Life, 1921-01-13 · page 17 of 36
Life — January 13, 1921 — page 17: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This cartoon satirizes post-World War I military spending priorities. A figure in top hat (representing Uncle Sam or government leadership) stands on shore pointing outward, addressing a group of refugees or displaced persons wading in water with belongings. The caption—"Sanctuary, yes, but not for birds of your feather"—is a bitter pun: while the government establishes bird sanctuaries (wildlife protection), it denies sanctuary to war-displaced Europeans suffering starvation and poverty. The accompanying text criticizes the U.S. government and navies globally for continuing massive military expenditures on warships despite post-war humanitarian crises across Europe, Russia, and China. The editorial specifically praises the *New York World* newspaper for advocating against wasteful naval spending. The satire's point: governments prioritize military buildup over human suffering—treating literal birds better than desperate people.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
BIRD SANCTUARY “SANCTUARY, YES, BUT NOT FOR BIRDS OF YOUR FEATHER.” system that is at all equal to the needs of the population, Part of Europe is in somewhat the same state in consequence of the war. Russia, indeed, is in very much the same physical state. Trans- portation has broken down and the country does not feed the cities, but worst of all, Russia’s moral and _ spiritual resources have crumpled, and so in a less degree have those of Middle Europe. What is encouraging for Europe is that resources, material and spiritual, are in store and accessible if present needs can be tided over, and energy and gumption enough can be developed in the residents to get at and use them, THe New York World has come out quite strong in vociferous headlines and calls to leading minds for aid to stop the expenditure of useful money on war- ships. It is a good work, a first class work! The wonder is that it should need to be done. The marvel is that after such a war as has been fought, with millions of children starving in Europe and all those starving Chinese and the India peo- ple in a bad way, any government should dream of spending more money on naval armament than just enough to keep along what they have got. But something like the old difficulty between Germany and England, that neither could stop building warships while the other went on, has kept up these expenditures for navies. It is preposterous. Presumably, if the United States had gone into the League, it would not be going on, but whether we are in the League or not, it ought to be stopped, and perhaps the World with all the, back- ing it is getting will help to stop it. To our mind none of our newspaper neighbors in these days makes quite so im- portant an effort as the World does to be of service to society. Its fights against Hylan and Enright, police demoralization and the building trades combines have been very useful. If it is not the leader in service of that sort, we would like to know who the leader is, for it is always a pleasure to take off one’s hat to a news- paper that is busy doing a duty that nothing but a newspaper scems able to do. While agrecable exercise, it is suitable to point out that we indulge in that white paper is very, very high, and that the great service, a first aid to civiliza- tion, which is done by newspapers and periodicals, is imperilled by the increased cost of production. The same condition confronts more or less every newspaper and every periodical in the world. We know that a sufficient number of them will sur- vive and continue to be profitable because without them the world cannot be “safe for democracy"; but all that is as yet much more a matter of faith than of calculation. The newspapers and period- icals will watch with absorbing interest to see how the world weathers the in- cidents of this unfathomable year that is getting under way, and no doubt, for once, the world will return the compliment of their attention. E. S. Martin comicbooks.com