Top Banned Books of 2003 1033
michaelzhao writes "The ALA (American Library Association) recently published the new 100 most frequently banned books list of 2003.
Of the banned books, Harry Potter was in the number 7th place in the most frequently banned. Also included were 'Where's Waldo' and 'The Giver' along with 'Goosebumps' and 'How to Eat Fried Worms.' These books were banned from various public institutions. This means that they were banned from various public libraries and public schools around the nation. (private schools, libraries, and institutions of higher learning don't count) The ALA encourages the people of the United States to fight against the book bans and read a banned book today!"
Wow... (Score:2, Insightful)
I can understand the banning of American Psycho (excellent book by the way), but Sex by Madonna (and lots of sex related books)? In the Internet era... i mean, is this serious? Is this to "protect" children or something? America is weird sometimes...
Weirdest ban go to 'Of mice and men'... What's disturbing in this story? It was obligatory to read it in Highschool for us in Canada.... Does it means Canadians are deviant or something? Can I live an healthy, balanced life after this? I hope so!
Re:Why Harry? (Score:4, Insightful)
Why would it be banned? Depicts socialism and controled death?
Re:Waldo (Score:2, Insightful)
I would imagine as it's wordless/pictorial, so may be removed from school libraries as it has no educational value as it doesn't help students with their reading comprehension. Time spent finding Waldo is time not spent learning anything.
People are stupid. (Score:5, Insightful)
5. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
56. James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl
88. Where's Waldo? by Martin Hanford
96. How to Eat Fried Worms by Thomas Rockwell
That list is disturbing. The ones I highlited here are some of what I read that really shouldn't be banned in my own opinion. Though I think no book should be banned, it's up to people to shepard their children and decide for themselves.
Re:Why Harry? (Score:4, Insightful)
The difference is in the number of copies published. J.K. Rowling has achieved a phenomenom that C.S. Lewis could not even dream of. With fame comes greater scrutiny. I'm sure there's hundreds of books depicting magic and paganism and ways more objectionable to religious fundamentalists, but none of them achieved the level of book sales that Harry Potter did.
Re:Why Harry? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:People are stupid. (Score:2, Insightful)
Tell me, how do you do that?
I mean, seriously - am I supposed to go to school with my child and help them pick a book to read in the school library? Do you really think "the new joy of gay sex" is something that a fourth grade kid needs to be read? And if I request that it not be made available in his school library - how is that wrong? When my child is in school, during school hours, under the guidance of his teachers and administrators and librarians - it's THEIR job to shepard my child.
That's a tad harsh. (Score:4, Insightful)
Not shelved, fine. If there's a book in the school library that you'd rather not fall into your child's hands, petition to have it removed from the shelf, or made inaccessible to younger children. But banned completely, based on the objective opinions of a mother? No.
Re:So What? (Score:5, Insightful)
And while I respect your right to decide what your child reads, you do NOT have the right to decide what MY child reads or what OTHER PEOPLE's children read. Just because you find Bridge to Terabithia to be crap doesn't mean all kids do, and I want my child to be able to check it out of a school library.
Keep in mind that this list does not just reflect school libraries, and that this is a list of challenges to books, not necessarily that all these books have been successfully removed from libraries.
I'd also disagree that Heather Has Two Mommies is inappropriate for elementary school kids. We have books picturing heterosexual couples, why not homosexual ones? It's not like the book advocates for only homosexual couples, or has sexual tones. Shockingly enough, there are also picture books about death out there. These kinds of books have a purpose. If your child brings it home, sit down and talk about it. If you don't want them reading it, tell them that. My parents vetted my reading.
If we're going to censor everything anyone finds offensive or inappropriate for their children, we're not going to have any materials in libraries.
Re:banning (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:So What? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:banning (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:So What? (Score:1, Insightful)
Yes it does, mostly. 71% of the challenges were with regard to school libraries.
I'd also disagree that Heather Has Two Mommies is inappropriate for elementary school kids. We have books picturing heterosexual couples, why not homosexual ones?
What children's picture books depict heterosexuality as the entire point of the book? Yes, books depict them if you mean that in the story there is a dad and a mom - but dad and mom and their relationship aren't the topic of those books now are they? I don't think it's appropriate for a little kid to have to read a book focusing on anyone's sexuality. PERIOD. Christ, at least wait until they're in double digits. My six year old doesn't need to know this kind of shit. I don't have a problem with anyone's sexuality, but I don't want my child's brain being pelted with everyone's vies - be they religious or sexual - when he's barely old enough to tie his shoe and still holds my hand to cross the street.
Re:Why Harry? (Score:3, Insightful)
What do you base this charge on? The article in The Onion that was pulled because stupid people believed it was real!?
Re:banning (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:banning (Score:5, Insightful)
I would agree with you about immoral activities. However, a school board telling a teacher not to teach certain material does not fall into that category. It may be unfortunate or anti-intellectual, but not immoral.
Re:So What? (Score:1, Insightful)
There was also some books I read in that class which I very much enjoyed reading. Fahrenheit 451 is an excellent book, as in Animal Farm. Huckleberry Finn is something I didn't have a problem reading. I just don't think Night was a good choice.
Re:So What? (Score:5, Insightful)
Also, I heard a story from a parent, whose child in the second grade (it was elementary school at the least), was reading a book that had a vivid description of a rape scene.
