Volume 3 — Whiz Bang Editorials

“The Bull is Mightier Than the Bullet.”

Jazz life seems to agree with Americans. We not only live faster than our great- grandparents, but, on the average, we also live eight years longer. So says the Census Bureau.

Some day the centenarian will be the rule, not the exception. That will come as a result of health education, not from eating monkey glands.

A popular song had this refrain: “He may be old, but he’s got young ideas.” That appealed to popular fancy because it caught the subconscious mind, which probably knew what the census now reports:

That marriages of persons beyond fifty years of age are steadily increasing in numbers, already being frequent. Out of 100 American men and women, 80 are married before they reach 45, while 10 take the leap afterward and 10 remain single.

Divorces among those who have passed 45 are also becoming more common. This, however, is not making us a cynical people, for the census finds that the majority of divorced people try marriage at least a second time, many making three or four ventures.

Figures—which never lie, though liars often figure—show that the span of life is lengthening during the Jazz Age.

The strain at times gets on our nerves. Frequently one of the contestants howls and goes to pieces. But, on the average, the real effects of the Jazz Age will not show up until our descendants of one hundred years or more hence.

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They Named the Soap After Him

In Dr. W. A. Evans’ column in the Minneapolis Journal, “A. G. M.” writes, under the heading of the Artistic Sex:

“I have a son, seventeen years old, who is and has been for ten years, obsessed with a strange desire. He wants and feels that he ought to be a girl. Ever since he was seven years old, and probably before, although I had never noticed it, he has thought of himself as a girl, acted like one, desired to be regarded as a girl, and has, whenever he could worn girls’ clothing.

“His mother and I had a terrific struggle to allow his hair to be cut like a boys’, when he was six or seven years old. He withstood us until he was nearly ten, when, for the sake of peace, he consented to have it bobbed. Up to that time he had worn it in a great mass of curls, away down over his shoulders, regardless of the ridicule of his playmates. He wore his hair bobbed until two years ago, when he finally had it cut after a fashion similar to other boys. This is just one incident, but it may serve to show you something of his frame of mind.

“He attended a gymnasium class until he was fourteen, and he invariably wore bloomers and a bow of ribbon in his hair.

“In fact, he is far more at home in girls’ clothing than he is in boys’, for he has always insisted on wearing dresses and gowns when in the house. His bedroom is a real girl’s boudoir, with dressing table, powder puff, etc. He has as few boys’ clothes as he can get along with for going out. Playing with dolls was his favorite amusement until he was about thirteen. He is about five feet eleven and one-half inches tall, good looking and possessed of a remarkably good mind. He never has given any signs of mental deficiency, unless you term what I have above described as mental deficiency, or rather insanity. I would be grateful if you would tell me your opinion.”

(Dr. Evans’ answer): This is a case of third or intermediate sexism. You will find a fair amount of literature on the subject. Such subjects are not in any sense feeble-minded. In fact, many of them are exceptionally bright. As a rule the stage, music or painting offers the best fields for men and women of this group.

Wonder what our friends of the theatre think of Dr. Evans’ advice? Probably they would feel the same way as the Army officials felt towards certain chiefs of police who paroled the bums and the crooks on condition they join the Army.

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