THE SKETCHER.

Otago Witness, Issue 3513, 12 July 1921, Page 52

THE SKETCHER.

RACE SUICIDE DECLARED IMPOSSIBLE.

Dr Alexander Graham Bell, the honoured inventor of the telephone, maintains the impossibility of rate suicide. In an article contributed to The Journal of Heredity (Washington) he calls attention to the fact that childlessness can not be transmitted to one’s descendants, for the reason that the childless have no descendants. The practical result of this fact is that any tendency to race suicide dies out in a generation. Feritility stands a better chance of transmission than infertility, even when not absolute. The case, Dr Bell notes, is an instance of what he calls “negative selection,” which he says has always exerted a powerful influence upon population. lie writes: “Mo inheritable peculiarity associated with lack of offspring can be made to grow and flourish in a community. In spite of all efforts it will languish and 2>romote the growth of its very opposite. History is full of illustrations. “After the fall of the Roman Empire there was a great religious revival among the nations. The Middle Ages saw Europe tilled with monasteries and nunneries, where enormous numbers of people took vows of celibacy and renounced all home and family ties'. “Instead of helping the Church this produced the very opposite effect, and actually paved the wav for the Reformation ! Large masses of the people who were most attached to the Church led celibate lives, and left no descendants, whereas the independently minded who were not so devoted to the Church were not limited in their reproduction. It is now felt that the interests of the race demand that the best should marry and have large families, and that any restrictions upon reproduction should apply to the worst rather than the best. “It is, of course, useless to expect that the worst would take vows of celibacy or keep them; and the realisation of this has led to all sorts of impracticable schemes to prevent or restrict their reproduction by compulsory means. “The great trouble about all these schemes, apart from their impracticability, is that they aim simply to prevent degeneration. They aim to prevent the race from moving backward, but do not help it to move forward. The only hope of producing higher and better Wpes of men and women lies in the multiplication of the better elements of the population. “There is one very promising feature about the present situation, and that is that the best are readily attracted by high ideals. Give them a new ideal, and* many will follow it, especially if they believe that duty points In the same direction. Depose ‘celibacy’ from tne high and com manding position she has occupied for so many hundred years, and put marriaoe’ there instead as the ideal to be held up before the best and noblest of the race. Marriage, with marriage vows as sacred as the former vows of celibacy. Nature demands this in the interests of the race. Tor the extreme helplessness of the human infant necessitates parental care tor very prolonged periods of time —in fact, at least from infancy to the beginning of adult hfe—and this involves the permanency of the marital tie on the part of the parents, especially where a number of children are produced.” At the present time, Dr Bell ,oes on to say, considerable alarm has been expressed at the apparently growing disin‘Ciuiation of American women to bear children, and a cry has been raised acainst what people call “Race Suicide.” Whatever the cause, it is undoubtedly the fact that m America the children of the foreign-born are increasing at a greater rate than those of the native-born, and the position-is sufficiently grave for serious consideration. He continues: , The desire to avoid maternity is a caaracteristic associated with lack'of offspring, and can not therefore go on increasing indefinitely in a community. Its natural tendency is to die out through tack of offspring to inherit it, leaving the more fertile part of the communitv alone to propagate the race. “Reflection therefore leads to the somewhat startling conclusion that even wholesa.e abstention from children so far from -evening the fertility of the community a f A whole, will eventually increase it in«tead Actual race suicide will not result from such a cause alone, so Jong as the race is left to itself to work out its own destiny. “.Just consider the case of a race of people in which the women show a disinclination for motherhood, surrounded by prolific immigrant races ready to take its place; then, of course, there'would be serious danger of the native race being displaced by the immigrants. The immigianri mignt absorb the native race instead of the native race absorbing the immigrants; but such a result would be due to the presence of the competing races and not due directly to the operation of natural causes within the race itself “In order to appreciate this imagine our native race to be placed upon an island protected by suitable immigration Jaws from competition with other races Then it becomes obvious that the sentiment in favour of avoiding the production of offspring must necessarily diminish m process of time, on account of the lack of offspring to inherit it, and that the opposite sentiment of a desire to have children will grow, and ultimately become predominant, because each succeeding generation jvill be composed exclusively of the descendants of the neople who had children. If the desire for offspring is an inheritable characteristic, and it 'certainly is, then, of course, the next generation will inherit it from their parents to a certain extent; whereas, there will be no descendants at all to inherit the characteristics of those who abstained from offspring.