So, the parent complains, and the school complies, and the ALA lists it as a "banned" book.
The ALA has a decent idea here, fight censorship, but they have to be aware, we should but the same sort of standards on our literature that we put on our movies. There simply are some books that aren't appropriate for children.
And NEVER have these "banned" books been truly banned. If the parent, or the child really wanted the book, they could obtain it for their child to read. It was just felt by the school system, that it wasn't appropriate for them to supply it.
Re:Pft, whimpy stuff (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:So What? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:So What? (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm not so sure how I feel about this one. Something like "The New Joy of Gay Sex" I could understand. But I like the idea of people seeing a homosexual couple as normal. (Conservatives will totally flip out over that?)
Go back 150 years, and imagine it was "Heather Has a Black Mommy." I'm not trying to defend gay marriage here or anything, but I think it's the same thing -- I strongly doubt the objection to this book was because of the homosexuality, as opposed to the homosexuality.
A homosexual couple has nothing to do with sex until, well, they have sex. It'd be like banning a book with a mother and father because they have a heterosexual relationship. The mere act of having a child proves they had sex!
I haven't read the book, but if it doesn't cover their bedroom activities, I don't see the problem. But maybe that's why I'm a liberal democrat.
Re:So What? (Score:2, Insightful)
Being able to get books for free is not a right.
Re:Pft, whimpy stuff (Score:3, Insightful)
It was rather meant to point out an example of the ultimate extreme in modern day censorship.
I'm certainly not trying to indicate that the Holocaust never happened, but the fact that these books were burned truly speaks for itself.
Re:Why Harry? (Score:5, Insightful)
When I got older, I read that it was basically the End of Days/Second coming of Christ, for kids. The two evil and foolish characters the Monkey and the Donkey represented scientists (evolution, get it?) and disbelievers. This didn't make me like the book any better.
Re:People are stupid. (Score:5, Insightful)
Specifically, Huckleberry Finn uses a specific cultural setting to deliver an anti-racist messsage.
Re:That's a tad harsh. (Score:5, Insightful)
You've said the school has every right to choose what books they stock. Right, but the ALA will list a book as "banned" just because the school chooses not the shelve it.
"If there's a book in the school library that you'd rather not fall into your child's hands, petition to have it removed from the shelf, or made inaccessible to younger children." Such a book that would be removed would still be counted by the ALA as a banned book.
"But banned completely, based on the objective opinions of a mother? No." So a single lone mother who objects to an elementary age child reading a book describing, lets say, a gratutiously descriptive account of a rape, would be wrong and inappropriate?
The children can still read these books, if the parents want them to. But the same as a school wouldn't allow an R rated movie to be shown to any child on school grounds (regardless of who owns it, and who's watching it, and what kind of parental permission they have) there are some books that are INAPPROPRIATE for the student at school.
But they can still read the books at home, because they're not actually BANNED. They're just this nebulous thing that the ALA calls "banned", because they have had action taken against them, and have been removed, or moved due to the objections of one or MORE parents.
Re:banning (Score:2, Insightful)
Oh and Godwin's law be damned!
Re:Absurd! (Score:1, Insightful)
I have a problem with neither, but there is a little bit of intellectual hypocrisy going on here.
Re:Why Harry? (Score:5, Insightful)
And the opinion of "some Christian organizations" is impacting what's in a public school? (Maybe it's nothing new, but it still shouldn't be happening.)
How about the Qur'an? Do stories about an Islamic child get banned? It's clearly against their teachings, whether it's witchcraft, Buddhism, or Judaism.
Not that I'm a fan of Harry Potter (I saw that movie with family, and got up several times to just pace through the hallways, as it was more interesting). Not that I'm against Christianity (I'm a practicing Catholic). I just don't think the Christian church has any right to control what's in a public school.
Re:Pft, whimpy stuff (Score:1, Insightful)
build your own library (Score:2, Insightful)
"if you like being able to read whatever you want, these titles may also interest you:"
i went to a 50's pop culture exhibit here in calgary a couple of years ago and they had an entire section of banned media from that period in canada. i couldn't believe some of the titles. they had the books in a barrel, implying they were about to be lit on fire.
the title i remember best in that pile was "lord of the flies", which was required reading for english when i was in grade 6 in british columbia.
it's nice to see i am not the only person that gets "the rage" when i see organizations trying to ban books.
Re:banning (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Why Harry? (Score:5, Insightful)
More than half of them were on our reading lists, either in that class, or in previous english classes.
I think anything worth reading has probably been banned by someone, somewhere, since almost by definition it has interesting ideas which must offend/annoy/worry someone.
Doug
Re:So What? (Score:4, Insightful)
But it should be.
Re:The ALA continues to strip meaning from words (Score:3, Insightful)
Banned books would be those books that it used to actually be illegal to import and sell in the United States, like Ulysses and Naked Lunch, as in "banned in Boston." Challenged books are books that parents and teachers ask libraries to discard or not order. There's a very important difference, because even in the most conservative town in the United States, you can't get arrested for walking into the public library with Madonna's Sex. The worst they can do is tell you to put it away, and even that would be
questionable under the 1st Amendment.
School libraries, obviously, are different, since they can claim disruption of the educational process or whatever, but it's still not the same as an outright ban, since the worst they can do is confiscate the book and tell the parents to come pick it up.
