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Economic Debauchery Of Polynesians

By Friendly Troops

By ROBERT DEAN FRISBIE, well-known American Author.

AMERICANS who have lived for many years in the South Pacific are aware that, albeit relations have always been amicable, never before have the people of United States and New Zea land understood each other with the sympathy and fraternity that exist to-day.

Recently, while speaking to the chief medical officer of this island, I men tioned an act of generosity performed by the Junior Red Cross of Hawaii on behalf of some distressed children in the South Seas.

“That’s just like the Americans!” the doctor exclaimed. “They do things spon taneously. No one had asked those Hawaiian children for help, but when they heard that some children in the South Seas were in need they came to their aid with impulsive goodwill.”

“Yes,” I commented, “you’ll' find the Americans are good people when you know them well. They are not as avari cious as they are made out to be.” • T never found them that way,” the doctor affirmed. “I consider my own people in New Zealand much worse in that respect.”

Then, like the Alfonso and Gaston of bygone comics, we each recounted inci dents disparaging to our own country men, finally to disagree courteously and change the subject.

THE other side of the picture—the side, incidentally, that one seldom hears commented on by the New Zealand ers—concerns the harm United States troops are doing to the cultural and economic life of the South Pacific people

among whom they are stationed. A well-informed Hawaiian correspondent writes me:— “I understand that a few men in charge of construction in the South Pacific have been very wise in paying and caring for native workers, but others

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T* T Pr ° blem With money ’’ n 0 luch^Cultural 5, and^So P™°* ed ?s those that have been eroded hv H?f United StetA trL Tt S d k S y i h thellst vestfee of the hpaVftnfnirt Pnf? 4 nes i an wav S Hfp i<f na^^n^fnrpu^

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dec nning into what Tails thl f e n a heen state in which the niS nnitiirp leavtot the neonle in spiritual staJnftion P P state 0 stagnation.

If such is the case, their material welfare may be improved, according to the standards of western civilisation: they ma y have more canned bully beef and tess fresh fish, more motion pictures and tess native dances, more religion and less faith. It will be a change for the worse: but, because it seems inevitable, there is no point in deploring it. Here I am concerned only with an objective discussion. . . mHERE is, obviously more than one X viewpoint to the question of improving the economic status of a native people—namely, that of the natives themselves; that of the white settlers; that (in this instance) of the United States troops who are obliged to occupy

the islands; and, finally, the viewpoint of the disinterested observer.

An officer from one of the islands where United States troops are stationed told me that he was one of 14 soldiers who landed there when construction commenced. His face glowed with plea sure when he described how hospitably the natives had received them. For some months they had received no pay, but this did not affect the hospitality of the islanders, who brought them fruit, fish, and fowls, washed their clothes, cele brated with feasts and dances.

Then, with the coming of the main body of troops and regular pay-days, the picture changed overnight.

“To-day,” the officer stated, “the natives do not think in terms of less than a dollar: a dollar to wash a shirt, a dol lar for a string of shells, a dollar to climb a coconut tree and throw down a couple of nuts.

“And they are getting fastidious,” the officer went on, smiling with a sort of amused tolerance. “For instance, one day I handed a native friend a carton of ABC cigarettes—a present, mind you.

He eyed the carton for a moment, almost contemptuously, then handed it back, saying, ‘Thanks, but I smoke only Lucky Strikes.’ That same man, a few months before, had been glad to trade a dozen coconuts for a stick of twist tobacco.

“It’s that way with everything. They refuse to work their plantations, but expect to eat European food. They refuse to go fishing—and about their only handicraft is the making of cheap curios for the soldiers. But don’t blame them,” the officer concluded. “It’s not their fault. We’ve spoilt them and we take all the blame.” 1 REPEATED the officer’s story to a trader from the same island. He was inclined to be vindictive, and I

could not blame him, albeit his attitude was wholly selfish.

“Yes,” he growled; “they can take all the blame, but a lot of good that does us! X used to be the snuggest little island in the Group, but now it's gone to blazes. Listen here,” and then he went on to tell me how, formerly, he had bought eggs for 1/- a dozen, a fowl for 1/6, and all the fruit and coconuts and fish he wanted for a stick of tobacco.

He had paid his store boy £1 a month and his cook 10/-.

Now, eggs were 3d. each, a fowl 6/-.

There were no fruit, coconuts, or fish, because all the local produce went to the soldiers. His store boy had left to work for the Army, his cook, too.

“Why in blazes can’t these Americans leave well enough alone; pay ’em like we

used to pay ’em?” he wanted to know, “They’ve ruined business and they’ve ruined the natives, too!”

T>RIEFLY, it must be mentioned that JD the Government officials have done their utmost to control this spate of inflated values; but they have been pow erless to prevent soldiers, with their pockets full of money, and no place to spend it, from giving a native a dollar for a coconut, or five dollars for a fake curio. Moreover, these administrative officials are a people with a highly developed sense of democracy, and there fore are inclined to submit to the wishes of the majority of the people, What those wishes are was expressed by my neighbour’s wife, a woman from the same island. "When I asked her how

her people liked the American soldiers, she could not find superlatives enough for their praise.

The natives did not have to work in the plantations any more, she said. They did not have to make copra or ship oranges and bananas. There was plenty of Army work, with big pay. There were free talkies twice a week. .When the young people gave a dance, ‘ the Armv men threw them “hundreds of dollar bills. When the soldiers walked through the village they handed out candy and chewing gum to the women and children cigarettes to the men. A soldier often paid as much as five dollars to wash a bundle of clothes, a dollar for a dozen oranges, 10 dollars for a hula skirt worth not over a dollar. On her island, every day was a feast day and no one was in want. ‘Yes,” I thought; “but to-morrow, when the troops are withdrawn, will every day be a feast day and will no one be in want? You have acquired a cham pagne appetite through the generosity of your friends. When you are obliged to return to your old way of life you will find your tastes perverted. Life will be repugnant to you when you go out to clear your long-neglected plantation, to repair your fishing canoe, to re-thatch your hut.

You will want to know why your own Government cannot spend its money on you as lavishly as did the United States soldiers. You will hate your old way of life. It will require many years to undo the harm caused by the unwise genero sity of a few kind-hearted soldiers.”

And when the soldiers return to their homes they will tell their people that the stories of primitive hosnitality in the South Seas are myths. They will state that the Polynesians are no better than the beggars of Cairo; only a few of them will realise that the soldiers have reaped a harvest of mendicancy because thev have sowed the seeds of extravagance.