass of wine in reply “To struggle — the kind that makes us whole.”

Host: The camera panned outward — the candle’s smoke rising like a thin thread of faith into the night air. Beyond the fog, the city pulsed on — full of souls chasing pleasure, running from purpose, or maybe, somewhere in between, learning to stand.

And as their figures faded into the quiet glow of the café, Mary Wollstonecraft’s words lingered like the echo of unfinished revolution —

That freedom is not given,
but earned through virtue and struggle;
that pleasure without purpose is decay;
and that no woman,
and no soul,
is free until she dares to rise from comfort
and demand the crown of her own becoming.