“Anti- Communism and Employment Policies in Radio and Television”
Excerpt from Jahoda, Marie, “Anti- Communism and Employment Policies in Radio and Television,” Report on Blacklisting (New York: The Fund for the Republic, 1958)
Cynicism
Most of our respondents believe that the “blacklisting” procedures, initiated and defended in the name of national security, have no bearing whatsoever on national security. They were all aware of the watertight system of control over content before it goes on the air which excludes possibilities of direct subversion. Some of them pointed out that engineers, who are in the most crucial position to do harm in an emergency, were not affected by these policies. None of them mentioned an argument which is often made elsewhere, namely that outstanding performers might use a good deal of their income to help the cause of communism financially. Most of them, as already indicated, had doubts about the motivation of the listers. When this doubt was voiced in a more charitable spirit, the listers were called misguided or crazy; in a less charitable spirit, the listers were called misguided or crazy; in a less charitable mood the adjectives were insincere, profiteering, money-greedy, hypocritical, and the like.
Such an evaluation of the motivation behind the “blacklisting” procedures, and of their ineffectiveness, taken together with the sense of frustration with regard to decency in human relations, the constriction of activities without a justifying conviction, and the belief that unfair and unintelligible criteria are used which get people into serious trouble -collectively, these add up to an attitude of cynicism. It is not surprising, therefore, that when the question was raised as to why powerful networks and sponsors complied with the requests made by such doubtful characters, the answer was, as a rule: money.
There are some practices cited by respondents which lend support to this all-embracing cynical explanation. One major employer, for example, allegedly checks on personnel not once and for all, but insists that every new assignment of a person be confirmed only after a new check has been performed. One person in the sample, commenting on the need for repeated clearance, declared he could understand it only in terms of a rumor he had heard: there was an alleged fee of $7.50 a person had to pay to one of the outside organizations which had set up its own machinery for “clearing” personnel, whenever a question was raised. More open support for the assumption that it is all a question of money derives from several statements, allegedly made to personnel by some networks and advertising agencies, that it is in the financial interest of the sponsor to avoid the use of “controversial” persons.
This is not to assert that the persons we interviewed were blind to the general trend of public opinion. On the contrary, they mentioned again and again that what was happening in the entertainment industry fitted well into the national climate of thought - or “the national hysteria”, according to some - and was possible only because of it. But what they felt was that here it was the catering to a mood rather than the fulfillment of a good purpose, and for reasons of personal profit.
Of the persons who expressed an opinion as to whether anyone should be excluded from work in the industry because of his political beliefs, the great majority felt that no one should be; qualification for the job is the criterion which they repeatedly stressed. As they perceive those who pay for their services to hold very different views, they keep quiet for the sake of the job in the conviction that there is in this respect little room for fairness in the entertainment industry. They submit to what they believe to be wrong.