CHAPTER 2

Resistance to Early Mass Media

Abstract Media resistance was shaped by industrialization and urbaniza-

tion, and the debates over mass society and mass culture. The chapter
reviews resistance to early mass media: print and books, serial ction,
cinema, radio and comics, and show how these media were seen to under-
mine morality, culture, enlightenment, democracy, community and health.
The chapter discusses campaigns and protests against early mass media and
shows that a common feature was a struggle for political and institutional
control, prohibition or censorship.

Keywords Media history
Mass culture
Mass society
Censorship

SMASH THE VITASCOPE!

The rst US exhibition of Thomas Edisons Vitascope, a Motion Picture
projector, took place in 1896. Literary editor Herbert Stone protested:

I want to smash the Vitascope. The name of the thing is itself a horror. Its
manifestations are worse (cited from French and Petley 2007, 8).

Throughout history there have been many strong exclamations as to

what people would like to do to media, although calls for destruction

*is used throughout the book to indicate my translation.

The Author(s) 2017 15

T. Syvertsen, Media Resistance,
DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-46499-2_2
16 MEDIA RESISTANCE

waned as mass media proliferated. This chapter explores media resistance

and scepticism in the early mass media era, showing how historical
conditions from the beginning shaped both media and concerns about
their negative impact. I begin with resistance to writing, print and books,
before moving on to the mass media emerging in the wake of the
industrial revolution: serial literature, cinema, radio and comics.
Resistance is directed at both new and old media, but in this chapter,
the emphasis is on resistance when the media were new. The early phases
of a mediums life fascinate scholars as well as history buffs; this is the era
when fantasy and speculation contribute to how a new medium is under-
stood (Natale and Balbi 2014, 208, see also Marvin 1988; Boddy 2004).
New media are met with high expectations, but also with ambiguity,
distrust and dystopic visions. In the early phase of a mediums life, warn-
ings are issued about potentially destructive effects; in later phases these
may be overtaken by explanatory narratives where social ills are explained
by reference to ongoing media inuence.
The historical sweep in this chapter cannot do justice to the twists and
turns of each mediums early history, the purpose is instead to identify
what was at stake for resisters: What were the social and political projects
that were perceived to be most profoundly challenged by emerging
media? I show how concerns for morality and culture were complemen-
ted with concerns for enlightenment, democracy and community, and
how the media were often considered a threat to mental and physical
health. In addition to perspectives and arguments, the chapter discusses
actors and actions; what were the methods proposed and employed to
limit, curtail and restrict? Important sites of struggle in this early phase
were the legal and political domains, but also schools, libraries, churches,
public areas and homes. Examples and cases are drawn from the UK, the
US and Scandinavia, with scattered examples from elsewhere, but the
purpose is not to do a stringent comparative analysis. Instead, the aim is
to identify concerns and actions that became emblematic and represen-
tative in a Western context, and had impact across national and social
boundaries.
In the chapter, I am indebted to existing media and cultural histories, as
well as historically informed discussions of media theory (see, for example,
Bastiansen and Dahl, 2003; Brantlinger 1983; Scannell 2007, Ytreberg
2008, Storey 2009; Fang 2015). In addition, the chapter draws on expres-
sions of protest, criticism and scepticism in articles, books, political docu-
ments and other non-ction material.
 2 RESISTANCE TO EARLY MASS MEDIA 17

WRITING, PRINT, BOOKS: EARLY EXPRESSIONS OF RESISTANCE

Writers and commentators often date criticism of new media back to
the ancients. According to Plato, Socrates opposed the teaching of
writing. He disliked that text was mute and did not engage in dialogue,
and warned that the alphabet and writing would create forgetfulness
since people would no longer depend on memory (Plato around 370
BC, see also Fang 2015, 21). The position of Plato himself is also often
cited; he advocated artistic censorship, believing that art should inspire
appropriate social attitudes and behaviour (Solomon and Higgins
1996, 54). From the beginning of philosophy, a key question has been
how to live a virtuous life, and moral philosophy, as well as various
religious denominations, has prescribed rules of good behaviour
(Solomon and Higgins 1996; Brantlinger 1983). Perhaps the strongest
argument against new media has been that they have not supported this
moral endeavour, but instead embody characteristics that threaten to
undermine what is virtuous and valuable.
It is always risky to take a contemporary phenomenon and draw historical
lines back to a time when conditions were entirely different. In this book, the
emphasis is on media developing from the nineteenth century, and I make no
claims to present a full history of media resistance. However, some historical
observations are interesting in a longue dure perspective a perspective that
emphasizes continuities in structures and mentalities (Braudel 1980).
Particularly interesting are early reactions to writing, print and books.
The shift from oral to written culture in ancient history is the rst of
many shifts in media modes and functions. In the early modern period, the
invention of printing as well as the arrival of paper in Europe prompted a
new shift in communicative modes. Printed material became important for
trade, the rise in colloquial speech and the spread of dissenting ideas
(Barnouw 1966, 3). But printed material also challenged the King and
the Church, and undermined the religious monopoly on knowledge. The
Churchs reaction to the invention of printing was dual; printed bibles
made Gods words accessible, but the technology of printing could also be
used to distribute unauthorized material. Reactions were brutal: In the
sixteenth century, the Catholic Church prohibited reading of heretical
writings, offending books were consigned to public bonres, and an
Index was drawn up of prohibited books (Fang 2015, 46ff). In contrast,
lists of good books became the basis for collections and later public
libraries (Hertel 1986, 347348).
18 MEDIA RESISTANCE