Re:So What? (Score:5, Insightful)
Just because you don't like them doesn't mean you have the right to prevent other people or other people's kids from reading them. If we could ban anything that people considered crap, Britney Spears and the all those "Spice Boy" bands would not be played on any radio stations if it was up to me.
* Daddy's Roommate / Heather Has Two Mommies Well, need I say anything? These obviously don't belong in a school library. Six year old kids don't need to be learning about homosexuality anymore than they need to be learning about heterosexuality. Leave this stuff for the later years - like when they can at least tie their own shoes.
I agree with you that material that deal with sexuality (homo or hetero) is not approprite to younger children. But the list is not definitive on what was banned and where. If these books were banned from a high school, I would have a problem with it.
Really, most of the books on that list suck. Some are great, but not many (Slaughter House for example). And many of them SHOULD be banned. I'd be pretty ticked if my kid brought home some of the books from that list from school. Others, though, make no sense at all. Really odd.
I think you answered our own question. People with strong opinions like yourself have probably taken on themselves to make sure that the libraries in their area do not carry books that are against their beliefs or tastes. I think one reason why the list is so huge is that some people don't distinguish between material they don't like with material that offends them. They think that they can speak for everyone and have that material banned.
Re:What about "Unfit for Command" (Score:5, Insightful)
John Kerry's claiming the book is incorrect; he didn't use the word (that I see), but it's essentially saying it's a slander campaign. He's asking that they stop selling a book that's just out to slander him.
He's not legislating it away because it's damaging to him.
Granted, I'm a Kerry supporter, and you're clearly (by your signature) anti-Kerry. It's no secret that if you support someone, you'll make allowances for things, and if you oppose them, you'll blow things out of proportion. Which is why I hate arguing about politics.
Asking someone not to carry what you perceive as a slanderous book is totally different than him trying to legislate it away, which is what's suggested.
Re:People are stupid. (Score:2, Insightful)
Define "Banned" (Score:1, Insightful)
Am I, as a adult citizen of the United States, unable to obtain a copy of said books? If so, then they are not "banned". If a library chooses not to stock a certain book, that is unfortunate, but not a "banning" of the book.
Can you obtain a copy of "Penthouse" at your average Elementary school library? No (or at least I certainly hope not). But is it banned? No, since an adult can obtain a copy pretty freely.
If an author writes a book that simply stinks, and nobody will buy it, is he banned? No.
The first amendment protects you from PROCESCUTION for excercising your free speech. It does not, however, require anybody to LISTEN to you.
Re:banning (Score:4, Insightful)
People pick their battles: they cannot fight all negative things in the world all the time. Maybe she quit teaching Brave New World and substituted some kind of different dystopian future novel, or some other work critical of the society in which we live.
It's also possible the curriculum changed, or that some other event occured of which you are not aware. To say that you lost all respect for ceasing to teach a particular novel seems unfair.
Perhaps you have not shared the whole story, and if that is the case then I apoligize for the above.
Re:So What? (Score:2, Insightful)
Things have changed a bit since we were kids, you know, the whole Intarweb thing? Watch the movie thirteen, and go talk to some junior high kids. Kids are finding out about sex from their peers, and media, at earlier and earlier ages. Where once a girl was a slut for even kissing more than one guy in the space of a few weeks, now she's a tease if she doesn't suck a dick on the second date....times change, try to keep up.
And no, I wasn't implying a correlation between those two books and teen pregnancy, simply the underlying fear of talking about sex with your kids that leads to trying to shelter them from ever learning about it until they're "old enough."
By all means keep sheltering them, it's your right to raise your children however you see fit. Simply put though, for those that shelter their kids as much as possible, don't be surprised if that over-sheltering comes back to haunt.
Huck Finn, To Kill A Mockingbird, etc. (Score:5, Insightful)
Books that deal with issues of race are often banned by people who object to racism. I sometimes think it's because they haven't actually read the books, but have merely done the kind of sanctimonious counting of "offensive" terms or situations (e.g., like the CAP Alerts [capalert.com]. Or anybody remember that lady who talked to the Meese commission, and enumerated the number of times the word "horny" was used in Catcher in the Rye?). You could argue this for several of the books:
Huck Finn was clearly written with an anti-racist agenda, but was written ironically, from the perspective of an ignorant kid. It contains the word "nigger" many, many times. As a result of these two factors, it's considered by some as inappropriate for children.
To Kill A Mockingbird deals with a rape trial, and therefore could be considered inappropriate for kids. It also contains a lot of racial slurs and violence.
I think what's underlying the attacks on these books, though, is less these characteristics (which are usually the nominal reasons for banning them), but the anti-authority themes running through the books. They question the conventional morality of the times they describe. People who don't like that kind of thinking may find that mroe offensive than all of the ostensible faults of the books. They don't wnat to encourage this kind of questioning (of course, they're way too late to try to stop it now.)
You can see a similar effect, by the way, against some of the best anti-authoritarian books like Animal Farm ("it makes kids think animals can talk!"), Brave New World ("but it mentions sex!"), Slaugherhouse Five ("it's filthy!"), and so forth.
Re:People are stupid. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:banning (Score:3, Insightful)
Censorship is bad. But if someone gives into the school board's request, rather than putting up a fight and getting herself fired, I fail to see the parallels to the Holocaust.
Okay, so the Nazis banned some stuff. I think the similarities end there.
