OUR  CIFINLIDIRIEIN

What about

policemen ?. .

wet 9

LAST SUMMER I heard of sev-
eral mothers who didn’t take their
children to a picket line because
“it showed the policeman up in
a bad light,’ and the children
would cease to think of him as a
friend. Although, as I pointed out
last week, it is not a good idea to
take children to such a picket
line; this reason is not valid.

This is one example of the kind
of problem parents are often
pushed into facing when they are
not entirely truthful with their
children.

It’s true that many books on
child care stress the fact that
children should be taught that
policemen are big, brave and won-
_derful. We are supposed to tell
our children that policemen in
general adore little children and
spend all of their time doing
noble deeds, protecting citizens,
their property rights and free-
dom, out of sheer kindness.

This is the kind of thing par-
ents must watch for in the “book.”
because it simply isn’t true. Fur-
thermore, nobody believes it, not
even the people who write it.

Why then build up a _ phony
dream of shining knights for
children? It’s done, I suppose, so
children will not fear the police-
man, and will not hesitate in
asking his help, in crossing roads,
when lost, and so on. This is not
at all necessary. :

: * * *

CERTAINLY we do not want
cur children to fear policemen.
The policeman ‘should never be
used as a threat, nor should there
be any suggestion that he is a man
to fear. We may have to explain
over and over that the playmate
is quite wrong, policemen do not
take children off to jail.

Policemen should be presented,
quite impersonally, as men with
Many jobs. Just like the milkman
delivers the milk, the postman the
mail, so the policeman directs
traffic, helps children across the
street, is the man to go to when
lost and so on. These things can
be taken for granted quite “cas-
ually, and are, in fact, in many
homes. :

During the “cops and robbers”
stage children may tend to gla-
morize the police department, but
aside from explaining these fur-
ther jobs the policeman does, par-
ents needn’t add to the glamor.
As the child continues to grow he
will become aware that many
police acts, such as strike-break-
ing, evictions, breaking up meet-
ings, rudely pushing people
around, are not quite as kindly as
he had imagined. :

Having already laid down the

' foundation of the “job’’ aspect,
parents explain why the police-
man acts as he does. I think it’s
important for the child, who will

someday be an adult, to be told

that the policeman is an_ em-
ployee, and regardless of what he
is like as an individual, he does
the work he is hired to do. Thus
the “mean cop” will still help a
child cross the street, while the
smiling friendly one will help with
an eviction if he is supposed to.

When a child has been taught
that the kindhearted men in blue

are always right it must be a ter-
rible blow when they march in
and take daddy off for belonging
- to a union of his choice. There is
only one inference—daddy is bad,
and wrong.—VERA MORRIS.

Castle. Jewelers

Next to Castle Hotel
752 Granville MA, 8711
A. Smith, Mgr.

Watchmaker, Jewellers :

Curacao Stamp

Contrast

While the Netherlands was is-
suing this stamp—a special is-
sue to be sold at extra cost for
benefit of a hospital for crippled
children—in its West Indian
colony of Curacao, Dutch troops
were bringing the terror of war
to millions of children through-
out Indonesia.

‘INSECURITY GONE’

WVOIRISIE INIELSIEIN

REPORTS FROM

PAIRS

Peace poster arouses France

IN THE PAST people may have
been enthused about the splendor
of Paris for a variety of rea-
sons. Its beautiful buildings, its
food. its wines, its lovely wom-
en. Today there is an air of ex-
pectancy, a feeling which seems
to be in the very streets and
among people. In the Metro they
read their papers—and so often
it is L’Humanite they are reading.
Policemen walk in groups of
threes and fours, sometimes larg-
er groups (except those who
simply direct traffic). Beneath
their short capes swing the white
truncheons, :

A little while ago a famous
French artist, Andre Fougeron,
designed a magnificent poster for
peace and the people of Paris be-
gan to put up these posters on
walls —everywhere they could.
They were warned by the police
to stop. The brave ones continued.

Then Andre Houllier, a young
father, went out to nail up a post-
er. Without warning he was shot
by a group of policemen and kill-
ed instantly. This was in the dis-

Czech women better off

‘ MRS. FIALKOVA IS ONLY one of the 1,100 workers of
the Prague chocolate plant, but her story is typical. She started werk
ia the Orion chocolate plant in 1929—a period of dark memories
for her, when her husband was working for only three months of

the year.

Then she was paid a miserable .
87 crowns for 48 hours of hard, |

intense work. Half of this went
to the landlord in rent for her
“flat’—a small, dark attic, wet
and unhealthy. The rest was just
enough to keep her husband and
two children from starving.
Her family lived, week after
‘week and month after month on
a basic diet of chicory brew and
potatoes. They seldom ate bread.
and they never had butter, meat
or vegetables. :

On Sundays Mrs, Fialkova did
washing for the rich; her eve-
nings were spent washing stairs
in Prague’s residential district. In
Canada, some may find it hard to
believe, but she got no money for
this: she was paid in bits of hard
bread, in the scraps left over from
the tables of the well-to-do, and
occasionally —if lucky—she got
old well-worn shoes and clothes.

Then one day Mrs, Fialkova
was fired from ther job in the
chocolate plant and thrown on
the street. The trouble was not
that she was a bad worker, or
that the Orion’s shareholders
were getting smaller dividends (in
fact they were getting more each
year). She had been seen selling
“red” newspapers at the factory
gates.

* ck

TODAY THE ORION chocolate
plant bears the sub-title ‘“Naro-
dni- Podnik’’— National Enter-

prise. It is owned by the people.

and produces for the people, and
-all the old bosses are gone. Mrs.
Fialkova still works there, and
her wages are over 500 crowns a
week.

