Patricia Bartlett
Patricia Maureen Bartlett
Biography
She was born in Napier to Bertrand and Ivy Bartlett (née Boult). She attended Sacred Heart school in Napier and failed her University Entrance examination. In 1947, she became a primary school teacher. She entered a Sisters of Mercy (R.S.M.) convent at Hill Street in Wellington after her mother died in 1950. She left the cloister in 1969 to become increasingly involved in social conservative political activism.[1] In 1970, she founded the Society for Promotion of Community Standards (SPCS), which survived her death, albeit in much reduced circumstances.
Bartlett remained the secretary of her organisation for 25 years, during which time SPCS campaigned against exposure of bared female breasts (1970) and won initial bipartisan support from social conservative
Over the years, she campaigned for theatre censorship, against the stage show Hair in Wellington, (1972) and prohibition of adolescent-oriented sex education books like Down Under the Plum Trees (1972). SPCS tried to have Stanley Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange and Last Tango in Paris (1972) prohibited, which led to New Zealand Film Society activism against SPCS attempts to stifle freedom of artistic expression throughout the late seventies and early eighties.
In the 1977 Queen's Silver Jubilee and Birthday Honours, Bartlett was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire, for services to the community.[3]
In the mid-eighties, Bartlett and SPCS fell afoul of social change, as the
In 1993, Bartlett was awarded the
As time went on, Bartlett's elderly former patrons and pro-censorship activists died. In 1995, Bartlett learned she had inherited her own mother's cardiovascular problems, which meant her enforced retirement from public life. In 1996, she retired as SPCS Secretary, and lived quietly in Upper Hutt until her death in November 2000. She never married.[6]
Legacy
Bartlett's pro-censorship campaigns contributed to a backlash against
See also
References
 | This article includes a list of general references, but it lacks sufficient corresponding inline citations. (September 2010) |
- ^ Carolyn Moynihan, A Stand for Decency: SPCS: Lower Hutt: 1995
- ^ Carolyn Moynihan, A Stand for Decency: SPCS: Lower Hutt: 1995
- ^ "No. 47237". The London Gazette (4th supplement). 11 June 1977. p. 7128.
- ^ Paul Christoffels: Censored: A Short History of Censorship in New Zealand: Wellington: Department of Internal Affairs: 1989
- ^ "The New Zealand Suffrage Centennial Medal 1993 – register of recipients". Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. 26 July 2018. Archived from the original on 18 September 2018. Retrieved 18 September 2018.
- ^ "Anti-pornography battler Patricia Bartlett dies" Dominion Post: 11.11.2000: 9
- ^ "SPCS — Society for Promotion of Community Standards Inc". Archived from the original on 30 August 2018. Retrieved 2 December 2018.
Further reading
- Moynihan, Carolyn (1995). A Stand For Decency: Patricia Bartlett and the Society for Promotion of Community Standards. Upper Hutt: Society for Promotion of Community Standards. ISBN 0-473-03340-2.
External links
- Dictionary of New Zealand Biography, Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand.
- Society for Promotion of Community Standards
- Office of Film and Literature Classification
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