The duality in the Churches reactions were mirrored by others in the

early modern era. In the essay What is Enlightenment, Kant (1997)
encouraged fellow citizens to trust their own reasoning, and believers in
enlightenment and universal education held high hopes for the revolu-
tionary technology of print. But as mass distribution of printed material
ourished, concern intensied about popular taste in content, and new
lines were drawn between art and non-art, and between acceptable and
non-acceptable genres (Newcomb 2002, 8). Each new genre was met with
ambivalence; for example, when the novel became popular in England the
eighteenth century, it was at rst considered a vulgar phenomenon
(Williams 1958, 306). In contrast, poetry, drama and the verse epic were
seen as the ultimate literary genres (hman 2002, 10).
The immersion of readers in novel plots intensied concerns about
copycat behaviour, a recurring theme in the history of media resistance.
Would readers be able to distinguish between literary depictions and real
life, or would they copy the behaviour of literary characters? A much
discussed novel, which exemplies the concerns raised by popular reading,
was Goethes The Sorrows of Young Werther [Die Leiden des jungen
Werthers], a 1774 bestseller about a young man committing suicide
when he is unable to marry the woman he loves. The novel had a huge
impact and gave rise to intense discussion on the ethical problem of suicide
and whether it was morally responsible to depict suicide in print. The
Gentlemans Magazine for 1784 reported the unfortunate destiny of a
Miss Glover who was found dead with a copy of Werther under the bed;
the magazine blaming the evil tendency of that pernicious work (cited
from Swales 1987, 9495). In 1775 the Leipzig city council responded to
a petition from the theological faculty and made it an offence, punishable
by ne, to sell copies of the novel, remaining in force to 1825 (97).
The debates over early print media illuminate the use of metaphors in
media scepticism and resistance; there is a rich tradition of rhetorical expres-
sions characterizing media and use of media negatively and many predate
the mass media era. Several are linked with disease; Krefting et al. (2014)
show how the public sphere in the eighteenth century expanded despite
warnings about the writing epidemic*. The Danish writer Ludwig
Holberg was among the critics, he expressed strong concern for the con-
tagious writing diarrhoea* that prevailed in his time and urged charla-
tans from all classes not to pick up the pen and let their thoughts out (9).
In other words, the development of writing, reading and books was marked
by enthusiasm, but also ambivalence, disillusionment and resistance.
 2 RESISTANCE TO EARLY MASS MEDIA 19

SERIAL FICTION: POISONING THE MIND

The period from 1850 to 1920 is described as the the great technical
revolution* (Bastiansen and Dahl 2003, ch. 3). Universal education
systems greatly extended literacy, and inventions in production and dis-
tribution technologies printing presses and railway networks made
printed material widely available. Shorter working days, lamps and elec-
tricity allowed reading for leisure. The rise in advertising enabled new
forms of nancial support for popular media; Hilmes (2007, 20) describes
an explosion in numbers, forms and types of media in the US between
1890 and 1920. Media went from being organs published by and for the
elite, to be directed at people in general.
This was a great epoch of media resistance. Intellectuals and profes-
sionals had to come to terms with spectacular new forms of mass commu-
nication: based on not only the printed words but also electromagnetism,
sound and images (Marvin 1988). To sceptics, popular media blossomed
like weeds on a hot day (Hilmes 2007, 20).
The rst genuinely popular genre was serialized ction, emerging rst in
newspapers from the 1830. The stories drew inspiration from folk tales and
oral culture; thrillers and mysteries, romance and historical epics, science
ction and horror could be found in the cheap volumes (hman 2002;
Sutter 2003). Stories were sold for a dime in the US and a penny in the UK
hence the terms Dime novel and the more deprecating Penny dreadful.
Cheap literature was also called pulp ction because of the rough pulp
paper. Serial ction was from the beginning considered an outright threat to
culture: it was formulaic, with no literary merit, poor writing style, plot and
characterization (Bierbaum 1994, 95). The voluminous character of the
series often several thousand pages was attributed to the fact that authors
received payments per sheet and were writing purely for money (hman
2002, 9). Since characters were to survive through a drawn-out narrative, the
stories depended heavily on stereotypes. Ethnic stereotypes in popular c-
tion came complete with predictable occupations and phonetically ren-
dered dialects (Bierbaum 1994, 95).
Popular ction drew condemnations on moral grounds. The moral
criticism continued to be based in the belief that literature should depict
good behaviour and elevate individuals to a higher moral level (Drotner
1999, 603). In popular ction, heroes were often lawless, such as pirates
and highwaymen. Female characters were active and strong-willed, and
sometimes lawless too, and it was commonplace to warn that popular
20 MEDIA RESISTANCE

