Through Methods -- Justifying Unbanning Books

Scott Clifford
2022 03 21

    As a class, I believe we have reached the consensus that we are not opposed to the idea of controlling the media that enters children's hands on principle. We ruled that books with actually sexually explicit content should stay out of their hands, and that triggering content should be carefully monitored when presented to children. How then, can we differentiate our desire to regulate books against those with whom we disagree? Perhaps this question is moot / simple but this is a blog.

    I want to pursue the difference in methods and language in the various groups of this issue. One idea Mullally illuminates is how books' opponents "challenge" these books. The word "challenge" brings connotations of a fair fight and a righteous battle, but it hides the reality of the asymmetrical nature of the conflict. People who contest these books dislike how it opposes their views, but it would be ludicrous to imagine the books telling people they cannot hold their own views. Except many of these books do strike at the status quo and condemn standard American ways of thought. Rather than letting these ideas duke themselves out on even ground in the minds of the children, opponents to certain books wish to disqualify their contender altogether in a way authors cannot retaliate. Bringing the word "censoring" into discourse, I believe, would healthily address the one sided nature of these interactions. I imagine people do not wish to use this word because then support of censorship seems to go against the first amendment, to which I would say is precisely the point.

    The history of book banning points to how it has largely served the  "the white, wealthy Protestant" (Ringel 4) portion of American society. The Pico case formally established that a simple disagreement is not enough basis for banning books, but proponents of banning books largely ignore this statement. It has transformed from a dislike to opposing religious views to that of moral views. Note that the books we have read are not encouraging physical violence or social violence of any kind. The proponents of book banning hide behind flimsy language to hide their true cause that would prove tenuous when spoken about openly. They use the term "politically incorrect" or "diverse content" to vaguely damn information they see unfit. We are constantly confused by the lack of precise descriptions for why certain books are banned. With clarification would come clarity, but the work of the oppressor relies instead of confusion.

    One phrase really stood out to me, "The court looked to the highly irregular and erratic manner in which the book was removed as evidence of the board’s improper motivation" (Mullally 4).  Stealth censorship implies that the person removing the book is afraid of some sort of backlash from their action. If their action is for the good of a community, then anyone committing stealth censorship should be willing to stand their ground and claim the good they are doing. But they do not. They take part in clandestine activities to undermine children. The information that we try to present children is to help them better confront the world. We do not lie; we try to clarify the truth and bring it to the forefront.

    Ultimately, their motivations are ill placed as well. Ringel admits that "It’s understandable that adults want to minimize children’s anxiety" (Ringel 4), and often that is what parents and children claim they are doing. Yet they seek to minimize this anxiety by obfuscating the world, even parts of the world the children themselves are specifically living in. "'We don’t serve only our children,' Messner said. 'We serve children in the real world'" (Ringel 6). As a society, as much as we may want to, the reality is that we cannot control the problems children face. By denying them literature about these issues, we will not remove "diverse" content from their life. LGBTQ+ people and people of different races will continue to exist. It then positively harms those directly experiencing these marginalized experiences, as Messner puts it "When we say 'This book is inappropriate,' we’re telling those children 'your situation … your family … your life is inappropriate" (Ringel 5). These groups, normally of the dominant conservative straight white middle class, get tunnel vision and seek only to protect their own children while further alienating those of the marginalized experience they seek to erase.

    A difference between the regulation we may propose and the book banning is the availability of information. Book banning seeks to nearly erase reality with its removal of certain information, while the methods we discussed in class is only about restriction. Additionally, As a class, we try to explain our reasoning and stand by it. Khanna would expect nothing less than the forthright confrontation of our emotions to overcome them. Yet the people banning books constantly cover up their own true intentions with rascally language and discrete methods than by fighting on fair grounds out in the open. I conjecture it is the same methods used by the men within Lysistrata to undermine the women.