In honor of Banned Books Week

Great Debates
1

This week is ALA’s Banned Books Week . While there are very few posters to this board who would favor the banning of the literary classics (“I know why the Caged Bird Sings”, “Huckleberry Finn”, “To Kill a Mockingbird”, etc.) that always make this list, where do you stand on the following titles? Do you believe that any of them are too “dangerous” or “offensive” to live in a public library?
1- (the grandaddy of all banned books)- THE ANARCHIST COOKBOOK- if you haven’t heard of this book then it probably means that you HAVEN’T been living in a cave. Renounced by its author (who says he greatly regrets writing it), it’s a recipe book for all types of bombs and other weapons and explosives. It’s believed that Klebold and Harris learned from its pages as well as a few less famous murderers.

2- THE PAINTED BIRD by Jerzy Kozinsky- while a very important work of literature, it’s not for the fainthearted. Almost every type of sexual perversion (pedophilia, incest, bestiality, etc) is displayed in explicit detail as well as unspeakable acts of violence and horror as a young gypsy boy makes his way through the Eastern European countryside during WW2.

3- The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion- a gospel of anti-Semitism, this 19th century novel details the Jewish plot to achieve global domination and was taken as absolutely true for decades. It is still revered by neo-Nazis, and in the 1920s Henry Ford distributed copies to all of his employees.

There are many many other titles I could list, but these will hopefully get the conversation started. Let me add (and this is particularly addressed to believers in intellectual freedom), ARE there any titles that you would not allow to be included in a public library’s collection?

2

I certainly would want my library to carry The Painted Bird. It’s a great book. There ought to be a way to keep it from too young ti read it.

I tend to think they ought to carry The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion and The Anarchist Cookbook in a special locked case. The books should circulate, but it should take a special request to a librarian to borrow them.

3

I’m always exasperated when I hear about “banned” books.

For crying out loud, it’s not as if Maya Angelou is going to prison, and it’s not as if people can’t or won’t be able to buy “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings”* from Amazon or at any mall book store.

What’s at issue is USUALLY whether a given book is appropriate required reading in an English course, or whether a school library should keep it on the shelves. Most of the time, assuming that the local school board and the local school librarian are intelligent, literate, reasonable people, most parents would just as soon sit back and let THEM decide what books should be in the curricula and in the library. I’m certainly lazy enough that I’d prefer it that way. I don’t WANT to have to pre-read every book my future children are assigned at school. I WANT to be able to take it for granted that my future kids can read pretty much anything in the school library without coming upon smut. And I daresay that, in most school districts, parents CAN take that for granted.

But not always. And that’s why parents have to be vigilant.

Are some of the “book-banning” attempts misguided, even silly? Sure. But just as often, the fights are trigered by

  1. Liberal school librarians trying to use the minimal powers their jobs give them to push their political points of view. (Come on now- you really think little kids are running to the school library, begging for a copy of “Heather Has 2 Mommies?” If a school library carries it, I’d wager that reflects the librarian’s political agenda, rather than any demand from the kids.)

  2. Parents concerned that a given book isn’t age-appropriate for their kids.

Do I believe, for example, that “Huckleberry Finn” is a racist book? No, far from it- but I understand PERFECTLY why black parents would object to it being required reading for children. Its casual use of the “N word” doesn’t make it a bad or racist book, but younger children aren’t likely to grasp that. The end result of making “Huck Finn” required reading in 5th grade is likely to be a class full of 10 and 11 year olds using crude, racist language.

But when parents try to make that valid point, newspaper coverage generally looks like: “Parents Want to Ban Mark Twain.”
And that’s just unfair.

Look, I HAVE read “Huckleberry Finn,” and expect my kids to do so too, at some point (preferably when they’re old enough to make some subtle-but-crucial distinctions). For that matter, I’ve read and enjoyed a host of books and films that some on the far-right would regard (wrongly, I think) as immoral. Where they go wrong, I believe, is in equating “G-rated” with “moral,” and “R-rated” with “immoral.” I think there’s a huge difference between saying, “This book/movie is evil” and “This book/movie is not for kids, under any circumstances.” There are many books and films I heartily endorse that I would NEVER want available at a grade school (or even high school) library.

I know first-hand that there ARE genuine idiots among the censors. You won’t find me defending fundamentalists who insist that the Harry Potter series is leading kids to Satanism (and such folk do exist; I encounter them occasionally in Texas). But the issue is a little more complicated than you’d grasp by reading ACLU propaganda about “banned books.”

