[Mattasher]

The confusion between libraries, especially school libraries, not carrying certain books, and censorship or "book banning" is disingenuous and hyperbolic. All libraries curate, every single one. In particular, school and specialized libraries "censor" based on what is appropriate for their audience.

My highschool library didn't carry any Chilton car repair manuals. I asked about that once because I had a rapidly decaying, hand-me-down Ford Pinto. The librarian laughed and suggested I was attending the wrong high school for those books.

I am bothered by the trend towards fewer physical books and pushing people towards digital copies — there's no substitute for physical browsing as a discovery process.

[constantly]

They’re not banning books that are not aligned with the audience, like banning Chilton car manuals from high schools. They weren’t there in the first place because they’re not aligned to the audience and we’re curated away.

What they’re doing is more like banning all Ford Chilton car manuals from Autozones.

[stetrain]

Was your school library forced to not carry car repair manuals by a law passed by local or state government?

[vel0city]

Just a heads up, a lot of public libraries have access to the ChiltonLibrary.

https://www.gale.com/c/chilton-library

Scroll down, click "Access through your library >>", get wrenching.

[krapp]

Doubly so because half the country is attacking public libraries for spreading "woke" or "transgender" propaganda. I remember a recent story about a city that voted to defund their public library entirely for that reason.

Between culture-war politics and people's disgust at the homeless using libraries as shelters (as if that was the libraries' fault, and not the fault of societies refusing to care about the homeless) I really despair for the future of libraries as cultural centers. Because books aside, that's really what they are.

It's not surprising libraries are turning to stores and apps for funding when the people either don't care or are actively hostile to them.

[634636346]

The pearl-clutching over "book banning" is ridiculous. It's parents not wanting schools exposing their children (i.e., minors) to certain materials the parents think is inappropriate. And these supposedly "banned" books are still readily available to adults from Amazon, B&N, and (usually) regular libraries. Why is this such a big deal?

Meanwhile, you now have censorship at the internet backbone level, with ISPs arbitrarily, unilaterally deciding to stop routing traffic to legal websites, and there's been little outcry: https://twitter.com/IncogNetLLC/status/1685359845505957888

[w0de0]

The big deal is the cowardice and ignorance of these parents.

A smart child raised by parents who fear and censor media contrary to their ideology or morality is a child whose future has been stolen. It is a theft from society as well.

Why is the dumbest parent allowed to circumscribe the smartest child?

[FrustratedMonky]

Sure.

There is a need to curate.

Because space is limited, every library can't be some billion square foot Library of Alexandria. Choices have to be made.

Guess the argument is around who 'chooses' and 'what'.

But I would say that not carrying 'Chilton' as an example of why they shouldn't, say, have 'To Call A Mockingbird', as also disingenuous.

[nvahalik]

Likewise, school libraries should not include books with explicit graphic examples of oral sex. The whole "To Kill a Mockingbird" has been a red herring. Nobody has banned books. They just want to remove books that do not have value... and they have.

[FrustratedMonky]

Don't think pictures of Greek Statues count as "graphic oral sex".

Your "graphic oral sex" is also a red-herring.

Something to get the right-leaning parents fired up to go storm the school board.

>'Stop taping my kids eyes open and making my precious little boy view porn (let him sneak it from his dads stash or online like a decent boy should).'

"Nobody has banned books" -> Literal Book Banning https://www.ala.org/advocacy/bbooks/frequentlychallengedbook...

[nvahalik]

> Don't think pictures of Greek Statues count as "graphic oral sex".

Not sure when I saw a greek statue in any school, what does this have to do with anything?

> Something to get the right-leaning parents fired up to go storm the school board.

This is a comment out of ignorance. If you believe people would take time out of their already busy days just because they wanna go to a school board meeting... wait... do you have kids? (I'm guessing you don't...)

> "Nobody has banned books" -> Literal Book Banning https://www.ala.org/advocacy/bbooks/frequentlychallengedbook...

Which (again) requires you to redefine the word "banned". You can still get all of these books. They are just not allowed in certain areas. They are still legal. You can still own them. Various private areas and some public places have chosen not to allow them or to carry them.

"Banned or _challenged_". Yeah. Not banned. "Challenged".

[FrustratedMonky]

Pictures of Greek Statues were banned in Schools in Florida. (related because it was in a book). (thought, to be fair, not-banned-banned, needed a release form) So maybe this is inflammatory, but think I can mention it because it was national news.

There are a lot of school board meeting with some very upset religious yelling. Dozens. Typically these are open to the public, and videos are online. Just search for 'angry school board meeting', they are swamped with religious parents trying to ban things, more than books. To them, they are in a religious war, and do show up at School Board Meetings.

