Know Thy Enemy

[elfs]

I've held onto this web page all day, debating whether I should post about it. When that happens, usually the answer is in the affirmative. Citizens for Class Standards in Schools is a group dedicated to dictating what books teachers may assign to students in schools. They have a limited charter right now, you can bet that boards like this will be popping up nationwide soon. With the reflective and amplificative properties of the Internet, you can also bet that groups like this will assemble enormous arsenals of material in the name of their cause. That's the nature of the Internet: instead of isolated islands each creating their own petitions, we're now allowed a natural selection process by which the ineffective petitions get weeded out to be replaced with effective mutants from the district next door.

Read their material carefully: one of their objectives is to get books "rated" the way movies and video games are rated. The Honor Harrington and Vorkosigan series will get a T (teens) for violence and suggestive content, and will not be available to children under the age of 13; much of Heinlein would be T, with later stuff being M (Mature) or AO (Adults Only). Right now our music, video games, television, and movies are rated this way; do you really want the next novel you buy to have a "recommended for all ages" sticker on it?

Comments

[tonyawinter.livejournal.com]

Oh hell no! Although I must admit that it amuses me that the bible would get an AO for all of the sex and violence...

[technoshaman.livejournal.com]

*nods* Song of Solomon is quite the bit of erotic....

I think the ALA has the only defensible position. No Censorship Whatsoever End Of Story other than by parents themselves for their own children only. Anything else gets into quid custodes.... ("Who watches the watchers?)

Parental censorship is by its very nature self-correcting; I think it is the duty of any librarian who runs across a sheltered kid who knows enough to ask for something to help him get it, parent or no. The kid will find ways to rebel; best help him do it safely.

[slutdiary.livejournal.com]

I think the ALA has the only defensible position. No Censorship Whatsoever End Of Story other than by parents themselves for their own children only. Anything else gets into quid custodes.... ("Who watches the watchers?)

And I'll go one step further to proactively say, "May Ms Grundy and her league of bluenoses fuck off!"

this is so like them though

[dion.livejournal.com]

overachiever parents attempting to make the world safe for their little crotchlings have been responsible for more dumbing down of culture than any source I can name.

And the more they repress, the more the kids grow up the opposite, quite often the case.

Not really in favor but...

[(Anonymous)]

It seems to me that this is what you have to have (formally or informally) if we are to have public schools. Not every book is suitable to assign to children (whether your off-limits is open racism, scientific inaccuracy, or erotica--I think we all agree SOME things should not be taught); further, many books that might be acceptable are fairly useless. Someone has to decide what books will be assigned; it seems to me that parent groups are exactly the people one would want doing that.

SamChevre

Re: Not really in favor but...

[(Anonymous)]

"It seems to me that this is what you have to have (formally or informally) if we are to have public schools."

You're probably right. Reason #233 why we aren't sending our kids to public schools.

But if we are to have standards of permissible, informally is better than formally. Formal standards just create a lever of control for the authoritarians to grab hold of.

Matt