Re:Pft, whimpy stuff (Score:2, Insightful)
As for the pulling of that article, the reason for that is pretty obvious. The authors used terminology which had an obvious political spin to it. Something that really doesn't have any place in a scientific journal. It had nothing to do with the findings of the article. Only and idiot would deny that the Jews and the Arabs aren't related. I'm pretty sure both groups are supposed to be descendants of Abraham.
Re:So What? (Score:5, Insightful)
Not that I agree with banning it, but I can appreciate some academics having trouble with the material (Atticus Finch is seen as a "nigger lover" - a quote straight from the book, btw).
Academics should be broadening the minds of tomorrow's leaders. Racism still is an issue in our country, although not as bad as it used to be. "To Kill a Mockingbird" does explore racism a little bit, and that is a good thing. Banning it for quotes such as what you mentioned is a very bad thing. That is like living in denial -- if I pretend that word does not exist, it will not (at least not in my head). Ludicrous.
When my son is old enough to go to school I will be very proactive and make sure he learns about these issues. I will encourage him to read banned books if his school acts stupid. Government censorship is evil. There are two people allowed to censor what my son sees, and the other one is my wife.
Re:Pft, whimpy stuff (Score:3, Insightful)
Censorship is not about right and wrong, it's about censorship, because "right" and "wrong" are highly divergent people. Also, the banning of such publications actually adds fuel to the anti-semetic fire in that they are actively suppressed. It makes the kooks feel more important because their efforts actually required intervention. The only way to disprove flawed ideas, bad science, etc. is to publish it and expose it to public scrutiny so it can be proprely proven to be incorrect.
I love lists like this (Score:3, Insightful)
This don't think it's odd that a list of banned books would have a lot of very good books one them. Good books tend to be more challenging to the reader and it's exactly those challenging parts that certain people object to. To those people, if it's not the same old pablum, then they don't want anything to do with it.
Still, there are some books on the list that are decidedly NOT great or even good books. "Sex", by Madonna. "The New Joy of Gay Sex". I'll have to admit that I can definitely see why somebody would try to get them banned from a public library. After all, you don't see Hustler magazine next to the New York Times at public libraries so why should you expect to find "Sex"? But on the flip side to that, they ARE books and as such, were I at a public library, I would fight any attempt to ban them.
And finally, it would be nice if this particular list had the following info:
1. Was the book actually banned? All it says is they were all "challenged" which means "somebody tried to ban it" to me.
2. WHY was the book challenged in the first place?
Re:So What? (Score:4, Insightful)
1. the authors of the books
2. the choppers of the trees
3. the processors of the wood into paper
4. the drivers of the raw materials
5. the printers of the words onto the paper
6. the editors of the books
7. all the people who support all of the above
Re:Define "Banned" (Score:5, Insightful)
Your comparison to porn is disingenuous or ignorant--most of the books were banned, yes, banned in those school district or public libraries because they contained cultural or political views that offended a few squeaky wheels.
Lastly, while it's nice that you and I have plenty of money to buy whatever books may not be found in a library, I for one would like to see my tax-funded libraries not reacting for or against some would-be censor's political agenda.
Many of the books I had to read in (Score:4, Insightful)
6. Of Mice and Men
41. To Kill a Mockingbird
47. Flowers for Algernon
70. Lord of the Flies
All required reading in my highschool english classes.
Re:banning (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Pft, whimpy stuff (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:So What? (Score:1, Insightful)
It's so normal that you have to have a book depicting it as normal. It's so normal that you have to mount feverish activist campaigns to push it as normal.
It's so normal that you have to reach children at a young age so they have the mental discipline to fight the constant, nagging tug of reality -- lest they think it might not be perfectly normal.
Why not just live your life the way you want and leave the rest of us out of your wish to be considered normal?
(Watch this post get "banned" now.)
Re:So What? (Score:5, Insightful)
A lot of things considered "normal" today - women voting, blacks not being slaves, minorities having equal rights - were not in previous years. What makes you think that our idea of "normal" today is any better than it was a hundred years ago?
The reason why we need "feverish activist campaigns" is because there are bigots like you - the same kind of people who were against civil rights 40 years ago - trying to repress a segment of society. And that's what they're fighting.
Book bannings are like book burnings (Score:4, Insightful)
Some books are banned because they showcase the shame of America, like Huckleberry Finn with the word nigger being used correctly in context as it was for the time the story was wrote in. Does banning this book for printing the word nigger as it was used make bigotry and racism go away, change history and the fact that it was used, miracle away American hypocrisy of liberty and justice for all except slaves? By not learning the truth and being exposed to facts we erradicate the lessons we should have learned. Those who forget the past are condemned to repeat it. If you have such a serious problem with a book, close the cover and get rid of it. If you are such a failure as a parent you don't want little George reading a book because you don't have the time to invest in your child, don't get them the book. If they have book because they do not want to follow in your silhouette, take it from them or find somebody to be the parent you are not. Nobody is making you read them, why force others down to your level of illiteracy.
Putting a book on a banlist is a quick way to get my attention, and usually much more reliable for a good read than the bestseller listings. Celebrate the banned book list, check them off as you read each one.
No book should be banned, censorship spawns ignorance.
Re:Pft, whimpy stuff (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Teocracy? (Score:1, Insightful)
Deism? Pluralism? Oh, you must be one of those stupid fucks who thinks the founding fathers were asshole fundamentalist like Falwall and Chick.
