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Banned Books Week: Just a Lot of Propaganda Says Jonah Goldberg

Submitted by Elaine Magliaro, Guest Blogger

Banned Books Weeks 2011 will be observed September 24-October 1.

 

Jonah Goldberg claims that Banned Books Week (BBW) is nothing but hype. In a column he penned for USA Today in early September, Goldberg wrote that BBW “is an exercise in propaganda.” He continued, “For starters, as a legal matter no book in America is banned, period, full stop (not counting, I suppose, some hard-core illegal child porn or some such out there). Any citizen can go to a bookstore or Amazon.com and buy any book legally in print — or out of print for that matter.”

Evidently, Goldberg thinks that books which have been removed from the shelves of public and school libraries “due to pressure from someone who isn’t a librarian or a teacher” don’t count as “banned books.” He appears to believe they can only be considered banned books if they have been banned on a national level. So what if books are removed from school and public libraries? One can always get a copy at a book store or from Amazon.com. Right?

Goldberg got into the numbers of challenged books to demonstrate how “overhyped” stories about banned books are. He wrote that reported challenges had dropped from 513 in 2008 to 348 in 2010—and that the “historic norm is a mere 400 to 500 bans or challenges” a year. He said there are almost 100,00 public schools in this country educating approximately 50 million students—as well as 33,000 private schools and 10,000 public libraries. According to Goldberg’s math—if there were “500 parent-driven ‘bans or challenges’ in a given year in public schools, that would mean for every 200 public schools, or every 100,000 students, at least one parent even complained about an age-inappropriate book. What an epidemic!”

Reported challenges…a mere 400 to 500 bans or challenges…only one book challenge per 100,000 students. What’s the fuss all about? Why should people be concerned? Maybe the American Library Association, public libraries, and schools in this country should only begin to worry when the censorship, challenging, and banning of books becomes an epidemic. Why address the problem when the numbers are so small?

Well, one could conclude that many book challenges aren’t reported. As noted on the ALA website: “We do not claim comprehensiveness in recording challenges as research suggests that for each challenge reported there are as many as four or five that go unreported.” And I have little doubt that there are many librarians, teachers, readers, and defenders of the First Amendment who feel that an historic norm of 400 to 500 challenges a year are a few hundred too many.

I have to wonder at Goldberg’s motives for writing his column. Was it so he could get in a dig at teachers’ unions? Here’s what he wrote about them:

“These days, teachers unions are fond of claiming that apathetic parents deserve more of the blame for the woeful state of education today. Maybe so. But a national policy of bullying parents interested in what their kids are reading hardly seems like the best way to encourage them. Indeed, from these numbers, the real scandal might be that so few books are “banned or challenged.’”

I’m not sure how Goldberg drew the conclusion that there is a “national policy” of bullying parents who are interested in what their children read.  He didn’t provide any proof that there was. And why  would Goldberg suggest that the real scandal is that so few books are being banned or challenged? Does he think that more books should be banned and challenged every year?

 Molly Raphael, President of the American Library Association, responded to Goldberg’s column. She wrote:

 “When a library removes a book from its shelves because someone disapproves of the ideas or opinions contained in the book, that is censorship. When it is done by publicly funded schools and libraries — government agencies — it is a violation of the First Amendment.”

Raphael said we should remember that when a book is removed from a library it is an act of censorship that affects an entire community—not just one individual or one family. She also said that public libraries “serve everyone, including those who are too young or too poor to buy their own books or own a computer.” She added that the reason librarians and library users celebrate BBW is as “a testament to the strength of our freedom in the United States. We celebrate the freedom to read because we all know that we are so fortunate to live in a country that protects our freedom to choose what we want to read. If you doubt this, just ask anyone from a totalitarian society. That is why we draw attention to acts of censorship that chill the freedom to read.”

Do not feel safe. The poet remembers.

You may kill him — another will be born.

Deeds and words shall be recorded.

~ Czeslaw Milosz, Poland

 

The lives of artists are more fragile than their creations. The poet Ovid was exiled by Augustus to a little hell-hole on the Black Sea called Tomis, but his poetry has outlasted the Roman Empire. Osip Mandelstam died in a Stalinist work camp, but his poetry has outlived the Soviet Union. Federico García Lorca was killed by the thugs of Spain’s Generalissimo Francisco Franco, but his poetry has survived that tyrannical regime.

 We can perhaps bet on art to win over tyrants. It is the world’s artists, particularly those courageous enough to stand up against authoritarianism, for whom we need to be concerned, and for whose safety we must fight.

