Red State 'Values' Watch: Banning Books in 'Bama

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An Alabama State Representative is sponsoring a bill to ban all books with gay characters.

 

I guess Oscar Wilde's works are banned from Alabama?

 

*sigh*

Freedom of thought and speech? Bah, who needs it!

So I suppose they'll be getting rid of all of Walt Whitman's poetry as well? Sheesh.

 

If Tennessee Williams is out, Wilde doesn't stand a chance...

I think Alabama's next bill should be to ban books from France...

 

Does that mean the Bible will be banned? Or will they just rip out the pages about Sodom and Gomorrah and then put the mutilated Bible back on the shelf?

 

Ah, how about we shy away from this "red state values watch" thing, alright? All that sorta title is gonna do is cause bad feelings.

And yes, the folks responsible for introducing this bill are idiots.

 

I could see bills like this getting passed throughout the Deep South.... This is only the beginning.

[ December 05, 2004, 05:38: Message edited by: Rednik ]

 

But this only applies to using public funds to acquire these books. The private sector can do as they please. They don't want their schools promoting Homosexuality or other inappropriate practices (bestiality, incest), but they aren't restricting these books in the private sector. As far as I know, they have that right...

 

All I have to say is Heinrich Heine's words: "Whenever they burn books,
they will also, in the end, burn people."

 

Gnarfflinger, when a country decides to outsource education and call for sponsorship for public schools the whole money comes from the private sector - and that again means it comes from private citizens with their opinions and interests.

It's basically censorship through the backdoor. Outsourced censorship. Political players exercise their pressure through private channels as the official channels would limit their leverage and impose on them too many restrictions. That especially applies to America's right.
The last election shed some light on that - the anti-Kerry swiftboat vets were a GOP front, it's leader a good buddy of Karl Rove and active in the smear business under Nixon already, but they were distanced well enough from the Bush campaign to still be credible for the blue-eyed, didn't they have a few token "liberals"?.

I daresay, without being to well informed about that part of the US education policy that there are comparable GOP fronts under nice names like a hypothetical "American Foundation for Christian Education" who fund and support schools, as long as they adhere to their ideological direction, or else: That is, no money.

The result is that the line between teoretically nonpartisan government influence and very much partisan private influence blurs, dmc made a good point about the slippery slope.
With underfunded schools and public sponsoring from the right the teachers and school directors have practically no choice but to take their money and accept their silly ideas like creationism etc.

When the gvt withdraws from general responsibilities such as education it leaves a vacuum that is filled by private players and must be regulated if you want to avoid the consequences of ideological influence.

The old American liberals were dead right when they said that individual ambition generally leads to excesses and greed and has to be restrained by the government and that business has to be regulated.
The American conservatives of that time where quite right on target when they criticised the liberals of that time for their faith in govermnent as the big equaliser and controller - because as business politics are as well a result of ambition and it's corresponding dangers. Their scepticism of big budgets and big government was just as justified. What's left about their government scepticism?

Todays GOP loves big budgets, ignores the states responsibility to regulate and is oblivious to the perils of unrestrained executive power. There is nothing conservative anymore about todays GOP. It's reactionary. It's leaders want to roll back modern America to the time before the New Deal and Anti-Thrust legistlation were invented. Sadly so.

 

I really agree with what you are saying here, Ragusa. Still, there are those in the GOP who are carrying the old agenda of less government and the whole range of issues that are in that agenda (big spending, executive control, nation building etc). But they are carrying it only in their hearts because Shrub and the "new" Republicans in town are into something very different.

The problem that the old guard faces is one of split loyalty between the new leadership, or loyaty to their long held principles. Some in the GOP are holding their noses while they continue to support Bush.I feel bad for them because to remain Republicans they sold out their principles for the sake of party unity, and so that the party could continue to beat the Democrats, who have suddenly raised the old banner of less governmental spending constraint as their own. Yet, no one is really taking them seriously at this point, even democratic supporters. But if a Democrat with different credentials moves in on the current Democratic leadership that could change.