Re:Why Harry? (Score:2, Insightful)
Remember that this is the U.S., which was settled by fanatical Christian sects. So generally, the people on school boards and the parents of students who are members of fanatical (and not-so-fanatical) Christian sects are the loudest, and generally get their way.
I think it's just that nobody else has the energy to speak up against closed-minded fanatics who are constantly shouting their religious tenets. And heck, in order to have a debate, you have to subscribe to reason. That's why they call religion "faith" and not "reason".
--Rob
And how do you justify this bannings : (Score:3, Insightful)
"The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain"
Furthermore if you ban a book from the library because you DO NOT WANT YOUR OWN CHILD to see it, your forbid ALL OTHER CHILD to see it even if they parent would have authroised them. In other word censor is always wrong in such case. For pity's sake your example is wrong too, "the new joy of gay sex" would be in the ADULT section of your library and certainly unavailable to 4th grader (at least around ehre we have very young, young, teen , and adult section !!!).
Re:So What? (Score:2, Insightful)
I think the poster's point is that much of our current teen pregnancy and STD problem is the result of things like abstinence-only education, skittish silence about the subject of sex, and other similar attitudes.
Kids--even younger kids--are naturally curious about their and others' bodies, and it seems both unnatural and slightly hypocritical to assume that there's no room for sexual dialogue of any kind until a certain age.
Wow. Interesting bias (Score:4, Insightful)
Too bad that list isn't a click-through to Amazon to buy those books. I bet they could be raising a little bit of money from that website to combat censorship.
Re:So What? - Insulting (Score:1, Insightful)
Also, animals are just that animals. Are you stating we should act like animals and be gay?
Re:Why Harry? (Score:5, Insightful)
Magic is never used by good mortals in C.S. Lewis's books, except in the case of Merlin in That Hideous Strength -- and even there, Merlin's use of magic is depicted as something that placed his soul in jeopardy, only to be saved when he turns himself over to angelic beings as a vessel for their power.
Certainly, specific items of power are used by good mortals, when given to them as a gift, while Aslan sometimes uses poer directly. The analogy is miraculous gifts and Divine intervention.
Now, let's look at Harry Potter and his friends. Is their approach more like the Holy Spirit descending on the Apostles and granting them the power to heal, or Simon the Magician asking to be taught how to perform those miracles? Like being handed a healing cordial by Santa Claus, or by studying to learn the Deplorable Word? Like being given an apple of life by Aslan, or like carefully separating and purifying magic dust to create rings to travel by? Like letting an angel posess you and work through you, or learning the secrets of making things obey your will?
Re:Why Harry? (Score:5, Insightful)
Finally, reaching the library of the country, Kino looks for an interesting book. The library of the country, which prides itself in books, however has only two rooms of books, and not a single interesting one.
They only have books in the library, which are officially aproved because they don't unsettle someone.
I've learned English as a foreign language, and in my last year at school, we read "Catcher in the Rye", "Brave New World", "Lord of the Flies".
Somehow disturbing to hear that US-American pupils are now practically prohibited from analysing and discussing those books under the guidance of a teacher.
Re:So What? (Score:3, Insightful)
Would you object to a book about divorce? That's considered immoral in some religions too. Maybe we shouldn't tell kids about it, or it will seem like an activist campaign to legitimize divorce? Maybe if we don't talk about divorce to kids, noone will ever grow up and have them. Maybe we shouldn't let kids read anything about divorce, or it'll seem like we're advocating it.
I guess you're a bigot if you want to make your own decisions rather than have them made by the government or some activist group.
Your depiction of some books as being done by activist groups while others are just 'normal' is kindof odd. If someone was trying to get any mention of heterosexual couples banned from libraries, that would be an example of an extremist activist group trying to make other people's decisions. And it would be pretty similar to your stance on the matter as well.
Re:2003? Recent? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:banning (Score:5, Insightful)
The Nazis came to power because the Germans were forced into blind obedience by the own fear and insecurity. Many people like to think that it was some violent coup d'etat or something that made Hitler chancellor then fuhrer. No, Hitler was democratically elected by good decent Germans (I say that with no intended irony) because they just didn't care what he was doing because at the time they thought they had bigger problems. They let themselves be bullied by the browncoats in the street, they let themselves be frightened by the Communists. They had the power to stop Hitler's tyranny but they didn't stand up for their rights because they were obedient.
Look, I am not usually a fan of disregarding Goodwin's law, at least so early in a discussion but this is an important thing to consider in this topic. Fascism is the product of total obedience as concretely as anarchy is the product of total disobedience. Do what you are told when it is wrong and you are no better than the guards at Auschwitz operating the death chamber. Sure, what an average person is asked to do in a compromising situation is not nearly as heinous as genocide, but I am sure the average SS officer didn't go straight to genocide from helping old ladies across the road either.
It is ignorance of an unforgivable magnitude to compare 1944 Germany to your own country and then immediately assume that your country is immune to fascism simply because there are no deathcamps around. Nazism started as a simple mix of national pride and workers rights, both intrinsically good things, but pretty much the complete basis of the worst tyranny in recorded history. Nazism was truely a good thing for Germany for a while and the Germans loved it, just as we love benign things in our own societies today. The Germans could not see what Nazism really was, because by the time it unveiled itself it was too late and Germany was already dependant on it. Can you confidently say that there is nothing evil like that lurking in our society with any more cirtainty than the Germans had? But we are far more fortunate than the Germans of the nineteen thirties because we now KNOW what can happen and we CAN do something about it. However Nazism happened to good, well meaning people before and it can happen to us too, you just have to let it. Will you?
