The producers news. [volume] (Plentywood, Mont.) 1918-1937, 1919-10-31
B0ISFEVlSM BETTERS
LIVES OF WOMEN
WRITER AYERS
Terms Tale Of Making Mere
Free love Herd of Them
Canard.
Nv w. r. G00de

(Coupright 1919 by The Manchester
Guardian and The Chicago Tribune)
Manchester, England, Oct. 28.-
There are a number of ideas on Rus
STA which are popularity current in
west Europe and which have aroused
mass feeling against the bolsheviki.
From what source some of these have
sprung into being it is difficult to dis
cover. Others are based on actual
facts.
1t is said and printed that the
Jews are bolsheviks and that the
bolsheviks are Jews.
It should be borne in mind that
throughout the Czaristic regime Jews
were to be found in every revolution
airy movement-it was their only
way of protesting against cruelties
practiced on them-and in this last
revolution there were bound to be
Jews.
In the Office of the government, it
would be absurd not to look for men,
bers of the race in Russia which has
always valued education and culture
qualities that are of first import
ance in a new regime.
SEES MORE RUSSIANS
But wherever saw Jews there al
so l saw Russians in immeasurably
greater number and l came to the
conclusion that in all fairness the
utmost that can be said is that Jews
are found officially among the boil
sheviks in greater proportion than
their race bears to the entire popula-
ton of Russia. That is, however, a
very different proposition from the
one popularity believed-that Jews
and bolshevik are convertible terms.
But that statement sticks and it
has produced dire results-especially
in the south. In districts overrun by
Demikine, Petlura and the Poles, de-
structive attacks and pogroms on the
Jews have been almost the order of
the day based on statement that
where you find Jew there you will
find a bolshevik.
Again it is blieved that the church
is prosecuted in Russia. AS trav-
eled was struck by the frequency of
church bells calling to service. Meth
err in village, town, nor city through
which | passed, or in which | stopped
did see single damaged church..
Damage to Churches
I had photographs of Jaroslav,
where considerable damage to
churches Of that beautiful town had
been done in fighting between Whites
and Reds, but | did not go there. In
Moscow as ! previously said, grand
church buildings are intact. Indeed
when the government was at Petro-
grad, rurnor came that the Basil
cathedral at Moscow had been de-
stroyed. Mortified at this Lunachar-
sky, commissary of education and
art, resigned at once only to find lat
er on that the rumor was false.
There is now no state church. All
forms and creeds are tolerated but
their maintenance depends on the
faithful and not on the state. The
Opoes-priests-ar bitterly hostile
to BolsheVism but so far as | could
judge they are unmolested.
A specific act of the Bolsheviks is
perhaps the best guide to their atti-
tude toward religion. One of the
strongest popular beliefs was that
the bodies of certain saints and holy
men remained interrupted and in
perfect preservation in their Shrines.
These shrines became the recipients of
that religious adrotion of which the
Russian peasant alone among the
populations of Europe seems capable.
Help No Religion
In the presence of commissioners,
church dignitaries, local officials and
the populace certain of these shrines
were opened and as was to be expect
ed the people We're shown that their
belief had no foundation. The result
in the minds of the simple fervent
people can better be imagined than
described. Speaking generally, the
Bolsheviks are contemptuously toler-
ant to any form of religion which
claims the right of existence but no
help of any kind is given.
But perhaps the belief which most
wildly excited feeling against bolshe-
vism was that due to stories of the
naturalization of women. This was
supposed to be the last expression of
the socialist intention of breaking up
the home and marriage tic and in
shutting a state of proElscuous free
love. may remark at once that in
no country where | have been did
the story create so much astonish-
ment and amusement as in Russia.
The best disproof was the visible
condition of the women The home
life goes Gil in the country among the
peasants. as before In towns like
OSt4ov,. Realities, NciiI;ip, l.uki and
Moscow. the family life cont inues, and
one saw constantly whole families:
taking an airing on the buulcvarus in
the geological gardens ;,rA on Sunday
in the >hiilrcn's thcatcr..
STORY is (an.!.d
Ilc story, at any rate. can lie dis
cartlcd, and with it goes the free love
canard. Marriage i: Il civil function,
but no hinGrarcc is placed in til"
way Of Il further religious ceremony
should the parties desire It. And tn.
Russian peasant or WORKER marrieS
young. ="
But the hardest blow is dealt
againsts this free love belief by the
following fact: There it to all appear
anccs no open prostitution in Mos
COW. That remark is nor singular to
me; it had previously been made BY
Frazier Hunt of the Chicago Tri-
bune, who passed from Russia thru
Helsingfo.s nlole than two months
before / entered.
Improved conditions and pay of the
workers--inen ard Wonlnn-removc
one OF she CHEF causes OF prcstitu-
ton, the economic one, while the