One great thing about the Internet, I think, is that there is so much offensive stuff on it that what used to seem offensive just doesn't seem that bad any more. Since Sunday is the first day of Banned Books Week, it strikes me that, in kind of a strange way, Web sleaze actually promotes the reading of a wide variety of books.
In the past, it didn't take much to get a book banned, especially in places like Kansas. For example, in 2006 "Charlotte's Web," by E.B. White, was banned because "talking animals are blasphemous and unnatural."
Some versions of William Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet" were banned in South Carolina because they were too mature, which I guess is frowned upon there. J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter is banned in many British Christian schools because, well... just because. And the fourth grade potty humor of Dav Pilkey's "Captain Underpants" series is, I believe, the most challenged children's book of all time.
Currently, the most frequently challenged books are "The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian," by Sherman Alexie, which contains just about every vice there is, and "And Tango Makes Three," by Peter Parnell and Justin Richardson. The latter is a true story about hom*osexuality in two male penguins that hatch an egg together. We'll just have to see if things change now that the penguins could presumably get married.
Often, it's completely obvious why a book was banned. George Orwell's "Animal Farm," an anti-Communist and anti-corruption critique, has been banned in every country where Communism and corruption flourishes from 1945 until today. Frankly, I'm surprised that anybody sells it, given the current state of the world.
Allow me to suggest that Henry Miller's "Tropic of Cancer" kind of makes my point. It used to be considered obscene in both this country and Canada. Compared to some of the websites people can freely peruse today, however, it seems like pretty thin gruel.
I've been told that one can find copies of "Captain Underpants" in the Naperville Public Library. I haven't tried to find one because I can't imagine why anyone would want to do that, but the point is that our library doesn't ban books.
There is a mechanism for patrons to challenge books, they tell me, and any patron can complain about any book to any library employee. And while such complaints will be seriously considered at the executive level, depriving one person of their chance to read a book because someone else doesn't like it goes against everything the American Library Association stands for.
Obviously, parents should be able to decide what they think is appropriate for their children. Everyone thought I was weird because I wouldn't let my kids see Carol Burnett's show. But I didn't want them to think that type of insulting, belittling humor was acceptable.
However, adults have to have the courage to defend free expression, even when that's very uncomfortable or embarrassing. We have to be willing to defend books that are essentially garbage because those are the ones they attack first. As I have often said, when you stand on principle don't wear good shoes.
Salman Rushdie, a man whose book "The Satanic Verses" has earned him a death fatwa and whose writings are banned in almost all Muslim countries has said, "What is freedom of expression? Without the freedom to offend, it ceases to exist."
The point, I think, is very simple. In a land that treasures freedom and liberty, the people can't afford to be afraid of any ideas, no matter how offensive they may seem. If they are, the worst ideas will be the ones that triumph.
bill.mego@sbcglobal.net
Bill Mego is a freelance columnist for the Naperville Sun.
