The Drugged Awaken
The famed coat of many colors of Joseph of Biblical fame, or the ever-changing chameleon, can’t pretend to hold a candle to the editors of the Coast publication “It” for variety and shiftiness of policy.
’Twas only a few months ago that this magazine, together with one or two others put forth here in Los Angeles were rising up on their hind legs and mouthing vapid denunciation at “FILM TRUTH’S” policy of getting right down to fundamentals and digging at the cancerous sores of the industry. Now comes to hand an issue of “It” thundering against the shame of many of the movie colony, terming them drug addicts, and calling for a thorough cleansing of the Hollywood section.
Well, well, well! Even Rip Van Winkle awakened in time. And so it is with “It.”
To pretend that all the men and women of Hollywood were lily white, beyond criticism, etc., has been a favored role with every publication devoted to the industry. FILM TRUTH’S entry into the ring was met with a holier-than-thou-don’t-dare-to-touch-us greeting by several publications. We have gone on our well-known way, and now we must compliment “It” for getting a little vision and editorially announcing that all is not well with our little colony.
“Two members of the colony carted off to the police station as drug addicts” is the gist of “It’s” editorial. But why stop at two? And why have certain publications risen in horror against articles appearing in a San Francisco paper giving the report of the State authorities that twenty-five per cent of the registered addicts in Los Angeles are of the movie colony?
That the use of drugs is widespread in certain quarters has been known for some time. There is nothing that is new in the fact. It is a beastly shame that such a cancerous few should smirch the clean majority; that magnates should expect the public to take its entertainment from such hands.