Page:The International Jew - Volume 2.djvu/143

 it, and very clearly. There are two families in this world, and on one the darkness dwells.

Reformers, of course, heartily agree with this as far as criminal portrayals are concerned. Police protest against the technique of killing a policeman being shown with careful detail on the screen. Business men object to daily object lessons in safe-cracking being given in the pictures. Moralists object to the art of seduction being made the stock motif no matter what the subject. They object because they recognize it as evil schooling which bears bitter fruits in society.

Well, this other kind of education is going on too. There is now nothing connected with violent outbreaks which has not been put into the minds of millions by the agency of the motion picture. It may, of course, be a mere coincidence. But coincidences also are realities.

There are several developments proceeding in screendom which are worthy of notice. One is the increasing use of non-Jewish authors to produce Jewish propaganda. Without using names, it will be easy for each reader to recall for himself the more popular non-Jewish authors whose books have been screened by Jewish producers, and who are soon after announced to have a new photoplay in preparation. In several cases these new photoplays have been sheer Jewish propaganda. They are the more effective because they are backed by non-Jewish names famous in the literary world. Just how this state of affairs comes about it is not possible now to say. How much of it is due to the authors’ desire to enter the field of pro-Semitic propaganda, and how much of it is due to their reluctance to refuse amiable suggestions from movie magnates who have already paid them liberal sums and are likely to pay them more is a question. It is not difficult to bring oneself to believe that “anti-Semitism” is wrong. Everybody knows it is. It is not difficult to bring oneself to an admiration of Israel. Every writer is happy in idealizing an individual or a nation; it is a pleasure to write about an altogether admirable Jewish hero or heroine. And so the non-Jews are writing Jewish propaganda ere they are aware.

The flaw, of course, is here: in avoiding anti-Semitism,