My book got taken away!

"Bridge to Terabithia" by Katherine Paterson, for offensive language and occult/satanism. I read this in school, no satanism that I remember, unless they made a new book with the same title.

And the reasons they give are good for schools, but they are not just bannings in school, but in any library.(in that state/city) And banning a book for satanism? What about the one based on the Salem Witch Trials? The whole point of the book is killing, satanism, and sex. But that isn't banned.(from the list I saw)

Second time on this, hmmm

Anyone want to 'stalk' my posts I don't care

About banned books:
PUBLIC= everyone's property
no books on homemade:
bombs
poisons
chemicals (harmful)

and things like this.

You want that stuff get it from an outside source or have mom and dad buy it. Why should a public library provide information that you can poison me with or that causes some other physical harm?

On the Politics and Philosophy- they (authorities) go too far.

Hate books are good for kids- they teach them how crazy the world can get. Lots of good came in the 60s and 70s- there was plenty of hate material out there.

DENY IGNORANCE

Go to a town meeting, ask a dumb question. Get embarassed, participate. Fight the book banners with tools that work- public exposure and votes!

Expose the stupidity! Read Fahrenheit 451 (the book)

Here's a thread on hate books, some of my favorites.

DENY IGNORANCE

Heh, heh I get charged over this stuff.

[edit on 29/8/2004 by PublicGadfly]

Wow, that list contains some great books. I'll list the books that our school recommends to read (you have to read about 15 books in your school carreer):

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
Lord of the Flies by William Golding
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain

Those are all classic literature. Why ban them? There's no problem with shocking people and making them think. Well, at least Ulysses by James Joyce isn't on the list. The greatest masterpiece, in my opinion, of 20th century literature was also banned in the US.

And that while books that I can understand being banned are not on the list: De Sade or Hitler are not on the list.

People are strange.

I knew a person who could not read the Bible because she felt offended, because it had too much sex in it.
As she was a christian, she did not would wanted that book banned, but she did not liked it.

Our rights are just slowly getting taken away. They always gotta start somewhere, why not ban books. If you control what they read and see, then you can also control what they believe.

I've read most of thebooks on that list, and they're fantastic books. Thankfully, I read many of them while in middle school, and highschool, such as:
Elementary School:
Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson
The Giver by Lois Lowry
Goosebumps (Series) by R.L. Stine
The Witches by Roald Dahl
How to Eat Fried Worms by Thomas Rockwell
The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton

High School:
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
Go Ask Alice by Anonymous
The Handmaid�s Tale by Margaret Atwood
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes
Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
Lord of the Flies by William Golding

Thankfully, most of these titles haven't been challenged in Canada, and those that have, haven't been removed from the shelves.


Challenged Books in Canada:
This is a good list, it gives reason for the challenge, the status for most, as well as those who objected to them in the first place.

www.freedomtoread.ca...

Of course books that teach how to make bombs have been banned, but that is only one book, Anarchist Cookbook. What about the other 99 on the list?

And yes, start somewhere I guess. But why books? Nowadays the majority does not read often, unless in school. At my school, when I went, there were about 8-10 people, not including me, who read for fun. Eveyrone else groaned and complained if they had to read a book. And read F/451 in sophmore year, it is a good book, and may be the future of books. Those people were brainwashed, like Ben Franklin being first fireman, a person who sets fire to books.

Also, on the list, why are so many great classics on it? Some are books anyone should read, and yet are banned in places around the country! Lord of the Flies and James and the Giant Peach being main ones.

Originally posted by parrhesia
Thankfully, most of these titles haven't been challenged in Canada, and those that have, haven't been removed from the shelves.

off topic for a moment :

I was visiting friends in Vancouver who were ranting about Canada being Communist(which I scoffed at) .

I was supprised to find ( or rather NOT find ) any technical information about the work of Nicola Tesla in ANY of the bookstores I went to . Just a couple slight references , but nothing about his ingenious invention , or technical details like you can find all over the US .

I was wondering parrhesia if you could check into this the next time you are physically in a book store , and shed some light or give your oppinion on this aspect of censorship (or tell me I am wrong) .

I hate to go the conspiracy route , and this is not regarding books of fiction that have been censored , but censorship of any kind totally blows...

OddTodd, that is odd. Maybe the place/s you went to just didn't have that kind of thing. Did they have just fiction titles, or if they did have nonfiction titles, what kind were they? Some places don't carry books about science and such for they don't sell much. I have to go to Toledo Public Library to get anything by Stephen Hawking(Theory of Everything is the best)for they are not sold at Kmart, WalMart, the Malls(we have 3 in the area) and so forth.

