The ideals of society must be so changed that young men may not be weakened and corrupted by the passive acceptance of false standards of morals. One of the most important factors for the attainment of this end is the same education of boys and girls in the matters of sex, from which all secrecy, except that which is necessary from true modesty and refinement, shall have disappeared.

We as parents must recognize and help establish the truth of the law that the same virtue is needed in both sexes for the happy development of that family life on which the security of the race and the progress of civilization depend.

CHAPTER IV
RECREATION

The old maxim, “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy,” has been amplified in the past twenty-five years in many ways. All work and no play may make Jack a sick boy or a delinquent. If Jack plays not at all, neither can he work. What is true of Jack is true of all the members of Jack’s family and of all his relatives and neighbors. What is true of Jack is equally true of Jill. In order therefore to prevent dullness, illness, crime and delinquency, recreation has been provided in cities in homeopathic doses, at least, for Jack and Jill and their relatives and neighbors.

The interest in, and advocacy of, municipal recreational facilities for the people of the urban districts grew out of the knowledge that, unless wholesome recreation is provided, unwholesome recreation will be sought and found. There is no alternative.

Interesting figures have been compiled by Mrs. Max Thalheimer, Assistant Probation Officer of Syracuse, N. Y., which show that in one section of the city, where a public playground has been established, juvenile delinquency has decreased about 30 per cent. in two years. The neighborhood of the Frazer School Playground was selected for the study. The records show that during the year immediately preceding the establishment of the playground there were 127 cases from that neighborhood in the Juvenile Court, as compared with a total of but 180 cases for the two years which have since elapsed. The more time a child spends in well-directed play, the less time does he have to get into mischief.[[17]]

It has also been made clear that municipal prevention of arrests, illness, unemployment, inefficiency, is cheaper than municipal care of delinquents and criminals, of the sick, of those illy equipped to earn a livelihood, and of the vicious whose supervision entails such administrative expense and anxiety. Even motives of economy therefore may lead to this form of municipal enterprise.

Because the keynote to all modern social activity is prevention and because prevention is cheaper than cure always, recreation today is of public concern. That the public’s interest and belief in municipal recreation has been guided into faith in its educational advantages is due in no small degree to the patient work of women in behalf of amusement facilities. In their recreational work, women have also sought to make recreation serve the purposes of family unity, community spirit, and an increase in the real joy of living.

The mother’s appreciation of child psychology began in the days when she excused baby pranks often misunderstood by others with the statement that “he is just playing.” Realizing the persistence of that play instinct all through childish development, and never eliminated in fact, women have sought to direct play so that it may not react to the injury of the player. That is the explanation of all the intimate guarding of children from the moment they learn to walk and then on until the child leaves the protection of home.

Public recreation is but the effort to provide better and safer places for babies to play in, for growing boys and girls to combine the work they later desire with play or to make work their play, as they do instinctively themselves when conditions are suitable, and for adults to come together for that conviviality or stimulation through association which leaves no sting in additional family expenditures or ill health or misery. From all over the country we hear of women initiating and carrying through movements to provide play facilities for young and old.