The Daily News. WEDNESDAY, MAY 29, 1912. EVIL PICTURES.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 285, 29 May 1912, Page 4

The Daily News. WEDNESDAY, MAY 29, 1912. EVIL PICTURES.

If the constant spoken and written evidence of public men- is to be regarded seriously, the'young New Zealander is exceedingly easily influenced for evil. The immense popularity in every town in New Zealand of the moving picture has turned the eyes of the judges, mayors, philanthropists and mere journalists to the machine that has become "the "window of the -world." Every conceivable means are taken nowadays to distract folks from the humdrum routine of every-day life and the earth is searched for gaud, glitter, and moving picture dramas. The picture people give the public stirring drama .because the public craves for sensation .The public's primitive instincts are stirred by the most impossible situations which include warm-blooded passion, sia-suffering sorrow, joy and personal contact. In the New Zealand courts repeated youthful sins and indiscretions are attributed to the influence of moving pictures of the "revolvery" sort. In fact, the moving picture has largely taken the place of Penimore Cooper, Mayne Reid, and other classical writers, not to mention the "Deadwood Dick" class of 'literature." If the reader will pull up in front of the average bookshop which contains the latest popular works of Action, he will probably find that the majority of the colored cover pictures include revolvers, knives, dead people, dying people, or tragedy of some kind. It may be held that a pictorial play of the very popular cowboy, "bad-man," or Red Indian order is not more likely to damage normal folks and to make them turn criminal than the books with the "revolvery" covers. As a matter of fact, many of the dramatic episodes covered by moving picture films for sheer art, far outpace the majority of blood-and-thunder bookis which find so ready a sale in New Zealand. The points to be stressed in discussing the suggested censorship of pictures by municipalities and other bodies are that almost every person differs from the other as to what is harmful and harmless; that if a youth goes wrong because of a picture he would go wrong anyhow, and that the picture therefore has the effect of hastening him to deeds that place him in the position he will eventually occupy, picture or no picture. Unfortunately a large proportion of people do not recognise that evildoing is innate. It is not acquired by a youth because he sees "Bad Bill, the Bold Broncho Buster," waving a revolver in a picture, and if it inspires him to

show his innate evil, it leaves tens of thousands of normal youths untouched. The reasonable sense of decency apparent in the people of New Zealand does not permit exhibitions that are morally dangerous (at least publicly), and the oily pictures now showing that can be objected to are those of the "prairie" order, in which revolvers and bowie knives, wedded to virtue, are the chief concomitants. It is, however, suggested that exceedingly clever and artistic work should be debarred to 09 per cent, of normal people, because one per cent of abnormal people are influenced into the hands of the police through them. If wo-are to put a stern foot on every kind of entertainment that is likely to induce a stray degenerate to show his degeneracy, it is high time we passed a law forbidding anything hut plain brown paper covers on works of fiction. A learned K.C. lately remarked in a shooting case that the moving picture show may have been partly responsible in developing an irregular instinct in a young man. That careful K.|C. thus suggest- ; ed that the irregular instinct not only | existed, but was fostered. It may be held quite justly that the best thing that could happen to an irregular instinct is to have it expressed in action as soon |as possible. The police exist in order to deal with irregular instincts, and the sooner sanctuary is found for the irregular person, so much the better for the people. As time advances, irregular inj stincts will find more frequent expression, chiefly because science cannot cure irregular instincts but saves the lives r the possessors of irregular instincts. The careful study of eugenics by scientists is necessary, because scientists have been able to preserve the unfit to become irregular. To blame a mental failing to a picture show is not only unscientific, but highly absurd. One might as well blame a pantomime for causing scarlet fever.