  • My problem with Maya Angelou isn’t that she’s obscene or offensive- it’s that she’s mind-numbingly dull. Her poetry is about as deep as a suburban 7th grade girl’s, as everyone who heard her ramblings at Bill Clinton’s inauguration already knows.
4

astorian said what I wanted to say, but better than I would have said it. For the most part. I do not tend to have objections to books (including the ones listed above) in libraries. Nor do I tend to have objections on their being generally accessible. I do have some objections to books included on required reading lists.

5

“1) Liberal school librarians trying to use the minimal powers their jobs give them to push their political points of view. (Come on now- you really think little kids are running to the school library, begging for a copy of “Heather Has 2 Mommies?” If a school library carries it, I’d wager that reflects the librarian’s political agenda, rather than any demand from the kids.)”

I’m not a children’s librarian, but I do know that there are very few books in any library, Harry Potter notwithstanding, that are there as a result of the kids demands. The purpose of books like “Heather Has 2 Mommies” is to represent children from minority households, to assure them that they are not alone and to let other kids know that other types of families exist. A good librarian develops their collection policy with a view towards representing all views, thus an average library should stock Michael Moore’s STUPID WHITE MEN and Ann Coulter’s SLANDER just as they should include NAPPY HAIR and the LITTLE HOUSE series. The only political agenda touted is that we are an incredibly diverse society.
(It’s ironic that librarians are now the front line of defense against censors. prior to the McCarthy era it was quite the reverse; the responsibilities of librarians included using their moral judgment in deciding what was appropriate for a community or institution and they were often as not the banners of books rather than the defenders.)
I agree with the Huckleberry Finn diagnosis; it’s unfortunate that because the title character is an adolescent the book is usually deemed as a children’s book. I have no problem with it being required reading for advanced high school students or for college students, though, as it was a turning point in world literature due to its use of vernacular style, uneducated main characters, etc…
I completely agree with the Maya Angelou diagnosis, though the rape scene rather than the writing style is what usually gets it banned.
Protests for the collection of public libraries is probably far more common than you think; the vast majority of it does not make the papers. In addition to the formal protests, most libraries have a problem with books on the occult, homosexuality, and other controversial issues being returned to the shelf desecrated, destroyed in the restroom, or disappearing altogether from the library.
A major aggravation of public libraries is that no matter how large the signs and disclaimers announcing that the library does not act in loco parentis, parental complaints that Billy Rick and Tadpole have looked at pictures of nekkid people or otherwise checked out the Forbidden Fruit Salad Cookbook are at least a monthly occurence. It’s a subject of constant amazement that I’ve never once heard readers of the “evil” Harry Potter series demand the removal of the LaHaye/Jenkins series (high on the list of books that offend me aesthetically, though I’ll always keep them in the stacks [or at least until they’re as old and unloved as the Frances Parkinson Keyes novels]), but the reverse is at least a monthly occurence.

6

When I was in sixth, maybe seventh grade, over 25 years ago, our english teacher, read excepts from The Painted Bird

At the time, I had no idea how compelling the book was. I read it in it’s entirty about three or four years later and read it again about a decade later when I understood much more about it than I did during the first read.

I know that a number of people I went to school with also read the book because of the readings in that classroom. The teacher really only read parts of it that were appropriate for us - so not much of the book, really. But it was important, and it did impact us.

The point I am rambling toward is that I think it is important that kids, teens, pre-teens, are exposed to ideas, thoughts and pictures of history that may (will) make them think, will expand their view of the world and will hopefully make them better people.

By not allowing them access to these things, it makes us weaker as a people and shallower in thought. If the cost of having thse books available is that the Anarchist Cookbook is also available to them, then that is a risk that I personally believe is worth it.

7

if the books were really banned I would be upset. banned as in “if you own this book your going to jail”. but nah, from a school library is perfectly fine.

I mean, you can still bring your kids to a REAL library and get them darn well every book you could ever want. why aren’t you doing that anyway? derr…

8

Sampiro.

I hate the very idea of banning a book. That said, I’ve got to admit that there is something to be said for restricting access to some of them.

Huck Finn: a classic and shouldn’t ever be banned from a library. I do understand Astorian’s point that in the hands of fifth graders it would probably just turn into a license to use words that most people would rather see disappear so maybe leave it for high school.

Caged Bird: Can’t comment as I’ve never read the book.

Anarchist’s cookbook: This is one that I DO think should be banned, or at least not stocked. Not because it contains explosives recipes, but because it contains poor explosives recipes. The methods given are unsafe as hell and have probably killed several people. Usually kids, thinking it is actually a ‘cookbook’ for neat things that go boom.

All of this is IMHO of course, except for the Anarchist cookbook. That thing really ought to be banned.

Testy

9

Banning a book is the single best way to get it highly sought after and widely recognized. I for one feel an overwhelming desire to read anything that someone else dosen’t want me to see.