{"id":6775,"date":"2024-08-18T00:02:39","date_gmt":"2024-08-18T05:02:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/?p=6775"},"modified":"2024-08-17T20:58:27","modified_gmt":"2024-08-18T01:58:27","slug":"is-book-banning-the-equivalent-of-censorship-or-book-burning-bradburys-prometheus-winning-classic-fahrenheit-451-figures-in-current-debates","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/is-book-banning-the-equivalent-of-censorship-or-book-burning-bradburys-prometheus-winning-classic-fahrenheit-451-figures-in-current-debates\/","title":{"rendered":"Is \u201cbook-banning\u201d the same as censorship or book-burning? How Bradbury\u2019s Prometheus-winning classic Fahrenheit 451 figures in current debates"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Michael Grossberg<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

The late great Ray Bradbury memorably dramatized the dangers of censorship and book-burning in Fahrenheit 451.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/em>
\nBradbury\u2019s Prometheus-winning 1953 novel, inducted in 1984 into the Prometheus Hall of Fame for Best Classic Fiction, is occasionally brought up as a cautionary tale in contemporary discussions about freedom of expression, censorship, school libraries and what books are appropriate for students of different ages to read.<\/p>\n

Fahrenheit 451\u00a0<\/em>is referenced anew in an interesting Thinkspot column that challenges common media reporting about \u201cbook bans\u201d in government-run schools and libraries across the country.<\/p>\n

But do the lessons of Fahrenheit\u00a0451<\/em> truly apply?<\/p>\n

Is \u201cbook banning\u201d tantamount to book-burning and other forms of State-enforced censorship?<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

In a Thinkspot column<\/a>, Taminad Crittenden argues that the current debate over alleged \u201cbook banning\u201d is misconceived, biased, inconsistent, hypocritical and largely misreported by major and local media.<\/p>\n

Rather than actual book-banning taking place almost anywhere across the country, what\u2019s really going on, Crittenden suggests, is \u201ccurating which specific books the government will include in government-run schools and libraries.\u201d<\/p>\n

And the columnist adds pointedly, everybody\u2019s doing it.<\/p>\n

Skewering what he calls \u201cgas-lighting\u201d by the Left, which he argues only highlights works allegedly \u201cbanned\u201d by the Right, Crittenden points out that quite a few books have been \u201cbanned\u201d by progressives and Democrats.<\/p>\n

THE \u201cBANNED LIST\u201d \u2013 FROM MARK TWAIN TO DR. SEUSS<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Among them, ironically: Huckleberry Finn,\u00a0<\/em>Mark Twain\u2019s classic 1884 coming-of-age novel questioning institutionalized racism, slavery and prejudice and affirming freedom for all; Ender\u2019s Game, <\/em>Orson Scott Card\u2019s Hugo-winning sci-fi classic; and\u00a0<\/em>To Kill a Mockingbird,\u00a0<\/em>Harper Lee\u2019s beloved courtroom-drama novel about bigotry and injustice in the South.
\n\"\"<\/a>
\nNot to mention all the illustrated children\u2019s fantasy books by the famously liberal Dr. Seuss (notably and most recently, no longer just the six previously canceled books that Crittenden suggests could \u201clegitimately\u201d be excluded from school libraries because of their outmoded national, ethnic and racial stereotypes.)<\/p>\n

Crittenden launches his essay in a rather provocative way:<\/p>\n

\u201cNobody is \u201cbanning\u201d books in the United States. No one. What coercion-loving and dissent-hating Leftists call \u201cbanning\u201d is something that Democrats also do regularly and just as legitimately as when Republicans do it: Curating which specific books the government will include in government-run schools and libraries,\u201d Crittenden writes.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo, when Democrats go around criticizing Republicans for supposedly \u201cbanning\u201d books, they are gaslighting the public into ignoring that Democrats do the same thing all the time. And it\u2019s all perfectly fine and democratically legitimate. Because none of this is actually \u201cbanning\u201d books.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cNo: \u00a0“Banning” books means Fahrenheit 451<\/em>-style, or Communist-style, prohibiting the book from even existing anywhere in anyone’s possession even personal and private. No one in America is doing that….\u201d<\/p>\n

OUR PROGRESS BEYOND CENSORSHIP
\n<\/strong>
\nHere the Thinkspot essay makes a valuable point that reminds us how, even amidst the turbulent cross-currents and disturbing illiberal trends of today, the eras when actual censorship (by government) was common within the United States are thankfully long gone.<\/p>\n

