| Show sensational journalism intelligence in americans is nimble and prompt they seize upon ideas with very little effort to catch a hint is neither an ambara harassing bara asing assing nor a slow process to af z elaborate a hint bint into details and generalities does not require a severe series of coach ings already keenly alive to events skimming shimming with a five minute glance the cream of the daily news it is hardly necessary to take extra precautions cauti ono to call attention to that which vitiates the taste corrupts the morals lowers the healthy tone of the intellect and panders to an excited imagination perhaps now teeming with morbid ard abnormal cravings clavings cravi again on the ground of journalistic civility the refined and cultured classes of society have a right to demand from the publisher a courtesy and decency iu his sheet which he dares not overstep in person the untrained minds who find one half of their education in the pages of a newspaper a and nd who imbibe their notions of society morals etiquette law policy and religion from the columns intended to convey the record of the worlds doings the gentlemen wh the necessary data of affairs from the debris of scandals divorces murders elopements elope ments thieveries thie veries and cruelties cruel ties forced upon them all who come under the influence of a periodical should find the same protection of law and custom respecting their intellectual food that is rigorously observed over the food for the body we have an inspector of milk and meats why not an inspector of newspaper reports for instance why should the fageot a great daily paper present the features of a murder day after day in boldest type and most minute pictorial Urial effect why must the boys and girls the young men and maidens of this country find a picture of the saw the knife the trunk the bloody furniture the headless body and all the sickening particulars of a murder in low life made the most prominent portion of a newspaper professedly designed to convey the latest information or why should the portrait of an unfortunate u anfor or wicked woman the cell in chiw she is confined the gallows on whick she is to be executed and a hundred other details be either portrayed with cuts or written up in graphic language I 1 have looked through the great dailies of new york chicago and san francisco only to find murders and crimes and hangings hannings hang ings illustrated and made the most important and noteworthy events of the day what but deterioration of mental quality can come from the knowledge that a woman about to suffer the death penalty had a particular fancy to have her dress made so that it should be a stylish fit what is there of warning or of elevation in the scenes depleted depicted of her disposing of her personal property or writing verses to her relatives and when other men and women answering to society for the wicked deeds they have done shall come to their time to die who will feel one moment of exaltation who will acknowledge a morally deterrent force against sin who will find the mind expanded and liberalized by the storied picture of their varied humiliating or painful fu I 1 experiences it is reserved for the press of america to spread in hundreds of thousands of copi esthe useless demoralizing moral izing vice producing atod aind crime stimulating stuff which is falsely and improperly called chews news n I 1 see no legitimate reason why a nation any more than a family should wash its dirty linen in public ab u if evil is an acknowledged factor of civilization and cannot be wholly eliminated every effort should at least be made to keep the unnecessary and practically irrelevant circumstances of crime in the he background the cry for sensationalism 10 at the very root of the matter the XA yit f cravings clavings cravi of ignorance vice morbid 4 and diseased imagination uneducated taste and vulgar desire com mand and uphold this theatrical display display of human follies shams an and offenses iu in all the picturesque setting of would be eloquence and claptrap clap trap art caught aught by the tragic element in these accounts fascinated by the subtlety boldness or desperation pe ration of the malefactors the hero or heroine of some monstrous deed becomes by clever journalistic environment viron ment a center of attraction to minds already bent in that direction and the temptation to read is irre sis tible brain and heart too often empty of higher theories ao tive energetic hun hungry gry tor foll food and stimulants the many who spend their coin for the daily j dose receive the very bane they crave dulling the sense of purity and honor deadening all noble as aa ara pi ration producing moral lassitude j brushing the bloom of innocence J from the untried soul and opening up long vistas of human weaks m far better hidden behind the veil of silence papa said a thirteen year old boy the other day as he looked up from a new york daily in which he has been absorbed for half an hour papa im going goin to read th the PP r every day now f I 1 wish I 1 arlit had read it ever so long ago I 1 did not know it was like that like what inquired his fathers father surprised at the flushed cheeks and sparkling eyes of his boy CC why like that pointing to a woodcut its better than cousin dicks dacks detective stories for its real they did do it you know papa and they have to go to prison for I 1 4 it is ever so much better than make n up stories that feller who robbed the store was smart he 5 papa Sm smarts artl that was the ides idea received of a burglar and that was the first time a christian father had brought close home to him the bad i influence of sensational journalism but the people will have W exclaim publisher and editor in a breath see even how our small illustrations have increased our circulation cu lation 11 then gentlemen in the name of righteousness ill illustrate only good and wholesome subjects if your desire for is BO 80 much stronger than your sense or of responsibility to your fellow maus man 7 illustrate every page but let the plo 00 A tures portray nothing demoralizing de I 1 to principle do not prostitute j divine art to the uses of those who will have such matter do not pander to the corrupt tastes of the j low in defiance of the wishes of the thou thousands sadis of readers who inwardly protest against your methods tremendous influence of the u press for good can hardly be j 4 ed can any one say what its ln in fluence for evil will be when resins 69 alts are developed in the future i at the height of prosperity ro with money prestige acx and FL whole world wo of interesting news from which to N cull when movements for the light ants are eloquently advocated in every direction when the destinies of na tiona hang on correct edleigh beum on t and progress is the immediate immella te EW aaa ok of broad and liberal instruction cannot the press of the country find more worthy tb the e payer of their multiple sheets than the raw and revolting of criminal actions and penalties will not the editors pay sufficient homage to their own culture to banish from the departments depart mente under their control the miserable and scandalous sensations which before taking home they clip from their own paper for fear they shall be read by we the family and lose our list of subscribers I let me quote to you a noble sentiment what signifies self it is ig not one man or a million hut but the spirit of righteousness which must be spread mere selfish calculations ought not to be made on great feat occasions I 1 should almost s regret that my own affairs were well when those of nations are in peril there is one magic way by which the opinions of those may be changed hanged 01 who oner offer us the news mixed like an olla of a hundred blundred elements if the more intellectual tel among us las would persistently ignore the sensational newspaper and as persistently buy the cleanest dally daily in the market so that thousands of readers should suddenly drop from the famous circulation to the immediate detriment of the financial departments of such journals doubtless a season of virtuous reform would set in headed and advertised with the same zeal now displayed by those who must give what the public demand for after all the press is what we lake it we can make or break this great concentrated power if we are fully determined it behoves behaves each honorable person to act unselfishly so as to further the true good or of humanity and when all the best individual minds and wills are pulling in the same direction against R fa t a assof of undisciplined and untaught U g bt intelligence the newe newspaper paper must go with the stronger party or be split ona end to end DR DB ED ISAACSON AMERICAN FORK nov |
