Part 2 (1/2)

When mother and father were young, Sunday was a day set aside for church-going and dull and decorous behavior. Games and fun of all kinds were laid away, everybody put on their best clothes and sat around and talked, or took quiet walks with an overhanging air of seemly propriety.

To-day there are tennis and golf and baseball games and dinner-parties and gambling at the bridge-table, in which mother and father partic.i.p.ate along with the rest.

It used to be considered improper for a girl of good family to go out at night to any kind of party without being accompanied by a chaperon.

Nowadays, the girl who is obliged to take a chaperon with her wherever she goes, is liable to be laughed at by her up-to-date friends.

It was not so long ago that in any respectable community, a woman who painted her face, smoked cigarettes, drank c.o.c.ktails and gambled with the men, would have been considered a shocking spectacle of depravity that no self-respecting wife, or mother, could accept or tolerate.

Nowadays, the growing boy and girl have only to open their eyes to see women doing such things everywhere--as likely as not their aunts and cousins, or their own mothers.

Examples of this nature could be given in great variety, but enough has been suggested to show the trend. In another connection it will be interesting to discuss these manifestations in greater detail and reflect on their cause and meaning.

For the present, it is sufficient to indicate that the social customs have changed and are changing very materially. Under such conditions, it would not be natural for young people to be unduly impressed by them.

Such standards are so unstable and they differ so much to-day from what they were yesterday, and they differ so much in different circles and even in different families, that their force and importance are not very compelling. The authority of past customs has undergone a process of confusion and weakening, much the same as parental authority. There is less respect for it on the part of the new generation.

The same thing is true of traditions and public opinion. Traditions have been modified and lost sight of in the new movement, and public opinion on many questions is to-day so confused and indefinite as hardly to exist.

Some people still think that divorce and re-marriage is shocking. Other people thoroughly approve of divorce, and believe that when a marriage has proved unsatisfactory and objectionable, it is right and best to call it off and look for something better.

Some people think it wrong for young people to run to the picture-shows and see baby vampires and demoralizing examples of licence and misconduct; others are enthusiastic about the educational value of the movies and encourage their children to go as often as they like.

Some people disapprove violently of the way young people dance together and of the present att.i.tude of girls and boys toward one another; while others accept it as a part of the new era of emanc.i.p.ation and enlightenment which is all in the way of progress.

There is practically no real public opinion to-day on these, and many other similar questions. A diversity of individual opinions and notions has taken its place, which young people are more or less free to follow or ignore, as circ.u.mstances may determine.

Yet it is not so long ago that public opinion in most communities was a firmly established, vital force. It was generally recognized and carefully respected by anybody, who wished to be considered respectable.

Certain acts, certain kinds of conduct, were considered immoral, or shocking, or in bad taste and those who defied public opinion were made to pay the penalty. They were given the cold shoulder, cut off the visiting-list and made to feel the stigma of disapproval.

If a girl sneaked off alone with boys in the dark, or was caught smoking cigarettes--if a married man was seen consorting with a divorcee--if a woman drank highb.a.l.l.s and gambled and broke up a happy home--if any member of the community did any one of a number of things which were considered improper, or unworthy, or immoral, or dishonorable, public opinion was sternly in evidence, unquestioned and unquestionable, to judge and to sentence.

Young people learned to take account of this consideration, just as their mothers and fathers did. They grew up with respect for it. In the new generation the thing itself has lost greatly in consistency and force, and the young people see no reason to be much concerned about it.

In the fourth group, are included the laws and regulations of const.i.tuted authorities. For the most part these find their chief representative in the policeman, with the jail and law-court, as a background behind him. About the only change in this influence lies in the mental att.i.tude of the average individual.

A generation ago, people who got arrested were usually thieves, or drunkards, or crooks and criminals of some kind. To be a law-breaker and in the clutches of the police was something that a reputable citizen shuddered at. The police were the guardians of all good people, majestic, respected and a little awe-inspiring.

Nowadays, people of all sorts and kinds are constantly getting into trouble with the police, and getting arrested, and being hauled to court and fined before the same bar of justice as the crooks and drunkards. It is usually in connection with automobile driving. They are law-breakers--they know it and are caught at it.

And since the prohibition laws have gone into effect, another crop of law-breakers has sprung up on every hand. Deliberately and defiantly they disregard the law and scoff at it.

In addition to this matter of the police, there is a growing tendency on the part of the average person to question the worthiness and integrity of officials and representatives of government, all along the line.

Aldermen, commissioners, mayors of cities--even senators of the United States--are frequent objects of mistrust, of sneering disrespect.

Political scandals and corrupt deals in high places are commonplace topics in any community.

So young people, looking about and absorbing ideas, under these conditions, are inclined to have a lessened respect for const.i.tuted authorities and the laws.

Above and beyond this, having a deeper significance and effects that are more intimate and constant and far-reaching, is the change which has been taking place in the influences of the fifth and last group--Sunday school and church--the force of religion.

This is such a delicate subject, so close to the hearts of so many people and having so many variations and degrees in different individuals, in different families, in different communities, in different churches, that it is extremely difficult to discuss. It is largely a matter of private sentiment, of vague personal feelings for which the average person is unable to find adequate expression. No sooner is the subject broached than the individual mind takes refuge in a defensive att.i.tude. As it does not intend to be disturbed in its own spiritual att.i.tude and beliefs, it is ready to seize the first opportunity to raise objections.