Book Banning and Book Burning to Limit Access by High-School Students

[Zorba]

The party of family values strikes again. Total party of really shitty people.

Also remember when republicans claimed they were concerned about mental health impacts on children of wearing masks? I thought they were the party of children's mental health, who knew they were full of shit.

 

[pauldun170]

Looks like our district is now being hit with more social media disinformation bullshit. Idiots spread rumors that a student was sent home for wearing a patriotic shirt and admin had to waste brain cells responding to "parent concerns"

In other news, Florida gonna Florida

A Florida school board member filed a criminal complaint over a Black queer memoir | CNN

A school board member in Florida wants someone to be criminally prosecuted for allowing a young-adult memoir for Black queer boys on school library shelves.

www.cnn.com

 

[thilanliyan]

Unsurprisingly, they seem pretty excited to purge Margaret Atwood books. Handmaid series really chaffed those people.

100% state provided healthcare, just disgusting.

Commies!!

 

[uallas5]

Also going after mental health programs and suicide prevention:

Parents protesting 'critical race theory' identify a new target: Mental health programs

Groups have voiced opposition to suicide prevention programs, mental health coordinators and social emotional learning, claiming they are being used to indoctrinate students.

www.nbcnews.com

Pro-lifers for you.

It's almost as if they weren't sincere when talking about how mental health is the REAL issue, not guns, and what we needed to do was to beef up mental health care and not gun control.

 

[BonzaiDuck]

I remember reading way back there are two varieties of mice within a single specie that differ genetically by 10% whereas humans and chimps only differ by, what?, around 1%.

The genetic difference between human so called races is minute by comparison. There is just one human specie.

You are right, I got something screwed up in that small children sentence.

Sorry I haven't seen the Elton commercial but I know I share a lot of the sentiments I read in a book called Wisdom of the Idiots. I suspect there's a kind of perceptional experience on can have that lends itself to, shall we say, less than flattering names. I think the reason I like you is because you are somewhere on the spectrum. It's bound take foothold, I would say, in anybody who has spent some time questioning things. After all, being confused by anything just isn't normal. The book burners haven't the slightest doubt they could be wrong. Anything that creates any discomfort by challenging their world view is automatically wrong

My (1965) high-school classmate is a closet fascist and racist. In a heated exchange we had when he told me "All the Mexicans -- there won't be any room left for white people" -- I told him "Art?! When are you going to re-join the human race?!'

He became incoherent in his apoplexy.

 

[Moonbeam]

My (1965) high-school classmate is a closet fascist and racist. In a heated exchange we had when he told me "All the Mexicans -- there won't be any room left for white people" -- I told him "Art?! When are you going to re-join the human race?!'

He became incoherent in his apoplexy.

Hehe. May I offer you a small comfort I sometimes try to employ around people like that: You had to suffer that heated exchange and every time you think back to it, but he has to be him every day of his life. That, I think, is something to pity. You can’t make him human, only the awakening of his conscious can do that, but you and not he has the better life from the better understanding of what it feels like being more human. There is nothing subjective about this. Human is a gift of our genes. The ego attachment to monstrosity is a product of delusional thought, a product of programming. What he calls Mexican is what he was told he would become if he tried to be a human being. His life is the rage of denial of how he was made to feel.

Edit: As I said regarding having a point of view that is strange, I think you can find some of it in Joseph Campbell’s The Hero With a Thousand Faces. A typical archetype is the slaying of the Hydra, probably the many identities of ego, via means of a sword and a mirror polished shield. I see this as the slaying of the false self only made possible by one with the tools to see the actual enemy without turning to stone. What you did was to offer a mirror that showed him what he could not face, the real source of his contempt.

 

[Jaskalas]

All this noise and infighting. Do you think China bans books? Ever ask yourself why?

Answer is obvious. To control a narrative. To wield power over their population and shape the minds of their people to fit the agenda of the party.

Clearly Americans have the same motives to do the same things. It is dangerous to have an enemy spreading information. Or shutting yours down. But I must say that subject sounds a lot like our First Amendment. Free speech. To that end I dare say we do not allow censorship in this country. And all good Americans should oppose it and disown any proponent of it. Our society is not supposed to be built on the iron fist of a majority to silence the minority. Such power should not exist in America.

Ours is an open society with competing ideas, and all should be available to be heard. No?

 

[BonzaiDuck]

Hehe. May I offer you a small comfort I sometimes try to employ around people like that: You had to suffer that heated exchange and every time you think back to it, but he has to be him every day of his life. That, I think, is something to pity. You can’t make him human, only the awakening of his conscious can do that, but you and not he has the better life from the better understanding of what it feels like being more human. There is nothing subjective about this. Human is a gift of our genes. The ego attachment to monstrosity is a product of delusional thought, a product of programming. What he calls Mexican is what he was told he would become if he tried to be a human being. His life is the rage of denial of how he was made to feel.

