Uddipana GoswamiJan 9, 2023
Annalee Newitz 🍜

Was just doing research for a book I #amwriting and discovered that in the U.S., over 1600 #books were banned in school libraries in 2022 -- as compared to just 175 being "challenged" in 2015 (books that are challenged are rarely banned, according to the American Library Association, so the numbers of banned books that year were much lower).

In 2022, 41% of books were banned for LBGT content. 40% had BIPOC characters.

Citations:
2022: https://pen.org/report/banned-usa-growing-movement-to-censor-books-in-schools/

2015: https://www.ala.org/advocacy/bbooks/frequentlychallengedbooks/statistics/2015infographiclong

Banned in the USA

PEN America's report on school book bans offers the most comprehensive look at banned books in the 2021–22 school year, with counting more than 2,500 bans.

PEN America
Jan 7, 2023 at 12:16amWeb
Show threadBruce MirkenJan 7, 2023
@annaleen And the people responsible will righteously declare they're "protecting freedom." 😬
Show threadAereynJan 7, 2023
@annaleen this is so disheartening
Show threadEarthlingJan 7, 2023

@annaleen

That's from the Nazi German playbook in the 1930s:
Banning and burning books by Jewish, liberal and leftwing authors!

This is an autocratic "test". If a democratic society lets this happen without protest and prosecution, then probably there is more to come.

RESIST THE BEGINNINGS
🌈❤️🧡💛💚💙🌈

Show threadHTTP 1.1/418 TeapotJan 7, 2023
@annaleen [stomps around grumpily muttering] Dammit
Show threadJyoti MishraJan 7, 2023

@annaleen

Amerikkka's Christian right scare the shit out of me. Truly evil.

Show threadBlueBoomerJan 7, 2023
@annaleen The wackos have been told that that's how they control local government. They also maintain that drag queens are grooming children. SMDH
Show threadTimo GrünJan 7, 2023
@annaleen And there we have it: It isn’t 45 and the new speaker and all their cronies who are the problem. They are where they are because of these new Good Americans who feel represented and protected by them. These Concerned Parents who want to protect their children and their country against everything that disturbs them. And they have the 35%+ that has always been all it takes to destroy civilization with all its scary disturbances and differences.
Show threadCherylJan 7, 2023
@annaleen government overreach
Show threadMayhawkeJan 7, 2023

@annaleen Many years ago I read a #scifi #shortstory by (I think) #Robert_Heinlein. In it he imagined a future US that was a theocracy, in a similar vein to post revolutionary Iran in the late 70's. He set the story a couple of centuries ahead, and when I read it - as a teen - I thought it was stretching the bounds of possibility.

Four decades later, it's looking increasingly feasible.

Show threadT. Thorn Coyle they/themJan 7, 2023

@annaleen @mayhawke

I found The Family by Jeff Sharlet indispensable for understanding how a strange theocracy runs the US government. It’s non fiction and very real. There’s a documentary series on Netflix as well as the book.

Show threadSpeakerToManagersJan 7, 2023
@thorncoyle @mayhawke @annaleen
It’s “If This Goes On” published with 2 other stories in a collection called “Revolt In 2100”. He was inspired by events in the US in the 1930s very similar to what’s happening here and now: rising Protestant theocracy, rising home-grown fascism, rising racism and antisemitism.
Show threadMayhawkeJan 8, 2023
@SpeakerToManagers @thorncoyle @annaleen Yes, someone else has ID'd the book for me, as well, but thank you.
THinking about it now, 40 yrs later, what strikes me is how enduringly and powerfully that story, and the horror it inspired, have stayed with me. I read pretty much everything by #Heinlein & #Asimov at that time, and odd bits are remembered, but that story is one of the stand out memories from quite a large corpus of work.
Show threadSandy McClearnJan 7, 2023
@mayhawke @annaleen Heinlein’s “Revolt in 2100” and it may appear in bits of his other work.
Show threadMayhawkeJan 8, 2023
@sandymcclearn @annaleen YES! THat's the one. Thank you. I've been trying for a few years to figure out which it was, with only the increasingly old memory from decades ago to go on.
Show threadSandy McClearnJan 8, 2023
@mayhawke @annaleen I had to check my shelf, but fortunately it was on the cover and I didn’t have to look inside.
Show threadHans (Unverified)Jan 7, 2023

@annaleen life goals: write a banned book.

Sounds like a plan!

Show threadRich Rubin Jan 7, 2023
@annaleen I’d like to wager that those wanting to ban certain books have never actually read those books. Personally I’m now more interested in reading them now and making sure I talk about them with anyone and everyone
Show threadAlexander MacgillivrayJan 7, 2023
@annaleen excited that you are working on a book with this as its research.
Show threadAnnalee Newitz 🍜Jan 7, 2023
@amac it's about psychological wars!
Show threadD. G. MarshallJan 7, 2023

@annaleen

If only the USA would write an amendment to their constitution, granting some kind of Right to Free Speech.

Show threadJeff PummillJan 7, 2023
@annaleen the dumbing down of America is definitely in full swing 😡
Show threadRight Off The NogginJan 7, 2023
@annaleen I have a real problem with book banning and agree it is dangerous. At the same time I am troubled by my immediate impulse to ban that children's guide to the #Trump way that's offered for free on their sites and mailings.
Show threadColin SalterJan 7, 2023
@annaleen I'm writing a best-novels-ever listbook just now, and have been coming across this notion of books being challenged and banned in the US. I'm really shocked! Can't believe it happens in the UK, but maybe it does. USA really isn't the land of the free it claims to be!
Show threadHalCGJan 7, 2023

@annaleen, this list is absolutely baffling. I remember my literature teacher giving us to read Hosseini as an assignment. Thinking that it is now banned in schools in Florida is a punch in the gut. There is even Brave New World on the list... 😵‍💫 And Julie Otsuka's Buddha in the attic... Charlie Jane Anders as well 🙈 the more I scroll through the list, the lower my jaw drops...

The real obscenity is banning these books from schools.

Show threadAmericonoclastJan 7, 2023

@annaleen

This is part of why I'm no longer a teacher.

Show threadAzure Jane LunaticJan 8, 2023
@annaleen And the current stats are likely not counting a class of challenge where the librarians immediately dismiss the challenge without taking further action, because the challenge is sufficiently groundless while also not being submitted in a way that generates a paper trail. My household's librarian was complaining about one such incident within the last two years that was not reported as a challenge.
Show threadJojoJan 9, 2023
@annaleen Conservatives: “We are the defenders of free speech.”
Also Conservatives:
Show threadGromsJan 24, 2023
@annaleen in any case weapons are still available...