Ownership. Yes. You can still buy things. The government is not 'banning' the selling. But that takes money, which is another form of restriction. It is a way to keep the poor, poor, away from knowledge.

The Country established Libraries to allow the free flow of knowledge so anybody could 'pick themselves up'. Not just for those that already have money.

Think you are missing "Challenged" means someone did want to 'Ban' them. People fought against it, so it simply remained recorded as a 'Challenge'. But if you stop fighting, then they win, and boom, 'Banned', that's how you get 'all-the-bad-things-from-Germany-that-we-can't-mention'.

[pierat]

Romeo and Juliet, required freshman high school reading.

Act 1 scene 1:

.... SAMPSON ’Tis true, and therefore women, being the weaker vessels, are ever thrust to the wall. Therefore I will push Montague’s men from the wall and thrust his maids to the wall.

GREGORY The quarrel is between our masters and us their men.

SAMPSON ’Tis all one. I will show myself a tyrant. When I have fought with the men, I will be civil with the maids; I will cut off their heads.

GREGORY The heads of the maids?

SAMPSON Ay, the heads of the maids, or their maidenheads. Take it in what sense thou wilt.

GREGORY They must take it in sense that feel it.

SAMPSON Me they shall feel while I am able to stand, and ’tis known I am a pretty piece of flesh.

--------------------

This is straight up "this is how I'd rape women from the "enemy's side". But yet, no howls from ANYONE about Shakespeare. Even though he was writing to what amount to "Days of Our Lives", or an episode of Jerry Springer, he's viewed as some enlightened literary artform.

[FrustratedMonky]

Rape is only fifty silver shekels

Yeah Man, Ban It

Ezekiel 23:19-21

"There she had longed for her lovers. Their private parts seemed as big as those of donkeys. And their flow of semen appeared to be as much as that of horses. You longed for the time when you first became impure in Egypt. That was when you allowed your breasts to be kissed. And you permitted your young breasts to be touched.”

Deuteronomy 22:23-24

“If there is a girl who is a virgin engaged to a man, and another man finds her in the city and lies with her, then you shall bring them both out to the gate of that city and you shall stone them to death; the girl, because she did not cry out in the city, and the man, because he has violated his neighbor’s wife. Thus you shall purge the evil from among you.

------ Pretty Harsh - we'll be killing a lot of people to comply with this law. Dead.

Leviticus 20:10

“If a man commits adultery with the wife of his neighbor, both the adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death.

---- No Bad Words, or you are Dead.

Leviticus 24:13-14

"Then the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, “Bring the one who has cursed outside the camp, and let all who heard him lay their hands on his head; then let all the congregation stone him."

----- Wave the bloody Sheet or, Dead.

And father fined.

Deuteronomy 22:20

"But here is the proof of my daughter’s virginity.” Then her parents shall display the cloth before the elders of the town, 18and the elders shall take the man and punish him. 19They shall fine him a hundred shekels b of silver and give them to the young woman’s father, because this man has given an Israelite virgin a bad name. She shall continue to be his wife; he must not divorce her as long as he lives. If, however, the charge is true and no proof of the young woman’s virginity can be found, 21 she shall be brought to the door of her father’s house and there the men of her town shall stone her to death. She has done an outrageous thing in Israel by being promiscuous while still in her father’s house. You must purge the evil from among you."

------- Women are property, and the Bible lists a price sheet. Rape is just fifty silver shekels. Not dead, but now married because you were raped.

Deuteronomy 28

"If a man happens to meet a virgin who is not pledged to be married and rapes her and they are discovered, 29he shall pay her father fifty shekels c of silver. He must marry the young woman, for he has violated her. He can never divorce her as long as he lives."

----- Some Sexy Times

[_mgt8]

https://www.usatoday.com/story/entertainment/books/2022/06/2...

Has a list of banned books and some of the reasons.

Elsewhere, although I couldn't find the article they categorized the different reasons, and scenarios such as "explicit graphic examples of oral sex" were not a thing. In that categorization there were some banned for sexual content, but it was a tiny tiny fraction, like a fraction of a percent.

That sort of idea is commonly used as justification in the larger wedge of "protecting the children". But if you look at what is actually banned and the reasons (or even if the banned book has been read by the people banning at all), it's pretty clear that's not actually what this is about.

[nvahalik]

Please, let's be honest about this discussion.

These books were not banned.

They were removed from libraries.

You can still legally get copies of them from any number of booksellers.

Making something harder to get doesn't make it illegal. It doesn't mean it is banned. It doesn't mean you can incur legal problems for owning it.

[FrustratedMonky]

So,

If you have money you can have knowledge.

If you are poor, so sorry, no knowledge for you. Go pick some crops.

Actually, kind of what we have now.

[nvahalik]

Smut is not knowledge.

[constantly]

They have removed them…by banning them.