Rock Island daily Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1886-1893, 1888-08-10
WHAT WE SHOULD READ.
a CITIZEN Gives His Views of What
should Constitute Proper and Prof
liable Newspaper Material.


liable Newspaper Material.
The reporter had been wandering about
in the rain for several hours in the so far
fruitless pursuit of something that might
have some semblance to an item. He
had dropped into the office of philo-
sophically inclined citizen aud sank into
a chair in state of exhaustion and al
most despair. In reply to the scribe's
anxious inquiry the citizen had made the
same confession that so many before him
who had been Intercepted had made-'I
know no news, when a gentleman who
was present suggested to the hungry news
man that he 90 jump into the river and
then write mp his own suicide, That, the
kindly disposed citizen thought would
produce as startling a sensation as any
thing imaginable.
Now if there is any one class of work
ing people more than another that don't
like to take bluff it is the reporter, and
anxious almost TO desperation as this par>
ticular one was for an item. the sugges
ton did not strike him with any particu
lar favor and he was dehberating as to
whether TO take advice or not when the
citizen first appealed to came to his
rescue:
That shows the morbid tendency to
which the human mind runs, he said,
throwing down paper he had
been reading and removing his
spectacles. Il have often been
inclined to blame the newspapers
for the sensational matter to which
space seems to be given precedence
III their columns. To OUT daily papers
have attributed to Il very large extent the
generally prevailing impression that the
world is growing more sinful 1t has be-
come my opinion the more have given
the subject study that the news reports
ers were prone to ignore ana pass by in
their search Cor news all those things and
which 90 to make the world
better. to denote progress and promote
better moral tendency. Yes, | have
thought that Il reporter would 90 twice as
far for Il sensation that
would do violence to the normal state of
he would for something that
would be of as much concern to the pubs |
lie. and yet have an elevating instead of |
Il degrading effect upon the human mind |
which is shaped and trained to consid>
cradle extent by the sentiment of the |
daily press
But See, continued the citizen ele. |
waiting ms feet to his desk and settling
back into more comfortable attitude |
Il see, he repeated, that these report
ers are feeding a morbid appetite
sensational in the news market. and yet |
it is my opinion that the human mind can |
De differently trained in this matter. |
From the daily accounts of crime and |
accidents that are being published in the |
papers, the average reader believes the |
world is going to the devil, that it is |
growing more wicked daily and is retro. |
grading instead of advancing. Not so IN |
my mind. PropOrtionateiy speaking |
here is not AS much crime and casualty |
today as there WAS in the last century, |
hut it is the power and industry of the |
press that brings it before the people. |
The facilities for the accumulation of |
ional order can happen unnoticed, and |
he mind of the reader has become so
urned, you will say, that it yearns for
i.
This is not true of all people who de-
pend upon the daily paper for enlighten-
ment There are quite large number |
who simply skip through the accounts of
crime and sensation, and it is therefore
that insist that it is not at all necessary
that a reporter create r tragedy and |
make fool of himself in order to pros
vide the readers of his paper with read
able news item. 1t would be my slgges-
ton that something more of normal |
nature he substituted
What would you suggest. pray ? |
ohirped in the reporter, who had been
silent up to this time.
Why" replied the citizen with an air
If much Importance take the weather
Tor subject"
The reporters hopes which had been |
-aised step by step. were crushed with
lne foul blow and he was about to 60
forthwith and comply with the advice |
which had led to tue discussion, when the |
citizen pulled from his pocket fine Ha~
wanna and the sCribbler departed in a