WOMEN AND THE WORLD DEPRESSION

Otago Daily Times, Issue 21360, 13 June 1931, Page 3

WOMEN AND THE WORLD DEPRESSION

SOME PHILOSOPHIC REFLEC- '■, TIONS o j ' ■:■ ■’ ; ‘ :' : ' IL By Up Against It. We hear a lot about the “Made in New Zealand Week,” and people are urged to get busy and buy goods made in this country. Well, it is in our own hands. Certainly, it is not an all-round cure for unemployment, but it will help tremendously. We can do things here the same as they can elsewhere. We go to the pictures and are thrilled by the alleged world super-stars. Some of them are really good at their profession; others are pretty' brave to be shown on the silver sheet at all. But they must live like the rest of us. Most of them are boomed as “ stars.” It sounds so big, you know, and some fancy French, Italian,- or Russian name helps the 'illusion. I think it was Barnum, the great showman of circus fame, who said the people loved to be fooled. We get it in large quantities, and distance lends enchantment to the scene, maybe. The greatest actresses, actors, sculptors, painters, movie artists, authors; verse writers, statesmen, and women reside in Dunedin, St. Petersburg, Paris, Wellington, London, Christchurch, Neyr York, Auckland, and Australia, and other places, including Hollywood, where they have been trained for their special profession. The same big things can be done by people of this country if they have the inclination, and, lastly, but most important, get a fair, chance, but our present social system is up against us. It takes a great number all their time to get food and shelter. I am not off my subject, but wish to show that we can produce goods and everything else here within a certain, radius, as good as can be done elsewhere,. Battleships, airships, and a lot of other things are not in the picture, but I have not so far seen a. better type of womanhood on or off the screen or elsewhere than can be seen in this country. I have-seen the best of the world’s artists, even years ago, but the best show ever I . have witnessed in my life /was put on by amateurs in this city in a continuous three f -hour programme for a modest shilling some good while back. I never pay empty compliments. They are stupid and dangerous, also insulting. This is a true bill, and honest lines, and I know what I am writing about. We have the goods and talent here. A little advice to women who are but of employment! You can’t stand still. You must either go back or go forward. Get busy on something.. It keeps the mind employed, if it is only attending to the backyard garden or front door knob, by giving, it a vigorous polish. If we are surrounded by things that are bright and in order, it keeps the mind that way. If we stand still, we get despondent, in some oases brooding, and a sort- of melancholy feeling takes charge of us. It is a natural law for those of an active mind to get that way. You can’t find a “boss” to give you employment? Very good! Did you ever try »giving yourself a job? I have, plenty of times whilst moving around these colonies. There are hundreds of ways when we know how, which I have not space to go into. Honestly, I wpnt to help you. Why? Simply because it is my duty to do so. All through this life, which has not been a bed of roses' for me, your sex has always come to my assistance in some form or other just when I most required a friend. It may be a matter of the fates. I know not. A young Maori maid saved me from drowning in the long ago-—which is a good sample for a start, anyhow. I was too young to pass her a vote of thanks at the time, but will do so now, and I am sure anyone of the fair sex who acts on my advice will live to be thankful I did not finish, but lived to pen these lines. I could give no end of incidents, but there is no need to. On second thoughts, I will quote one.

I w£s looking on the seamy side of life in one of the big centres of Australia with a mate. We battled hard, but nothing seemed to come our way. I was getting right down sick of things. .Strange the awful loneliness of a big city throbbing with life. There are hundreds, yes, and at times thousands, abroad in 'the streets, but it is deadly when you can’t jingle two coins together in your pocket. Even if, you are "well-dressed, you feel your position when “ stoney broke.” We were .trying a street for any old stray job that was going, including gardening, trimming hedges, squaring up the back yard, or using the lawnmower. I attacked a large house in the rear. No there was nothing doing as regards a job, but the maid who answered the door went inside and returned to ask if I could kill and dress a fowl. I felt as if I could kill anything, barring lions,'tigers, or poliand set sail after the chooky called for boiling water, and had the business managed quicker than' it takes to explain about it. In the meantime, my mate got into hospital, and I went back some time after to see if there was another fowl to , despatch, and got a job at a small figure instead, and bad to sleep in the laundry. Now, that Australian dame had got me that position. She was one of the good sport type, and things went ahead all right, and were different. . It gave me a fresh start: put some go into me, and, strange to relate, later on; I met a musician who proposed we should go on the road together and travel as street musicians. I hesitated, being quite certain it would be simply awful to face a crowd and play music.' .Well, I got over the difficulty. We got away out into the suburbs, where the crowd was absent, and it was as easy as falling' out of an aeroplane, and) there was more cash in it. Eventually we worked back to the big centres, where the crowds were vast. .. Great life, too, as we could put across a good show, and were our own masters. • That taught me what I am trying to teach the women of this land, and is only an illustration of what you can dojif you have to get to it. Seemed great to have people throwing coin from away up in the air from a skyscraper at you, and vfe hung to that Bohemian life for quite a good time, and improved as we went on, travelling by rail, steamer, and road thousands of miles, finishing up financial, and when we parted eventually, my partner joined up wi£h a vaudeville show. This sort of occupation is considered no class; still one must get the cash somehow. You have 100 per cent, more dash in cities where you are not known, somehow, and when you get back into spcial surroundings of a 1 congenial nature again, you simply say you have been abroad on a financial venture. , _ I know one waterside employee who informs his acquaintances that he is engaged following shipping pursuits in a large way. He has “held good positions long ago,” and the industry under mention is down at zero just, now. This world takes you at your own valuation. A lawyer told me that years ago. . Domestic service for women is a highgrade occupation, according to my idea, and teaches the and unfair sex all t about the home life, which is necessary when they get into the matrimonial area later on. Everybody wants a home .of his own, be it ever so humble, with golden canaries singing bn the front veranda in a cage, and the radio going for a change, _ and the ivories on the piano getting a fair amount of - attention. Those who keep this world going by hard work are entitled to these things, as the home-ought to be the centre of all joy and harmony. We sing that there is no place like home, but home life is getting a bad run in the craze for outside excitement, which fails to satisfy somehow, as your presence is not required elsewhere once your cash runs out, and you are up against things, but- there is always a welcome at home. The best plan is for a number to get together and make a home, if short of one. Jean and her brother Ned look after things here when we are away, but Ned is a real outlaw, and_ helps himself to things when one’s back is turned. He is game, anyhow. Jean is- of a more refined type, being not of the rogue variety. Still, we manage somehow to pull along, and both apparently believe in home life. It is easier for three or four people to prepare a meal together, all working in unionism, chatting, and making things happy, than if a person is on his own m a dismal room with no one to talk to, and I have pitied the working girl so situated in cities and elsewhere. When all are together the rent comes cheaper, and several heads are better than one. It is also handy in cases of sickness or to drive away the gloom feeling in these distressing times. “ Pal in together ” is our motto, and stand or fall together on

