POWER OF SUGGESTION

Hokitika Guardian, 7 March 1924, Page 1

POWER OF SUGGESTION

SYDNEY, Feb. 2s. due ol tin- leading police ollieer* here lias just given it as bis opinion that pan-ms should be lar more careful than they are as to what they allow children and people ol immature tears to bear and read. Suggestion, il is believed, ha- played no small pari in the wave ol murder, robbery, and other crime which has recently swept New South Wales. The belief is held that behind the orgy of crime there surolv lies some psychological inlluence, and that the prominence given to the List murder in Victoria, and the eagerness with which the public devoured the details of this tragedy, p. ohahiv in tiueuced young Batson to make hi- attack on a picnic party near Al!iur\ in New Smith Wales. The police have almost innumerable examples ol the maniicr in which one !,ig crime produces others. There is tin- notorious Gap, near Sydney Heads,

for instance. As surely as someone fakes the fatal plunge over it. and Lite papers are filled with details of the tragedy, other cases follow. Tho police cite the definite case of a young -girl who told a wild story of being attacked and brutally treated by a matt. The whole thing was a fabrication from end to end. The evening before tho girl had heard her father reading out about such a ease, and it had suggested to tho impressionable and imaginative youngster a similar outrage on herself. There is quite a lot of sound and elevating philosophy . in the words of one leading detective. • Every day.” he says, ‘we are being directed this way or that by the influence, often unconscious, of our friends. It should only make us more careful t 0 watch our speech and actions to see that no careless or thoughtless influence for harm should emanate from us.” Tn that there is undoubtedly much wisdom and truth.