Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1884-02-09
DEFENSE OF FLASH PUBLICATIONS.

| ga Newsdealer incloses US a copy of
New York satirical journal with
marked article inveighing against the
dishes the daily press set before the public
! for its delectation-" fresh scandals, al
piping hot fresh murders, all a-bleeding
not gore, battle, murder and sudden death;
suicide, abduction, rape, divorce, marital
Inconsistency, and the like" He points
especially to the editorial in this same
satirical journal, which concludes with the
expression that surely never yet was vice
made go cheaply familiar to youth and in
nocence. The girl of IS who reads her
fathers daily paper may know more of
immortality and moral disease than her
mother ever dreamed of-ever thought
possible"
And now, what is the moral our CORE
spondent would point He says;
ain answer to your editorial Of January Slst take
the liberty mail TO You journal which, in my
humble opinion, is the most fitting and appropriate
reply to your conclusions. The police papers which
YOU condemn much, can not put picturlIllY in
| their weekly issues all kinds Of crimes committed
more attracively than the Imagination Of the read
ers # the daily press viii and can do. The news
stands have the unpleasant pecuniary interest
| 10 sell and display in their show windows those
pictures as the daily press have display in print
the record OF crimes and the details thereof"
After suggesting that we would not APP.
prove the illustration in police papers OF
news items appearing in the RECORD.
UNION of that date (ogt in which issue we
ia to ind matter subject to the criticism),
he concludes:
As news lealer l am in position to ai rm that
| the trashy literature is not so much bought by
Young boys an girls rs it Is by full grown and
married people. What IS the cause -
The reply Newsdealer" makes is simply
no reply. Ii for the sake of the argument
the counts in our correspondents indict-
rnent are taken as true, what then? It
amounts to an allegation by the pot that
the kettle is black, but the pot is none the
less sooty. If we put the psck.saddle on
the OK it is none the less a pack. saddle
The plea Of ''You're another" is always a
confession, and in this case it is fiat ad-
mission of all we have had to say concern
ing pernicious literature, So far as this
journal is concerned no one will be able
to put finger upon a line of apology ever
made by the RECORD. UNION for vicious
sensationalsm of the daily press, or such
Objectionable matter as sometimes creeps
INTO It's news departments.
But it remains, nevertheless, to be said
by the kettle, which for this special occs-
sion and argument may admit that it is
kettle, that its purpose in life is not to
hold filth while the pot has no other aim
or ambition. If it be true tina. the saddle
is fitted to the OK, the burden it bears is
vastly different from that strapped
to the back of the donkey. News
dealer" who very evidently speaks
for his class, must see that if admis.
sion is made of his charges against the
daily press, it is in no sense proper de.
Tense of exaggerated pictorial art brought
to the aid OF the nastiness he sells,
and which, devoted to nothing else
but the attractive display of vileness and
indecenoy, and to the presentation of
moral corruption " in such garb and
form as to stimulate the baser passions,
| benumb the moral sense and invest crime
and lasciviOusness, debauchery and bar.
lctry, with romantic allurement. 1t
is no defense whatever to the spreading
of these illustrated denominations across
the highway, that they may be forced
upon the attention of youth and age alike,
that the daily press records with CHASTITY
calmness the horrible deeds OF men. The
one shocks and appals where the other in.