Thumbs down:
In spite of the Constitutionally protected freedom of speech, mind policing in America has been going on for a long time. This week, we celebrate Banned Books week. Each year libraries remind us that even today there are those who are vigilant in exercising their discretionary view of what you and I should be able to read.
Who are these mind police? Often they are simply mothers and other busybodies who for the most part are afraid of what might happen if one of their children, or God forbid, you or I happen to read something they disapprove of. Some of the books they target for reasons that seem quite silly on the surface. Still, their assault on this protected liberty (freedom of expression) is not silly at all. Here is a statical overview between 2000 - 2005.
In another stroke of irony, it's the 50th anniversary of the legal action surrounding poet Allen Ginsberg's "Howl." The publisher of Ginsberg's poet was put on trial contending the work contained obscene language, but a San Francisco Municipal Court judge ruled that Allen Ginsberg's Beat-era poem was not obscene. Still, half a century later, a New York listener-supported radio station WBAI decided not to air the poem because program director Bernard White fears that the FCC will fine the station $325,000 for every one of Ginsberg's dirty-word bombs. This concern was based upon recent actions by the FCC in numerous other imposition of fines to broadcast outlets. Instead, WBAI will include a reading of the poem in a special online-only program called "Howl Against Censorship." It will be posted on www.pacifica.org, the Internet home of the Berkeley-based Pacifica Foundation, because online sites do not fall under the FCC's purview.
Last night I attended a event at the Kansas City Public Library in with authors Shirley & Wayne Wiegand presented a factual account of a historic 1940 incident in which Oklahoma County officials confiscated the entire contents of a local bookstore then put the proprietors and patrons of the store on trial not for anything they did, but for the contents of the books on their store shelves.
The story of their arrest, conviction and the battle for some three years to get their convictions overturned is an interesting and chilling one. The implications of this care are far reaching when considered against some of our government's actions today. Not only were these individuals victims of the governments fear of communists, but the basic fundamental rights of our constitution were victims as well.
I was especially surprised how significant racial overtones were in the prosecution of this case. I know Oklahoma is a southern state, but not the deep south, and none of the defendants were black. It was their association with civil rights issues that were paraded before the jury.
Over the next three years, the public outcry as news of this case spread throughout the U.S. ultimately sent this matter to a appellate court and the convictions were overturned. Libraries and Universities throughout the country cited that they were likely equally guilty based on the fact that many of the books the prosecution cited in their case were on their shelves as well. No evidence of any subversive or violent actions by the defendants to overthrow the government were ever presented. It was all purely based on the contents of the bookstore and the inflammatory suggestions that these individuals would dare suggest that blacks and whites have equal rights.
It is a story worth reading. The book: Books on Trial - Red Scare in the Heartland - authors Shirley & Wayne Wiegand
Thank you for bringing us closer to a police state!
From my deck this morning, the ornamental tree that rises next to it is praising spring.