~ Salman Rushdie, 19 April 2011

Top Ten Most Frequently Challenged Books of 2010 (Out of 348 challenges as reported by the Office for Intellectual Freedom)

  1. And Tango Makes Three*, by Peter Parnell and Justin Richardson
    Reasons: homosexuality, religious viewpoint, and unsuited to age group
  2. The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, by Sherman Alexie
    Reasons: offensive language, racism, sex education, sexually explicit, unsuited to age group, and violence
  3. Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley
    Reasons: insensitivity, offensive language, racism, and sexually explicit
  4. Crank, by Ellen Hopkins
    Reasons: drugs, offensive language, and sexually explicit
  5. The Hunger Games, by Suzanne Collins
    Reasons: sexually explicit, unsuited to age group, and violence
  6. Lush, by Natasha Friend
    Reasons: drugs, offensive language, sexually explicit, and unsuited to age group
  7. What My Mother Doesn’t Know, by Sonya Sones
    Reasons: sexism, sexually explicit, and unsuited to age group
  8. Nickel and Dimed, by Barbara Ehrenreich
    Reasons: drugs, inaccurate, offensive language, political viewpoint, and religious viewpoint
  9. Revolutionary Voices, edited by Amy Sonnie
    Reasons:  homosexuality and sexually explicit
  10. Twilight, by Stephenie Meyer
    Reasons: religious viewpoint and violence

 (*And Tango Makes Three is a picture book.)

 Sources and Further Reading

Column: Banned Books Week is just hype (USA Today)

Banned Books Week celebrates freedom to read (USA Today)

Banned Books Week: Celebrating the Freedom to Read (ALA)

Frequently Challenged Books (ALA)

Banned and/or Challenged Books from the Radcliffe Publishing Course Top 100 Novels of the 20th Century (ALA)

Banned Books Week 2011 (Amnesty International)

The 11 Most Surprising Banned Books (PHOTOS, POLL) (Huffington Post)

Letter re: Slaughterhouse Five Ban in Republic, MO (National Coalition Against Censorship)

First Lady Laura Bush Cancels Poetry Gathering Fearing Anti-War Poems: Democracy Now! Hosts Its Own Poetry Slam with Def Poetry Jam Stars Staceyann Chin, Suheir Hammad and Steve Colman (Democracy Now, 2/7/2003)

 
Other Turley Blog Posts on the Censorship, Challenging, and Banning of Books

Publisher Announces Intention to Edit Huckleberry Finn To Remove N-Word

On the Banning, Censorship, and Challenging of Books

Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?—I See Anti-Marxists Looking at Me!

151 thoughts on “Banned Books Week: Just a Lot of Propaganda Says Jonah Goldberg”

  1. What I do not know is what the effective tax rate of Berkshire-Hathaway is presently….I wonder if the shares have decreased since Warrens offer to pay his fair share of taxes…Wall Street does have a way to punish non-compliant souls….

  4. Elaine M.,

    Thank you…I seemed to have missed that article….

    Raff,

    I suppose if you are a corporation like Yahoo….and your net effective tax rate is…something like 2.1%….I’d comply with what the money’d people asked as well….There was some concern that if Yahoo paid its fair share of Taxes that it’d drop about 30% in value…Hmmmm….I wonder if there is a connection…

  5. Elaine,
    I saw that article about Yahoo and their lame excuse claiming it was just an error on their parts, but then they said the error might take awhile to fix! I smell a rat.

  6. Banned Books Week: defending our freedom to read
    Gordon T. Belt
    First Amendment Center Library Manager
    Tuesday, September 20, 2011
    http://www.firstamendmentcenter.org/banned-books-week-defending-our-freedom-to-read

    Excerpt:
    “I cannot live without books.” — Thomas Jefferson.

    Of all Jefferson’s inspiring and thought-provoking quotes, this one is among my favorites. As the First Amendment Center’s librarian, I have a special affinity for books, and as someone academically trained as a historian, I have an appreciation for the Founding Fathers and for the important words they left behind.

    Banned Books Week — Sept. 24 through Oct. 1 — is an annual recognition by librarians and book-minded people that the First Amendment should never be taken for granted. I believe the freedoms embraced by the Founding Fathers in the 45 words of the First Amendment also speak to an implied freedom to read, yet history shows us that the struggle to maintain that freedom has never been easy.