Re:Why Harry? (Score:3, Insightful)
You didn't refute my point. There are no laws abridging the freedom of speech (those books are still available), or of the press (those books can still be printed at will). Emphasizing the text may make the works stick out more, but that doesn't change their meaning. The government (local, state or federal) is under no obligation to spend tax dollars on every book ever published.
Re:I don't get it (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:So What? (Score:5, Insightful)
Children's innocence is an adult fantasy.
My parents tried hard to keep me not only sheltered, but their "little baby girl" forever. Yet by the time I was 10, I knew all the facts (or at least myths) of life, courtesy of classmates. I knew things that would have curled my parents' hair. Children were far from "innocent" when I was 10 years old -- and I'll be 42 in September.
Unless you isolate your children from every child who knows a child who knows a child who has seen mommy and her boyfriend going at it on the couch, unless your isolate your children from every child who knows a child who knows a child who has been molested by her uncle, unless you isolate your children from every child who knows a child who knows a child who knows about something you want to pretend doesn't exist, there is no "innocence." There never was. There is only adult blindness, pretending that if we don't talk to children about things we don't like then those things will go away, or at least never affeact our children.
Re:People are stupid. (Score:3, Insightful)
To repeat my answer when a college professor asked me "Who's teaching these things, anyhow?": "Those who can't."
What are kids required to read? (Score:3, Insightful)
It would be interesting to see a list of books children are required to read, around the country and around the world.
My 6th grade class was required to read The Scarlet Letter. I still question adultery as an appropriate theme for grade schoolers. If it was supposed to impart a moral lesson, it missed its' mark as we all knew the teacher was having an affair with the gym instructor. It shouldn't have been banned, but should it have been required?
And why isn't Fanny Hill on that list? ;)
Re:I don't get it (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't even get it.... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Waldo (Score:2, Insightful)
I think most of these are books about which people are likely to disagree. For example, if I authored a dull and poorly written story that offended some thin-skinned fraction of the population, it would never make this list because nobody would want to see it in the library anyway.
Most of these books appeal strongly to a group that's large enough to create the demand for the book to appear in the library in the first place, but offend another.
This kind of disagreement is a natural part of a free society, but it shouldn't lead to banning books from the library. If you don't like a book, go ahead and ban it in your home but don't try to ban it from mine!
Steinbeck? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:banning (Score:3, Insightful)
censorship is subjugation of the people through enforced ignorance. The fact is that if we say it's ok to ban Harry Potter, or Jane Has 2 Mommies, or The Anarchist Cookbook, then we are setting a dangerous precedent.
To introduce another analogy, it would be like saying it's legal to drive 100mph through a residential area as long as there is nobody around to run over, and no other cars to hit. Sure that might not put anybody in danger (except perhaps the drivers), but as soon as it's ok to do it sometimes, people are going to start doing it all the time.
Give the censors an inch, and they take a mile.
Incorrect and inappropriate (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:So What? (Score:4, Insightful)
Actually, you're mistaking average life expectancy for the age people actually lived to. Average life expectancy includes infant mortality -- so if you have a society where 50% of the people die before they're a year old, and the other 50% live to the biblical threescore and ten, your average life expectancy is 35. But nobody is actually dying at 35 -- it's either 0 or 70. Of course, reality isn't quite that binary, but it's the same basic math. Since modern western societies have such a low infant/child mortality rate, we're used to seeing the average life expectancy number having something to do with how long you can expect to live, but when you're dealing with societies that have very high infant mortality rates, it's not even close to the same thing.
Wander around a cemetery in New Engalnd some time and read the dates on old tombstones. If a man lived to grow up, he was fairly well assured of living to 60+. If a woman survived childbearing, she would probably live longer than that. But that is counterbalanced in the overall average by those rows of little tiny stones that say "Baby Smith, 8 days old."
The average of first menstruation in girls has actually gone down in the past hundred or so years. This may be because of better nutrition and overall health, nobody is quite sure. Though, interestingly enough, it seems to have been at roughly modern ages in ancient Rome and possibly during the medieval era. It's rather difficult to determine, because in societies where marriage is arranged or contracted for social reasons rather than individual choice, girls often are married before they are capable of bearing children, and the actual consummation of the marriage is postponed. Without medical records, it's hard to tell when young women were sexually mature; mostly it's a matter of guessing based on birth records.
Your whole point is a non sequitur anyway. When people were getting married and starting families at young ages (12 or otherwise), it was not because they had seen the pigs making piglets. It was because they were ready to take on the duties of adulthood, which were much simpler at the time. They had learned the basic skills of household management, food production, etc., as children -- kids worked from the day they could toddle. Many young couples lived with one or another set of parents (usually the husband's) for a number of years and got further on-the-job training before they established a separate household.
They didn't have educations to complete -- if they were lucky, they went to the one room schoolhouse for a few years. They didn't have careers to decide on -- they did what their parents did, which was usually farming. They didn't travel and see the world -- most people never went more than 100 miles from where they were born. The reasons that modern people put off marriage and family didn't exist for any but the wealthy classes. Since they had learned the skills they needed for adult life since early childhood, the only thing they had to wait for was their bodies to be ready to do the job.
