LIQUOR AND CABARETS

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 418, 1 September 1928, Page 11

LIQUOR AND CABARETS

“Womanhood Debased”

AUCKLAND’S SINS ARRAIGNED

Commissioner Hay’s indictment “ I COULD mention actual and recent experiences—converI sations with the police—actual addresses of questionable places for dancing’ and drinking, and strange scenes in the early morning.” Although he did not mention names and places, these were some of the powerful indictments of Auckland’s sins made by Commissioner James Hay at the Salvation Army Congress Hall, Grey Avenue, after the Sin Parade held in the city last evening by the Auckland Divisional Corps of the Salvation Army. The Sin Parade, made up of mourners dressed in black, scarlet and white, passed unmolested through great throngs in Queen Street, although there was spasmodic ‘‘barracking.

By 7.30 p.m. large knots of people had assembled outside the Congress Hall, and the Army officers were gathered together making final arrangements before the procession moved off. It was decided to have a bodyguard for the mourners, but if the temper of the crowd was reasonable, it was planned that the men, so used, should change their position to the rear to lengthen the procession out. As the time for the start grew nearer, the crowd increased, and thousands assembled at the bottom of the Avenue near Civic Square. From there to Wellesley Street there must have been 20,000’ people. Shortly before eight the band formed up outside the hall, and soon after came the mourners of the city’s sins. There were 25 dressed in black flowing gowns and hoods and girdled with white. Following them were 10 dressed in scarlet and 10 in white.

Each section was headed by brilliantly painted banners: “Jesus beheld the city and wept over it,” one read; “We mourn the sins of Auckland,” another; and the third, “Though your sins be as scarlet they shall be white as The parade formed up; but before it moved off a voice of command rang out: “Stand to attention, boys, for the flashlight photograph! ’ Then came the explosion that turned night to day in a blinding flash, and the crowd “wowed" and “booed." There was a funereal beat on the big drum, and the procession, headed by the commissioner, marched off, stepping slow to the accompaniment of hymn music, which for its heavy melancholy, might just as well have been the “Dead March." The music boomed solemnly through the night. The crowd moved quickly on to swell the throng at.,the Town Dali, and the mourners passed down the road before the curious gaze of Chinese gathered outside shops, and the chop suey eating house. The scene filled them with wonder expressed eloquently in quickfire conversation. POLICE CLEAR WAY The flag with its “Blood and Fire" motto was fluttering bravely in the wind as the parade met the first portion of the great public assemblage. Energetic constables, led by an equally energetic sergeant, forced a lane through the throng. The crowd was not hostile: the bulk of it was merely curious; but as the procession marched on and the heavy music throbbed, there was an occasional “barracking" voice raised. From the Town Hall to Victoria Street the crowd had formed into a thick, solid line on each side of Queen Street, and all the points of vantage had eager sight-seers. Heads were craned from all the firstfloor windows, and the police plugged a way through the crowd. Traffic was completely held up, and people clambered on to the standing trams. HOSTILITY SHOWN At Victoria Street there were signs of hostility, and hooting was fairly persistent. At the same time the crowd closed in, and it was impossible for the band to play its music. The police had to work hard to force a clearance for the parade to turn about —Victoria Street was as far as it went. Turning there, it passed back again to the Congress Hall to hear the Commissioner’s indictment. The big crowd, as a whole, appeared to take no more than good-humoured interest in the procession, and it certainly did have the bearing of inhabitants of a 20th century Sodom. There were none gathered to scoff—the people just appeared to be mildly interested in a novelty. They evidently did not consider that a serious charge had been made against them. The commissioner may have made a slashing indictment, and the sin parade may have been impressive, but there were two people who did not care at all. One was the man-in-the-moon who beamed down benign on Queen Street, and the other was a little slant-eyed Chinese girl in Grey Avenue who won’t look so happy again until her next birthday comes round. THE INDICTMENT OPENS COCKTAILS AND MARRIED MEN PRAYER FOR CITY COUNCIL The Congress Hall was crowded when the procession returned. Prominent Army officers who were in the van of the procession, and who occupied prominent positions on the dais, wore Commissioner and Mrs. Hay, Lieuten-ant-Colonel Gunn, Chief Field Secretary, Brigadier Bladin, Brigadier Harewood and Brigadier Cotterill. At the outset Commissioner Hay said that Press alarmists imagined, or feared, that he was going to make a list of the sins of Auckland and a category of places and persons—something such as would show that Auckland was an exceptionally bad place. On the contrary he was pleased to be able to state that Auckland was a very fine city and had a fine people, but Auckland, like every other city,- was lapsing far more than many thought, and possibly far more than many people knew, tie did not intend to prove that by crime records —his topic was not crime, but sin; departure from righteousness and from God-fearing, and passing down to the lower levels of life. There was positive and convincing evidence that Auckland had sins to mourn about—and mourn they did. “Is it toward sin or against sin that our present day tendencies turn?" asked Commissioner Hay. The most optimistic would find it hard to Bt\y that the tendency was to turn away from sin, he added. He could say from his own experience of some of the large cities of the world that Auckland, comparatively speaking, was a good city. Anybody knowing anything of the police reports of places such as Liverpool and other large cities would know that Auckland was well ahead of such cities. . . . But, at the same time, Auckland was lapsing far more than they thought. It was their duty as Christians to cry out and show the people their sins. Such action had healthy and curative service, and was authorised by the whole history of spiritual and moral reform. . . . It would be amazing if we did not mourn our sins, said Commissioner Hay. . . . Sorrow for our sins shows that we are consistent and sympathetic toward our fellow men. Referring to Sunday observance the commissioner said that

