Page:1954 Juvenile Delinquency Testimony.pdf/111

Rh Do the comics eneonrage delingnency? Dr, David Abrahamsen has written :

Comic books do not lead juto crime, allkough they linve beeu widely blamed for it. L ftavt comie books maty tines helpful for chitdren in that through them they can gel rid of many of their uggressioms and harmint fantasies. I can never remember having ssen one boy or cil who las comnitted a crilue or who became nenrotie or psyehotie becuse hie or She read comie buolks-

The. Senator Kefauver.

Senator. Is that Dr. David Abrahamsen?

Mr. . That is right, sir, I can give you the source on that, if you like. I will give it to you later.

The. You can supply that later.

(The souree is as follows :}

Mr. . I would like to discuss, if you bear with me a moment more, something which Dr. Wertham provoked me into, Dr, Wer- tham, E am happy to say, T have just caught om a half-trnth, and Tam very mdignant abont it. He said there isa mag: wine now on the stands preaching vacil mtolerance, The magazine he is veferring to is my magazine. What he said, as much as he said, was time. There do upper in this magazine such materials as "Spik," "Dirty Mexican," but Dv. Wertham did not tell you what the plot of the story was.

This is one of a series of stories designed te show the evils of race prejudice aud mob violence, in this case against Mexican Catholics.

Previous stories in this same magazine have dealt with antisemitism, and anti-Neero feelings, evils of dope addiction and development of juvenile delinquents,

This is one of the most bri}tantly written stories that T have ever had the pleasure to publish. J was very proud of il, and to find it being used in such a nefarious way made me qnile angry.

Tam sure Dr. Wertham can read, and he must have read the story, to have counted what he said he counted.

T would like to read one more thing to you.

Senutor Hennings asked Dr, Peck a question. I will be perfectly frank with you, I have forgotlen what he asked him, but this is the answer because I made a notation as he went along.

Anyone, any child, any adult, can find much more extreme deserip- tions of violence in the daily newspaper. You can find plenty of ex- amples in today's newspaper. In today's eclition of the Daily News, which more people will have access to than they will to any comic magazine, there are headline stories like this:

Finds he has killed wife with gun.

Man in Texas woke up to find he had killed his wife with gno. She had bullet in head and he had a revolver in his hand.

The next one;

Cop pleads in cocktail poisoning.

Twenty-yeur-old youth helps poison the mother and father of a friend.

Court orders young hanging. Man who killed his wite wilt be hung in June for lis almust-perfeet iurder,

Let us look at today's edition of the Herald Tribune.