Some clearly might wish to bring censorship back (and some always do). Many freedom-loving observers might want contemporary culture and discourse to be more open and inclusive of serious and thoughtful arguments and facts reported by all sides (in addition to no censorship by governments). Yet, overall, the absence of censorship, along with other freedoms we still have or have recently gained, do mark our tgenuine progress towards a more libertarian and truly liberal future – and should not be overlooked.<\/p>\n

Yet, most libertarians also recognize that while all schools (including government-run schools) necessarily must be selective about which books to buy for their libraries and must be even more selective about what handful of books are assigned and discussed within classes, too many of their choices seem biased, ideological, faddish and shortsighted – often at the expense of some of the classics that have shaped our common culture, and deserve to be read.<\/p>\n

Thus, understanding that the wider context of the issue might involve challenging some cultural trends (beyond politics) as well as deeper assumptions about the problematic distortions and potential indoctrination of government-run compulsory education itself, libertarians might respond with mixed feelings to other parts of Crittenden\u2019s column that take that status quo for granted:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cWhen Democrats cancel Huckleberry Finn\u00a0<\/em>from government-run schools and libraries, they have just as much legitimate right to do so as when Republicans cancel books from schools and libraries, for any reason.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat is because democratically-elected governments have every right to curate the necessarily limited set of specific books included in government-run schools and libraries.<\/p>\n

\u201cTeaching time in schools is very, very, very limited. The choice of which books to include will necessarily involve refusing many books and choosing just a few…. (It\u2019s) a normal government procedure: Accepting some books and denying others for specific classes. Calling (such) actions \u201cbook banning\u201d is lying disinformation.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cDemocrats and Republicans alike are always denying the vast majority of books to include in curricula and choosing only a few in accordance the values upon which they were elected. Cancelling books like Huckleberry Finn\u00a0<\/em>literally happens all over the country in every school every year….<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is really, really clear that curricula space is extremely limited. Library shelf space in both school and public libraries has much more availability, but still has limits. Governments, whether democratically elected or not, can never include and should never include literally every book ever printed or written. Governments will always have to deny certain books from being included in libraries…<\/p>\n

\u201cDemocrats and Republicans alike need to stop the hysteria about so-called book \u201cbanning,” Crittenden concludes.<\/p>\n

WHY HUCKLEBERRY FINN SHOULD BE READ AND TAUGHT<\/strong><\/p>\n

Crittenden makes several valuable and even undeniable points skewering the false definition and misleading terminology of \u201cbook banning,\u201d as well as recognizing the practical necessity and everyday realities of prioritizing which books are included in school libraries and classrooms.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Yet, in my view, it\u2019s also a shame to see Huckleberry Finn <\/em>and other great American novels become metaphoric victims of cancel culture \u2013 especially given their historic and literary value and their enlightened and still-relevant themes \u2013 in Mark Twain\u2019s case, affirming the principles of the Declaration of Independence, especially that \u201call men are created equal\u201d in liberty.<\/p>\n

When I first read\u00a0Huckleberry\u00a0<\/i>Finn in grade school, I might have winced at a few of the N-words that Twain chose for accuracy about that era, but I identified with Tom Sawyer\u2019s coming of age \u2013 and appreciated his dawning realization that his friend Jim, a black slave, deserved just as much respect for his basic rights as anyone else.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Thus, Tom Sawyer begins to question the widely-held views of his pre-Civil-War Southern world that slavery was legitimate or somehow natural – and Mark Twain clearly was aiming for the readers of Huckleberry Finn,<\/em> including children and students, to make that same metaphoric journey of growing awareness up and down the Mississippi river and towards freedom.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a pity, in my view, that some schools have denied today\u2019s students a chance to read and better understand, within the context of history and literature and with the helpful guidance of history and literature teachers, one of the Great American Novels.<\/p>\n

WHAT WOULD BRADBURY THINK TODAY?<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Ray Bradbury in the early 2000s (Creative Commons license)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I think Ray Bradbury would have shared that multi-leveled and contextual view.<\/p>\n

Bradbury himself, as a devout civil libertarian and classical liberal, understood the distinction between official censorship and more subtle forms of cancel culture.<\/p>\n

I know this from his life, writings and speeches \u2013 including his eloquent acceptance speech at the 1984 Los Angeles Worldcon accepting the Prometheus Hall of Fame award for Best Classic Fiction for Fahrenheit 451.<\/p>\n

