THE CLYDE

Grey River Argus, 17 April 1925, Page 8

THE CLYDE

WHY IS IT RED? ‘ ‘ Why are we always hearing about Glasgow?” ask the Thoroughly Comfortable with, indignation. “Why arc the MLP’s, from the Clyde so fierce in theijr denunciation of present conditions? What is behind this rent strike that attracts so much attention?’’ Well, here is an answer to these questions, an answer that was given in a Tory periodical, says the London “Herald” in a review of a book by William Bolitho, entitled “Cancer of Empire.” No more complete exposure of “present conditions’ lias ever been made. Mr Bolitho, contributor to the “Out |iok, ” Conservative weekly, went to the “Red Clyde” to s-c what was the matter. Ho came back admitting that the matter was the breakdown of the Capitalist system. Ho found people living in a state which cannot be described within the bounds of decency. He describes “rooms eternally dark even in summer, where it is impossible in the dim gasligl>. always kept burning, to seek out and remove the dirt.’ He pictures “deep cobbled passages shut in under tall and airproof walls,” in Ghich children play, “spilling the refuse of ashbins and treading it into the black. moist ground to make modern Glasgow.” “The very soil is impure, unclean able, in this city that lies in mists of river and chimneys, in the northern, sunless cold. Tn its black, high barracks, that elbow each other desperately for room, millions have lived, 'crammed like salt fish in a. barrel’ for a century. “Well migh' Carlyle wonder, 'Under that hideous coverlet of vapours and put refactions nnd unimaginable gases, what fermenting vnf lies hid? Tt is, I assure you. no less frightening in those modern times than when he saw it; we are now to see what that ferment. means.” Tt means, Mr Bolitho says, that the. superstructure of our economic system is swaying, the base is splitting. “Our system itself it built on this misery that, is now quaking under our feet; this overcrowded, air-starved overpressed labourer. “He is the strained, tortured base that supports our civilisation; eternally dissolving, always till now renewed bv the natural increase of the race, l\v the waste products that drain down to him from all other classes. “For this labourer, this Baeklandcr, is naked humanity itself, stupid, patient Picks, who will make any effort to avoid effort, suffer all things rather than think. This is our security, and our shame, that Ims now turned our danger, for his sufferings have gone so far that he is beginning to think and to strive.” Who is to Blame? “In a. sense no one is to blame,” urges Mr Bolitho. “Tn a sense we arc all to blame,” wo should reply. To blame for a system 'which allows 40,000 one-roomed houses to be owned bv a ''great number of small landlords. warn- of them little better off than' their tenants.” To blamo for allowing industry to be so mismanaged that it is impossible lor good workmen fo earn enough 1" pay rent for a decent habitation. Which means that “either the. workman must live where ho is, be for every deprived of light, air, space,, cleanliness, and all education; or the employer must go out of business.” What it means to live in these foul slums, Mr Bolitho vividly describes. Seven in a bed. no privacy, no purity of body or mind, dirt everywhere, »■>•] everywhere the slum smell. '“Tt is this smell which is the most oppressive symbol of such ■ives- choking. nauseating; fto smell of corrupt sweat, the unnamed filthiness of body—the smell of the slums, the unforgettable, abominable smell. “Henceforth, when asked: ‘What deepest misery may overcrowing such as this mean? What ultimate ‘torment, is reserved for humanity deprived of air, light. food ’ money, space?’ I "’'is! answer, ‘The. slum smell.’ ” Tired of Waiting. Ami all because the eapitalist.s arc “unable to carry on their business: without a vast class of troglodite slaves, living in perpetual darkness on bread and margarine. For 100 years the Glasgow workers have suffered. Now “the people aro tired of waiting; they arc obscurely conscious of the justice of their demand for life amt light and air. Many of them are returned soldiers, and if the lower grades of them arc stupid, they have the longer memories of certain promises made when the army had need of them. Sixty thousand of them arc entirely without work; all of them in varying degree, without comfort or common decency in life. “Tt is a bad thing to make any large body of men careless whether they live or die; to put them in the position of having nothing to lose. It will not. bo denied that the Glasgow workman is nearly in this situation.”