"Banned Books" Discussion...ooooohhh, sounds exciting doesn't it?
Well, it was! There were only seven of us, but, as usual, we had a LOT to say! It's a long post - so get a cup of tea and settle in. Write back to us if you want to share your own ideas about censorhsip or your favorite quote.
Quote of the evening by Joel, our favorite newcomer,
"This group opens our eyes to things other people close their eyes to".
We love Joel.
Each of us read a different book that has been banned or challenged in a library or a school. Just to clarify - a banned book is one that has been removed from a library (not ours!) or school because "someone" has deemed it offensive or inappropriate. There are organizations that track this kind of information, namely the American Library Association's Office of Intellectual Freedom.
Here is a blurb from their website:
The Office for Intellectual Freedom is charged with implementing ALA policies concerning the concept of intellectual freedom as embodied in the Library Bill of Rights, the Association’s basic policy on free access to libraries and library materials. The goal of the office is to educate librarians and the general public about the nature and importance of intellectual freedom in libraries. You can vist them online at, http://www.ala.org/ala/oif/Default622.htm
Please also visit ALA's Banned Books week webpages for more info
http://www.ala.org/ala/oif/bannedbooksweek/bannedbooksweek.htm
Joel read To Kill a Mockingbird, which has been banned for racism and vulgarity.
Elias read Captain Underpants, banned for vulgarity and some parents have complained about the mispelled words.
Bobby read Fallen Angels, banned for foul language, violence and gore.
Simon read And Tango Makes Three, about two male penguins at the zoo, who fall in love and raise a baby penguin as their own. Banned for "guess what?" Turns out this is actually a true story.
Tami read Harry Potter which has been banned for witchcraft and wizardry.
Sophia only reads banned books - just kidding - but she is very well-read and could comment on all of the books the others had read. And..we were so happy to have her back!
We discussed each book and why or to whom it might be offensive. While we understood why each book might offend one or more persons, we agreed that one should never be able to say "no one" should read the book. A book about 2 gay males rasing a child obviously has a place on someone's bookshelf. It was a lively discussion about censorship and we asked the question, "Is it ever appropriate?". We think it has it's place. We agreed that parents are often good judges of what you may or may not read, especially when you are young. Perhaps they want to protect you from things you are not emotionally ready for or subjects that might frighten you. We decided this was okay - big of us, huh? We also said that sometimes we do our own self-censoring, the best kind. When YOU decide you don't want to read something. Maybe the whole book, or maybe you just want to skip over passages that make you uncomfortable. Some may ONLY want to read those uncomfortable passages :)
As part of our discussion, I had printed and cut out various quotes on censorship. Periodically we would select a quote to discuss and determine whether it was blog-worthy enough to share. Here are our favorites.
Sophia led the way with the following Emily Dickinson poem.
Emily Dickinson (1830–86). Complete Poems. 1924.
Part One: Life
LXXXVII
FORBIDDEN fruit a flavor has
That lawful orchards mocks;
How luscious lies the pea within
The pod that Duty locks!
A good follow-up is this one
"To forbid anything is to make us have a mind for it" - Michel de Montaigne, Essays 1959
Elias pointed this one out to us -
"I am thankful for all the complaining I hear about our government because it means we have freedom of speech" - Nancie Carmody
We all really liked this one, too
"Adam was but human - this explains it all. He did not want the apple for the apple's sake, he wanted it only because it was forbidden. The mistake was in not forbidding the serpent: then he would have eaten the serpent" - Mark Twain
Good reverse psychology!
"Books and ideas are the most effective weapons against intolerance and ignorance" - Lyndon Baines Johnson
This one set Sophia off. She objected to the reference to books as weapons and would prefer a gentler word, but the rest of us thought it helped make the point.
It made us think (what a good thing!) Can you think of a better word than "weapon?"
Here are some others that we agreed we'd like to share....
"All of us can think of a book... that we hope none of our children or any other children have taken off the shelf. But if I have the right to remove that book from the shelf - that work I abhor - then you also have exactly the same right and so does everyone else. And then we have no books left on the shelf for any of us."
-- Katherine Paterson, American author of childrens books
"If we don't believe in freedom of expression for people we despise, we don't believe in it at all." - Noam Chomsky
"What is freedom of expression? Without the freedom to offend, it ceases to exist." Salman Rushdie
And as we ended the evening, so I will end this post....
"Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? - Who will watch the watchers?" - Juvenal
Until we meet again.
