WOMEN AND PUBLIC AFFAIRS

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 14, 11 October 1917, Page 6

WOMEN AND PUBLIC AFFAIRS

Sir,—As an old New- Zealand girl, recently returned from England, will you allow me to express my disappointment at the attitnde of the women of the Dominion towards public affairs? Twenty Tears ago I was proud of being a Aew Zealander. I boasted in England of our education system, of woman suffrage, and of the gradual disappearance in our progressive land of all sex diffewmtinbonthat bar to the highest form of civilisa■y'as! things havo changed. I received my first sh'oek six months ago [ when I arrived in Wellington and found tuat the Education Council had decided to handicap girls by compulsory qualification for a domestic science diploma before matriculating. Owing to a peculiar twist in the mind of some male medico, a knowledge of cookery and hygiene m a mother is supported to avert the dire eutfering of babies caused by a. diseased father. • '.„,•, ~„ To-dar I am horrified at a still more retrograde move on the part of our legislators. I am filled with shame tJiat a Legislature which was the first in the world to place women on an equality with men ns citizens should now meditate bringing in a Bill which, every other civilised country has pronounced degrading to some women and a menace to all, and which at the same time is powerless to avert the consequences to men of their own sensuality. This revival of the CD. Act under a new name would' have been unthinkable had New Zealand women been less apathetic and less selfish during the past 20 years. Meetings should be held to stir up the community to a realisation of the risks that all young "iris and soldiers' wives would run were such a measure to become law. Particularly would iit bo dangerous for respectable working girls. If they wero working after dark at office or factory, if their business necessitated their st-.nding about for a few minutes either waiting for a Iramcaj or a friend, they would be at. the mercy of any policeman o* patrol who might choose to brine a hideous accusation against them. The Town Hall should he packed to overflowing by women, vigorously protesting against this Bill.—T'nin, etc., RETURNED NEW ZKALANDER.