Edit: As I said regarding having a point of view that is strange, I think you can find some of it in Joseph Campbell’s The Hero With a Thousand Faces. A typical archetype is the slaying of the Hydra, probably the many identities of ego, via means of a sword and a mirror polished shield. I see this as the slaying of the false self only made possible by one with the tools to see the actual enemy without turning to stone. What you did was to offer a mirror that showed him what he could not face, the real source of his contempt.

Amen, Brother.

 

[BonzaiDuck]

All this noise and infighting. Do you think China bans books? Ever ask yourself why?

Answer is obvious. To control a narrative. To wield power over their population and shape the minds of their people to fit the agenda of the party.

Clearly Americans have the same motives to do the same things. It is dangerous to have an enemy spreading information. Or shutting yours down. But I must say that subject sounds a lot like our First Amendment. Free speech. To that end I dare say we do not allow censorship in this country. And all good Americans should oppose it and disown any proponent of it. Our society is not supposed to be built on the iron fist of a majority to silence the minority. Such power should not exist in America.

Ours is an open society with competing ideas, and all should be available to be heard. No?

I agree, but the situation is complicated by people willfully spreading misinformation and lies. It is costly in the resources devoted to debunking and countering these lies. If everyone were committed at least to an ideal of the Truth, then we could have reasoned discourse to the end of reaching the Truth.

You can say we do not allow censorship, but censorship occurs. I first caught on to the agenda of Fox Cable News back in early 2004. I can say I had suspicions about Fox for some period before that, but I hadn't given it much focus until then. Let me elaborate.

If you have ever been in or around Washington, DC, there is an institution or organization known as the National Press Club. Here and there, in this month or that, a person might receive a notice in the mail that someone important will give a speech or presentation at the National Press Club. This time, it would be Senator Ted Kennedy. Kennedy was calling George Bush out, for falsifying justifications for taking us to war for the overthrow of Saddam Hussein. The Iraq War began in March of 2003.

For a week preceding Kennedy's presentation, Fox News was continually notifying its audience: "Ted Kennedy will speak at the NPC . . . blah blah blah" over and over, daily, noting the appointed day and time. When it finally occurred, they gave Kennedy five minutes from his presentation, and then cut it off to offer about 20 minutes in comment from their own pundits. I was livid. I feverishly checked my cable channel lineup, to see if I could find it on CSPAN. I did find it on CSPAN, where the tape of Kennedy's hour-long broadcast was aired.

Things are being censored all the time in perfectly legal ways. You can see this happening, as I did, by comparing what one news source chooses to report as opposed to others.

In these school districts, the parents want to censor acclaimed books because they don't want their kids to develop a tolerance for others in a multicultural society. It's that simple. They figure that what they tell their kids about racism and history is good enough.

 

[Lezunto]

This is what conservatives have brought to their so called hate of cancel culture


In reality this made up bullshit about getting rid of CRT in schools has allowed them to do something they've wanted for a long time. Remove any black influences from American history. CRT just gives them cover to cancel what they want removed.

This is their comeback for confederate statues coming down. "You darkies think you get the last word? We'll remove you from the history of this country"

But CRT is not being taught in any public schools.

 

[BonzaiDuck]

But CRT is not being taught in any public schools.

Well, I think Homer or somebody already observed this. It's a dog whistle or political symbol for several things that are being taught in public schools. Someone just inserted a law school topic in their lexicon, and they're running with it, even if it has no presence in the secondary-school curriculum.

This underbelly of American society has been with us since the Confederacy. It has just morphed into different forms with different names. In their hypocrisy, they claim Abraham Lincoln as their trademark hero, but Lincoln today would have nothing to do with these people. He'd be a Democrat. Or -- he would be writing books like those being banned. After Bobby Kennedy's murder, and I don't know the exact story, Nixon offered the southern Democrats a proposition such that they switched parties.

Maybe some of today's Trumpers have ancestors who had put on the gray uniforms, but it's part of a more general American sub-culture. They get together for their bridge and poker games, all attendants being white, and feel comfortable using the N-word in the casual conversation; no black faces holding cards there to listen to it. They teach their kids certain attitudes. So, beginning with the end of Reconstruction, people spread out and settled elsewhere, into the West, into the northern Midwest, into the Plains states.

So now, they oppose public education if it means over-riding those attitudes.

 

[Zorba]

Now trying to erase the Holocaust:

School Board in Tennessee Bans Teaching of Holocaust Novel ‘Maus’ (Published 2022)

The board voted unanimously to remove the Pulitzer Prize-winning graphic novel from classrooms because it contained swear words, according to minutes from the meeting.

www.nytimes.com

 

[cytg111]

I just now realized that the M&M story from last week ... was not onion/sarcasm.
Conservatives fainted over a fucking M&M's... Is it not someones bedtime already?

 

[Zorba]

I just now realized that the M&M story from last week ... was not onion/sarcasm.
Conservatives fainted over a fucking M&M's... Is it not someones bedtime already?

