The Program of Moral Reform Our Mothers Propose

Edvick — And the cinema? What way is there to check this sweeping tide?

Widad — I believe mothers have grown very lax and indulgent, when what becomes them is firmness, and imposing their word on their children — permitting them to go to the cinema only where it is proper, and after making sure that the film is of the wholesome kind.

Sumayya — But my dear Widad, your children are still small (God let them grow!), and so you can speak in this tone, which we mothers know no longer succeeds with our children. The method of "forbidding" is no longer — educationally speaking — fit to treat this problem, and it is to be feared it will drive our children to lie to us and go in secret, on the principle that everything forbidden is desired. I tried it with my eldest son: there came a time, at a certain age, when he was going to the cinema three times a week; then came a time when he turned away from it of his own accord.

Edvick — What, then, is our duty as mothers?

Sumayya — Our duty is to work for the formation of a women's committee to reinforce the committee that has existed for years, to press effectively for the supervision of films.

Nazik — This point is very important, for the disgraceful films that are sometimes shown for six consecutive weeks, with the whole public flocking to them, make our brows sweat with shame. In my opinion this committee should draw its powers from the Ministry of Social Affairs, and should look for a practical way to carry out the censorship and apply the law, after the example of the advanced countries. And I insist that among the members of the committee should be the wife of the Minister of Social Affairs and the wife of the Director General, or whoever may stand in for her, so that responsibility is fixed in a strong and effective way.

And I believe, Nazik added, that we have another source of corruption besides the cinema — the "plages," on whose shores the ugliest moral spectacles are on display; and those responsible must be more vigilant in keeping watch and striking at whoever behaves scandalously.

Widad — Here use can be made of the secret morals police; once word of it spreads, and its severity with offenders is heard of, the rest will take fright and behave decently out of fear.

Sumayya — And the houses of prostitution? How long shall we keep silent while they remain a stain of shame — and in the heart of the capital?

Widad — The Society for Combating Prostitution must press hard and demand insistently that these houses be moved outside Beirut — that is, if there is no way of closing them for good, which would be the better course.

Nazik — But closing them leads inevitably to an increase of the clandestine houses, which are more dangerous and of graver consequence... And I have, finally, one important remark: the return to the religious teachings, which alone strengthen the virtues and the spiritual values, and so restrain from the committing of vices and evil.