literature would teach young people criminal behaviour (Sutter 2003,

166). The new genres were seen as particularly detrimental to the
young, but women and working class men were also seen to be vulnerable
to their inuence (hman 2002, 12). Publishers were prosecuted; an
extract from a criminal indictment for obscene libel in Britain stated that
the defendant intended to debauch, poison and infect the minds of
youth (cited from Lewis 2003, 145). Health threats were imminent; a US
ofcial report from 1876 referred to warnings from physicians that reading
romantic literature would lead to disorders of the nerve centres, which
had so alarmingly increased (cited from Bierbaum 1994, 93).
The resistance against popular ction also reected concern for enlight-
enment and popular education. Efforts to teach the population to read
were motivated by a desire to advance learning and maturity, whereas
serial ction was seen to encourage passive reading, romantic fantasizing
and escapism. If people wanted to read, they should read something
useful: geography, history and statistics, argued Swedish editor C.F.
Bergstedt in an 1851 essay about wretched literature*. Serialized ction
caused young men to have no energy for serious and benecial work*
and young women to sacrice happiness, peace of conscience and pro-
gress for frivolity and entertainment* (cited from hman 2002, 11).
First among those who resisted popular literature were the religious and
literary establishments, with some support from the medical profession. But
also to the relatively newer professions of teachers and librarians, resistance
became an integrated element of organizational and professional ideology.
[T]he whole idea of ction in the library was one which the profession
wrestled with for many years, writes Bierbaum of US librarians (1994,
100). Librarians as a rule strongly denounced serial literature, and kept it out
through the means available: selection lists, catalogues, including not to be
circulated lists (Bierbaum 1994, 94). In schools, the main strategy was to
suppress it, pretend it does not exist, and in this way express their contempt*,
writes Tvinnereim about the early attitudes of Norwegian teachers (1978, 81).
The metaphors used about popular literature were inspired by the
problems of the day, metaphors alluding to disease, garbage and sanitation
ourished. Popular literature was likened to poison and pollution, epi-
demics, infestation, sewage, garbage, rottenness and thrash (see Lewis
2003, 145; Sutter 2003, 165; hman 2002, 9; Fang 2015, 48). The rst
urban sewage systems date back to the same time as serialized ction,
around 1840, and whereas uncontrolled sewage poisoned the body, litera-
ture was seen to poison the mind.
 2 RESISTANCE TO EARLY MASS MEDIA 21

CINEMA: EDUCATION FOR CRIME

Cinema shows began around 1900, and cinema rapidly became the
dominant institution in popular culture (Black 1994, 6). Cinema trans-
cended class, ethnic, gender and national differences, and soon became a
controversial medium on both sides of the Atlantic. Movies were seen to
rapidly intensify the process of demoralization; it drew young and vulner-
able people out of their homes, tempted them into dark spaces and served
them content of low quality and despicable moral standard (Grieveson
2004, 13, see also; Pearson 1984, 93; Drotner 1999, 605; Black 1994, 9).
Young women were seen to be corrupted by movies romanticizing illicit
love affairs and young men were incited to criminal behaviour by lms
glorifying criminals (Black 1994, 9). Instead of teaching the values and
competences needed by the young and uneducated, they provided a
different form of education; across national boundaries cinema was
labelled education for crime, schools of vice and crime (Black 1994,
10), a training school of mischief, mockery, lawbreaking and crime
(Grieveson 2004, 15) and a training ground for prostitution and rob-
bery (Thompson and Bordwell 2010, 29).
In response to the cinemas illusions of reality, new medical metaphors,
involving psychiatry and mind control, became part of the vocabulary of
resistance. Austrian psychiatrists Josef Breuer and Sigmund Freud had
introduced hypnosis as a treatment for hysteria in the 1890s and hypnosis
later became a metaphor for media effects. Cinema allegedly led to sur-
render, under conditions of hypnotic receptivity, to the cheapest emo-
tional appeals, wrote F. R. Leavis in 1930 (2006, 14). Compared to the
cinema, popular ction suddenly appeared more innocent, an argument
spelled out by a Kansas philosophy professor:

[P]ictures are more degrading than the dime novel because they represent
real esh and blood characters and import moral lessons directly through the
senses. The dime novel cannot lead the boy further than his limited imagi-
nation will allow, but the motion picture forces upon his view things that are
new, they give rsthand experience (cited from Black 1994, 10).