“We have placed the people upon an | islan-a, ana protected uiem. irom mtertereuoe n-um oilier races, so as to cave tnem to tnemseives to carry on their dyes in tneir own way, as tuey ties ire. "Some ol tiiese people love little children, and •desire to nave children of tneir own. Others loon upon ennarexi as nuisances, perhaps necessary evils ior the continuance ol tue lace—out wny should tuey be bothered witn them wnen they don't want tnem I Let others nave tnem n they want them, but leave them alone. Weil—let them nave tneir desires. “net those who desire children have them, ana those who don't, nave none, and see now it will all work out. “Now, does it not become at once evident that so mag as any of the people desire onspnng and have them, complete race suiciue is impossible, borne offspring will be prouuceu and a second generation will appear. “ ‘'Suppose, for example, tile boom against maternity reaches suen proportions that oy per cent, of the population decide to have no children—anu surely this is an extreme case—will the race die out'; No —not immediately, at all events. There will be another generation composed exenuriveiy oi tile descendants of the one per cent, who desire to have children, -the whole of the next generation will be composed oi their children ; and there will be no’ descendants at all oi the other 99 per cent. Let us revisit the island after the original population has passed away. Yve find the population now only a fraction of what it was before; and the question naturally arises: Will the population continue to diminish at eacn successive generation until actual race suicide results ? “It is not to be supposed that the sentiment against maternity will disappear in one generation. The second generation will therefore undoubtedly continue to be divided upon the question of maternity, some wishing to have children, others not; but the proportion desiring children will necessarily be greater, on account of heredity, than in the original population; for the whole of this second generation are descended from the one per cent, who desired offspring, whereas the 99 per cent, who did not desire them left no descendants. "There seems to hr* 'no escape irom the conclusion that in this second generation more than one per cent, of tile people will de-ire children, and less than 99 percent. will abstain from their production. Therefore the proportion of the second generation who will have children will be greater than in the first, and the proportion opposed to maternity will be less. “Thus m each succeeding generation the proportion who desire children and have them will increase, and the proportion avoiding maternity diminish, with the net result that each succeeding generation will be more fertile than rile last. The desire to avoid maternity will die out to a great extent on account of die lack of offspring to inherit it. .. The spirit of race suicide will itself commit suicide and leave a more fertile race than betore. “The only thing that could prevent such a result would be the admission ol immigrants during the period of declining birth rate. “This, indeed, is the critical period in the history not only of our hypothetical islanders but of every nation im iLarly situated. When, therefore, a nation reaches a. stage where it finds its own birth rate declining and immigrants with a much larger birth rate flocking into the country, tile time lias come lor very serious consideration as to the means to be taken for sell-preservation. “The United States is to day in this critical position. The birth rate of America is declining ; the spirit of avoiding maternity is on the increase; and the immigrant races are increasing at a much greater rate than our own. The only hope for a truly American race lies in the restriction of immigration.”

THE AftIERIOAN RELIGIOUS FrtisSS UN YOUTHFUL MURALS.