    Jefferson believed that censorship only served to draw attention to books that might otherwise be ignored or forgotten. In 1814, Jefferson wrote to his Philadelphia bookseller, Nicolas G. Dufief, concerning Jefferson’s purchase of a book by Regnault de Bécourt, La Création du Monde. American authorities claimed that de Bécourt’s book contained blasphemous material, and had accused the author of selling his book to Jefferson. In coming to de Bécourt’s defense Jefferson eloquently stated, “I am really mortified to be told that, in the United States of America, a fact like this can become a subject of inquiry, and of criminal inquiry too, as an offence against religion; that a question about the sale of a book can be carried before the civil magistrate.”

    Throughout our nation’s history, words that have questioned the authority of our government and religious institutions have faced public scrutiny. Even works by our most well-known Founding Fathers have been censored out of fear of rebellion and societal decay.

  7. Off Topic:

    Yahoo Appears To Be Censoring Email Messages About Wall Street Protests (Updated)
    By Lee Fang on Sep 20, 2011
    http://thinkprogress.org/media/2011/09/20/323856/yahoo-censoring-occupy-wall-street-protests/

    Thinking about e-mailing your friends and neighbors about the protests against Wall Street happening right now? If you have a Yahoo e-mail account, think again. ThinkProgress has reviewed claims that Yahoo is censoring e-mails relating to the protest and found that after several attempts on multiple accounts, we too were prevented from sending messages about the “Occupy Wall Street” demonstrations.

    Over the weekend, thousands gathered for a “Tahrir Square”-style protest of Wall Street’s domination of American politics. The protesters, organized online and by organizations like Adbusters, have called their effort “Occupy Wall Street” and have set up the website: http://www.OccupyWallSt.org. However, several YouTube users posted videos of themselves trying to email a message inviting their friends to visit the Occupy Wall St campaign website, only to be blocked repeatedly by Yahoo.

    *****

    Check out the link above to view a video of ThinkProgress making the attempt with the same blocked message experienced by others.

  8. Missouri School Ends Ban On ‘Slaughterhouse-Five’…Sort Of
    http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2011/09/20/323474/missouri-school-ends-ban-on-slaughterhouse-five-sort-of/

    This Summer, the Republic School Board in Missouri decided to ban Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five and Sarah Ockler’s Twenty Boy Summer after a resident complained these novels “teach principles contrary to the Bible.” After enduring serious blowback, the school board unanimously voted to overturn the ban yesterday. Technically. The two books will now be available “for independent reading as long as they are kept in a secure section of the school library. Only parents or guardians can check them out.” The teachers “still cannot make the books required reading nor read them aloud.”

  9. Pingback: Banned Book Week aka The Geek Gets Political (Again) | Serial Distractions

  10. Forgot to finish. A repairman showed up. I was saying I would like to have the opportunity to work for her, but since I still live in Texas it won’t be happening, but I can send a donation.

  13. Otteray Scribe, I’m so sorry for your loss. And after reading this I’m sorry she didn’t blog because she sounds lovely…

    “I did get ideas from her as she would read over my shoulder and make suggestions for comments. Some of the trolls and right-wingers got her Celtic dander up and she used some language about some of them that could not be put in a family newspaper. ”

    Heal back quick….

  14. Notable First Amendment court cases
    From the American Library Association
    http://www.ala.org/ala/aboutala/offices/oif/firstamendment/courtcases/courtcases.cfm

    This page contains summaries of frequently cited First Amendment cases. Arranged by topic, they cover case law issued by a variety of courts: the Supreme Court of the United States, the Court of Appeals of different Federal circuits, the District Court of several Federal districts, as well as the highest court of several states and particular appellate courts of action.

    *****
    Three of the Notable Cases:

    Campbell v. St. Tammany Parish School Board, 64 F.3d 184 (5th Cir. 1995)

    Public school district removed the book Voodoo and Hoodoo, a discussion of the origins, history, and practices of the voodoo and hoodoo religions that included an outline of some specific practices, from all district library shelves. Parents of several students sued and the district court granted summary judgment in their favor. The court of appeals reversed, finding that there was not enough evidence at that stage to determine that board members had an unconstitutional motivation, such as denying students
    access to ideas with which board members disagreed; the court remanded the case for a full trial at which all board members could be questioned about their reasons for removing the book. The court observed that “in light of the special role of the school library as a place where students may freely and voluntarily explore diverse topics, the school board’s non-curricular decision to remove a book well after it had been placed in the public school libraries evokes the question whether that action might not be an attempt to ‘strangle the free mind at its source.'” The court focused on some evidence that school board members had removed the book without having read it or having read only excerpts provided by the Christian Coalition. The parties settled the case before trial by returning the book to the libraries on specially designated reserve shelves.

