COMING CHANGES

Wairarapa Times-Age, 17 November 1941, Page 3

COMING CHANGES

SPORT IN THE POST-WAR WORLD. PLEA FOR TOLERATION. Without doubt the close of the present struggle will witness significant changes, social and political, wisely based, let us hope, on experience thoughtfully weighed, writes the Marquess of Crewe in the “Sunday Times.” Some moral profiteers are already active. It is a singular fact that to some good people the amusements of their neighbours are more irritating than their defects of character or conduct. The war has harshly but inevitably curtailed many of these diversions, racing, fox-hunting, coursing and football. Some critics trust that these may not recover when peace arrives. Meanwhile they urge the arguments for complete repression. Racehorses consume some oats which might be given to poultry; a careless field across country may damage some young wheat or a field of seeds; football is the favourite vehicle for gambling among the working class. And so on, ignoring the value to the country of the horse-breeding industry and export, and the freedom claimed by all classes to enjoy air and healthy exercise. And yet it is fair profit to ask what part sports and games should play in the life of a people-tested and steadied by the experience of the war. Similarly with the moral profiteers of total abstinence. They do not hope for the advent of prohibition, which failed so dismally in America; but they argue that most of the cereals used for brewing and distilling ought to be kept as foodstuffs for livestock.