This is one of many statements where genres that were widely condemned,
appear more respectable because new genres are seen to be worse.
Compared with popular ction, the cinema was also seen to expose users
to more serious health risks; risks of re in unsafe buildings with
22 MEDIA RESISTANCE

inammable nitrate lms, concern that spitting in theatres would spread

disease, unease over whether ickering lights would damage eyesight and
induce epilepsy (Pearson 1984, 95; French and Petley 2007, 7). Familiar
metaphors were used to describe cinema, such as dirt, lth and trash, but
also new diagnoses were hinted at with metaphors such as nickel delir-
ium (Black 1994, 6).
From around 1910, state and industry censorship boards emerged locally
and nationally. In the US, local censorship boards were formed from 1908,
and the industry allowed lms to be censored to achieve respectability
(Thompson and Bordwell 2010, 29). In Europe, virtually every country
established some form of censorship, in Norway from 1913. In the UK, an
act of law from 1909 required local authorities to issue licences to safe
cinemas, but soon authorities also interfered with content. By 1912 the
British Board of lm Censors was established, becoming the accepted self-
governance board from 1913 (Robertson 1989, 1).
For those who resisted cinemas presence and potential inuence,
pushing for political and institutional control was an obvious choice.
Books and print had been subject to censorship, and when cinema
emerged in the early 1900s, the police already had both in Europe and
the US authority to withdraw licences from music halls, variety shows and
other public spectacles if performers included offensive material (Mathews
1994; Nymo 2002, 20).
The campaigns to censor cinema were coalitions, with some types of
professions and social activists involved across national borders. Churches
and clergy of different denominations organized protests and boycotts of
lms judged immoral by church authorities (Black 1994, 2). Churches
were joined by social reform movements for juvenile protection, virtuous
lifestyles and temperance. In the US, the Progressive reform movement
fought corruption, child labour, unsafe houses and factories, prostitution
and alcoholism, but also immoral media from books and newspapers
to cinema (Black 1994, 8). Nymo (2002, 22) points to the activism of
teachers as instrumental to achieve Norwegian cinema censorship; the
teachers seminars and the enlightenment ethos laid the foundation for a
professional self-condence and status that teachers could draw on in their
struggle to restrict popular culture.
Many women and womens groups were active campaigners (Evensmo
1992, 61; Black 1994, 9; Nymo 2002, ch. 2). Middle class ideals pre-
sumed that women were virtuous and should act as moral guardians, and
female reformers became a counterpart to masculine pursuits such as
 2 RESISTANCE TO EARLY MASS MEDIA 23

drinking alcohol and using prostitutes (Grieveson 2004, 27, 29).

Censorship is often seen as a class issue (Mathews 1994, 1), yet campaigns
drew support from across the political spectrum, also from labour repre-
sentatives who saw the movie industry as capitalist and speculative
(Nymo 2002, 35).

RADIO: RISK OF CONTAGION

Early radio was blamed for a lot of things: dizzy spells, changes in
weather, creaky oorboards, Barnouw writes (1966, 103) and cites the
example of a farmer complaining to a Louisville station that radio waves
had killed a blackbird and potentially might kill him. In general, however,
radio was met with the kind of enthusiasm that would later greet the
Internet (Ch. 5); a discourse that gloried radios special properties to
unify disparate communities and build a national culture (Hilmes
1997, 1). But as radio became a mass medium, radio was subject to
similar warnings and scepticism as other mass media, in particular
concern that radio would undermine cultural standards, and be used
as a tool to threaten democracy.
Radio was rst used for ship-to-shore communication in the early 1900s,
but was soon embraced by enthusiastic amateurs (Briggs 1985; Dahl 1975;
Barnouw 1966). With the outbreak of World War I in 1914, amateur activity
was suspended, and the initiative passed to the armed forces (Dahl 1975;
Hilmes 2007; Briggs 1985). David Hendy, who has studied the develop-
ment of wireless on the eve of World War I, describes an atmosphere of
control, paranoia and anxiety (2013, 77). An important metaphor to
describe the negative effect of radio was that of contagion; the fear that
wireless could spread information or more precisely misinformation in an
uncontrolled way. Wireless was invisible, synchronous, and messages could
be heard by anybody. It was increasingly clear that, given the special
qualities of wireless, it needed to stay in the right hands (81).
But whose hands were right? After the war, controversy erupted in
many countries over how radio should be controlled, involving state actors
as well as social and cultural movements, manufacturers and advertisers,
and educational institutions. The different paths taken had important
implications for the development of broadcasting, and also for the evolve-
ment of media resistance.
In the US, radio proliferated with a multitude of operators, many of
which were universities and educational establishments. But apathy,
24 MEDIA RESISTANCE

