CITIZEN TRAINING

Manawatu Standard, Volume LVI, Issue 304, 21 November 1936, Page 14

CITIZEN TRAINING

PRESBYTERIAN DEBATE. DANGERS STRESSED. Per Press Association. CHRISTCHURCH, Nov. 20. “I think this is one of the most dangerous and insidious motions ever brought before a Presbyterian Assembly, ” said Rev. J. Paterson, of Wanganui, at the Presbyterian General Assembly to-night, when a proposal fqr a compulsory scheme of training in citizenship was under discussion. The proposal, which was put forward by Rev. J. Douglas Smith, convener of the social relationships committee, was that the Government should be requested to introduce a compulsory citizenship training scheme for young people up to the age of 21, with the military element excluded and including physical culture, civics and moral instruction. Mr Paterson said the world to-day was full of parasites who were afraid to think, and he looked with horror at any proposal to impose stereotyped thinking upon the youth of the country. “1 do not think anything could ultimately destroy a nation so quickly as a dogmatic system of thinking imposed on our young people by dogmatic teaching and Government officials. As a Church we have stood for individual thought, and I cannot understand a Presbyterian Assembly giving this proposal even two minutes of its time. “It is the very tiling that Bolshevism and Fascism are doing, to dominate, mould and control the thought of their youth. What the world needs to-day is not but adventure and pluck to go out and take a risk in life, both in acting and thinking.” Mr Smith, in reply, said it was impossible to have liberty without discpline. The danger in New Zealand was that young people would not think at ail. These must be 6ome balance between the extremism of individualism and that of State socialism. The debate was adjourned.