New at Reason
Thomas Doherty traces how Joseph Breen become Hollywood's censor-in-chief.
Comments to "New at Reason":
Ian C. | December 4, 2007, 10:06am | #
Not having seen any of the films from that four year golden era, I have to wonder exactly how risqué these films actually were, and whether there were any films that were both "dirty" and *good*.ObLibertarian: Censorship bad! But Boycotts are a good and right way for consumers to tell businesses what to do. So confused!
J sub D | December 4, 2007, 10:55am | #
ObLibertarian: Censorship bad! But Boycotts are a good and right way for consumers to tell businesses what to do. So confused!Nothing to be confused about. You said it succinctly from the get go.
I am somewhat surpised that the artilcle mananged to avoid mentioning the queen of the anti-prudes, Mae West. The woman aws constantly at war with the censors, bigots and homophobes of her day. I propose inducting her in the Libertarian Hall of Fame.
Curly Smith | December 4, 2007, 11:37am | #
“Considering these evils, I hereby promise to remain away from all motion pictures except those which do not offend decency and Christian morality.”I don't have any problem with people exercising their Freedom to (not) Assemble but why do they forever have to tell me about it? Can't you just sterilize yourself to save the planet without running your yap? Can't you just drive the hybrid and leave off the "look at me I'm special" bumpersticker? It seems to me that if you know what you're doing is the right thing to do then you don't need affirmation from the masses. Or, do you only do the right thing if the right thing is the easy thing to do?
Decide how you should be living your life and leave me out of it. I can, and do, make my own decisions.
Jesse Walker | December 4, 2007, 11:47am | #
I am somewhat surpised that the artilcle mananged to avoid mentioning the queen of the anti-prudes, Mae West.She's in the book from which the article was excerpted.
Warren | December 4, 2007, 11:55am | #
I am somewhat surpised that the artilcle mananged to avoid mentioning the queen of the anti-prudes, Mae West. The woman aws constantly at war with the censors, bigots and homophobes of her day. I propose inducting her in the Libertarian Hall of Fame.I second the motion. Mae West had it going on.
Not for nothing, but I wish Reason would hold back on putting the print articles online. I just got my copy yesterday.
R C Dean | December 4, 2007, 11:59am | #
I knew it: the Catholics run hollywood!So does this mean Catholics are the new Jews?
J sub D | December 4, 2007, 12:00pm | #
She's in the book from which the article was excerpted.Thanks, do I have to read it now? ;-)
Shannon Love | December 4, 2007, 12:37pm | #
I suppose its taboo to point out that changes that the moral conservatives in the article warned about did in fact take place, that the harms they warned against did actually manifest and that entertainment media in all forms appears to have been one of drivers of that change?Only our advancing technology has blunted the ill effects of these cultural changes. In the 1930's, syphilis remained a major disease. A one night stand could lead to ones death while screaming insane a decade or more later. Birth control was ineffective by modern standards. It wasn't intellectually indefensible to argue that anything that fostered promiscuity presented a danger to the general society. Indeed, it is only by fluke that AIDS did not spread easily by heterosexual sex and thereby create a plague that could have killed millions. If that had happened, the old fogies who opposed the sexual revolution wouldn't look so stupid today.
I think that moralism represents a poorly studied behavior. We conventionally write it off as a mere power grab but I think it arises from an attempt to suppress behaviors that (1) cause no individual-->individual harm (2) don't cause harm if a small percentage of the population engages in them but (3) does cause significant harm if a critical mass of the population engages in it.
If my suspicion proves true then moralism represents a major stumbling block for the wide acceptance of libertarianism. People will revert to the use of state power to suppress behaviors they intuit will cause widespread harm if allowed to spread.
ed | December 4, 2007, 12:58pm | #
Not for nothing, but I wish Reason would hold back on putting the print articles online.I just got my copy yesterday.
Does that make you feel like a sucker for subscribing, Warren? See today's post about making South Park and The Daily Show and others freely available online to all at no cost.
prolefeed | December 4, 2007, 2:20pm | #
Does that make you feel like a sucker for subscribing, Warren?Hey, I recently sprung for a subscription, knowing full well that every article in it would be posted online. Figured it was time to reward Reason for running this awesome website.
Plus, I get to enjoy the pained look on my non-libertarian wife's face when she sees the magazine each month.
Not to mention the cognitive dissonence from having subscriptions to both Reason and Ensign magazines ...
LarryA | December 4, 2007, 6:24pm | #
We conventionally write it off as a mere power grab but I think it arises from an attempt to suppress behaviors that (1) cause no individual-->individual harm (2) don't cause harm if a small percentage of the population engages in them but (3) does cause significant harm if a critical mass of the population engages in it.Actually most moralists act because they find a behavior icky, however they define that, and want to prohibit for everyone what they won't do themselves.
People will revert to the use of state power to suppress behaviors they intuit will cause widespread harm if allowed to spread.
You’ve stumbled on the heart of the problem. “Intuit.” Like gun ban advocates who think firearms are icky and ignore widespread evidence that bans don’t work. Like drug warriors who find chemical mood enhancement icky despite obvious evidence that the WoD causes far more problems than it solves. Like the B.M.I. nazis who fail to notice that icky “overweight” people live longer than those of “normal” weight.
Personally, such folks belong in the middle of the “intelligent design” crowd. No reason required.
Mad Max | December 4, 2007, 9:12pm | #
“The NRA divisional administrator appointed to regulate the motion picture industry was a loyal New Dealer named Sol A. Rosenblatt, a man whose mogul-like name belied any sympathy with the studios.”What do you mean, “mogul-like name?” What are you suggesting?
“. . . establishing a censorship regime that ceded dominion of Hollywood cinema to Irish-Catholic theology for the next 20 years.”
I’m a sucker for happy endings!
“Only our advancing technology has blunted the ill effects of these cultural changes. In the 1930's, syphilis remained a major disease. A one night stand could lead to ones death while screaming insane a decade or more later.”
Fortunately, nowadays you can no longer get deadly diseases from sexual activity.
“Birth control was ineffective by modern standards.”
Yeah, the illegitimacy rate was incredibly high back then, in contrast to today. In our enlightened era, while illegitimate births occur, it’s not the norm in any segment of society, and . . . wait a minute, I’ve got my eras reversed.
“It wasn't intellectually indefensible to argue that anything that fostered promiscuity presented a danger to the general society.”
Today, we know that fostering promiscuity is perfectly safe.
Jim Walsh | December 4, 2007, 10:16pm | #
The spirit of the Decency League is alive and well: the Catholic League, i.e. Bill Donohoe and his hard-core followers (all seven of them) have called for a boycott of the new film The Golden Compass due to perceived anti-Catholic themes in the source novels.Now, I have never read The Golden Compass, nor had I intended to see the movie - until I heard about the attack by the League. I don't care if they're both complete crap; I'll buy the book for all my friends and enemies, see the movie, and when the DVD comes out, I fully intend to link it to my blog. Fuck you, Donohoe...
MJ | December 4, 2007, 10:58pm | #
The anti-Catholic themes are not merely "perceived", the author has said that he wrote the story as an attack on Catholicism and Christianity in general. If you don't like Donohoe and his group, that's one thing, but they are not wrong about this. Sometimes when someone ocmplains of bias in a work the claim us legitimate.