Godless Sabbaths were more pronounced in some places than in Auckland, but the arguments made by many in Auckland for more abandon to pleasure were significant. Were they to silently allow such to operate? Was the picnic and pleasure spirit, the bridge and whist parties, to dominate the life of the people? The Rev. Thornhill recently said: “Society is suffering from moral anaemia, the res Lilt of a valuation of life in terms of its pleasures. We should each ask, ‘Are we giving our fellow-citizens j good value for their money, or are we exploiting their weakness, their ignorance and gullibility’?” “These bridge and whist parties,” said the Commissioner, “as a woman recently wrote to the Press, are becoming more and more mere gambling opportunities.” Referring to the liquor question, the Commissioner said that the ruin liquor was working was to be seen in a dozen directions. The police knew —in joy-rides, in clubs for men and women, and the evidence of our streets. Pleasure, gaiety, dancing, cabarets, loose-living and its accompaniments were not neutral joys, as was sometimes suggested, said the Commissioner. They were the joys of lower life. To call men “wowsers,” or to say they were “joy-killers.” might relieve some minds, but it did not alter the fact that the world of gaiety was increasing and dragging down the people. \ LAX SEX STANDARDS On© of its attendant evils, which will socially damn not a few, is the readiness to adopt wine drinking, and the looser standards that immediately follow, frequently in the relation of the sexes. The Hon. Triggs, M.D.C., quoting from Government statistics, says: “In eight years, with 33,000 legitimate births in New Zealand, we had over 10,000 illegitimate; but of these 33,000, more than one-third the babies were born within six months of marriage—or a total of 23,000 out of 43,000 were not conceived in wedlock.” It is a sign of the damning effects of loose living that these figures have excited no general or national repentance. How far has Auckland contributed to these New Zealand figures? It is easy to look at these facts, and then draw back into inaction. Are we doing our part to save the young? I could mention actual and recent experiences—conversations with police, actual addresses of brothels, questionable places for dancing and drinking, and strange scenes in the early morning. One of our officers says that nowhere in her experience, after 30 years, have dancing associations been so fruitful in illegitimacy as in Auckland. The disgrace attaching to married men in this connection is often apparent, who, alas, are often responsible for initial work in “cocktails” among young girls. The New Zealand Year Book shows that the situation is not improving. Divorces increase. In 1917, 282; now nearly 800 a year. The horrors associated with ruined children in Auckland can hardly be mentioned, but

I schoolmasters and social workers have seen me and they know what I speak of. One of our Auckland social workers says, “Respectable women of from 23 to 30 years of age have been trapped by doped wine to their rum.” I have visited many of the public houses in Auckland, said the Commissioner, and I think your hearts would have bled if you could have seen those fine young women—and there are'none finer than in Auckland —ruining themselves with drink. He had spoken to police officers regarding women and ! girls who went out joyriding and l going home early in the morning under the influence of liquor. As long as the present conditions remained handsome women would be ruined damnedly as a result of drink. It was a serious thing if the men went wrong, but If the women went wrong it meant social and national damnation. It must always be our highest endeavour, said Commissioner Hay, to preserve the highest standard of life in this land set in silver seas. . Together with some of his officers he had seen thousands of people thronging the picture theatres of Auckland. In Auckland there were 20 houses showing pictures and entertainments of that kind. Many of the picture shows were free of corruption, but, nevertheless, every year the toll of immorality through the influence of sex pictures. . . These pictures must deal with sex problems or down go the “attendances. GAMBLING A CANKER Citizenship has been gravely affected in its standards when gambling has been left free; but, though tile law issues its prohibitions, the spirit for gambling and indulgence increases. It is, I beneve, the bounden duty of all Christian and civic leaders to denounce gambling —a canker in our social life and a damnation to our spiritual hopes. Charity being helped by gambling or totaiisator is no cover to its iniquity or ruin. The sum of £. 2,581,544 passed through the totaiisator this season in the Auckland Province. Is this credible? Who shall tell the names and addresses of those who are damned by gambling i We know many—every minister knows —the police know. The meeting closed with a hymn and a prayer for the Mayor and the City Council.