Newark leader. ([Newark, Ohio]) 1917-1946, 1919-11-21
WHAT HAS CAUSED DISTRUST
AND HATRED OF PRESS
AMONG TOILERS?

hiss the mention of the press.
1t is undoubtedly true that the
working people distrust and dislike
the press. They never miss a chance
to make this plain.
Yet scolding them will do no good.
If the workers feel that way, they
feel that way, and that's all there is
to that part of it.
Also, if they feel that way, there is
reason. The reason may be good
or the reason may be bad, as you
happen to look at it. But it exists.
1t is there.
We think we know the reason. We
know lots of working men and work
ing women-and we are glad to know
them and glad to have their friend
ship and confidence. 1t is by init
mate, friendly contact with the mass
workers that one knows how they
feel and why they feel so.
Now, the foundation of the pro-
found distrust and the marked dis
like with which the massworkers
view the press is the gigantic propa-
ganda of lies and deceit which they
believe the press put over on them
in connection with the war.
To do foreign fnanciers and war
makers the service which propaganda
bureaus demanded the majority of
American newspapers and news agen-
cies lied to and deceived the Ameri
can people night and day for months
and years.
Also, they bounded with abuse and
vilifcation any man or any news
paper that attempted to tell the truth
ia those times.
Now, the people have found that
out.
The workers know what was done
to them.
And that is why any and every
meeting of the working classes re-
sounds with boots, jeers, Kisses and
curses when the press is mentioned.
We all suffer alike, the innocent
with the guilty, because a portion Of
American papers-and an unfortu-
nately large portion-serve private
interest rather than public interests.
There is another reason, too. The
workers feel that the press reports of
their doings and their demands are
unfair
For example, they point to the false
light in which the demands of the coal
miners are presented to the reading
public.
The public reads, day after day,
that the coal miners demand a day
of six hours and a week of five days
thirty hours work a week-and the
public naturally thinks that the de-
mand for such short week and such
short days is preposterOus.
Probably that is just the way you
feel yourself.
You see, these reports carefully
omit to say that the coal miners do
not work for days wages but "by the
piece" by the number of pounds they
dig, and that what the coal miners
really demand is that they shall be
guaranteed at least thirty hours
work a week, so they can earn enough
for themselves and families to live on.
That is something different from
what you supposed they were de-
manding, isn't it?
And just because so many papers
and press agencies have conveyed that
totally false impression to your mind,
no coal miner will ever believe any
thing newspaper prints, or have any
confidence in what a newspaper says,
or look upon the press as anything
but his enemy, which he is to hate
and lnjure all he can.
Even the papers which try to tell
the truth and be fair cannot correct
the doubt and suspicion which a ma
jority of newspapers bring upon the
whole press by the indiscriminate dis
trust and hatred of the nations
workers.
And this is bad for the nation, bad
for the employers, bad for the work
ers, bad for capital, bad for labor,
bad for everything and everybody.
We know of no way in which the
press can regain the confidence of the
masses except by resuming the old
fashioned method of being truthful
and fair to friend and foe-by follow
ing the quaint old maxim which used
to adorn the front or editorial page
of so many pioneer American papers:
"Hew to the line, let the chips fall
where they may"
The square deal all around-that's s
the only effective remedy for the
evils that cluster so thick in the
j futures menacing skies.
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