PASSING NOTES

Otago Daily Times, Issue 25736, 6 January 1945, Page 3

PASSING NOTES

When Goebbels blandly informs us that Hitler’s love of mankind extends beyond his own people towards the universe and says if the world only knew this “it would forswear false gods and turn to worship him ” it is strangely reminiscent of Napoleon’s declaration in June, 1815, just before Waterloo, when he assured the Allies that his policy was (and always had been!) entirely pacific and liberal. It seems a pity that, this splendid spirit of brotherhood was not made more obvious long ago. It is strange that we in New Zealand have remained oblivious of this deep affection for us on the part of the great Fuhrer. Perhaps we were too blinded by propaganda to realise our good fortune. We may say to Hitler what the poet said to his friend:

" perhaps it. was right to dissemble your love, But-why did you kick me downstairs? ’’ Or rather, why did you dissemble your love bjt torturing and killing millions of innocent people? Perhaps Hitler hopes that this fantastic portrait of what we may call his moral physiognomy painted for him by Goebbels will be helpful when the crash comes. Perhaps he is naive enough to think that instead of being forced to make a hasty escape his hew role as a great humanitarian will enable him to await the arrival of the Allied armies with quiet confidence, surrounded by his admiring fellow countrymen.

If this was the plan that Goebbels had in view let us imagine Hitler walking boldly into the Allied headquarters in Berlin, wrapped in the mantle of Mr Pecksniff or Mr Chadband and saying:

Peace, peace, my brethren: I come to declare to you that all the stories you have heard of my cruelty and treachery arc false; it Is a mistake to think that I have murdered millions of innocent men, women, and children. My concentration camps are really rest homes. I am filled with overwhelming love of all mankind and indeed of the universe. So let us lay aside all enmity and dwell in peace, my brethren.

No doubt the docile people of Germany, drugged by ceaseless propaganda, may believe that their mythical hero has, like the fox in the fable, turned into a monk. Indeed, Goebbels urges all mankind to worship Hitler as a god. But if the Allies are wise they will continue to regard him as a devil incarnate and do their best to send him to his proper place, which is in hell.

This quaint conversion of Hitler to a love of all mankind comes on the eve of his downfall, when all is on the verge of being lost, including honour—which never existed anyway. And though circuitous and obscure,

The feet of Nemesis how sure. The whole incident is verv significant. It illustrates once more the truth of La Rochefoucauld's maxim, “Hypocrisy is the homage that vice pays to virtue." So Hitler's alleged love is an unconscious or hypocritical homage to those sublime Christian ideals of human brotherhood which lie and bis gangsters have always ridiculed and despised as signs of weakness and race inferiority. An old Roman writer truly said. “A bad man is worst of all when he pretends to be good.” When Goebbels describes Hitler as “ a lonely genius towering in icy solitude above his fellows,” this may be how he appears to the Germans. But when he adds, “No one can fool him,’’ he overlooks the fact that Hitler has often fooled himself, especially when he made war on Russia against the advice of his generals. The hypocrisy of his new role of brotherhood seems doubly farcical when we recall the savage words he uttered on his last Heroes’ Day address: We should be grateful to our enemies for bringing out the German people’s natural Instinct of ardent love of their fatherland and for giving birth to the seething hatred of every

enemy. . . . Our people are no longer confused by sentiments of world brotherhood." These pregnant words reveal the true Hitler, and Goebbels's attempt to picture him as an angel of light comes too late.

What would happen if the school teachers, exasperated by the failure to remedy their grievances, decided to go on strike? Certainly there has so far been no indication of their intention to resort to direct action; but in the growing scramble for higher wages it is hard to condemn those who are incited by the repeated concessions yielded by the Government to those who threaten. No doubt the teachers will remain loyal, but their grievances seem more serious than those of other groups who are “ getting away with the swag," to use a current slang phrase. We read of teachers who are in such poverty that they have to sell their radio sets, bicycles, and other articles to keep the wolf from the door. Other teachers have to seek work lor part of their vacations in order to be* able to give their families a brief holiday. Instances are quoted where the school janitor earns (or at least receives) more pay than teachers on the staff. But would not a teachers’ strike be more disastrous than any other? For it would be impossible to call in free labour to replace teachers on strike. Moreover, while a miners' strike arouses fierce protests from consumers of 'coal, would any protest come from the pupils who are the consumers of learning? Would they not cheer the striking teachers and implore them to stay out as long as possible? It wmuld be for the pupiis a glorious windfall —an extension of their holidays. If their parents sought to break the strike they would regard them as blacklegs, But as a teachers' strike is not likely to occur, the pupils may be hoping that the teachers will hold frequent stop-work meetings of a prolonged nature.

