JUVENILE IMMORALITY.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LI, Issue 195, 7 August 1908, Page 4

JUVENILE IMMORALITY.

DOCTORS AGREE. LAX PARENTAL CONTROL. "AULK AXU WATER ON TOP; DIRT BELOW." Following [he strictures passed upon the monil condition of juveniles in New Zealand by the.Rev. Air. Hoggins at the Pan-Anglican Conference in London, inquiries wore recently made among experts in Cliristehurch which showed that the strictures Were richly deserved. '1 he question of the immorality of bhe youngis a most delicate one, and one to be approached with dilhdence. Still, when evils are glaringly apparent, it is wrong to turn one's hack on facts. In order to discover whether the evils existing in Cliristehurch also existed in Wellington, and in order to discover if in the .opinion of expert* there was a way out of the labyrinth, a Times representative lias made inquiries from local peopie who, by virtue, of the positions they hold, are competent to pass judgment. AT Tllli PAULINA HOME. Among Hie people interviewed was Staff-Captain Hubbard, of the Salvation Army Paulina Home. Newtown. This lady said that she' did not believe in her experience that the morals of the young people of Wellington were so lax as those in another New Zealand city she named. The Salvation Army dealt only with a mere fraction of the casts of juvenile immorality, which was rampant. Children were not to blame; thev should be taught that everything God made, and the human funcl'iohs generally, were pure, it was the withholding of information from children tint led them to investigate for themselves.

PARENTS TO BLAME. The parents were to blame for the larger part of juvenile immorality. There >vas no home control. Parents' weakly complained that their daughters got out of hand. Was it not an absurdity thlt a parent should admit defeat at the hands of a sixteen-year-old girl? Girls learnt to wander from home very young. Their parents did not control them when they had n chance. Young girls who strayed from home afterwards strayed with boys. Their natural inclinations led that way. Parents "couldn't be bothered" with the teaching of their children or the adequate care of them. The majority of young girls who cainc to the Paulina Home were good girls. She neither blamed the girls nor the boys. She blamed the parents for the opportunity they gave both sexes to meet under all conditions and away from control. If an institution by benevolent discipline could control many girls, p:u - - I cuts could control their children. She had cases in which the girls had come to the Home voluntarily. Parents lia'l written to these girls asking them why they did not go out and earn their living.

DANGEROUS COURTSHIPS. There was great laxity in the matter of courtship. Parents, trustful and frequently good enough, believed that their g'l'is were quite safe morally if they were engaged to be married. They gave girls and their fiancees every opportunity for meeting away from control. The results were not inevitable, but evil iesuits were nevertheless frequent. It was wrong in the interests of a dangerous delicacy to keep quiet on a subjc'jt of such vital importance. The work they were able to do was " but a drop in the burket," but it was worth while.

There s-jemed to be a lack of varolii. U love. Children learnt frequcntl.y to hate instead of love their homes, and from this sprung the evils of immorality tlnit were so noticeable, so pitiable, and so very hanl to stem. PRUDERY.

All the medical men who were interviewed agreed that llic morals of the rising generation were very bad indeed, and were getting worse. .None of these men hesitated to call a spade a spade, and said if repressive measures were not taken .New Zealand would very much rue it, for juveniki immorality was merely' a stepping-stone to national decay. The first, doctor spoken to was emphatic- in declaring that the whole fault was with tiivj parents. There was an idiotic prudery i'J the matter, a wanton carelessness, a desire to shirk their responsibilities. It was- so easy for people to be immoral nowadays. Jfoung people were assisted in every way. KESlil/fS AVOIDED. Preventives Merc imported to NJnvi Zealand "literally by the shipload." Parents did not seem to know. Tiicy allowed their children to do as thev 'liked. All normal boys and girl's would emphatically "do as they liked' if they were noi'eoiilrolled. it was natural that should uo so. Preaching didn't elfect.the reform necessary. At present juvenile immorality—indeed, national immorality—was widespread. Why not eonliiie it'; lie knew there would be an onlcrv from one end of New Zealand to tili'o other at what lie was about to sit v. The revival of th-; CD. Ael anil tile licensing of Jiuum.v was the only way to deal with I lie evil. The evil of immorality would thus be greatly restricted. Such a measure Kcvmed hideous to many people. It would be hideous if not 'necessary. It. was. however, the lesser of two «reat evils.

