MODERN GIRLS

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 815, 8 November 1929, Page 16

MODERN GIRLS

RELIGIOUS INFLUENCE IS LACKING MISS BEGG ON INTERESTS “What is wrong with our young girls today? Why do we have tales of staying out late at nights?” The answer to these questions, in the opinion of Miss Jean Begg, secretary of the Y.W.C.A., lies in the fact that many young girls are growing up without any religious influence in their lives. Presenting this aspect in addressing the annual meeting of the Auckland Girl Guides’ Association last evening, Miss Begg said that many girls of 12, 13 and 14 years were growing up in irreligious homes. It was at this age young girls’ emotions were roused, said Miss Begg, and shoyld be inspired by tho highest ideals so that tendencies toward hero-worship could be directed along the right lines. The girls must be given the linest and highest spiritual training, and if this was done they would not go far wrong. In deploring the lack of good leadership, Miss Begg said that the modern girl could not be superimposed on, but could be carried along by good leaders. She expressed the hope that during the next year a course of training for leaders would be started in the city. Miss Begg spoke appreciatively of the development of the new sympathy of common-sense, and the fact that people did not now become panicstricken about the future of young people. The power of public opinion on the young was remarkable, said Miss Begg, who described the freedom of youth as an easily exploded myth. Where is the freedom of youth if one must follow the atmosphere of the mob or face social ostracism? she asked. The moment a girl joined the Y.W.C.A. or the Girl Guides she was expected to be a model of the virtues for which the organisation stood, people forgetting that only by practice could those ideals be achieved. “We often do not deal with the real problem of conduct of girls,’’ said Miss Begg. “We are apt to deal in platitudes of the necessity for clean thoughts and speech, but we do little to answer the questions the modern girl asks herself.” Another wrong principle being followed, Miss Begg considered, was the policy of “nose” counting—the focussing of attention on numbers rather than on quality. A vote of thanks was accorded Miss Begg for her addx*ess.