The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1920-12-13
Dorothy Dix TALKS
BIZ DOROTHY DIX
WeFid's Highest Paid Woman wrisss.
The Moving Picture Problem-1.

The Moving Picture Problem.
A young woman writes me that she
works hard all day doing her cook
| ing, washing and sewing. and that no
man comes home at night to a heater
house or a better-cooked dinner than
| her husband. The husband has to
work at night until about II o'clock,
and it is her habit to spend her even
| ings at the moving pictures.
Her husband and her family object
| to her going frequently, and she wants
| to know how often 1 think a movie
fan has the right to indulge in his or
her favorite diversion.
I am sure don't know. If could
answer that question, and draw the
| line between the psychological place
where the cinema ceases to become a
stimulating amusement. and turns
into a deadly dope, should solve one
of the great problems of the day; for
there Is no denying that no other in
fluence in the world is SO powerful,
and reaches so many people, as the
screen.
To answer my correspondents ques-
| ton in detail, 1 should say that it is
not good to go to any one place every
night, not even to church. The tend
ency of too much of anything is to
upset peoples mental balance, and to
obsess them with a single idea 1t
makes fanatics of them. Their minds
run along a single track that in time
|
no pleasant by-tracks, and no way
| stations or stopping places, and they
are lucky if they don't bump into a
padded cell at the end.
We need variety in our amusements
and occupations to keep US mentally
healthy, Just as much as we need va
riety in our food to keep US in bodily
health. That is why all crazes,
| whether they are crazes for dancing,
or roller-skating. or crazes over new
religion, or crazes over certain phases
| of literature, or moving picture cHazes,
leave wrecks behind them. People
who overdo always have to pay the
price.
| And, as Stephenson said. '"rhe world
| is so full of a number of things" that
are pleasant to do, it is pity not to
nibble at them all. Certainly it is
nings spent in reading, and in con-
verse with ones friends, with attend
ance at the picture houses.
| As to how much footage of a film
| is the proper allowance per week for
a woman, she must be her own judge.
A good test for her to apply to herself
| is to keep tab on her thoughts, and
/ see If the screen is becoming the most
absorbing interest in her life, and if
! she goes through her days waiting
impatiently for her nightly debauch
| of pictures. If she is, then it is time
| to cut down her dope.
| Also let her honesty search her soul
| and ascertain what effect the pictures
she sees have upon her. If she is
filled with envy of the snakelike vamp,
with long green eyes, and jade ear
| rings, and practically nothing else on;
/ if, as she washes her dishes, and chops
the meat for her Irish stew, tshe
loathes and detests her home1y task
| and feels as if she were a martyr be-
| cause she is not one of the sirens at
| whose feet men dump bushels of dia-
monds in the pictures, and who never
do anything more laborious than re-
| cline in real lace negligee on orr
entail divans, and puff cigarettes: then
she's had too much of the movies.