Dear Sir,

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 10, Issue 10, 12 August 1946, Page 4

Dear Sir,

Letters to the Editor must be clearly written on one side of the paper only and where a nom-de-plume is used the name of the writer must be included for reference purposes. The Editor reserves the right to abridge, amend or withhold any letter or letters. 7

’ TRUTH STAMPEDED [ Sir, —I suggest that your corres- . pondent Mr Hallett discloses the r weakness of * his argument by re- [ sorting to one method of . reply, l namely, personal abuse. He does not . show, where I have misquoted the Webbs or Huxley. He does not an- , swer why Mr Boswell’s report on the economic conditions in Russia cannot be published. He cannot dispute Mr Maloney’s report. He cannot reply to the statements of Paul Winterton, a Communist, who has returned after three years in Russia and who last month stated: “We must face the facts now plain to all but the wilfully blind.” Mr Hallett gets nowhere by calling such prominent Communists- as Eugene Lyons, Eastman, Alexander Smith and Fred Beale (who all lived for years in Russia) disciples of Judas Iscariot. He forgets that the British Labour Party in 1940 published an official pamphlet in which it is stated that the Russian system “is a new kind of slavery” (page 13) and that her policy is “a policy of deception, blackmail, trickery and brutality.” Another official pamphlet published by the British Labour Party called “The Moscow Trials, and the Labour and Socialist international” in referring to the confessions stated: “The value of the confessions is reversed. They proved that Stalin’s terrorism is adding to moral perversion a kind of mental decay. In every case in which we have been able to check the facts, we find the most monstrous lies in the indictment.” Mr Hallett will surely not accuse the British Lab-

our Party in a considered pamphlet, of trying to stir up mistrust and of being anti-Socialist propagandists ? It is so necessary to know the truth about the Socialist experiment. Evidence of the truth of the Maloney and Boswell reports lies all around us for as the State increases controls and attempts to regulate economic activities we see shortages and economic chaos increasing, whilst common sense tells us that Socialism is merely a return to the worst form of feudalism or slavery where there can be no freedom of thought or speech and where rule is by fear. Yours etc., ONLOOKER.

r TRUTH Sir, —Your latest ateempt to ex- ■ tricate yourself from a difficult sitr uation only makes. matters worse . for you. You now say you “prefer . the open and defined roadway; to truth which is in the conscience of ■ everyone of us.” Defined by whom . pray, and how can it be open and : defined when it is- concealed in the conscience of the individual. You previously recommended self analysis as a method of arriving at the truth, a new and original method but how calm it be called “open and defined.” Dark and obscure would surely be a more fitting way to describe this novelty and how you arrive at the conclusion that this introspective way would result in one truth for everyone rather than numerous individual truths is a matter for you to explain.

Truth, you say, is surely the one thing which cannot be classified or varied. Let us test the truth of this statement by what you call the academic method and which you so despise. Was it not true for Hitler and for all the Nazis that the defeat of the German armies at Stalingrad was an evil event and true for us that the same event was a victory for civilisation; is it not true for Prime Minister Fraser and those who support him that a defeat of the Government at the next election would be a bad thing for the country and equally true for Mr Holland and those who support him that a change would be for the better; do not Methodist parsons and their supporters believe it to be clearly true that Sunday cinemas would be an evil while most people believe the reverse to be true. If these propositions are true for the people concerned then it is obvious that some truths must be of a relative character, that the position of the observer must be a factor determining what he sees and believes and that truth not only needs classifying but cannot be understood unless it is so treated. The alternative is to remain in that “pitful” state of bewilderment” which you attributed

to the writer, but which, on the evi-r dence, could be better used to de-, scribe your own state of mind on the question. For you have'not told us anything about how to arrive at the truth of'such controversial matters as those which appeared in your columns and concerning which you lectured the writers for not telling the truth. So far you have been mainly concerned to try to ridicule and to gibe at those who question you and to deny the scientific me-* thod of objective analysis and classification—an attitude known as obscurantism. Yours etc., J. JESSUP.

(We appreciate the viewpoint of our correspondent a good deal better since reading the above and. can only express regret that he failed to make his argument clearer in the first instance when he allowed his feelings to overrule his better judgment as to our Editorial integrity. He is perfectly entitled to his viewpoint which however we feel is only sectional for £he broad truth around which our leading article was written is known to each and every one of us according to our character development. Truth must remain immovable and inviolate though the brain storms of humanity may lash about its base over the centuries before it is fully perceived. The examples quoted can scarcely be made to fit the theme of the original argument. The ladder we climbed is only halfway mounted by our correspondent. We agree that if a person’s conscience is ‘concealed’ it follows that truth is difficult to discover. It is the fruits of one’s conscience that mould character; it is the unrightness of character or otherwise that dictate one’s actions and formulate life’s policy for good or for bad. The results may be seen in the lives of Hitler, Stalin, Churchill and Rooseveldt, or who you will includ- - ing our correspondent himself. Truth as we see it is not necessarily made clearer by a surfeit of mechanical knowledge of ‘isms’ quoted by the writer with such avidity and which mean nothing to the average person. We imagine that its comprehension is universal and that the humble planter of potatoes or the uncomplaining housewife, busily rearing a family of future citizens, is as close if not closer to fundamental truth than one who is loaded with all the weighty terms and empty classifications which our correspondent cares to recite. We do not feel that any good purpose will be served by pursuing this subject further and the matter may now be regarded as closed. Ed.)

FOOD WASTAGE ‘ - < Sir, —William . Bennett, a wellknown British journalist, has just recently personally investigated London Dock Warehouses. In one he found 10,000 cases of food parcels from Commonwealth countries wasting and rotting. In warehouse No. 5, King George’s Dock 5000 all addressed covered with dust. In No. 7 warehoxise, same Docks, 6000 more cases of food from New; Zealand and Australia. These have been there for six inonths—tins of jam, honey and fruit blown, spilling their contents on other parcels stored below. At Livei’pool and Avonmouth, grain for bread lies rotting unfit for human use. The London Daily Sketch tells of thousands of tons of foodstuffs neglected and rotting in State depots all over Britain. All this is inevitable under State control and as governments go on increasing controls the greater the waste and the less the people will have. Youi’s etc., OBSERVER.