KIND AND GENTLE

Shannon News, 25 May 1926, Page 1

KIND AND GENTLE

THE “SOFT” ENGLISHMAN. CLIMATE AND CRIME. CHICAGO DOCTOR'S VIEW. The director .Of the Hobo College, Chicago, Dr. Ben L. Reitman, who describes himself as a criminologist, during a visito to London, made some scathing comments on the “weak, molly-coddling parental attitude” of the people of Britain. “Why,” he declared, “a man offered to share his umbrella with me ;on my way down from the bus this morning. “In the United States, if a man is fool enough to come out without an umbrella when it is raining we just let him go and buy one—or let him get wet. . “Then I notice that if you open up a road of leave a pil e of it lying about your streets overnight you place a' nice red light on it to warn people to take care. Not so in America. We do not put any warning lights on our obstructions. “If a man is stupid enough to walk into it or drive into it—well, let him, He might to keep a better look-out.” The Hobo College, which Dr. Reitman controls, is a clearing house and educational institute for homeless men in Chicago. He went to England to study the effects of climate on criminal tendencies, “I am convinced,” he said, “that your fogs and cloudy, damp weather are responsible for your mild and gentle characteristics. You murder so very few people in this country. “Why in America last year ten thousand of our best citizens were murdered and ten thousand others were killed by automobiles. And none of us tried to stop them! Why should we ? • “As a matter of fact we introduced prohibition to help on the good "work. It was one of the wisest acts ever passed. I will tell you why. : Your confirmed drunkards last out for years in England, but not so in the States. The Deadly “We sell them ‘moonshine’—‘moonshine,' which is guaranteed to kill off all our drunkards in six months. “The United States does not believe in saving fools from their folly We just kill them off. Last year 26,000 people caught* in the act of committing crimes such as stealing, ‘hold ups/ or similar acts of brigandage, were shot out of hand. And nobody weeps for them, „

“Even if 90 or 100 men are killed in our mines we don’-t allow.,~£heir fellow-workers to, stop for half an hour to mourn for them. No; we go right on . “It is a fact that only 75 adults were murdered in Great Britain last year, whereas in the States 100 Englishmen committed murder. Now there must be something in our air or in our conditions which causes 25 more Englishmen to commit murder away from home than they do in their own countryl “It is the same with the Swedes and Scandinavians. At home they are a peaceful people, but once they get to the States it makes them wild. “I want to meet your criminal experts to ask them, questions. I want to meet your doctors, because I believe that the natural rearing of children by their mothers ,as is the usual custom in this country, has a more beneficial effect on the child than the bottle-feeding which is all the average U.S. baby ever gets. “But, while admitting that your people have less tendency to crime, I am. convinced that you are too kind to your ‘down and outs.’ The place where I work is in the centre of ‘Hobohemia,’ in Chicago, and I know all about that type of American, “We give nothing away. Every man has to work for whatever he receives. If he is sick, he has to work for his medicine; if he is hungry, for his food. There is no' place in Chicago’" where a man can get food ot medical assistance for nothing. “If he is starving, and won’t work, we just let him die, and regard his death as meaning one ‘inadequate human being’ the less. Crutches For All. “You, on the other hand, give crutches to humanity. If a man comes to us and tells use he cannot get a job, Ave tell him he is a liar. If he is fool enough not to look for one, we let him die. ■ “We glorify the rich and worship the dollar and despise the poor so much that Ave shame our real outcast into Avorking, and if he Avon’t AA'ork he dies. “Seriously, I think that England AA-ill need to adopt much the same attitude or else she Avili a spoon-fed, dependent people Avithou/t pride and unable to maintain the position that Britain has won for herself in the Avorld.”