A Snob Song – Then as Now

A Snob Song! (1922)
(By Jean Bell.)

Though there has been no straight out declaration on the part of Capitalist candidates for the Provinces in favor of the  imposition of University fees, there have been some guarded references to "discrimination" in the matter of selecting students.

The Labor candidates believe in discrimination as it applies to an entrant's personal fitness or character, but strongly object to the "discrimination" which, would take cognisance only of the wealth and social standing of the student's parents, to the exclusion of the children of working classes. They would not, for instance, be guilty of singing the following snob song-

'Twould surely be a howling joke,
A farce to tickle all creation,
To educate the common folk
Above their station !

High fees will stop our kin and kith
From being with Bill Bowyangs handed,
Our sons and daughters mixing with
The hornyhanded !

The poor man at the poll--oh yes !--
May mingle with the moneyed voter;
In Halls of Learning--no"--unless
He owns a motor !

His entry is the tradesmen's door--
The front to him must show defiance--
Imagine him a Bachelor
Of Arts or Science !

Without high fees a worker's brat
Might soon attain a scholar's station--
He might--Gadsooks !--be honored at
A Graduation !

The toil-stained serf who humps a hod
Might wear a "mortarboard" in season ;
He might become a classic god ;

So, for that reason,
We'll have to make the entrance stiff,
To stifle that absurd ambition,
Which urges him to seek a different position.

The higher steeps of learning's joys.
The college honors and the passes,
Were never meant for girls and boys
Of working classes.

To working girls we'll close the door,
And bar their brains, and wilt their wishes--
Enough that they should scrub the floor
And wash the dishes !

No boy who owns a working dad
May venture 'cross our boodled borders--
The cheek and impudence of (Gad !)
The lower orders !

'Twould he a sacriligious sin,
A crime beyond all knowledge mortal.
Should e'er this rabble enter in
Our Sacred Portal !

High Fees must be our Sentries bold
To keep our Walls against the spoilers,
To guard the Privilege of Gold
Against the Toilers !

Notes

From the West Australian Newspaper The Westralian Worker 19 May 1922 p. 3.

The end of the Great War saw a period of hope that the old ways might change lives for the better and the growing labour movement demanding better conditions and rights for workers.