J«ATNiIC HAS ENEMIES. Violation of .Nature's laws, so common with the .youth of the coiinlrv. would lead to onfecbleiiient in the long run. There had always been ihesc vio° latioiis, but the conditions existing in New Zealand, where discipline was a tiling to be laughed at, would help to enfeeble (he .race very quickly indeed. Parents frequently allowed young girls to go to all sorts of places at night, be- , lieving that if the meetings were in con- : ncc-tion with a church or otlrer reli-i-' ous organisation they could not possibly come to any harm. 1 Girls and boys who attended church were as norma] and as human as girls and boys who 'attended race meetings. Constant watchfulness was necessary. If child- \

roil were taught tile tearful consequences of • the violation- of Nature's laws fewer of them would sill. live point wus Unit the instinct was normal, nut tliu means taken to cheat Nature meant ultiinuto ruination to the race. " STOPPING Tllli! SMVEK."

Still another liivdital man, agreeing with tile others that immorality was greater iu all the eifies of the Douim-' ion than ever it had been before, remarked tluit—as the French say—"you cannot purify the city by stopping up the sewer.'-- Serial purists might say what they liked and might ask the people to be moral, but as long as there/ were ordinarily constituted people in tins country, so long—unless centralised and controlled—would the evil grow. A canker under control was butter than a disease widespread, and the disease wa s widespread in this Dominion. j THE CONTEJH'TUOUS YOUNGSTER, youngsters in -New Zealand had an utter contempt for all constituted auui- | orily. They despised their parents and I elders. It was the fault of the parents and elders. One couldn't make men and women pure by Act of Parliament, but could insist on fewer being impure by restrictive and controlling legislation, ilodoi-ii conditions had of course intensified the evil. The looseness of morality he knew nourished as in a hotbed whci\i it was impossible, or at least undesirable, for people to marry young. People wore given certain functions at an early age, presumably so that they might use them.

aiAKlil' YuU-XH. ''lt is bctk'r to.many than burn," as St. Paul said, but the point is tlial marriage is unpopuliir with tlie young because the ~voting haven't the 'necessary money to marry, l'areuts do not advise early Marriage, and therefore countenance impurity. This nrodlcal man asserted that it was infinitely better to have an increase of illegitimacy than to continue to prevent natural functions, and so deteriorate the race. "It Das become so recognised a tiling," said the doctor, "for young men to designedly influence girls in tiro direction of immorality that, as most people know, Uiey frequently boast of their wretched conquests. These men marry some day, and they don't marry the girl who is as bad as they are— 4 which is one of the wickedest anomalies of Sux relationship." And the cure, doctor? "Absolute prohibition of preventives and the revival of the CD. Act. The position at the moment is positively damnable."

THE MAUISXiIATE SPEAKS. Dr. McArthur, S.M., said, in reply to a question on the subject, "I certainly do notice a looseness in the way young fellows and girls behave, and a familiarity which frequently tends to lead to immorality. Ido not consider that there is that amount of parental control exercised now that there was some years ago. Children take up a position of indifference towards their parents and their elders that would not be tolerated a few years ago. For this, in manv casus, the parents are entirely to blame, they themselves giving awajf too much to the pursuit of pleasure, to the neglect of their households. They , know too liCtlvj of the 'goings oil' of their families when the children are i out of sight. Parents do not attach sullieient importance to the oU'eiicce committed by their children. Thdy| are altogether tub prone to find excuses. Jn my own room, dealing with cases involving offences by children, I almost invariably iind that the parents are not in the least impressed with the lioinousnoss of the otl'ences, and are far too apt to look upon them as trivial. Kwn before a Magistrate they appear as apologists for the children. The offenders look upon a Magistrate not as a person who desires to-give them good advice, and thus show them the evil of their ways, but as an avenging angel, whose place is to punish them either rightly or wrongly for transgressions that their parents do not / seem sorry to have been committed."