Derb On Baden-Powell
3rd September 2010
There are many passages that now appear quaint, and a few that will offend the kind of person who believes that it was wicked of our ancestors not to subscribe to late-twentieth-century intellectual fads. Towards the subject peoples of the British Empire, Baden-Powell nursed the same mixture of disgust, paternalism, and respect that one finds in Kipling — that was, in fact, normal among thoughtful, humane Englishmen at the height of the Empire (Baden-Powell was born in 1857).
This edition includes, as an appendix, Baden-Powell’s warning against self-abuse, headed “Continence.” The author had wanted this section in the 1908 edition, and in fact fought for its inclusion. Both publisher and printer believed the material to be obscene, and the printer finally resolved the matter in their favor by simply stopping his presses until Baden-Powell gave way. Reading the passage now, it seems unexceptionable. Baden-Powell probably overstates the negative physical and mental consequences of excessive masturbation, but his advice here, as almost everywhere else in his book, is on the whole practical and sound: “[I]t is easier to stop it at first than when it becomes a habit … Avoid listening to stories or reading or thinking about dirty subjects … Restrain yourself when you are young and you will be able to restrain yourself when you grow up …” etc., etc. Of course, anyone suggesting such self-control to young boys nowadays would very likely end up in jail for some offense against political correctness — “onanophobia,” perhaps. That, however, is our fault, not Baden-Powell’s.