Despite war clouds, there’s hope for permanent peace

This column first appeared in the Victoria Daily Times on Sept. 9, 1939. I listened to a radio play recently portraying the case of a man who had spent 15 years in prison, during which time he had read books, magazines and newspapers and listened to the radio, becoming so wellacquainted with the human family that when his time came for release, he refused to come out.

He said he had no desire to mingle with his fellow men, knowing their cruelties, their stupidities, their vanities. He had become a true isolationist.

Now, all the people who feel like this are not in jail. Certainly, the newspapers of today carry appalling stories of man’s inhumanity to man — the train wreck in Nevada, that deliberately planned murder, with 20 innocent people hurled to death in the river; the grim revelations made in the Irish outrages in England; the continued miseries of the people who are deprived of their rights as citizens; the pilling up of war preparations, hatred and suspicions; even the mutilation of incendiary fires in our own province of British Columbia.

All these, and many more, convince us that the present era has to have a change or we are doomed to destruction.

Today, I met an old friend from the East who worked for women’s suffrage and other causes so dear to our hearts 25 years ago, but has become a pronounced isolationist, and taunted me with the futility of our efforts then to raise the status of women.

“Look at women now,” she said, “eating and drinking and amusing themselves. Look how they have adopted the drinking habits of the European countries. Canadian women could have sobered this nation. Do you remember the lovely speeches we used to make about women’s love of beauty, love of home, love of children?

“‘Women, to whom the Creator in His wisdom, delegated the care of the race in its helpless years, have declared war on all the enemies of mankind! God made mothers because He could not be everywhere at once!’ Do you remember that when we got this far in the speech there was not a dry eye in the crowd?”

I remembered, and like Ebeneezer Scrooge, when the Ghost of Christmas Past confronted him with the scenes of his past life, I begged her to “give over.”

My friend, the isolationist, had been sitting on the grandstand and looking on. She prides herself on her detachment from life. She does not disguise her contempt and pity for those of us who are still struggling.

So we argued. I contended that no endeavour is in vain. Life is a winding road. Progress follows a wavy line, like a fever chart, and while we are here we must struggle upward. Anything is better than sitting by the dead ashes of yesterday’s fire.

But I will confess to a great feeling of discouragement when I read a statement credited to one of our eastern statesmen, and supported by other people who should know better. He was speaking of the Japanese situation, and declared that all the Japanese people in Canada should be deported as a protest against the insults offered to British subjects in Tientsin.

I found this much more discouraging than even the train wreck or the incendiary fires, which no doubt were caused by maniacs. But this statement was given out by a man who is a prominent member of one of our great churches. The Japanese people in Canada have about as much to do with affairs in Tientsin as the Irish people in Canada have to do with the outrages in England.

The whole idea of reprisals is definitely medieval. Christ came to establish a better way of living.

Apart from the immorality of a reprisal, there is its overwhelming stupidity. At a time when the world is sick unto death of hatred and violence, our great concern is surely to foster every trace of international friendship.

I have before me a newspaper that is edited in Vancouver by a second generation of Japanese, many of whom are graduates of the University of British Columbia. It is a creditable publication in which these young people voice their desires and ambitions.

There is an appealing article, by Hide Hyodo, which tells of the happy days of the Canadian Japanese, when opportunities for contacts with other races are many.

“Classmates and teachers,” she says, “are alike kind and friendly, and close friendships result. But when graduation is over, the daily contacts dwindle, because of economic conditions. Fortunately there are several organizations which continue the spirit of the schools, of friendship, fellowship and fair play.

“The churches and other cultural groups have programs of activity welcoming people of all races. While there are friends there is hope, and we must prove that we are worthy of the support of these friends.”

So speaks a young Japanese, hungry for friendship, and these are the people our eastern statesman would send back to Japan.

In spite of war clouds and threatenings, foolish talk and crises, life continues to bear golden fruit. Humanity still has hopes for a permanent peace. The idea for a new sort of union has broken out in many places at once, which shows that it pushed up naturally and in response to a great need.

Union Now is the name of one book that proposes a union of all democracies, the United States, Great Britain, Scandinavia, the Netherlands and Switzerland, with a common assembly to regulate trade, currency, communications and foreign affairs. The union would be so strong no nation would be likely to attack it, for it would cover half the earth and control two-thirds of the world’s trade. The door would be open to other nations, and it may be that in this way lies peace, for the dictatorships, too. Free from the dread of war and the intolerable burden of armaments, what a world we could build.

The plan will succeed if there comes with it a new spirit of brotherly love, not only to “live and let live,” but to “live and help others to live,” following the teachings of the New Testament.

This new scheme might come to naught, or might be the light gleaming through the encircling gloom.