Hello my friends of the Omschool. Time for a walk down censorship lane. So this one is just for my adult friends. Or maybe not. I guess, now I think of it, that's censorship, too, pre-ordaining what a young person should or shouldn't read. Dang, it's so easy to fall into the bubble-wrapping trap. It's about their civil liberties so, why shouldn't kids be part of the conversation? I don't know, you choose. But be warned, I'm not going to filter, sanitize or dumb down my opinions on censorship, no sirree.
So, it seems not a day goes by that another piece of quality literature falls under the God Squad's torch. While inane rubbish like Kirk Cameron's "Brave books" remains, just because it sits on the "Christian" shelf. Well, they do have a history of tossing the pepper and leaving the fly crap. Brave, SMH, what a crock. With the sales pitch of "countering mainstream views with Pro-God stories and American values." Christianity and nationalism ARE the mainstream view. It's anything else that the extreme right bullies. So how is it "courageous" and "truth-telling" to say what everyone else in your echo chamber is saying while muzzling what you deem contrary? Why can't we all have our say? Seems the PUBLIC library isn't for the public anymore.
Remember when Cameron's bunch staged a hostile takeover of their local PUBLIC libraries? In a bid to "Take Back the Library for God." Take it back from what? Books? Study? Research? What are they so afraid? Where's their "faith over fear" trope now? And take it back to do what? Host a Tin Foil Hat craft club? My goodness, hysterical and paranoid, much? But no, they didn't want to take it back, they wanted to take it OVER. To push their agenda. Which was supposed to be the reason they were taking it over in the first place. To prevent others "pushing their agenda." Confused? It gets worse.
The "others" weren't pushing anything. The Drag Queen Story Hours were held in private meeting rooms where you could listen in or not. BUT, a private room, like the ones used by DQSH weren't good enough for the rioters (I'm just gonna call 'em what they are). Oh no, they had to read their tripe out loud, in the main area, forcing everyone to listen. Which actually is a violation of civil liberties, library protocol, common sense, etc. AND one which, if perpetrated on them, they would be screaming down the place. But that's just it. They AREN'T being made to read or listen to anything. They can stupid their minds with whatever schmaltz they want. All these books they hate are just sitting quietly on the shelf minding their own business. Kirk Cameron's lot could take a leaf from those books.
The zealots' current pearl-clutching is over LGBTQIA+ books like "All Boys Aren't Blue" because they explore sexuality and gender identity. These books are clearly YA. They are shelved in the LGBTQ section. Yet they're deemed vulgar. Despite shelves over-flowing with books about straight sex. Because the book might, I don't know, accidentally fall off the shelf and a kid might accidentally open it and accidentally become gay ?? Seriously, teacher here, with everything digital, just getting kids into the library to read is the challenge.
Oh and by the way, Harry Potter is deemed by the militant Christian right (cough, Fourth Reich) as offensive too. And many of my right-wing readers think he's the shiznit. And yet no one questions their gun nut mentality. Which sounds irrelevant but is not. So Harry is vilified for wizardry and magic (it's fantasy, FFS) and, what, owl employment with union representation? hell IDK, they make this up as they go. As if books are the threat? I've never heard of a book opening fire in a church and killing off a bunch of people.
And yet, AND YET! This self-same "moral majority" of gunslingers, have actually protested not being able to open carry IN THE LIBRARY. A place of safety. Of refuge. While also (and I have to stop myself shrieking) claiming to speak on morality and purity (gag) and "protecting children" as the voice of the people. (He ain't my king! I didn't vote for him!) At least Hogwarts had a wand-carry protocol in place. And now the lunatics feel entitled to carry in church too! Won't wear a mask, will wear a gun? Our church had to hire armed guards to protect us from shit like this. Whatever happened to sanctuary?
So can we just agree, people like Kirk Cameron needs to get permanent laryngitis, now. We the sentient left need to gag and flag him! Because, again I ask, what are these book banners so godalmighty afraid of? And why are they so all over the place about what to ban? How about this? Ban nothing! Let it all read as written and let each person choose for themselves what to read. No one turns gay by reading a book. Just like I didn't become Uzbeki just by reading about Samarkand at 5. Wish I had,. More's the pity.
If these good "Christians" (they've absolutely tainted that word) are so worried, maybe they should look at how they're parenting their kids, yeah? History has taught us you can't beat or shame the gay out of the kid anymore than you can beat the black or the woman or the blue eyes out. My cousin knew he was gay before there was a word for it. And conversely, a straight kid can't be "converted" to the gay side. It doesn't work that way, duh. But two things you can beat out are the child's spirit and light. Raising hand here.
As a child who knows what it's like to have her identity fractured and her light doused, just for being, For merely existing. The girl who's the thorn in THEIR side. I've got a lot add to this conversation. I read every book on the shelf. Some that I shouldn't have like Go Ask Alice (Beatrice Sparks) a fraud, Jay's Journal (Beatrice Sparks) a travesty and Forever (Judy Blume) soft porn. Beatrice Sparks is the one who should be banned just for ruining our childhood with her monetized scams. I fell for her stories! As so many like me, have confessed, as if it's a crime to be duped at age 11 into believing her pastiche!! While she profiteered off the poor family of Alden Barrett, god. As their son's grave was wrongly desecrated (as if there's a right reason to desecrate) by her fabricated lies of Satanism??
And here it goes again. Me, haunted by dreams AGAIN! Of a mother just trying to grieve her son, only to be exploited by some cash-grabbing bored RICH housewife confidence trickster! If Sparks' did indeed publish her patients' journals, wasn't she busted on HIPPA breach of patient confidentiality. And still her lies fill library shelves. Remember Charles Berlitz and his "Bermuda Triangle" hoax? Back when we still called them hoaxes. I don't even know if that's even a word anymore. But it should be and HOAXES are what should be banned.
Why are Beatrice Sparks books still being sold?? Why are people still reading and praising fakes. I just checked Amazon and her books sell like cyanide laced anthracite! You can smoke it, eat it, burn it in yo damn coal stove! Hallelujah! An opiate for the masses, fake news. Cue sexy soviet riff by MY boy Yevgeny Balyaev and his charming rendition of "Kalinka! Note those Capitalist white teeth! No matter, I'm a lifelong dues-paying charter member of the Red Army Choir fan club. За здоровье!
Sorry for the ramble, but sorry, not sorry for the cynical vein. Some issues are worth getting uppity about. History only remembers the uppity ones. Emily Davison. Evaline Hilda Burkitt. Dolours Price. Your little sister salutes you. Comrades! Tovarisch! Book banning, hostile takeovers, Guns?? In MY SANCTUARY. I recall queuing for the spanking new 1974 Norton Shores branch library. That smelt of gas fire. MY escape from parent shit, from sexual ick, from him and them. And they want to take that refuge and turn it into a McChurch. Oh hell no we won't go. Upon this hill I shall play my "Last Post" with bloody bagpipes, low and loud!
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