GAMBLING.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CXIV, Issue 16327, 25 August 1913, Page 4

GAMBLING.

TO THE EDITOR. Sir,—No thoughtful student of our social and economic system can bo surprised at the rapid growth of gambling as set forth in a recent issue of your widely .read and democratic paper. True, the totalisator should be prohibited at once, but its popularity only indicates more than ever tho serious fault in our modern system of education. We feed and encourage, this Gorgon-lieaded monster in our primary schools. When the barque of free, secular and compulsory education left the stagnant continent of ecclesiasticism, during the middle of last century, the tempestuous seas oyer which it is now sailing wero praotieallv un> charted. While we are tempted to offer a cheer to the' pilots of this stormtossed ship, we must remember it lias not by very many leagues reached the Utopia ahe'ad of all earnest thinkers. But no section of past society ever enjoyed the wide liberty which that ship gives promise of unloading. The spirit of progress is everywhere, but true progress is without precedent. Only knowledge won in the school of experience is our legacy to those who come behind.

Our educational system unduly fosters commercialism. If the leading nations of the world wero to pay more attention to the moral and physical developments of their child-life and less to the stifling of those two profound constituents of weak human nature, by stimulating baneful material, civilisation would ,not require to spend £400,000,000 annually to maintain ‘‘ peace,” tho Stock Exchange would not breed its Saccards, racehorses would not be priced at £50,000, and totalisators would die a natural. death.

Personally, I am not a bit surprised to note t he "rapid increase in totalisator investments. To get something for nothing is the spirit of the age. It is just possible "our “progress ” lies along tho path taken by the mighty Roman Empire. As we trample each other under foot to get this something for nothing .(nature loaths a vacuum), we realise how few Socialists wo possess for tho building up of «a wide world and genuine Socialism. The “leisured nobility ” doing business on tho Stock Exchange and tho worker who only reads the “ sportin’ n’us ” —athletics have' become a trade and tho interest in them a mania—are actuated by the same desire to get something for nothing. No legislative enactments, no socialistic state, no appeal to reason can satisfactorily check the craze for gambling. While wo patch and tinker with its many phases, prohibit bookmakers and reduce the licenses, wo neglect the sound education of the child, who in his utter helplessness accepts, as the heir, to all the ages, the meagre blood-stained knowledge we have to offer him. “To prepare us for complete living,” says Herbert Spencer, “ is the function which education lias to discharge.” Experience is now loudly proclaiming

that we are neglecting some important f phases of that function. The gambling craze has, as regards the totalisator, been with us quite long enough to point us very conclusively to the soil, from which its springs—tho very seri-5 ous defect, in our modern scheme of education. It is practically useless to point out to the working man who ■ takes no interest in- his day’s work, his home or his future prospects, the ■ evil influence of a brain devoted solely to juggling with the weight of jockeys, the age of dead horses and the “ divvev ” he failed to win because a friend had induced him to. back, tlia wrong horse. What good is to be derived from hair-splitting arguments with the “ cultured ” members of contemporary society about the .£3,000,000, which passes' annually through the totalisator on its way to sustain those in the-lucrative “know” of how to pluck “ pigeons ” ?■ What use to publish facts concerning the fruits of gambling on horse races: the selfish spirit it engenders, especially among tho womeii; the “ stoneybrokes ” who shun as they would a pestilence an honest health-giving day’s work; the angry, often diink-sodden, mother who returns to her hungry and crying baby with tickets drawn 'CM horses which figure among the"“also started”? Not till another Charlemagne or Cromwell rises up from our ranks and bogins the drastic overhaul-of our now proved defective instruments of I social betterment can* we expect p, fatal blow to bo struck by our legislators at this home-destroying hell-sent vice.—l am, etc., > • ARTHUR HUNTER. Mercer, August 20, 1913.