The origin of "What's good for the goose is good for the gander?"?

Question

Is this a proverb or just a common saying? It has always been one of my favorite quotations since it flies in the face of double standards.

Answer 1

I'm familiar with the saying "What's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander". We are not thinking of the well being of the poultry concerned, but rather of how we like to cook and eat them -- when served up they would have the same sauce. The term is applied to humans in the sense that one should not distinguish between male and female in administering fair and just treatment.

" 'Goose' and 'gander' here stand for women and men generally, and accordingly the proverb declares that what is good for a woman is also good for a man. An earlier saying based on the same logic, 'As well for the coowe as for the bull,' appeared in John Heywood's 'A Dialogue Conteinyng the Nomber in Effect of All the Prouerbes in the Englishe Tongue' (1546), and the first rendering of the current saying was recorded in John Ray's 'A collection of English Proverbs' (1670) as 'That that's good sawce for a goose, is good for a gander.' Ray added a further explanation: 'This is a woman's proverb.' The English writer Roger L'Estrange gave virtually the modern version in his translation of 'Aesop's Fables' (1692), quoting it as 'Sauce for a Goose is Sauce for a Gander'." From "Wise Words and Wives' Tales: The Origins, Meanings and Time-Honored Wisdom of Proverbs and Folk Sayings Olde and New" by Stuart Flexner and Doris Flexner (Avon Books, New York, 1993).

Answer 2

Sauce For The Goose Is Sauce For The Gander