Obviously, that is not the case today. People have educations to complete, careers to plan, a world to explore. Having children in today's complex world is a much more complicated isse than adding a few more kids to a big farm family, more than doing things the way your parents and grandparents and ten generations back had done them. It is that, rather than knowing where babies come from, that determines things like age of marriage. That is true whether wishful-thinking adults try to keep those children in ignorance in the hope of achieving some mythical "innocence" or whether they give them accurate and reliable information. They are going to get information from someone, somewhere, no matter what. They are going to ask questions and get answers. Far better that those be accurate answers.
Re:So What? - Insulting (Score:3, Insightful)
Let me ask you this: Why would someone choose to be vilified, outlawed, and unable to find a date?
The great thing about banning Huck Finn... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Conservative idea of freedom (Score:4, Insightful)
(1) These are primarily books that have been banned (actually the numbers are based on complaints received not the number of successful complaints) from school libraries, or childrens books that have been banned from public libraries. From the ALA web-site:
In otherwords this is mostly a matter of what kids get to read, not a matter of what adults get to read.
(2) Schools and public libraries are mostly government institutions, and what conservatives object to is the government deciding how and what their children will learn about issues like sex, religion, drugs, and so on. In short they would like the freedom to raise their children without interference from the government.
The liberal response is that children should not be subject to the control of their parents in this way. If you think one side or the other is obviously right, or obviously more interested in freedom then you need to think about the issue more carefully. The fundamental problem is that children can not be free because they are naturally subject to the influence of others. Hence the dispute over who gets to do the influencing.
Re:2003? Recent? (Score:4, Insightful)
Moreover, If books were are harmless as the ALA seems to think, nobody would bother to read or write them.
It wasn't so much the "magic"... (Score:4, Insightful)
...as the completely consequences-free environment known as Hogwart's.
I live in a fairly conservative area. Many, many families I know are strict Christians (Protestant, Catholic, across the board), and the ones that have read Harry Potter nearly all love it.
Once you actually read the books, it becomes fairly clear that the magic is just there as a gimmick. The author needed a British public school setting, but that's been done to death, so she made one with a slightly different curriculum.
The "nearly" part above... a number of people were bothered, not by the "witchcraft" but by the fact that in the first couple of books, Harry can do no wrong. Rules are bent or overlooked, everything is forgiven or ignored once it's all over, he makes bad decisions and doesn't discover -- via consequences, like the rest of us did -- that they were bad.
The later books definitely change that (people get injured, killed, etc, as a result of Harry's screwups).
Re:So What? - Insulting (Score:3, Insightful)
It's not research, but it's not bad as anecdotal evidence goes: Back when I used to raise fancy mice, I had one completely homosexual male mouse. Ticked me off, too, because he had really nice markings (tan and white spotted) and I wanted to breed from him. But he would only mount other males. If I presented him with females in estrus, he would either ignore them or attack them. Males, any males, he'd be all over. I never did get a litter out of him.
and innate?? give me a BREAK!!! I have NO desire to tup another guys arse, or him mine, or suck a schlong, or him mine
So why do you think it's a choice when someone else has no desire to get pegged by a your girlfriend, but tupping another guy's arse, or sucking his scholong, that's different? Could you choose to be homosexual? Could you get up some morning, and say "today, I think I'm going to give up all attraction to women, and go find myself a boyfriend"? If you looked at gay porn for the next six months, would you get the hots for other guys? If not, then why do you think it's somehow not equally innate for someone who feels as attracted to women as you feel attracted to men?
Re:That's a tad harsh. (Score:1, Insightful)
1) overt sexuality ( Song of Solomon)
2) rape ( forgot the actual reference, but a man rapes a woman, then marries her to avoid charges)
3) incest (Lot)
4) excessive violence ( jericho - kill every man, woman, child and animal)
5) racial intolerance
6) slavery condoned
7) disregard for protecting ones own family ( Lot offers his daughters for a gang bang to save his own skin).
8) selfishness, greed, murder
The list goes on.
Re:So What? (Score:4, Insightful)
You mean like being able to marry whoever they want to? To do whatever they want in their bedrooms with other consenting adults?
I guess you're a bigot unless you acknowledge there's only one set of acceptable thoughts and no others will be tolerated.
You mean like male-dominant, married, heterosexual relationships are the only permissable form, and all others are sinful and should be illegal as well?
I guess you're a bigot if you want to make your own decisions rather than have them made by the government or some activist group.
You mean like those groups that want to amend the Constitution of the United States to take those decisions away from individuals, from states, from the federal government, not only for our generation but for every one to follow?
I guess "live and let live" is bigoted now, and "you will think what we tell you and do what we tell you" is the only way to avoid this evil bigotry.
"You have to live in accordance with my religion" is bigoted no matter how you look at it. Nobody is trying to force you, by either laws or violence, to be gay. Plenty of people are trying to force gay people, by both laws and violence, to be straight, or at least to pretend so.
I'm put in mind of a passage from a book
Re:banning (Score:2, Insightful)
Yes:
Religion in our governments and government in our religions.
Invading a foreign country in the name of defence.
Allowing the CIA to order reservists to torture Iraqis.
Allowing Flordian police to stop black men and women from voting, by claiming evidence of felonies, when none exist.
Allowing Halburton no-bid, no-competion to Iraqi oil.