There are two men to watch in all this: John McCain and Howard Dean. Both of them are in a position to make a move on the party leadership. Dean needs to refine his message and work on his rough edges. But he has 3 years to do it. And if he takes over as "official party leader" he will be selling out. On the other side, John McCain will take on the Republican leadership because he wants to be prez, and he has the right stuff to be one. But he has criticized the GOP leadership for taking the party in the wrong direction, and leaving old Republicans like himself behind. In the last election he sold out, and supported Shrub. But sometimes appearance and reality are not the same thing.

[ December 05, 2004, 07:55: Message edited by: Chandos the Red ]

 

Want to hear something funny I learned in microbiology?

What area of the nation has the highest incidence of STD's?

I bet you were thinking California or New York, or maybe possibly your house...(you slut)...

Wrong! It's the South! By quite a bit too...

I bet that will make you feel quite comfortable sitting on a Nascar bleacher in a skirt...enjoy ladies. (just remember...spilled beer is not anti-septic)

 

@dmc: There's a line somewhere. There is obviously a strong population that feels that Homosexuality is not an apporpriate topic to be addressed in Schools. As for trying to ban Islam, there's an ammendment that protects it. It should not be preached, but it should not be outlawed either. Also, School boards reserve some rights to ban certain forms of dress or grooming, but again there is a line somewhere that they are not allowed to cross. The impression I got from reading the article was that they didn't want homosexuality preached to children. They can't ban it, but they don't want it supported either.

@ Ragusa: Outsourcing to the private sector would still require that certain directives be obeyed. If this includes not preaching Homosexuality, then so be it. The State retains the obligation to oversee Education, whether it's run by the state or by the private sector. This proposed ban would still be in force.

 

Actually, that's quite unimportant on this topic. Freedoms of speech, expression and religion are not dictated by the majority, but by the Constitution's Bill of Rights. It is the most potent way in which the individual is protected against the "tyranny of the majority."

 

I'm not at all a law scholar, but if I remember correctly, the First Amendment says "Congress shall make no law"; that Congress is the national Congress, not state legislatures. Of course, the states were required to ratify constitutions in accordance with the Federal Constitution, but unless that specific amendment is echoed in a state's constitution, according to strict constructionism it seems that an individual state is not required to abide by that provision.

And to those who would say that it falls under the clear intent of the nation's founders: remember that the Bill of Rights was added to the Constitution only to satisfy the demands of certain states that would otherwise not ratify the Constitution.

 

Amendment 14:

So yes, that's what the first amendment stated. Fourteenth extended that restriction to the states as well.

 

Ahh, Section one of XIV?

From my perspective, this simply says that a state can't deny privileges to their citizens. Amendment I does not confer upon the citizens a privilege, per se; it simply prohibits the legislation of law on those "rights" by the federal Congress.

Also: in direct contrast to the right to free speech, states and certain entities of the federal government (FCC, anyone?) prohibit the transmission of material deemed "obscene". I think the FCC is justified by the "Interstate Commerce" excuse (so ubiquitous, so abused), but under what justification do the state versions fall, given what you claim is the Constitutionally-mandated application of Amendment I via Amendment XIV? I'm aware that Amendment XIV has been used in the past to declare the Federal law supreme to state law, but again, Amendment I is a "no-law" rather than a law. Also, the Supreme Court once ruled that the freedom of speech only extended as far as was publically healthy (no "fire!" in a crowded theater), which demonstrates that Amendment I is not absolute.

Bah, I'm don't know what I'm trying to say. Food for thought, I guess. Ignore me.

 

Homosexuality is obscene now?
If you restrict enough literature, you can eventually mmake sure only your doctrine is exposed to children. Brainwashing, in other words..... I think that any book banned should be compulsory reading material for, well, everyone. Find out what they don't want you to know and think.

Exactly BOC. After studying human history, it is absurd to think that freedom can endure - do we think that this is a unique period in our history?