the co-operative principle. It is scientific. It is petty little debts that can worry a person. When, you owe two or three shillings at the corner store, and can’t possibly meet the account at once, as your uneniployment levy must be paid you imagine that the storekeeper’s manner is frigid and cold when you pass, and say “ good morning,” as he stands on the doorstep, looking up the street in a pained, pale way, for ■ customers. It would be a better morning, you think, if the small account was settled, and you cross on to the other side of the street and run into the coal merchant. Your account rendered with him for a Mg of coal runs back into 1930, and he looks black at you. Of course, that account will be settled shortly. You have been advising yourself of it for a good time, and as you rush along and try and forget things you just glance ahead, and to your horror perceive that your landlord is bearing down on you. sloiyly. Escape is impossible (as he is just passing the butcher’s shop) if you keep straight on, but you suddenly discover that a box of matches is required at home, and dodge into a tobacconist's to make the purchase .and try and force a discussion on the Unemployment Bill till the landlord fades out of sight. It would have been just awful if you had been going' in the same direction as he was, and had to keep step with him for a long distance. Such is life, .and our funny social system is a joke. They might alter it when we are all gone to a better plane of, existence. I believe this is only a flash of life, a sort of curtain-raiser. I have studied the matter for years, but if you want positive, definite information on the matter go to the man who hasn’t studied it for half an hour, and he is quite positive we just have grown up like Topsy in a certain book. Bless you! somebody told him all about it, and he has also read about the matter, but never investigated and thought for himself. I will now have another cigarette. Jean and Ned do not smoke at all, and they are strictly “temperate. I was working out in the open to-day (May 21)>. out towards the coast line, with an embryo gale tearing in towards ■us oil the ocean, with a rumour of enow in it. We called it by* a certain number of names that would not look nice in print, and as White Island would disappear from view in the driving storm and mist being lashed by the sad sea waves, the clouds that were dark and annoyed-look-ing would drive across from the sea, and down the rain would come, and away we would scatter for shelter; but,we stuck it all 'day. One thing, we were not short of tobacco, as we were on a previous occasion, when we had to have a general divide all round. It is considered very bad form to refuse the request for a cigarettte iri certain circles o£ the great and increasing unemployed. It simply “is not done.” One cannot but note the refined type of workers that are engaged in many cases inserting a pick into New Zealand and gathering shovelfulls of this island, together and throwing /it into drays. It becomes quite uninteresting after a time, and, it is possible to get . what we call fed up. I would personally prefer to be a millionaire and just be able to do as I pleased, but I might become like Mr Charles Chaplin and not care a fig whether I did any more business or. not. That is Because he has been over-paid and over-praised. No doubt most of us would do likewise, so I have decided not to become immensely wealthy in the meantime, and it is just as well I. have done so. Towards the end of his career Napoleon made his generals too wealthy, and they let him down. Poverty puts the spur into us, and we have to get busy, like it or not. What is being done as regards displaying New Zealand goods for a week in windows in this city rather amuses me. We ought to display our goods all the year round as we do for a week, and keep boosting the home-made (articles, such as clothing, boots, furniture, hats, newspapers, or anything that gives employment to people in this country, and give our own people work, but we give most of it to the other fellow and let our own crowd do a freeze, and in a great measure this 5a the reason there are so mapy, women unemployed as well as men. Another reason is that people are obsessed with the idea that things are really at a dead end, and are hanging on l;ke grim death to every shilling in many eases; riioney is not put into circulation, and there is stagnation and want.