But Canada has some strange books on their list. BTW, has anyone figured out why Where's Waldo was banned?

Originally posted by oddtodd


I was wondering parrhesia if you could check into this the next time you are physically in a book store , and shed some light or give your oppinion on this aspect of censorship (or tell me I am wrong) .

I'm in bookstores often, so checking won't be a problem. i can say right now though, that when I worked in a bookstore, I saw books on his works go through, and also in bigger name bookstores, I've seen his works also, such as primary sources (ie, His own actual writings).

The only book I remember actually being banned here was Mein Kampf by Adolf Hitler, and that was several years back, and I'm not totally sure if it was banned, though I can say I haven't seen it in any bookstores aside from those which deal in second hand items. Actually, I checked, and it was banned by a certain company (which happens to have a monopoly on book stores), not by the government itself. It's still availible, b ut hard to find. I'll have to look into other books that company may have banned.

I checked for banned books on UBU, the university library. You can check yourself here (just click the english flag for an english version). Everything you find there can be lend by anyone willing to pay 20 euro per year for a library subscription. I don't think Hitler is banned, because they have Mein Kampf in their collection.

Maybe you should check university library catalogues as well. We could start a project to compare banned books in different countries.

Originally posted by James the Lesser
OddTodd, that is odd.

Maybe the place/s you went to just didn't have that kind of thing. Did they have just fiction titles, or if they did have nonfiction titles, what kind were they? Some places don't carry books about science and such for they don't sell much. I have to go to Toledo Public Library to get anything by Stephen Hawking(Theory of Everything is the best)for they are not sold at Kmart, WalMart, the Malls(we have 3 in the area) and so forth.

But Canada has some strange books on their list. BTW, has anyone figured out why Where's Waldo was banned?

James the Lesser , I was in a science section with all kinds of electrical engineering books , physics , and everyday published science info . The place had a computer area where you could search their stock and cross reference without physicaly " hunting" . I found only 2 references , and they were about a paragraph each in both books , simple little bio's .It was the biggest book store I had ever been in , and I always look for cool older science info .

I was realy shocked to be honest , and started taking my buddies Communist claims into consideration . It might just be that particular store chain , and I may not be right about this at all , trying to deney ignorance with a little help from parrehsia . I'll let you know....

Also , if there is a shred of proof to my assumtion , I would consider it "supressed" as opposed to banned .

Thanks again girl !

[edit on 29-8-2004 by oddtodd]

Schools are allowed to take certain books out of their library, but merely having it on school grounds? They aren't allowed to do that. Go back and tell them to give it back.

maybe because it has the planet older then 6,000 years

What the heck kind of school isn't going to allow that?

This site lists some of the books banned over the years - with the reasons for the banning ... I have to admit, I had a few giggles when I read it. For example ...

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, by Mark Twain
Racially offensive.
...

Canterbury Tales, by Geoffrey Chaucer
Banned from the U.S. Mails as "indecent" and "obscene" under the Comstock Law of 1873.
...

Carrie, by Stephen King
Criticized for its "language, its violence, and its sexual descriptions," and for its "'Satanic killing' sequence."
...

The Clan of the Cave Bear, by Jean Auel
Barred for its "hardcore graphic sexual content."
...

Little House in the Big Woods, by Laura Ingalls Wilder
Racially offensive.

...

The Merchant of Venice, by William Shakespeare
Anti-Semitic.


And finally ...

Attacked as "obscene and pornographic," and said to contain "language and stories that are inappropriate for children of any age," including tales of incest and murder. "There are more than three hundred examples of 'obscenities' in the book."

Guess what book that was ... yes, its The Bible :shk:

Went today and got it back. Boneheads.

And anyways, the bible banned for all that stuff? Well, some of those are just stupid reasons. Like Huck Finn, it has Nigger Jim. It is not like they go "Hey you N, get over here you N." No, it is "Hey Nigger Jim, how you doing?" It isn't to be offensive, just that Jim is black, and back then they didn't use black, but Nigger. Nowdays he would have been called African American Jim.

That one book banned for Anti-Semite stuff in it, what? Mein Kempf(sp?) is under that catagorey and lots of libraries have them. Under Bibliography section.

Yea they banned my Playboy. LOL j/k.

[edit on 1-9-2004 by TACHYON]

Geez, it might have been shorter to list the books that haven't been banned...

I hate censorship!

The real irony of censorship is that both the extreme conservatives AND the extreme liberals end up getting different books banned, for different reasons.

"Of course your speech is free! We just have to approve it first."