Juvenile Delinquency And Indecent Books

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30294, 21 November 1963, Page 7

Juvenile Delinquency And Indecent Books

‘The Press” Special Service

AUCKLAND, November 20. New Zealanders had adopted the attitude that juveniles were corrupted by reading obscene and indecent books, said Mr J. A. Lee, author, publisher, and bookseller, but no-one had yet made a survey to find out what juveniles read. “If anyone asked me what books corrupted people in New Zealand I would say race books,” he said. Mr Lee and Professor J. F. Northey. professor of public law at Auckland University, were discussing the Indecent Publications Act, recently passed by Parliament, at a meeting of the Auckland branch of the Library Association.

The genesis of the act had been the belief that juvenile delinquency was caused by young people reading horror comics, said Mr Lee. People took the attitude that if these comics were banned delinquency would disappear.

"Simple people are always looking for simple cures. I would say that the effect of the previous act in reducing delinquency has been nil.” From a booksellers’ point of view the act might have some merit, but as a writer. Mr Lee said, he abhorred censorship and as a reader he got hot under the collar when he could not read a book he wanted to because someone else said he could not. Not one in a thousand! paperbacks was sold to youngsters. It was true they would read books their parents brought in to the home and if their parents read sophisticated books they would do so also. But their characters would be formed by the nature of their surroundings rather than through books. Most delinquents read nothing at all. Professor Northey said the question of indecency was difficult. People thought they ; could recognise it as easily as sighting an elephant, but , a person would have great , difficulty in defining it. i In some views the provii sions of the New Zealand act i compared unfavourably with ' the English legislation, he ; said. Some persons would argue that a jury wa: a more reliable guide than a small ; tribunal which could always be identified with literary , censorship.