Among ourselves

Title

Among ourselves

Language

English

Year

1938

Rights

In Copyright - Educational Use Permitted

Fulltext

WOMAN’S HOME JOURNAL Manila, January, 1938 Among Ourselves... SEVERAL months ago, Margaret Culkin-Banning, in a widely circularized article which appeared in the Readers’ Digest wrote a very strong plea for chastity. In it she showed her young readers why it paid to be “pure in body as well as in heart.” Wisely she did not put on that obnoxious, intolerable, holier-than-thou attitude which would have angered rather than convinced. She spoke, not from the religious point of view, not even from the strictly moral, but from the practical, the sociological, the psychological aspect of the matter. V/e do not know how much or how little we need the solid enlightening advice of Mrs. Culkin Banning. We like to feel that our young girls and our young boys, as well as our older people, are too highly imbued with the strong, decent ideals of our forebears, for us to be badly in need of this distinguished lady’s timely admonitions. However, a wise word here and there could never go amiss. Big cities always offer big temptations, some seemingly innocent at first, rides, shows, dances, that later, however, take on dreadful proportions which young hearts and minds might find hard to overcome. There is obviously only one piece of advice that one could give: resist the little temptations. This advice we give to all the young people who come to Manila, big-eyed with wonder at the bright things the city has to offer. Their parents have entrusted them with taking care of themselves,—they should not betray that trust. “Trust men and they will be true to you, treat them greatly, and they will prove themselves great.” A special message to our young girls is this—upon you depends the strength or the weakness of the coming generations. All that you do now will redound to the benefit or the discredit of your future children. Be true to yourself now, and the great men and noble women who will grow up as your offspring will respect your name forever. No one else can look after you more than yourself. Be an honest guardian, brave, strict, unflinching. There will come a time when, suddenly you will discover that the one whom you have been reserving the lovely gift of yourself has come. There will be no regrets then. * * * IT is distressing to hear about what is happening in Pampanga. The sit-down strike the tenants are making has gone several steps farther into harmful acts of terrorism and incendiarism. The versions are many as to what is the root of all these turmults. Some say it is discontent, pure and simple, on the part of the unjustly treated tenants, others that disgruntled politicians are back of the movement. Whatever the cause, it is up to the women to work to stop the havoc that is being wrought in these places and to prevent similar atrocities in other provinces. The Filipino woman, gentle and soft-spoken as she is, wields a great deal of influence on her men-folk. It is up to her now, in this crisis to use her gift of persuasion to convince the men that very little can be accomplished by force. Or has she given her consent to the angry movement? Or failed in giving timely advice ? The instrument called social justice is sometimes a slow moving machine, but that it moves steadily forward in our land is a fact not to be contested. Force cannot hasten its functioning rather, it may deter it. The ruthless burning down of canefields the brut al pulling up of crops can lead to nothing but destruction, misery and possible loss of life. Women of the Philippines, do not lie down on the job; tell your men that there are gentler, more civilized ways of settling even the bitterest scores. They will listen to you. They have always listened to you.

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