The New Barbarism, With Color

If you have ever wondered whether that is a blonde wig or a titian wig that Milton Berle dons at the height of his humor, or if you have ever had a great yearning to see that dark-haired girl roller-derby-skater with the Jersey Jolters in all her beauty, you are soon going to get your chance. The Supreme Court decided the other day to let C.B.S. put a little color wheel in front of your TV set that will cause all which now seems mere black-and-white to take on a multi-colored hue.

The F.C.C. had previously declared that Columbia makes color better than R.C.A., so the highest court's decision merely wrote judicious conclusion to what that celebrated television critic and raconteur John Crosby has described as a battle of the titans to determine which will ultimately control all mass entertainment in these United States.

Actually the titans are Tweedle-dee and Tweedle-dum to the fellow who clicks his dial from channel to channel hoping to chance upon something more enervating than Howdy-Doody or the lady wrestlers. Justice Frankfurter must have been trying to convey something of this horror and nausea when, in his decision the other day, he expressed the fear that television may be a "new Barbarism parading as scientific progress." He concluded that along with radio, television could no doubt "enlarge man's horizon, but by making him a captive listener it may make for his spiritual impoverishment."

It is the declared intent of those fellows responsible for deciding which programs will come into focus on your TV screen, to cater to something they conceive of as the taste of the mass audience. Certainly a night spent in the tortured confines of a neighbor's living room, where you can't turn the damned thing off, is sufficient to convince anyone of their success.

They disclaim all responsibility for the level of taste and intellect at which they claim to have found the American viewing public. But when the generation of children now growing up with eyes fixed on the television screen comes of age--physically at least--these broadcasting executives and ad-men will feel the full guilt of staring into their expressionless faces and saying, "I did this."

All that the Supreme Court's decision assures us of, is that the hollow men will now be filled with colored straw and not the plan old-fashioned black-and-white variety.