disgust and weariness set in (Barnouw 1966, 173) as interference led

to chaos. Proponents of educational and public service lost out as the
1927 Radio Act turned radio into a commercial medium run by networks,
although more regulated than press and movies (Hilmes 2007, 44). In
Europe, in contrast, private companies operating on a licence were
replaced by state monopolies. The British Broadcasting Corporation
(BBC) was established in 1927 in an atmosphere of choice between
monopoly and confusion (Briggs 1985, 33); its mandate to provide
national broadcasting with no concessions to the vulgar (55). In his
Broadcast over Britain, the rst Director-General of the BBC John Reith
refused to accept that radio should give people what they want. Few
know what they want, and very few what they need, Reith proclaimed, and
said that our responsibility is to carry into the greatest possible number of
homes everything that is best in every human department of knowledge,
endeavour and achievement, and to avoid the things which are, or may be
hurtful (Reith 1924, 34).
In the US, where radio developed commercially, criticism erupted over
moral standards. In a more profound way that other media, radio trans-
cended boundaries of age, class, gender and geography, as well as between
public and private spaces. The base in advertising was seen to draw radio
towards the vulgar, the barbaric and the illegitimate (Hilmes 2007, 55).
Of particular concern was jazz music, which, like many other forms of
popular culture, was seen as degrading and lowers all the moral stan-
dards; according to protesters jazz left the listeners incapable of distin-
guishing between good and evil, between right and wrong (cited from
Hilmes 1997, 48). In Europe, the BBC attempted to root out American
inuence and preserve a greater distance from the audience; the style was
different from the friendly, informal and democratic style of American
radio (Scannell and Cardiff 1991, 293). Yet, British radio was also criti-
cized for undermining morality and culture. Wolfe (1984) notes that
churches were sometimes positive, but more often cautious and belliger-
ently negative to radio, believing it to threaten clerical and ecclesial
autonomy (xxii, see also Brigg 1965, part II). British literary critic F. R.
Leavis in 1930 expressed concern about passive listening and saw radio to
have a standardizing inuence that hardly admits of doubt (2006, 14).
Perhaps the strongest concern surrounding radio was that it could aid
threats to democracy. During World War I, the media were used, for the
rst time, in a large-scale effort to control and manipulate public opinion
(Ward 1989, 58). From the time the Nazi Government took power in
 2 RESISTANCE TO EARLY MASS MEDIA 25

Germany in the 1930s, the threat became even more direct, as radio, lm
and public loudspeakers were used to rally support and mobilize the
masses (113). Members of the Frankfurt school, who had sought refuge
in the US to escape Nazi persecution in Germany, were dismayed by the
use of media for propaganda. However, Horkheimer and Adorno saw no
guarantee in the US commercial radio model:

In America it collects no fees from the public, and so has acquired the
illusory form of disinterested, unbiased authority which suits Fascism admir-
ably. (1997, 159)

The debate over radio prompted new stark metaphors, such as contagion,
but also chaos in the ether and the tower of babel (e.g. Barnouw
1966). The biblical legend of the Tower of Babel where different lan-
guages are Gods punishment to Man symbolized human curiosity and
desire, but also arrogance leading to chaos and confusion. Radio was seen as
having great potential for good, but in the war-torn rst half of the
twentieth century, it was also seen as a potential means of destruction.

COMICS: HORROR AND MUTILATIONS

The sale of comic books exploded in the late 1940s and early 1950s,
during and in the direct aftermath of World War II. While many of the
comics were innocent enough, with themes familiar from popular culture,
others broke new ground in terms of sex, violence and horror. The
resistance against comic books marks a shift to an era where traditional
values confront a more liberal cultural climate (Gilbert 1986, 1314).
Comics were part of the wartime and post-war boom in popular culture,
but the short distance to the atrocities of war also led to astonishment and
disbelief as to the level of violence and brutality.
Again, the content was argued to be more amoral, and generally worse,
than that of previous media. In addition to horror and violence; protest
erupted over the portrayal of sexually active and powerful women, evil
children, and what critics saw as role models for homosexuality (in Batman
and Robin and Wonderwoman) (Wertham 2004; rst publ. 1954, 190
192, 234, see also; Lepore 2014). Until the comic book era, alleged the
inuential US psychiatrist and anti-comics campaigner Frederic Wertham,
there were hardly any serious crimes such as murder by children under
twelve (2004, 155). Now, however, there were evidence of a signicant
26 MEDIA RESISTANCE

correlation between crime comics reading and the more serious forms of
juvenile delinquency (164).
Fredric Wertham was an important force in the anti-comics campaign.
From 1948, he wrote critical pieces in magazines such as The Ladies Home
Journal and Readers Digest (Bastiansen and Dahl 2003, 344). Seduction of
the Innocent, his 1954 book, had enormous inuence both in the US
and Europe (Barker 1984a, 5657). Reibman (2004, xi) characterizes
Wertham as a traditional left-wing European intellectual and product of
the Enlightenment tradition; as a rst generation Jewish immigrant from
Germany in the 1920s he nds it ironic that Wertham should be char-
acterized as a reactionary. Yet, Werthams ferocious critique of comic
books is yet another illustration that resistance to media and genres have
come both from left and right.
In later decades, Wertham has been criticized for both misrepresenting
content (Barker 1984a) and fabricating evidence from clinical trials
(Johnston 2013). Wertham himself, however, was frustrated that he did
not get more support from science and academia. After a description of
Jungle comics which specialise in torture, bloodshed and lust in an
exotic setting he sighs:

