The Washburn times. [volume] (Washburn, Wis.) 1896-1976, 1921-05-05
CENsoRING THE MOVIES.

ship means, for many of us, the in
quisitorial practices of the old-time
European police; Burleson's suppress
sion of freedom of the press; Puri-
tanicla expressions; the gross follies
of those self-selected guardians of
public morals who would subject all
literature and art to the petty stan
dards of their own ignorance or pru-
rience. There is of course, another
and less odious form of censorship.
There is a censorship of buildings,
which requires them to be construct
ed substantially and securely, with
proper planning for ingress and
egress, for light and air. There is
a censorship which compels proper
precautions against fire; another
which requires observances of SAM
tary regulations; another which
guards against preventable accidents
and injuries in industries. Indeed,
we are surrounded every day, at al
most every turn, by those beneficent
censorships which are among the
most creditable measures of progress
in social civilization. Yet there is
not one of them that is not suscep-
tible of being abused and prevented
into an agency of oppression and Of
fence.
The question may perhaps be ask
ed why, if we have these useful and
benefcent censorships in material
things, we might not have them pro-
fitably also in things which pertain
to manners and morals; and if we
have them for the body, why not
also for the mind? If the building
department and the fire department
and the health department exercise,
with our approval, their censorships
over the building in which the per-
Torrance is given would it not be
logical to have some similar super
vision over the performance or the
exhibition itself? And if it be con-
tended that we should allow complete
license in such matters and content
ourselves with penalizing and actual
" evil results, would it not be as
logical to say that we should permit
men to put up any kind of buildings,
and punish them only after one has
collapsed or been burned and lot
of people have actually been killed!
No: it would not be logical. The
truth is, of course, that spiritual
things, things of the mind, are not
similarly TO be restricted without
creating a worse evil than the enc
directly aimed at.
There would probably be no seri-
Gus demand for "a State censorship
of moving pictures if there were
not real need of some effective safe
guard against evil exhibitions. The
demand has come doubtless in some
degree from professional prudes.
But it has come also from multitudes
of clean-minded, if mistaken, men
and women, who have revolted at
the cheaply noxious things which
they have seen projected upon the
screen; and it has come from multi
tudes who, having common sense,
regard it as pernicious to regale au-
diences Of children, all possessed of
the initiative faculty in a nigh de-
gree, with exhibitions of all sorts OF
mischief, vice and crime.
II is, OF course, going too far to
protest that to forbid the poi srayal
of crime upon the screen or stage
would prohibit predictions of the
worlds greatest dramas. We doubt
if anybody since Shakespeare wrote
was ever corrupted into filial impiety
by beholding Lear ,or melted to
murder, by the spectacle of Othello. 1t
is foolish to pretend that penny
dreadfuEs" and recognized classics
are to be judged in the same cate
CORY.
Neither is it pertinent to say, as
is truly being said, that the i'm
portant writer's Of scenarios and the
important film-producing corpora
tions are quite free from the evils
of which complaint is made. The
fact that one, or dozen, or hum
dred productions are above reproach
does not justify the existence of al
single offensive show. If CEN
sorship should regrettably prove to
be necessary, it would not interfere
with them.
The promise of the reputable pro-
ducers, that if the matter is left to
them they will exercise an effective
censorship which win eliminate all
evil films within year, is interest
ing and gratifying, and we must
nope that it will be fulfilled. But
the fact must be recognized that
they have thus far, during many
wears failed To do ANYTHING Of the