Like Isaiah thundering, against idolatrous Jerusalem, Savonarola denouncing tire profligacy of Florence, or John Knox calling down the wrath of God upon the head of Queen Mary Stuart, so the voices of religious leauers have always been heard when tendencies in-dress and conduct have seemed to reflect a decline in, or an indiiierenco to, monos. The dances young people dance inese days, the garments young women wear or refrain from wearing, and all the other outward signs on the “new freedom’' felt by the generation growing to manhood and womanhood m these after-war years have occasioned grave forebodings on the part of teachers and legislators and social workers and editors, and have even been the cause of serious discussion among the young people themselves. Preachers and priests and rabbis have denounced some of these tendencies in the pulpit and through the press, and the editors of religious papers have expressed their views in no uncertain terms. To discover just where the Church and the Synagogue stand on this much-discussed question, we have collected the views of religious editors of all sects and of ail sections, and here present them to our readers, just as last week the college presidents and the spokesmen for the youth in our colleges had their hearing. There seemed to be a roughly even division last week between those who saw a real menace in present day tendencies among the young, and those who could see no cause lor great anxiety. The religious editors, in so far as they comment at all, are more nearly unanimous in agreeing that there is a peril. Lilt it must be admitted taat many of the more important church weeklies published in the great Eastern cities and representing large, constituencies of educated and progressive churchgoers do not devote much editorial space to the subject. Moreover, a considerable proportion of the denunciation of modern dances comes from

representatives of denominations opposed to dancing and worldly amusement on general principles. The Catholic Church, from the Pope down, it is interesting to note, seems to be thoroughly alarmed over present fashions in dress, and the Baptist and Methodist papers, it is equally notable, take the occasion to denounce wholeheartedly the modern social -dance. In Christian church circles the recognition of an evil tendency is followed by a search for a cure, and organisations have been launched in more than one great denomination to help bring the young people under better influences. In many cases, the girl problem is seen to be one for women to solve, and Christian women are undertaking its solution. Better forms of amusement, better examples, and better instruction in the home are called for by many religious editors. The religious journals which find little cause for anxiety in present tendencies in ■youthful dress and conduct are in a decided minority among those who send us editorials or other expressions of opinion. Their views will be stated at the outset, to be followed by the louder chorus of warning and denunciation. The Jewish weeklies seem to find less to criticise in connection with dances and femme attire than their Christian contemporaries. For instance, the editor of The American Israelite (Cincinnati) emphasises his disagreement with the college editor who speaks of certain dances and costumes as popularising indecency.” “Except foi the shortness of the skirt.,” ho says, “ball costumes show little change during my time, which has been a pretty long one. The present generation of women are perhaps more sophisticated than were thengrandmothers, but that they are less virtuous or less clean-minded, I do not for a moment believe.” Similarly, The American Jewish World (Minneapolis) is inclined to think that many people's imaginations have been “unduly overwrought over the matter.” “There is nothing indecent or vulgar about the new dances,” so far as this editor can discover, “if they are indulged in by the right people in the proper place and proper environment.” Whatever immodesty and indecency does occur is attributed to the character of the young people concerned and the place—that is, dance flails of a certain type. We can not expect to keep everybody perfectly moral, and the only safeguard is for parents to see that their own children do not visit places of a questionable character. In this way, and in this way only, we are told, “the evil will be reduced to a minimum.” The Jewish Advocate (Boston) looks on dancing as a fine art which is sometimes abused. The editor believes “that education and not alarm will cure tlie evil of indecent dancing.” He feels that the parents and the teachers together can handle the situation and that any preaching by ministers on the subject will be of no use. The Young Men’s Hebrew Association naturally has its social problem, but it believes that it is solving it, at least as far as the dance is concerned. The Y.M.H.A. Bulletin, of New York, thinks that modern jazz furnishes good rhythmic music under proper supervision. At the association dances it is said to be occasionally necessary to reprimand young ladies, and occasionally to caution a foxtrotting couple. In general, ‘objectionable dancing or dress is a rarity at the association, and when it appears it is “never permitted to progress beyond the first’ minute.” Turning to the unalarmed Christian periodicals, we find modern critics of dancing compared by the American Church Monthly (New York), to the elder son iti the Parable who would not go in to the dancing and festivities in honour of the returned prodigal—“ They refuse to sympathise with pleasure in any form.” In the opinion of this representative of the “high-church” element among Episcopalians, “dancing is a legitimate form of amusement for Christians, and it may quite properly be accompanied by lively and alluring music.” Tire editor of this paper also refuses to allow himself to become unduly excited about the way in which women dress to-day. He recognises that fashions differ' from day to day, and that what is proper in one land is improper in another. As to ,oine of the most extreme fashions, it is well to “use moral suasion wherever we can,” but, after all, “there is really no cause for a panic. In a.nv case our most formidable ally is the Northern winter. God help those who live in the South!” Another spokesman for Episcopalians, Bishop Gailor, of Tennessee, who is now presiding Bishop of the Church in America, exhibits a similar calm. The world, he says, “is not a bit more wicked than it has been several times before.” And he sees a sign of vast improvement in the fact that “people do openly today things that they used to do in secret.” He defends both the young men and the young women, saying in a Baltimore American interview : “The girls of to-day are as fine and as high-minded as any girls ever were I have yet to meet one who seems tainted ill the least degree by what they tell me is the tendency of the age, which is toward too much freedom with their male friends. “If there have been, and, of course, there have been, extremes in dress and deportment to be noticed in tlie young females of our species, it is reasonable to suppose that these are exceptional. There are always persons who exaggerate a style and manner. Bishop Gailor is as little impressed by the charges made against the young man of to-day. These are his words : “Frankly, I don’t believe that he has thus derogated from his father’s habits and principles. I base my judgment of him on wliat I know from my own experience.” At almost the other end of the doctrinal scale we find the Unitarian Christian Registrar (Boston) objecting to any indictment of the rising generation. There are. of course, “a few gilded youths,” but they are very few in comparison to the

