One of the hot new accusations against conservatives is that they’re banning books left and right. And usually, a “ban” means that a book has been reserved for a more age-appropriate audience. For example, there was an uproar on social media over the banning of the Holocaust graphic novel “Maus,” but it wasn’t banned — it was just moved up to a higher grade level. That’s not to say books haven’t been banned — liberals have banned classics such as “To Kill a Mockingbird.”
Randi Weingarten, who has limited replies to her tweet and yet is perhaps the most ratio’d person on Twitter whenever she tweets, said her union, the American Federation of Teachers, has joined a coalition to prevent the banning of books by people who are “trying to ban knowledge.”
Banning books, trying to ban knowledge, isn't what you do in a free society. That's part of why we're a part of this coalition. https://t.co/ljQpBizWwJ
— Randi Weingarten (@rweingarten) May 11, 2022
PBS reports:
“This is a dangerous time for readers and the public servants who provide access to reading materials. Readers, particularly students, are losing access to critical information, and librarians and teachers are under attack for doing their jobs,” Deborah Caldwell-Stone, director of the library association’s Office for Intellectual Freedom, said in a statement Tuesday. “It’s time that policymakers understand the severity of this issue.”
The library association reported last month that it tracked nearly 1,600 attempts to ban books in 2021, the highest since it began recording challenges more than 20 years ago.
They’ve tracked nearly 1,600 attempts to ban books just last year, and yet the article doesn’t name one.
It’s funny that Penguin Random House is a member of the coalition, seeing as its employees literally cried in an attempt to keep Penguin from publishing Jordan Peterson’s book.
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REMINDER: I have not heard of a single honest "book ban" in recent years.
Deciding what's age appropriate for curricula and kids' libraries is a necessary thing. You may disagree with the decisions made, but it ain't banning books if they're still widely available. https://t.co/zQGoga12Cw
— Mark Hemingway (@Heminator) May 11, 2022
No one is trying to ban books or knowledge. Deciding that certain books aren’t appropriate as curriculum, or not appropriate to be available in elementary schools at all, is good oversight. https://t.co/6Mi3WgFVuy pic.twitter.com/bx3LtT30MS
— NewEnglandDevil (@NewEnglandDevil) May 11, 2022
People are posting images from the celebrated graphic novel “Gender Queer,” but we’re not going to post them here because the illustrations are literally pornographic. “Gender Queer” does come up in a interview PBS published last December with Nadra Nittle, a reporter for The 19th, “a non-profit newsroom covering politics, gender, and policy.”
So one book that has caught attention all over the nation is a book called Gender Queer, and it is written by a person who identifies as non-binary in terms of their gender. And that book has graphics as well, so there’s images in the book. And it also discusses this person’s journey to kind of accepting themselves as being non-binary is not conforming to, you know, typical gender constructs. And so that book, I would say, you know, from coast to coast, no matter which region of the country has really sparked some outrage in some circles.
“So there’s images in the book.”
Nobody is “banning” books in 2022. They’re easily accessible in a variety of formats. Some of us are trying to preserve the innocence of childhood by removing obscenity and sexually explicit material from public schools. Hyperbole is getting tiresome. @NoLeftTurnUS @Randastovall1 https://t.co/Q1jI4sWA5T
— Beanie (@Beanie0597) May 11, 2022
Randi supports porn for kids. https://t.co/FinEQmJuJP
— Lemuel Malone (@freddy_farts) May 11, 2022
So we must give small children ‘unfettered access’ to info in schools, but censor it for adults on Twitter. https://t.co/yQNvQlSD6x
— J. Wesley Bush | Sacred-Cow Gourmand (@jwesleybush) May 11, 2022
Turning comments off is also a ban and does not support free debate.
This 'pearl-clutching' of book banning is just a smoke screen for your institutionalized child grooming 'literature'. https://t.co/duZvVWWzeC— Homeschool Life LLC (@Homeschool_LLC) May 11, 2022
https://twitter.com/IVMiles/status/1524502940840599553
You don’t tweet and turn off your comments for debate in a free society either, but here we are. https://t.co/qqln6rcHht
— KidDoc1992 (@KidDoc32) May 11, 2022
"Banning" books is bad, but limiting replies is a good thing ackshully. https://t.co/TJ7VfzzWyj
— Penny (@pennyelizabeths) May 11, 2022
Are we still “banning” “Huckleberry Finn” because of the n-word? Is that acceptable? What about Target pulling Abigail Shrier’s book on “the transgender craze that’s seducing our daughters”? Where was the outrage then? Shouldn’t that be in school libraries?
Related:
ACLU lawyer says stopping the book on transgenderism that Target pulled and its ideas is ‘100% a hill I will die on’ https://t.co/JjdAjZoA6C
— Twitchy Team (@TwitchyTeam) November 14, 2020
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