But I also know that from having interviewed Bradbury twice for newspaper profiles and from spending a good part of a day, listening to him and talking with him, when he was a chief guest of honor at the Future of Freedom Conference in 1985 in Anaheim, Calif.<\/p>\n

Based on my direct knowledge of Bradbury, along with an understanding of his deeper themes in Fahrenheit 451<\/em> (which also offers an oblique critique of the potential deadening effects of television and popular culture), I believe that this great and much-missed writer and humanist almost certainly would have been concerned about the negative trends in today\u2019s politics and culture.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Ray Bradbury in 1959 (Creative Commons license)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Ray Bradbury died in 2012 at the ripe age of nearly 90. I\u2019m convinced that if Bradbury were still alive today, he would condemn censorship as well as government propaganda and other State-directed efforts to manipulate culture and narrow the breadth of free social and intellectual discourse.<\/p>\n

But I believe he\u2019d also express profound concerns about today\u2019s negative cultural trends, especially the broader suffocating, distorting and debate-narrowing impact of cancel culture, misinformation, conspiracy thinking and many fashionable but wrong-headed trends and fads.<\/p>\n

While commonsensically recognizing that some books, TV shows and films may well be unsuitable for very young children, that parental guidance is appropriate, and that selective decisions must be made about which books to buy to stock school libraries, Bradbury also would have consistently opposed efforts by Left and Right to censor or \u201cban\u201d significant works of literature.<\/p>\n

For more about Bradbury, read the Prometheus Blog appreciation<\/a> of Fahrenheit 451.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
\nIF YOU WANT TO KNOW MORE ABOUT THE LFS:<\/strong><\/p>\n

* Prometheus winners:\u00a0<\/strong>For the full list of Prometheus winners, finalists and nominees \u2013 for the annual Best Novel and Best Classic Fiction (Hall of Fame) categories and occasional Special Awards \u2013 visit the enhanced\u00a0Prometheus Awards page<\/a>\u00a0<\/strong>on the LFS website, which now includes convenient links to all published essay-reviews in our Appreciation series of more than 100 past winners since 1979.<\/p>\n

*\u00a0Watch <\/strong>videos of past Prometheus Awards ceremonies (including the recent 2023 ceremony<\/a> with inspiring and amusing speeches by Prometheus-winning authors Dave Freer<\/a> and Sarah Hoyt)<\/a>, Libertarian Futurist Society panel discussions with noted sf authors and leading libertarian writers, and other LFS programs on the Prometheus Blog\u2019s\u00a0Video page.<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

*\u00a0Join us! <\/em><\/strong>To help sustain the Prometheus Awards and support a cultural and literary strategy to appreciate and honor freedom-loving fiction,\u00a0join<\/a>the Libertarian Futurist Society, a non-profit all-volunteer association of freedom-loving sf\/fantasy fans.<\/p>\n

Libertarian futurists believe that culture matters! We understand that the arts and literature can be vital in envisioning a freer and better future – and in some ways can be even more powerful than politics in the long run, by sparking innovation, better ideas, peace, prosperity, positive social change, and mutual respect for each other\u2019s rights, individuality and human dignity.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Michael Grossberg The late great Ray Bradbury memorably dramatized the dangers of censorship and book-burning in Fahrenheit 451. Bradbury\u2019s Prometheus-winning 1953 novel, inducted in 1984 into the Prometheus Hall of Fame for Best Classic Fiction, is occasionally brought up as a cautionary tale in contemporary discussions about freedom of expression, censorship, school libraries and … Continue reading Is \u201cbook-banning\u201d the same as censorship or book-burning? How Bradbury\u2019s Prometheus-winning classic Fahrenheit 451 figures in current debates<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[32,1585,2201],"tags":[2196,2199,641,2198,2193,2192,2200,68,2195,2194,2197],"class_list":["post-6775","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-author-updates","category-fiction-in-the-news","category-ray-bradbury","tag-dr-seuss","tag-enders-game","tag-fahrenheit-451","tag-harper-lee","tag-huckleberry-finn","tag-mark-twain","tag-orson-scott-card","tag-ray-bradbury","tag-taming-crittenden","tag-thinkspot","tag-to-kill-a-mockingbird"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pe8nGl-1Lh","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6775","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6775"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6775\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8082,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6775\/revisions\/8082"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6775"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6775"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6775"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}