Whenever I see a book like this in the hands of a little seven-year-old boy, his
eyes glued to the printed page, I feel like a fool to have to prove that this
kind of thing is not good mental nourishment for children! What is wrong
with the prevailing ethics of educators and psychologists that they have
silently permitted this kind of thing year after year . . . ? (31)

Werthams comment reects exasperation that experts were not unani-

mous; indeed, the debate about comics reects disappointment over the
early studies of media effects. In a 1954 Norwegian parliamentary debate
about comics, there are references to Werthams argument, but also to
experts disputing the copycat effect (516). It is lamented that no unan-
imous scientic conclusions have been reached despite this being an issue
which scientists wrestle with all over the world (1954, 509, 510, see also
Lepore 2014). For some members of the Norwegian Parliament, however,
the level of violence was indication enough that something had to be
done. As one member, Erling Wikborg, argued (St.tid 1954, 508),

Many of these series and this is serious undermines respect for human
dignity. They often degrade women. Sometimes other races are degraded.
 2 RESISTANCE TO EARLY MASS MEDIA 27

The series are lled with all dreadful possibilities in terms of brutality,
torture, murder and many kinds of crimes. Some series even depicts
crippled, deformed and coloured people as especially criminal.*

Great sacrices had been made during the war to protect civilized life,
democracy and enlightenment, and now comics laden with misogyny,
Nazism, racism and negative stereotyping became popular entertainment.
Campaigns against comics erupted simultaneously in many countries
and led to legislation or self-regulation (Bastiansen and Dahl 2003, 346).
In the US, Wertham campaigned for a law against the sale of violent
comics to children under fteen, and public hearings and legal action
followed (Gilbert 1986, 106). While a self-censorship Comics code was
adopted in the US in 1954, labelling the suitability of each comic book
now published (Reibman 2004, xxvii), so-called horror comics were
outlawed in Britain in 1955 (Barker 1984a, 5).
Allies in the struggle against comics were teachers, scientists, librarians,
psychologists, doctors and police. In Britain, the arguments against comic
books resonated with religious, educational and political interests,
including Communist Party members who were concerned about
Americanization and the corruption of the young (Barker 1984a, 29). In
a parallel to the campaign for cinema censorship (above), Barker points to
the National Union of Teachers as a decisive force in the campaign against
British horror comics (1984a, 15). The educational and literary profes-
sions were particularly incensed by the industrys attempt to achieve
respectability for popular culture through the use of high culture.
Already Shakespeare plays had been adopted for the cinema (Thompson
and Bordwell 2010, 2930) and now they were put into comic strips:
Shakespeare and the child are corrupted at the same time is Werthams
verdict on the marketing of comic-book Macbeth with the slogan a dark
tragedy of jealousy, intrigue and violence adapted for easy and enjoyable
reading (143, see also MacDonald 2011).
Publishers claimed that comics were good for children, teaching them to
read; trying to capitalize on the higher legitimacy of print compared with
image-based media. But the protesters did not buy it. According to
Wertham, comics prevented children from developing the necessary left-
to-right eye movements (127), prompted the habit of gazing rather than
reading (139), destroyed the taste for good books (140), made children bad
spellers (144), and taught words which were not proper words, such as
ARGHH, WHAM, THUNK, YEOW, BLAM (145).
28 MEDIA RESISTANCE

Although some restrictions were initiated, campaigners were not con-

tent; there was a sense that the legal path was becoming more difcult to
pursue, and support for censorship was vanishing. In Norway, Wikborg
expressed disappointment that authorities did not recognize that comics
were downright criminal (St.tid 1954, 518):

If prosecutors would monitor these comics with greater attention, they

would nd more than one opportunity to use the provisions of the
Criminal Code. I am thinking of para 140 of incitement to crime, para
142 about blasphemy, para 160 which speaks of public instruction in the use
of explosives to commit crimes. We also have paragraphs 322 and 323 of
criminal content in printed publications. We already have a number of
provisions that can be used, but I have the impression that the prosecution
has been rather hesitant when it comes to these issues.*

Wikborg, a lawyer as well as a parliamentary representative for the

Christian Peoples Party would continue to oppose new media; four
years later he would deem television to be exceedingly dangerous*
(St.tid. 1957, 24582459) and he also believed the Norwegian radio
corporation to have skeletons in their closets* (St.tid 1954, 509).
Reactions against comics stimulated new metaphors, which were both
sexual and violent. Norwegian author Bjrn Rongen saw comics as spiri-
tual rape of minors*, whereas a Danish author Trk Haxthausen pigeon-
holed them as education for terror* in 1954 (Bastiansen and Dahl
2003, 345). Comics induced depravity and destroyed human souls,
hence, the title of Werthams book Seduction of the Innocent and
metaphors used by him such as an orgy of brutality (111).