Her husband is again working
at his old trade—carpentering-—
after a gap of 15 years. Neither
of them fears the future. They
dent need to scrape and save fer
their old age, for they are both
fully covered by the new national
insurance scheme.

Today Mrs. Fialkova feels it a

definite cultural duty to herself —

to make regular visits to the
movies and the theater. It’s now

no longer a question of once a

year as a special holiday treat in
the cheapest row of a suburban

movie palace. She buys books now

and reads them avidly. |
When there is a musical or re-

‘Don’t have children‘

IN THE FRANTIC ballyhoo
accompanying the royal birth
newspapers have refrained from
publishing articles which might
seem to detract from the appar-
ent uniqueness of the Princess
Elizabeth’s accomplishment.

So it will come as a shock to
many people to learn that in
Bootle, a highly industrialized
North England town, doctors are
telling married women not to
have children,

In this town of 60,000 people the
infant death rate is more than
double the overall British rate. In
the last year a total of 185 Bootle
babies have died.

Biggest single factor, states a.
local physician, is the terrible
housing conditions. The only solu-.
tion, he said, was to tell all mar-
ried women to stop having babies
till the government gave permis-
sion to build houses for them.

cital circle at the Orion factory
she likes to sit and sing with the

-younger workers. She enjoys tell-

ing them about the “good old
times.” about strikes and lockouts
in the Orion, when machines
were more precious than men,
when there was “enough for
everybody” behind the shop win-
dows, and when starved women
workers collapsed over chocolate
packages,

Today, Mrs. Fialkova says,
there is nothing to fear. She
doesn’t believe there will be war.
She doesn’t conceive of any peo-
ple being deluded into believing
that war will better their lot or
bring them a solution of their
problems.

She has a burning faith in the
international brotherhood of all
working people, and has just or-
ganized a collection for the’
French miners in her department
of the factory. So far she has col-
lected nearly 2,000 crowns. “This
is an instalment of ‘Red Aid’,”
she says. “It helped to keep my
family alive for many years.”

trict of Paris known as St. Man-

dat. The day we left Paris the

Communist party had called for

a demonstration. We heard that

thousands were going to assemble.
* af *

ALONG THE Champs D’Elyees
the wealthy Americans, the busi-
ness men and those who live at
the embassies can see American
films, can eat at expersive res-
taurants—maybe for a little long-
er, but there is already the sound
of marching feet. ;

The people of Paris, to whom
the Arc D’Triomphe is still a sym-
bol and a rallying place, are gath-
ering their forces. They will de-
mand vengeance for their fallen
dead—for their brave people who
dare to nail up peace posters!—
who dare to demand cheaper
bread!—who dare to demand the
end of subservience .to the Mar-
shall Pian,

I asked a leading trade union-
ist in Paris what the Marshall
Plan was doing for French work-
ers. His reply showed in the dis-
gust upon his face even before he
spoke. The great silk industry,
‘one of the most widely known of
all the industries of France—
where is it now?

Every month more and more
women (who were the chief
workers in this industry) are dis-
missed. Raw silk is being sent to
‘America to be manufactured and
French mills and factories are

working only 40 percent of their -

capacity.

In a lingerie factory out of 110
women workers 40 were dismissed
last month. The workers spit
when the name Marshall is men-
tioned.

* x *

I WAS unhappy in Paris. Peo-
ple on the streets, in the metro,
in the cafes, recognize foreigners.
They would look at me with ob-
vious disdain and dislike. When-
ever possible I would try to talk
a little and say “American-non—
Canadienne!’ Then their expres-
sion would shape to a friendly
one.

When, because of the Marshall
Plan, the workers who worked 48

Why

EES 2 a om aero teens co cpa

Until the
Southam Co.
Negotiate and
Open the Door

hy Read
The Province?

THE DAILY PROVINCE IS THE ONLY
NEWSPAPER IN BRITISH COLUMBIA
PRODUCED BEHIND A PICKET LINE.

Vancouver Typographical Union No. 226

hours a week last January now
only work 25 to 30 hours a week
on starvation wages, can you won-
der they hate the American Mar-
shall Plan? —

Paris is beautiful, not because
of her ancient buildings, nor her
food, nor her artists, she is more
beautiful: than ever because she
is alive. The pulse of this city
beats with a strong rhythm—a
steady strong rhythm—the blood
of martyred. heroes and heroines
may yet stain the pavements but
the people of France know where
they are going—the sweet scent
of victory is in the air—DORISE
NIELSEN.

Effort to gag
auxiliaries hit

THE “REVENGE referendum”
by which CIO International
Woodworkers’ top brass sought
to silence free expression among
the women in its auxiliaries, is

_ being denounced by officials of

IWA Northern. Washington Dis-
trict 2.

The referendum, the IWA an-
nounced in Portland, carried by
a 2 to 1 vote. It gives the inter-
national executive board power
to révoke or suspend the charter
of any auxiliary that fails to toe
the line on policy.

“This is part of the drive of the

Fadling leadership to deny the.

rights of citizens to
the membership,” William Wal-
lace, District 2 vice-president,
charged. “It is an attempt to keep
women out of the common fight
for improved living standards and
world peace. It is a real job in
behalf of the employers.”

The referendum was drafted in
a mood of rage: and spite in the
dying stages of the annual IWA
convention in Portland, after the
Federated Auxiliaries convention
had demanded repeal of the Mar-
shall Plan and called for a re-
versal of the bipartisan war pol-
icy. The union itself took a pro-
Marshall Plan stand.

democratic

PACIFIC TRIBUNE — JANUARY 7, 1949 — PAGE 11