A correspondent submits for comment a new plan for selecting members of Parliament. He is not himself the designer of the plan, but has been invited to support it. Briefly stated, the proposal is that each of the 80 members of Parliament should be selected not to represent the electors of a district, but the employers and employees in some trade or profession. “This is a new idea,” says the author, 1 “of a Parliament of persons with expert knowledge of what is required to benefit society.” He hopes by this means to get rid of party politics and public elections. In an elaborate table consisting of 80 squares he classifies ail the different trades and professions, such as farmers, brewers, bootmakers, printers, army, navy, teachers, pensioners, barristers, and so on. The whole plan is headed by the excellent maxim, “ No one section has a right to benefit at the expense of the whole.” This sounds attractive at a time when on all hands complaint is heard that what are called “ pressure groups ” are pushing their claims, irrespective of the welfare of the community as a whole.

Now, this is not really a new idea. It is based on what is called “functional representation,” and has been actually tried in some countries as a subsidiary or advisory Chamber. In certain respects it resembles the ideas of the guild Socialists, who were active after the last war, but have since faded out. But a little consideration will show that the scheme has obvious defects. First, if members are elected to represent special trades, such as hairdressers, bankers, or doctors, the interests of their trades will be their main concern. They will fail to take broad views of national questions, and will be absorbed in the welfare of their own ' trades. In short, they will represent the nation too little and their own trades too much. Obviously it will still be necessary to create some Cabinet or Chamber that can handle foreign affairs, finance, education, national health, and ottier questions of wide policy. Secondly, it appears as if only one member is allotted to each trade without regard tc its size or importance. If so, it is absurd to say that a great industry like farming, or coal mining, shall have no more members than the jewellers or typewriting agencies. Even all the churches have only one member.

Many other objections will occur to the reader. For example, if the member of Parliament represents both the employers and employees in a trade,

is it not clear that when they choose their member the employers will bcheavily out voted and have no representation at all? Moreover, as Harold Laski has pointed out, the expert engineer or doctor outside his technical sphere may be a fool. “ Sailors,” he says, “ can never safely be left in control of a naval department. Doctors tend to see the population not as normal human beings, but as potential patients. The problems on which the statesman has to decide are not problems to which the special knowledge of the expert has any particular relevance.” Hence, while the plan may be useful as furnishing an advisory body, we would still need a Parliament to represent the same people as citizens. For no plumber or farmer is merely a plumber or farmer—he is a taxpayer, a parent, a sportsman, a churchman, an importer, a consumer, a monarchist or republican, a socialist or conservative; and all these complex aspects of his life need to be represented in his broad capacity as a citizen.

In the fairy tale of Cinderella and the Prince it will be recalled that the identity of Cinderella was finally established because, in her haste to leave the ball, she left behind a glass slipper which fitted no foot but her own In our early youth when we read this charming story, it always seemed to us that a glass slipper would be hard and uncomfortable to wear even if it fitted. But now comes good news from Czechoslovakia —the greatest shoe exporting country in the world. There they are now making shoes from elastic glass, known as “ plexiglas,' which is almost unbreakable. They are most comfortable and there is no danger of slipping because they are grooved. Above all, they last much longer than do shoes made of leather They arc made in many colours and they need neither a polish nor a brush. When they are dirty they can be cleaned by means of a wet cloth. So when Cinderella next appears on the stage she will have glass slippers of the same colour as her frock. The only risk will be that if her slippers are too flexible, her elder sisters may be more successful in putting them on than they were in the fairy tale. It would be too bad if one of _ the elder sisters thereby got away with the Prince and left Cinderella lamenting. Civis.