AN ANOMALY.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 8841, 30 January 1907, Page 2

AN ANOMALY.

' TO Tffß EDITOR. Sir, —On the grounds of modesty, and lest a glimpse of the human animal in its nude state should have a demoralising effect on its fellows, and the rising generation in particular, people desirous of bathing, even at a distance from possible spectators, and even among their own »ex in enclosed bathing places, are compelled by the authorities to endure tne discomfort of wearing clothing, leaving nothing visible but head, arms and feet. Lest the pictorial representation of the human animal in a nude or semi-nude state should wound the instinct of modesty, vendors of indecent post-carda have been prosecuted by the authorities ; yet on visiting the statuary room in your Museum I notice that the powers that be are not at all scrupulous about the moral susceptibilities of the thousands of all ages that visit the institution,. for, although I have seen the statuary in most parts of the British Dominions, I have never seen such an intensely rude display as that at Christ-church. Moreover, it is placed in a prominent position, and everyone must pass it to see the exhibits in the room beyond. If photos of the Museum statues were distributed among the public, prosecutions against the vendors would follow also. Wby do not the police prosecute, as they did in Auckland, when a pictorial representation of a statue was exhibited for sale some time a«*oP Does the law exempt museums? Perhaps it is Art. If so, let them all have a fling, and let sculptors make even more perfect representations of naked men, and let people bathe in the surf without their clothe 6, as Nature intended them to do. If two or three evils exist, why suppress one or two and leave the remainder? 'Hundreds, like myself, fail to find an explanation for the anomaly. —l am ,etc, v FIG LEAVES.