Continuing to ban Cuba, just because it's socialist; (Scared yet?)
Building a single national security agency, that has domestic and international authority, which now impowers them to do domestically what they've done in Nicaragua, Iraq, and Afghanistan in the 80's. --Read political over-throw for the sake of 'security'.
Stopping US Elections in November in the name of security.
Changing the US Constitution on grounds of morality.
Re:Pft, whimpy stuff (Score:2, Insightful)
I was stating that 2 groups, both of whom are American by citizenship and African by heritage and ancestry weren't both put under the banner "African American". This is because the term isn't being used the way, for instance, "Asian American" is. In that case (as in the case of most other constructions of the phrase), the first adjective is indicative of one's continent of origin, ie Asia, while the second is their citizenship, ie American. However, since "African American" is used pretty much wholesale where the word "black" used to be used and other, more offensive terms before that, it isn't used to describe a group of people, who are much more recently "African" as "African American".
Re:Why Harry? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Why Harry? (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Why Harry? (Score:3, Insightful)
I agree. Public schools have limited funds and therefore have to make decisions about which books to buy.
Librarians as a group are far to the left of American society, and their most controversial selections tend to be those which people on the right see as destructive or immoral.
If the librarians were stocking the shelves with Mein Kampf and Unfit for Command and The Bell Curve, to the exclusion of Heather Has Two Mommies, you can be sure that all the pious liberals now deploring censorship would be bitching front and center at the next school board meeting.
Purchasing decisions are not true censorship. There are no "book bans" outside of school libraries; as long as parents are free to purchase any book they want, and let their kids read it, there should be no issue of First Amendment rights at stake.
-ccm
Re:So What? (Score:3, Insightful)
You get over it, and realize that like every parent in history, any attempt you make to shelter your child will FAIL MISERABLY.
What you do have control over is making them able to analyze what's in the book properly so that they aren't damaged by it, and can make their own decisions about what they want to read.
Re:Why Harry? (Score:3, Insightful)
To expand your arugment, suppose, hypothetically, that the majority in your town were Zoroastrians. They decided to ban Christianity within the town. But that's OK, because you can go somewhere else to worship.
What's the difference?
Re:Why Harry? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Why Harry? (Score:5, Insightful)
i sure as hell didn't threaten that Salman rushdie guy with anything. In fact, not a single muslim I know did either...
Please stop thinking of "muslems" as some kind of hivemind. some ayatollahs wrote fatwas against the guy, that's all. and it just so happens that the vast, crushing majority of muslims don't pay any attention whatsoever to some obscure fatwa written by some unknown imam from god knows what country calling himself an "ayatollah". (ayatollah means "verse of god" and is basically a pretty looking title some dudes felt like having...god knows why)
Always remember, Islam is as decentralized a religion as it gets, there is no hierarchy of any sort, anyone can become an Imam if he wants to. he just reads or memorizes the coran, goes up early in the morning and starts shouting the call to prayer, if people show up, he can lead the prayer. that's about it.
heck, muslims don't even have to go the mosque if they don't want to. much less feel obligated to follow a fatwa (which is really just a statement of opinion that anybody can write with no other weight than what that particular Imam's congregation feel like giving it.
.
Re:compulsion in islam (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Why Harry? (Score:5, Insightful)
If the librarians were stocking the shelves with Mein Kampf and Unfit for Command and The Bell Curve, to the exclusion of Heather Has Two Mommies, you can be sure that all the pious liberals now deploring censorship would be bitching front and center at the next school board meeting.
Funny, the public library where I live has all of those. I don't see a bunch of agnostics and Democrats picketing!
Perhaps librarians as a group just tend to be intellectually honest and believe in making books available, even the ones they don't necessarily agree with.
Perhaps (some) people on the right are much more likely to be frightened of the free exchange of ideas. To be fair, in some countries, the left IS doing the banning.
Purchacing decisions are not in themselves true censorship, as you say. However, not purchacing a book that has a greatb deal of demand BECAUSE some people object to it most definatly IS censorship.
Re:Why Harry? (Score:3, Insightful)
You're saying that because in your job selling books you dealt with some people who expressed anger and resentment in different ways, you can tell everyone that Islam is more violent and evil than Christianity. Yes, that was implied by your post.
I don't expect you to bother learning [mrdowling.com] some [aaiusa.org] history [johnw.host.sk], but perhaps others who read this will pause for a second and realise that violence and rationality varies from one person to another, within the same person at different times and in different situations - and that's dangerous and foolish and ignorant to forget.
It's people with simplistic world-views like yours who thought it was a justifible idea to crash planes into buildings three years ago. Those who moderated you 'interesting' can perhaps be forgiven for pointing out an example of the sort of dogmatic thinking that causes so many global fisticuffs. Those who moderated you 'insightful' are clearly a bit feeble-minded. No dobut I'll be labelled a troll for this - but if you, Brandybuck, at least, consider how easily you jumped from subjective experience through to stereotyping and cultural generalisation and plain out-and-out insult, maybe you'll notice the next time you think to do the same.
Re:That's a tad harsh. (Score:3, Insightful)
There _IS_ nothing wrong with you having a graphic book about sexuality and just not lending it to six year olds. But when a library specifically only deals with children between the age of 4 and 9, then there should be some discretion in what books they make available.
Teachers don't check out book from their school library for themselves, and when they do check out books from their school ibrary, it's for a child.