=Rather do I appeal for the simpler and saner expedient of parental
responsibility in companionship, spiritual training, education,
ideals and confidences that will educate that child as to what evil
is, to know where it lurks, and what he must do to avoid it; that
will teach him to hate it and despise it.=
In this work, we need the cooperation of this great, new institution,
the movies. It can be done best by thus seeking the cooperation of
those who have the economic control of this new power, this new means
of education, the greatest that has ever appeared in any civilization.
I believe it can be done, and in a very large measure, it is
being done, with glowing opportunities and prospects for greater
accomplishment in the future than in the recent past. It is this sort
of remedy that I heartily advocate rather than any censorship or
regulation through city, state or national boards composed of people
who are to be given arbitrary, tyrannical and dangerous powers over the
development of the human mind. Such a remedy, I believe, will never be
accepted by the American people. If it ever is, it will be the saddest
day in the history of human progress since the bigotries and tyrannies
of the Middle Ages. It would mean that the issues of the Scopes case
in Tennessee would be as nothing compared to this new power of a few
people to tell the balance of America what they shall see, hear or
know, or what they shall be taught, to direct the human mind which
alone can retard or advance the progress of the world.
For let it be remembered that moving pictures, as a medium of
expression in influencing the human mind, as yet, are in their infancy.
They will be greater than the printing press, and whoever controls this
power will do most to control the future of the human race.