- Obvious typos and punctuation inconsistencies corrected.
F I L M
T R U T H
The Shame of Smut
I am of the mire too dirty for swine; I am of thefilth that incinerators cannot destroy; I am of thestench that God’s own sun fails to purify; I am ofthe corruption that lies at the most dismal depths of man’smind; I am the slime and slew that pervert the divinegift of speech;—I AM “SMUT.”
I am the foul breath of disease; I am the tainted handsof sin; I am Thought strangled by Shame;—I AM“SMUT.”
The muddied waters of the Ganges are to me as therippling mountain brook.
I am the refuse that Hell discharges.
I AM “SMUT.”
And it is to me that the great Master of the MotionPicture has turned for succor.
I am selected as the tool to lure a vile profit.
To me it has been left to smirch the good name of arevered American classic; to dig a Grave of the Namelessfor a play that clean men and women have loved.
I am the Satanic genius that makes an Artist—moulderof a pictorial masterpiece—poison his triumphin gangrene.
I AM “SMUT.”
My words need explanation. Yet from my own foulstation I hesitate to descend. Here, however, is anadvertisement that sullied the pages of a New York newspaperon October 4th:
“Why does every woman have to feel the strainingpower of seduction in one form or another—the hot,alluring breaths of deceits?
“This thing has been, time and again,