Tulsa daily world. [volume] (Tulsa, Indian Territory [Okla.]) 1905-1919, 1916-02-27

censor: he is unConfusod hV subtletios
and undisturbed by mitigations. With
mo capacity for business, no knoWl-
edge of law, no sympathy with art, no
pretension to philosophy" his is COM
plete certainty as to ''the secret that
has puzzled all the philosophers.
baffled all the lawyers. muddled all
the men of business, and ruined most
of the artists; the secret of right and
wrong" immortality is sexual passion.
Thore can be no other kind. And pas
sion is always wrong. No possible
doubt about that! Crime and Vio-
lence" are robbery and murder. 1t
doesn't occur to him that most of the
big and vital things done in the world
lave been done because of passion or
robbery or murder, and that most of
the big and vital things written have
been written about them. "lf 1t Is
deeply conceived" declares Meredith.
"it cannot be immoral.
IF it is deeply conceived" says the
consor, at cannot be moral"
Only the trivialities and superficial
tiles Of life are fit subjects for the pub
lie mind. As marital infidelity used to
be the funniest thing in the world, and
the chorus-gir evidence of the reward
of vice the most harmless while only
serious consde Grafton of the elemental
forces was dangerous and obscene. so
the motion picture censor remains un-
suspicious of the glorfcation of greed,
the eXaltation of brute strength, and
the humor of physical misfortune. He
does not ask whether impropriety is
Incidental to story or story to impro-
priety He does not know that one
bushes at little audacities rather than
at great infractions: that small men
have prejudices and big men passions.
He cannot conceive of the creative in
stinct as a thing beautiful, nor imagine
chastity as apart from virtue, nor see
the utter, the surprising immortality
of fear, of corporal comicality OF
maudlin sentimentalty Of dirt, drudg-
cry. poverty and stupidity.
Evil and Good.
II has not occurred to the censor
that without evil good goes unob-
served; that the best example is pun
ishment of the one and reward OF the
other. Bad men and women have ex-
listed in fiction ever since-and before
Homer sent for his stenographer to
take down the Had. An eternal, om-
nipotent and soul-saving censorship
might have kept sin and sinners out OF
romance-but then there Is history!
And biography!
Discretion is the better part of vir-
tue. Nothing is dangerous but the
truth. Disguise or conceal a thing and
Il ceases to exist. Refrain from calling
rake a rake, and you've pulled lts
teeth. even though every fool knows
that what you mean Is a rake. Ine
censorial mind utterly fails to take In
the fact that you invite attention to
betightened legs by pasting paper over
them, and that you invite attention
to a spade, and make 1t pernicious
instrument, when, instead Of calling
it a spade, you blush and remark:
"Garden tools! Oh, don't know what
they are, and you really mustn't discuss
them in my presenceI" Method and
motive and manner Of treatment are
nothing to the motion picture censor
! and al one "Ghosts' and Three
Weeks" MRS. warren's Profession
and THE Street Girls Revenge"
"Kindling' and Carmen" and "Hei
Wedding Night" -,
A certain melodramatic picture dis
closed the execution Of plans for ar
assassi n alton In an isolated house. II