They are worried about naked mice at the same time they are upset a green M&M isn't as fuckable as she used to be.

 

[gothuevos]

They are worried about naked mice at the same time they are upset a green M&M isn't as fuckable as she used to be.

Or that Minnie Mouse is no longer wearing a dress.

 

[Lezunto]

A big thank you to Homer JS, Zorba, BonzaiDuck and other members who hung in there for many months and valiantly tried to explain what was going with Critical Race Theory.

I had asked so many Black people on other forums to tell me what CRT was and I always received different replies. The general consensus from many is that CRT is Black History. But it is not.

And it took me a while to realize that few actually really knew how to explain CRT, but loved to holla about it. I couldn't believe that we on the Left and we who are Black surrendered the messaging landscape to a bunch of ignorant and angry White racists by not creating a one sentence retort.

So, after going through all the tortured supposed definitions of CRT, I simply came up with a one sentence description. Merely to hurl back at those who were bashing Black people over it.

"Critical Race Theory is a premise that posits skin color and race determine the outcomes of most decisions, laws and behavior in the U.S."

If anyone wants to edit this into easier to read clear and declarative language, please go ahead.

I abhor censorship. Book burning and the threats of same worry me.

After the Holocaust, the Killing Fields, Rwanda and Bosnia - it does not surprise me that once again, modern humans have gleefully danced right back to the edge of a genocidal abyss.

 

[Zorba]

A big thank you to Homer JS, Zorba, BonzaiDuck and other members who hung in there for many months and valiantly tried to explain what was going with Critical Race Theory.

I had asked so many Black people on other forums to tell me what CRT was and I always received different replies. The general consensus from many is that CRT is Black History. But it is not.

And it took me a while to realize that few actually really knew how to explain CRT, but loved to holla about it. I couldn't believe that we on the Left and we who are Black surrendered the messaging landscape to a bunch of ignorant and angry White racists by not creating a one sentence retort.

So, after going through all the tortured supposed definitions of CRT, I simply came up with a one sentence description. Merely to hurl back at those who were bashing Black people over it.

"Critical Race Theory is a premise that posits skin color and race determine the outcomes of most decisions, laws and behavior in the U.S."

If anyone wants to edit this into easier to read clear and declarative language, please go ahead.

I abhor censorship. Book burning and the threats of same worry me.

After the Holocaust, the Killing Fields, Rwanda and Bosnia - it does not surprise me that once again, modern humans have gleefully danced right back to the edge of a genocidal abyss.

This is the problem with right wing bullshit. Their messages are dumbed down into nothing, it's just "CRT teaches kids it's bad to be white." Nevermind it isn't even taught in schools, etc. It's hard to counter bullshit with truth in one sentence.

 

[HomerJS]

School district in Washington removes the book To Kill A Mockingbird. Even the school board President who is black is acquiescing to conservative attempts to create a lily-white version of history. I've seen the movie and it is painful. It SHOULD be painful. Yet another Pulitzer prize winning book based on this country's real history Republicans want to shield from students.
Schools Drop 'To Kill A Mockingbird' From Reading List After Race Complaint (newsweek.com)

 

[Xcobra]

Welcome to 1930s Germany...

 

[tweaker2]

Welcome to 1930s Germany...

If the Repubs create the fascist state they need to keep the governance of the nation away from the nation's majority who oppose them, things will be as you just described.

 

[Xcobra]

If the Repubs create the fascist state they need to keep the governance of the nation away from the nation's majority who oppose them, things will be as you just described.

Oh, definitely! All these extreme conservatards forget that the majority of the country actually opposes any fascist type of governing.

 

[Zorba]

School district in Washington removes the book To Kill A Mockingbird. Even the school board President who is black is acquiescing to conservative attempts to create a lily-white version of history. I've seen the movie and it is painful. It SHOULD be painful. Yet another Pulitzer prize winning book based on this country's real history Republicans want to shield from students.
Schools Drop 'To Kill A Mockingbird' From Reading List After Race Complaint (newsweek.com)

Duh, it teaches empathy for blacks.

 

[UNCjigga]

If only books could accept 9mm ammo or some ACP. Then Republicans would never take them out of schools.

 

[uallas5]

Well, these are the same people who think the Nazi party were a bunch of socialists. Expecting reasonable and intelligent thinking from them miiiiiiiiiight be a bit of a stretch.

 

[jman19]

Now trying to erase the Holocaust:

School Board in Tennessee Bans Teaching of Holocaust Novel ‘Maus’ (Published 2022)

The board voted unanimously to remove the Pulitzer Prize-winning graphic novel from classrooms because it contained swear words, according to minutes from the meeting.

www.nytimes.com

I read this with a friend in Hebrew school back in the 90s. These racist dipshits reminded me I needed to finally own the two books, so I ordered them last week. Amazon was sold out, had to go elsewhere (which is probably a good thing actually).