When martial law hit Poland in 1981, censors became a growth industry. Now, a journalist victimized by the thought police of stone-faced Gen. Wojciech Jaruzelski suggests that one road back to freedom may be to ”love the censor.”
It`s in the October issue of Index on Censorship, a superb, London-based magazine that chronicles repression by governments big and small, left and right. The article as it deals with Poland is most timely because Poles vote Sunday in an important national election.
Jacek Fedorowicz, a longtime Polish TV and radio reporter, recounts how he and others have sought to evade the regime by using deeply satirical allusions and metaphors. But he`s worried precisely because such satire is getting through with regularity.
He contends that the regime presents a more insidious threat by intentionally allowing such satire. He argues that journalists, by sitting down with a censor rather than repudiating his authority, take what amounts to a loyalty oath by acknowledging the censor`s legitimacy. Changes in a writer`s copy might be small but the effect of the procedure is the same, he says.
The regime`s tolerance of satire that ridicules it ”means that even the strongest satire does not bother them.” Opening the door slightly to media abuse ”is much worse than a system that murders ideas at birth.” Opening the door may tempt the journalist by creating the illusion of freedom.
So why love the censor? Fedorowicz finds many to be generally decent souls who aren`t entirely the government`s men. ”So we should not push them into its embrace.” Treat them kindly, he concludes, because even though their task may be reprehensible, they are ”people who at a critical moment of change could be on our side.”
Index on Censorship includes dozens of country-by-country reports on civil liberties abuses. It`s a helpful reminder for a world whose attention span for such injustices can be fleeting, perhaps limited to one country like South Africa or El Salvador for a brief period ($4.25 an issue, $25 a year via Fund for Free Expression, 36 W. 44th St., N.Y., New York 10036).
Sunday`s election in Poland is not important for the outcome of rigged contests for the National Assembly but, as the Oct. 18 issue of Natonal Review underlines in ”Solidarity`s Day of Reckoning,” it`s a key to discerning the outlawed union`s relative strength. Solidarity has called for a mass boycott, its first big action in a year.
— Spin (October)–David Crosby was once a creative member of a famous rock group, Crosby Stills Nash & Young. His best friend, singer Graham Nash, says matter-of-factly about Crosby`s drug addiction: ”He`ll eventually die, it`s only a question of when.” This racier clone of Rolling Stone, edited by Bob Guccione Jr., son of Penthouse guru Bob Guccione, nicely profiles Buddy Rich, the resolutely cantankerous, ageless drummer who makes clear that most rock music is junk.
— California (October)–Gordon Getty, 51-year-old son of the late J. Paul Getty, has usually been dismissed as the kookie kid of a zillionaire. His annual income from the family trust is $150 million but he drives a Buick Electra that he parks on the street and is an opera buff obsessed with composing unorthodox music. Here, one learns that the bona fide artistic recognition he has craved is starting to come. Elsewhere, Ehud Yonay details the profound concentration of money and technology in California because of U.S. defense spending, which totals $40 billion a year in the state. That dwarfs all other states and surpasses even California`s $31 billion annual revenues from tourism. Yonay also chronicles the bounteous, off-again, on-again $20.5 billion deal that Rockwell International got to build 100 B-1 bombers, partly through construction of ”the most formidable political assault force in the industry” ($2, 11601 Wilshire Blvd., Los Angeles, Calif. 90025).
— Art & Antiques (October)–A painstaking restoration of Michelangelo`s Sistine Chapel in Rome has been underway since 1980 and Leo Steinberg, a Renaissance art scholar, contends the results so far are dazzling. As accompanying color photos show, the cleaning reveals that the nearly 500-year- old masterwork contains splendid, previously unknown color and detail. ”The myth of a colorless Michelangelo collapses,” Steinberg writes. He suggests that the eradication of centuries of dust, soot and varnish may prompt a basic reinterpretation of the work itself ($6, Box 20600, Bergenfield, N.J. 07621). — Regardie`s (October)–A flashy Washington-based business publication, edited by former Chicago journalist Brian Kelly, has ruffled feathers of some pro football owners with a tale on the likely revenues of the 28 NFL teams. Those figures are well-kept secrets but this article contends it`s nearly impossible to lose money and that there`s no real link between winning and profits. You`re much better off with luxury ”sky boxes” to be snared by corporations (as are the lowly Indianapolis Colts) than a usually fine team whose stadium does not have special boxes (Washington Redskins). The Los Angeles Rams are said to have the biggest revenues, $29.4 million, with the Green Bay Packers the lowest at $23 million and the Bears supposedly 13th with $25.5 million ($2.95, 1010 Wisconsin Ave., NW, Washington, D.C. 20007).