    *****

    Sund v. City of Wichita Falls, Texas, 121 F. Supp. 2d 530 (N.D. Texas, 2000)

    City residents who were members of a church sought removal of two books, Heather Has Two Mommies and Daddy’s Roommate, because they disapproved of the books’ depiction of homosexuality. The City of Wichita Falls City Council voted to restrict access to the books if 300 persons signed a petition asking for the restriction. A separate group of citizens filed suit after the books were removed from the children’s section and placed on a locked shelf in the adult area of the library. Following a trial on the merits, the District Court permanently enjoined the city from enforcing the resolution permitting the removal of the two books. It held that the City’s resolution constituted impermissible content-based and viewpoint based discrimination; was not narrowly tailored to serve a compelling state interest; provided no standards or review process; and improperly delegated governmental authority over the selection and removal of the library’s books to any 300 private citizens who wish to remove a book from the children’s area of the Library.

    *****

    Counts v. Cedarville School District, 295 F.Supp.2d 996 (W.D. Ark. 2003)

    The school board of the Cedarville, Arkansas school district voted to restrict students’ access to the Harry Potter books, on the grounds that the books promoted disobediance and disrespect for authority and dealt with witchcraft and the occult. As a result of the vote, students in the Cedarville school district were required to obtain a signed permission slip from their parents or guardians before they would be allowed to borrow any of the Harry Potter books from school libraries. The District Court overturned the Board’s decision and ordered the books returned to unrestricted circulation, on the grounds that the restrictions violated students’ First Amendment right to read and receive information. In so doing, the Court noted that while the Board necessarily performed highly discretionary functions related to the operation of the schools, it was still bound by the Bill of Rights and could not abridge students’ First Amendment right to read a book on the basis of an undifferentiated fear of disturbance or because the Board disagreed with the ideas contained in the book.

  17. I donated most of the books but just found a copy of “The Witches” on the book shelf.

  18. I know now why my kids did not attend Texas public schools. My son read nearly every Roald Dahl book in his early grades at a parochial school.

  19. ACLU Of Texas Issues 15th Annual Banned Books ReportReport Finds Young Adult (YA) Literature Is Main Target For Challenges And Banning In Texas Public Schools
    http://www.aclutx.org/2011/09/15/aclu-of-texas-issues-15th-annual-banned-books-eport/

    Excerpt:
    HOUSTON — Books in the hottest genre in literature, called YA or Young Adult, are the most frequently challenged and banned in Texas public schools, the ACLU of Texas reported in its annual investigation published as “Free People Read Freely.”

    Texas schools banned 17 books last school year, 2010-2011, a decrease from the 20 taken from shelves the previous year. Most are in the popular YA category, although at Cibolo Green Elementary School, Merriam-Webster’s Visual Dictionary drew objections due to “sexual content or nudity.” As a result of the challenge, the dictionary was placed in a restricted area of the library.

  20. Banned Books Week
    ACLU of Oregon
    http://aclu-or.org/bannedbooks

    Excerpt:

    What is Banned Books Week?

    Banned Books Week is an annual event started by the American Library Association (ALA) in 1982. This week-long event, held during the last week of September, raises awareness of freedom of speech through celebrating challenged books and the value of free expression.

    What do we mean when we say “Banned” and “Challenged” books?
    A book is “challenged” when a person or group objects to the materials and attempts to remove or restrict their accessibility. A book is “banned” when this removal is successful.

    Thanks to the work of libraries and the ACLU, most book challenges are now unsuccessful.

    Who does the challenging?

    There is a misconceived notion that the term “banned book” means the government is trying to interfere in the public’s access to these works. According to the ALA’s website, parents of school aged children are responsible for challenges more often than any other group. The ALA website states that that the top three reasons books are challenged are:

    1.the material was considered to be “sexually explicit”
    2.the material contained “offensive language”
    3.the materials was “unsuited to any age group”
    Challenges are typically done on a small scale by a group of concerned citizens who attempt to have the materials removed from their local libraries and bookstores.

    Why Does ACLU fight to defend the freedom to read?

    The ACLU is dedicated to the protection of free speech and free expression. When a small group of individuals tries to keep the rest of society from reading a book or viewing a painting they are impeding that freedom by attempting to dictate what is and is not acceptable expression.

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