WHAT IS AT STAKE?
The preoccupations of media resistance are not some peripheral concerns;
they are connected with broader cultural, social and political struggles at
the time. As noted in the introduction, six recurring values have been
identied in media resistance from the early mass media era; new media
were seen to undermine morality, culture, enlightenment, democracy,
community and health.
In the early phases of resistance the most prevalent values that the
media were seen to undermine was morality and culture. Media and
cultural depictions were conceived as vehicles to raise standards, both
 2 RESISTANCE TO EARLY MASS MEDIA 29

morally and in terms of taste and quality, and resistance reected disap-
pointment when these expectations were not met. The emergence of the
rst mass media coincided with the height of Victorian morality; the
prominence of the British Empire ensured that Victorian values spread
across the world and shaped the ideals of the new middle classes (Sundin
and Willner 2007, 141; Black 1994, 2122). Central to Victorian morality
was that the upper classes should inspire and raise the standards of the
lower class; Victorian authors produced stories of poor children and
families following the path of virtue (Fang 2015, 75), whereas new
media delighted in ridiculing Victorian values (Black 1994, 7).
What critics saw as vulgarity and depravity intensied with each new
medium, and so did also the conviction that culture was at stake. It is
commonplace today that culture is in crisis, stated British literary critic
F. R. Leavis in the 1930 pamphlet Mass Civilization and Minority Culture
(2006, 13). Leavis saw the emerging media as contributing to a process
of levelling-down leading to passive consumption and loss of taste:

Broadcasting, like the lms, is in practice mainly a means of passive diver-

sion . . . it tends to make active recreation, especially active use of the mind,
more difcult (14).

Leavis represents a position where high culture and cultural aspirations are
seen as the basis for civilized life. Culture represents mans best achieve-
ments and high morality, whereas the mass media represented low culture
and amorality (Storey 2009). Although the perspective has lost ground,
Storey considers the approach foundational, still representing the com-
mon sense approach in some circles (33). From the left, the mass media
were seen as agents of standardization and uniformity, destroying aristo-
cratic high culture as well as authentic folk culture. Under the prevailing
conditions, argued Horkheimer and Adorno (1997; rst publ. 1944), all
mass culture is identical (121) and broadcast programs are all exactly the
same (122). Instead of contributing to enlightenment and social con-
sciousness, popular media destroyed the masses by drowning them in
pleasure (143).
Those who protest against media are often conceptualized as reaction-
ary or backward; and much media resistance in the early phases hark back
to a nostalgic past. But arguments and positions also point in other directions.
On the one hand, there is criticism that media are destroying what is dear and
valuable, on the other hand, there are arguments that the media stand in the
30 MEDIA RESISTANCE

way of progress. These latter arguments reect not only disappointment that
media depicted bad rather than good behaviour, but also disappointment that
the emerging media did not, to a stronger degree lend themselves to progres-
sive causes such as educational enlightenment and improvement of public
health. Progressive campaigners on both sides of the Atlantic were disap-
pointed with the escapist public, and media that prioritized triviality, super-
stition and frivolous entertainment. In the long run, it was argued, this would
hamper the development of mature and competent citizens, and prevent
youngster from developing into competent and healthy adults.
From the eighteenth century, authorities visibly increased their public
health ambitions and a steep decline in mortality followed, but the indus-
trial revolution brought new health risks, such as pollution and epidemics
(Sundin and Willner 2007). Many saw the emerging media as part of the
new risks, not only were there concern for eyesight, brain damage, mental
distortion and psychic infections (cited from Grieveson 2004, 12), there
were also concerns that spectators would burn to death or catch infections
in dilapidated cinema theatres.
The debate over early mass media reected the concerns over mass
society; concepts such as mass culture, mass art, mass entertainment
and mass media were all coined in the interwar period. The problem of
the masses was a common theme in social thought, whether Marxist,
Christian or liberal (Bastiansen and Dahl 2003, 237238). On the one
hand there was concern that the masses were inherently amoral and destruc-
tive, in the words of Spanish mass society theorist Jos Ortega y Gasset:
The mass crushes beneath it everything that is different, everything that is
excellent, individual, qualied and select (1993, rst publ. 1930, 18). On
the other, there were concern about authoritarian states indoctrinating the
masses with the use of media propaganda, a concern reinforced by the rise of
totalitarianism in Italy, Germany and the Soviet Union.
The concern with mass society is also relevant for the argument that
mass media would undermine community. Media and communication
technology is often depicted as bringing people together, but to sceptics
and critics media brought isolation. As Fang puts it (2015, 4),

For the many centuries during which most of the world was illiterate, people
received their information from each other, from travelers and from their
local priests. Entertainment came from one another in the form of singing,
dancing and story-telling. The shared element was community. Each other.
Media brought isolation.
 2 RESISTANCE TO EARLY MASS MEDIA 31