large numbers of “young people in all our communities who are courteous, studious, orderly, mid in their attitude idealists.” It might be a. good thing “if the critics would pause a moment and recall their own youth, their love of .good clotlies, entertainment, sparkle, and sunshine.” This generation, concludes the editor, is r.o worse than the one in which the elderly critics grew up. Another Boston weekly, The N ew-Cnurch Messenger, also withholds its condemnation. It admits that there is some improper dancing, but “decent people will dance decently, and indecent people will dance indecently, whatever steps may happen to be in vogue.” The thing to do. with young people, it seems to this Swedenborgian paper, is not to try to prevent them from dancing, but “to instil so firmly in their hearts the Christian standard of purity that whatever they do will even unconsciously be an embodiment of it.” Turning now to the large, number of religious papers which confess themselves seriously alarmed over the habits, amusements, and clothej preferred by young people nowaday?, we note first an extremely emphatic expression of opinion from Dr Francis E. Clark, who speaks with authority as founder and president of the Christian Endeavour Society, the largest and most important interdenominational Protestant young people’s organisation. In a full page article in The Christian Endeavour World (Boston), Dr Clark denounces the modern “indecent dance” as “an offence against womanly purity, the very fountainhead of our family and civil life.” It seems to Dr Qark no longer open to question, “that many girls who call themselves respectable so dress or undress themselves as to be more acceptable to the amorous embraces of the men. If this does not call lor reprobation and reform, I do not know what does. A very general opinion among Church editors is summed up in the declaration of The Mission Herald (Plymouth, N. C.), an Episcopalian diocesan organ, that “there is an ugly, sinister wave of'immorality sweeping over the country.” In the dio'cese of Chicago, the editor of the official organ of the diocese quotes with entire confidence in her accuracy, a statement of a social worker at a church meeting to the effect that dance evils are rife among the high school students of Chicago. These evils prevail especially among the young people of the so-called “better classes.” For instance, it is said, a common question heard when a j'oung girl is asked to a dance in these better circles is, “With or without?’’ meaning with or without corsets! The dance evil, declares the editor himself, is now general, has become a national problem, and should*;.be recognised and dealt with promptly. The editor of The Southern Churchman (Richmond) is inclined to think that a certain unnamed student of social problems was right when he said recently : “I believe there never was a time when more men were living straight than there are to-day and never a time when more women were going to the devil. We are beginning to get a single standard of morals, but we are getting it low instead of high.” There are facts which point this way, the Episcopalian editor believes. And on one, he observes, “can set down the limits to which the disintegration which begins with social immodesty may extend.” The Southern Churchman calls attention to an appeal sent to the church authorities by a number of churchwomen of New York who advocate an organisation to discourage fashions involving an “excess of nudity” and “improper ways of dancing.” Among the signers are Mrs Pierpont Morgan, Mrs Borden Harriman, Mrs Henry Phipps, Ms James Roosevelt, Mrs William D. Sloane, and Mrs E. H. Harriman. The Woman’s Auxiliary of this denomination feels there has been a “breakdown of high moral standards which is manifested “particularly in the habits of our women, young and old. as shown in insidious conversation, profane language, indecent dress, improper dancing, excessive drinking, gambling, and a general indifference to reasonable safeguards of proper conduct.” This organisation’s executive board calls for the formation of local committees to arrange: (a) Plans to arouse parents to the necessity for strengthening and safeguarding the ideals of American homes by maintaining Christian standards of iife and training for the children of this generation. ~ “ (hi For meetings with mothers and other thinking women for the consideration of the things tolerated to-day in society, with a view to eliminating the obnoxio-us features, such as indecent dress, the painting of faces, excessive drinking, improper dancing, joy-riding, vulgar conversation, swearing, etc., etc. “ (c) For meetings with girls where the influence and conduct of women may be discussed in a sympathetic and intelligent man ner. “ (d) For presentation of the evils of vulgar and- suggestive moving pictures, promiscuous dance halls, immoral plays and literature—either in book or magazine form—for the purpose of forming sufficient public opinion to guard against these things and to provide wholesome and attractive recreation and amusement. “ (e) For the formation of influential groups of women and girls in every community who refuse to sanction “ those tilings which, according to Christian teaching, lower the standards of iife and thought.” The Catholic Church is far from being unmoved by the new ways of dancing and dressing. “Dancing is not wrong,’’ remarks Truth (Brooklyn, organ of the International Catholic Truth 'Society), “but many of the modern dances are aecidedlv off colour.” Speaking of the modern dance. The Catholic Telegraph (Cincinnati) says that there is not a. feature of it that is not suggestive of sin. Indeed- - “There are, in fact-, some features so flagrantly violative of public decency that they would not have been tolerated m a. free-for-all dance hall by the police as recently as twenty years ago. The music

