SUPPRESSION NEEDED.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXX, Issue 11, 31 August 1914, Page 4

SUPPRESSION NEEDED.

Sane and sober-minded people, whether really of the race or by adoption British subjects, will heartily endorse the following remarks made by the writer in the Christchurch “Press” “While there is an obligation upon everyone just now to rally loyally bo the Imperial cause, there is no reason why the voice of friendly and rational criticism should he silent. But there is a class of people to whom the duty of criticism and dissent becomes specials zestful at a time like the present. One of these people has been writing ip the Wellington Press complaining of the action of the New Zealand Government in ordering the arrest and internment of Germans and Austrians liable for military service in their own countries. Ho is greatly upset because ‘we (in this country) have'- ex- 1 needed our rights,’ and he writes voluminously in denunciation of the inhumanity of this Dominion. This frame of mind is a very well-known one. British rights, to such people, are subject always to the rights of other nations. Any British right which conflicts with the convenience ol any other nation cannot he admitted. We cannot but feel astonished that there should survive in this country ovqn one friend of that English, school of thought which, by assailing patriotism as a Tory disease, by denouncing naval activiity as pocket-picking, and by abusing everyone who doubted tire good faith and pugged honesty and simplicity of Germany, have made very difficult the work the Ai'tfty and Navy efficient enough to meet such a crisis as the present one. ’ It is the banalities of psendo-liumanitarianists—who would lie the very first to cry Tor help if they jyere at-the mercy of a ruthless and mui derailslayed and checkoff') ByrfMfi’s 1 projkr preparation to meet such a trial ah' flit present brings to our greaj, coipitrv., A little more suppression of seditius nonsense on even German lines would ho wholesome. - i