'Unparalleled in intensity' - 1,500 book bans in US school districts.

[babylonsister]

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/apr/07/book-bans-pen-america-school-districts

‘Unparalleled in intensity’ – 1,500 book bans in US school districts.
Past nine months have seen censorship effort ‘unparalleled in its intensity’, with books on race and LGBTQ issues singled out
The Bluest Eye by the Nobel prize-winner Toni Morrison is one of the most banned books in the rightwing censorship effort.
Adam Gabbatt
@adamgabbatt
Thu 7 Apr 2022 10.00 EDT
Last modified on Thu 7 Apr 2022 11.22 EDT


More than 1,500 book bans have been instituted in US school districts in the last nine months, a study has found, part of a rightwing censorship effort described as “unparalleled in its intensity”.

PEN America, a non-profit organization that works to protect freedom of expression in the US, scrutinized efforts to ban certain books from school libraries for its “Banned in the USA” report. The organization found that 1,145 books were targeted by rightwing politicians and activists, including the work of the Nobel prize laureate Toni Morrison.

The report shows the striking impact of the ongoing effort by conservatives to censor literature in schools. The bans have largely targeted books that focus on race and LGBTQ issues, and a large number of the banned books are written by non-white or LGBTQ authors.

snip//

There is, however, some evidence that the efforts to censor literature that focuses on race and LGBTQ issues are having the opposite effect.

“Banned book clubs”, where children and young adults meet to read and discuss titles that have been censored by school districts, have sprung up across America, while sales of the book Maus, a Pulitzer prize-winning graphic novel about the Holocaust, soared in January after it was banned by a Tennessee school board.

[PJMcK]

1. Republicans should try reading some books...

... rather than banning or burning them. (Apologies to Dr. Henry Jones!)

Someone should ask Greene, Boebert, Gaetz and Gohmert what books they're currently reading. Like Palin, they'll probably say, "All of them."

[exboyfil]

4. The O'Reilly Killing series

or The Bible.

[modrepub]

2. Yea That Worked Out Well

Like trying to ban the Beatles, Rock and Roll, dancing, et cetera.

Banning something only makes people more curious. And in the end it's counter productive; whatever you're trying to make go away only comes back stronger.

[Wounded Bear]

7. Banning enhances the 'forbidden fruit' effect...

That which is denied is desired.

[exboyfil]

3. Ban the Bible for the naughty parts

They got mileage for someone reading 50 Shades out loud in a publicly televised school board meeting because of the kids that might be watching (Georgia school board shuts down mom reading explicit lines from school library's book). I am assuming 50 Shades was in a high school library. Most literate high schoolers would just probably chuckle at the text - it is God awful writing. Of course I probably wouldn't want grade schoolers hearing it.

I came up with a list of passages that grade schoolers and junior high kids probably shouldn't be hearing:

Was it in a high school library or an elementary school library? I guess they could have gone with the following quotes instead: "There she lusted after her lovers, whose genitals were like those of donkeys and whose emission was like that of horses." (Ez 23:20). "You also took the fine jewelry I gave you, the jewelry made of my gold and silver, and you made for yourself male idols and engaged in prostitution with them." (Ez 16:17) “When men fight with one another and the wife of the one draws near to rescue her husband from the hand of him who is beating him and puts out her hand and seizes him by the private parts, you shall cut off her hand. Show her no pity. (Deut 25:11-12).

Don't forget all the spicy passages in Song of Songs - here is just one example “Your breasts are like two fawns, twins of a gazelle.” (Song of Songs 7.3) Killing others and taking Jeffrey Dahmer like trophies for a dowry “Say to David, ‘The king wants no other price for the bride than a hundred Philistine foreskins, to take revenge on his enemies.’” (1 Sam18:20-30)

You also haved the stories of the angels in Sodom and Lot promising his nubile daughters to avoid their rape. Later those same daughters returned the favor by getting the old man drunk and raping him (not that he protested too much I think).

And we get to Revelations in which anyone familiar with a type of porn will quickly understand - "The woman was dressed in purple and scarlet, and was glittering with gold, precious stones and pearls. She held a golden cup in her hand, filled with abominable things and the filth of her adulteries." (Rev.17:4).

Do you think the school board would want those passages read in open session? I never hear them from the pulpit or in any Bible study unless one that goes line by line through a book, and then it is waved away. By the way we have copies of The Holy Bible in both of our Junior Highs and our High School, and they do belong there.

&lc=UgwmIp9oZhPmXaQaiWN4AaABAg

[KS Toronado]

5. Wonder if Playboy made their banned list

[dalton99a]

6. Kick

[Evolve Dammit]

9. Good Lord. No words. She'll make a good little fascist

[colorado_ufo]

12. Love the way she dressed for male attention.

[Evolve Dammit]

8. Back to the 50's. 1850's??? Look out if they take the House and/or Senate.

[llmart]

10. Those who want to ban books of a certain kind...

are more than likely the ones who used to as kids get hold of a Playboy or Hustler and stash it under the rafters in the basement or under their mattress for "inspiration". When I was growing up it was always the devout Catholics in Catholic school who did this. (I know that's a huge generalization, but that was my experience.)

[certainot]

11. meanwhile 87 universities support 260+ rw radio stations that cheered on and pushed this shit

it's fucking ridiculous that those 87 and many other institutions of higher learning broadcast sports on radio stations that have been attacking teachers, pushing privatization and defunding of public ed, excuse and promote anti lgbtq and racist politicians and bigotry, and book banning.