According to mass society theorists, uniformity and conformity character-

ized modern societies, eroding traditional bonds and communal solidarity.
In the US, the Progressive reform movement worked to reform urban
America by returning to values of local communities (Geraghty 2009, 4).
The philosopher John Dewey was a major progressive theorist, who shared
the concern that industrial society and mass media were destroying the
communal basis of society (Dewey 1991; rst publ 1927; see also Hilmes
2007, 18). Dewey describes a situation where, in the 1920s, there were
already too much media the telegraph, telephone, radio, mail and
printing press. He argued that the physical and external means of collect-
ing information . . . have far outrun the intellectual phase of inquiry and
organization of the result (1991, 180).
The six concerns for morality, culture, enlightenment, democracy,
community and health are not mutually exclusive; they are linked and
overlap, but also illustrate that media resistance may emerge from differ-
ent, and often contradictory positions. In addition to concerns about
different values, there were resistance to different aspect of the media:
technology, structure, content and functions. Resistance evolves in
response to each new medium and mode shift: From oral to written
communication, from writing to print, from print to images, from oral
to radio, from photographs to movies. It is interesting to observe how
protesters often contrast the functions of a new medium with a medium
already an object of resistance; while this may alert sceptics to new dan-
gers, the effect would also have been to make existing media appear more
innocent, thus aiding the process of media acceptance.

WHAT TO DO?
For resistance to be manifest it is not sufcient that someone is concerned;
organizations, politicians, professionals or other actors must also act pub-
licly, suggest measures and organize protest (Phillips 2008). But what
could those who resisted new media really do? Herbert Stone wanted to
smash the Vitascope and the Church in early modern Europe destined
objectionable books to public bonres. As we get closer to own time,
suggestions that media be destroyed or banned become less frequent.
In the early era of the mass media, in the nineteenth and twentieth cen-
turies, protestors largely fought for legal, political and institutional control
and censorship. Cinema was censored from around 1910; the outbreak of
World War I led to state takeover of radio, in the 1920s radio became
32 MEDIA RESISTANCE

regulated as public companies in Europe, in the 1940s and 1950s anti-

comics campaigners succeeded in instigating prohibition and censorship.
In order for censorship and control to function, professions and experts
must exercise discretion and authority. Churches, schools and libraries
were important gatekeepers for keeping out undesirable printed material.
With popular literature, as well as movies and comics, panels of experts
were set up to vet, evaluate and recommend. Educational, religious and
medical professions were also inuential in advisory bodies for early broad-
casting. State and public broadcasting institutions, as well as the US radio
networks and their self-regulatory mechanisms, are prominent examples of
institutional control of media.
In the cases I have discussed from early mass media history, I have not
seen material where consumers pledge abstinence because they were con-
vinced that media were bad for them. But there are plenty of efforts to
convince others to abstain from media. A whole range of social and political
movements was active in the struggle against early popular media and
genres. Campaigners used parents meeting to mobilize support and
urged parents to behave responsibly and restrict youngsters media con-
sumption. Appeals were directed at producers and distributors to behave
responsibly. For example, in a 1954 parliamentary debate on comics in
Norway, a representative suggested an information campaign to get
newsagents and tobacconists to refuse to sell this lth* (St.tid 1954, 515).
Resistance travels across borders and protesters, such as Fredric
Wertham, helped to inspire campaigns in many countries. There are also
references to the involvement of international bodies, in the case of comics,
critics refer to debates in UNESCO, a United Nations agency established
in 1945 that would later develop a strong media-critical agenda (St.tid
1954, 507508). Studies show that the methods used were similar from
one campaign to the next (see for example Grieveson (2004) on the US
and Nymo (2002) on the Norwegian cinema campaigns, and Barker
(1984a) on the UK comics campaign). The campaigners toolkit was
similar to that of any social or political activist of the twentieth century:
public meetings were held, petitions were directed at politicians, pamphlets
produced, lists of speakers were offered to conferences, letters were written
to the press, alliances built with experts and professional bodies. A method
that was often used in this early period was to collect particularly despicable
pieces of content to show to legal authorities, politicians, clergy and press
in order to create a public outcry. Likewise, campaigners collected
 2 RESISTANCE TO EARLY MASS MEDIA 33

examples of stories indicating potential copycat behaviour. As one British

anti-comic campaigner described the situation in retrospect,

We looked it is almost wicked to say this with eager anticipation for a

story in the press of a child who had done something so that we could point
to the comics. And if one had done something, then this supported our case.
And we called this research. (Joe Benjamin, anti-comics campaigner, cited in
Barker 1984a, 182)

The quote illustrates how protesters did research and how many
yearned for scientic evidence and proof of medias detrimental character.
Systematic media research was of course initiated; such as the 1928 Payne
Fund study on cinema effects and the Ofce of Radio Research with Paul
Lazarsfeld and colleagues at Columbia University from the 1930s
(Ytreberg 2008, 40). But as the period of early mass media resistance
came to an end, there was reason to be disappointed, as expert evidence
became increasingly contradictory. Those critical and sceptical of the way
media transformed society would not get an unambiguous answer from
science, but there were other sources of inspiration: not least engaging and
popular ction stories where bad media played a part in undermining
civilization and leading to apocalypse.

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