Banned Books - Part 1

"Swimming pools can be dangerous for children. To protect them, one can install locks, put up fences, and deploy pool alarms. All these measures are helpful, but by far the most important thing one can do for one's children is to teach them to swim." (emphasis mine) ~National Research Council, Youth, Pornography and the Internet

Dare I make the obvious connection? There is a lot of stuff out there that is unsuitable for certain age groups. We can--and should--protect our children from exploitive things such as pornography, violence and a host of other things. But the best thing we can do is to teach our children to think.

(And let me add a parenthetical here. Some people argue there is material out there that's unsuitable for any age group. To them I say--don't frickin' tell me what I can and cannot read/watch/listen to. If something comes up that I find offensive, I'll stop reading/watching/listening. But it's my choice. Not yours.)

What does banning books solve other than to take away one of our most basic liberties? The freedom to say/think/write what we want?

Hey, let's just do away with democracy and establish the Thought Police. Then we can all say the same things, do the same things, think the same things, be the same things.






"BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU, the caption said, while the dark eyes looked deep into Winston's own. Down at street level another poster, torn at one corner, flapped fitfully in the wind, alternately covering and uncovering the single word INGSOC. In the far distance a helicopter skimmed down between the roofs, hovered for an instant like a bluebottle, and darted away again with a curving flight. It was the Police Patrol, snooping into people's windows. The patrols did not matter, however. Only the Thought Police mattered." ~George Orwell, 1984