is sensuous, the embracing of partners—the female only half-dressed—is absolutely indecent; and the motions—they -.re su.n as may not be described, with any respect ior propriety, in a family newspaper. Suffice it to say that there are certain mouses appropriate for such dances; but those houses have been closed b\ law. the editor of The Catholic Transc-rint (Hartford) feels th.it ‘‘fathers and mothers as well as the Church have reason to look to the fashions both in dress and in dance that now obtain among their sons and daugirters.’ ‘the Catholic Daily American Tribune (Dubuque, Iowa) considers that its own stand on the question of preterit-day dances and costumes is plainly ie\ ea.ed by the following titles taken at random from some of its recent issues: “Hits Improper Dances”; Nasty Diess and Dances”; “Protest Against Dress Indecency ; Dancing Society Wars oil Slummy”; “Want Women to' Adopt Standard Dre?s” ; “Modern Dance Leads to Spiritual Death”; “‘See-More’ Waists”; Immodest Dress Bar to Sacrement” - “Cities Curb Freak Dances”; “Immorai Craze Leads Officials to- Act in Indiana”; "No Shimmying for Children” ; “East St. Louis Bans Freak Dances” ; “Immodesty Dresses Condemned by Women” ; “Girls, Listen to Common Sense and Good Taste,’’ etc. Some of the modern dances ‘are an expression of animalism and lead to spiritual death,” we read in this Catholic daily which quotes with evident approval the recent remark of a Missouri legislator that mothers are helping to send tneir daughters t-o hell by permitting tnem to walk the streets almost in a. state of nakedness.”