Yet Another Crusade Against Books - West Bend, Wisconsin Hello!

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A fight over books depicting sex and homosexuality has riled up a small Wisconsin city, cost some library board members their positions and prompted a call for a public book burning.

The battle has stirred much of West Bend, a city of roughly 30,000 people about 35 miles north of Milwaukee. Residents have sparred for months on blogs, airwaves and at meetings, including one where a man told the city's library director he should be tarred and feathered.

1) The idiot who called for a public book burning should be thrashed about the head and shoulders with a copy of Webster's Dictionary.

2) Someone actually said that the director of the library should be tarred and feathered? On the record and everything?

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The row even spread to this year's Fourth of July parade, which included a float featuring a washing machine and a sign that read "keep our library clean."

Oh for the love of...

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The strife began in February when West Bend couple Jim and Ginny Maziarka objected to some of the content in the city library's young-adult section. They later petitioned the library board to move any sexually explicit books -- the definition of which would be debated -- from the young-adult section to the adult section and to label them as sexually explicit.

Ginny Maziarka, 49, said the books in the section of the library aimed at children aged 12 to 18 included homosexual and heterosexual content she thought was inappropriate for youths.

Yes, let's rearrange the way books are classified because one person was uncomfortable about some "homosexual and heterosexual content" without actually telling us what the content was?

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She and her husband also asked the library to obtain books about homosexuality that affirmed heterosexuality, such as titles written by "ex-gays," Maziarka said.

Oh, never mind. She's in the "GAYS CAN BE CURED IF THEY JUST COME TO JESUS" crowd.

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"We want parents to decide whether they want their children to have access to these books ... and we want the library's help in identifying [them through labeling and moving]," Maziarka said. "It's just common sense."

Um, asking the library to move books is not letting parents decide what their kids should have access to. It's dictating what you believe they should have access to. That's not common sense; that's censorship.

Beat me to posting.

For anyone interested, here's Ginny Maziarka's blog. You can see her view of the whole saga - and, of course, celebratory posts on other areas removing books from their libraries, and a post about "Banned books" being "hogwash".

Sparrow wrote:

here's Ginny Maziarka's blog.

I love how one of the books she apparently has a problem with is this one. Because being well informed on the subject of how one's body works is totally inappropriate for a teenage girl.

This just makes my blood boil. As a librarian, I have had to deal with these batshit people more than once, along with a former boss who was so afraid of getting sued that she'd bow down to whatever the $%^$%^ censors wanted. :bang:

I cannot stand these people. They seem to think that their neuroses should apply to everyone. I've had parents tell me that there shouldn't be any non-Christian books in the library (hello! This is a public school!) I also had one really batshit mother throw a fit over a book on guinea pigs that her daughter was reading. The reason? It had a picture of a mother guinea pig nursing her young, which she said implied that sex had taken place (the existence of most multicellular organisms implies that sex has taken place, but let's not let logic get in the way of a good whine). This mother said that her 17-year-old daughter didn't know anything about sex and she didn't want her to know anything about it. I could have told her a thing or two about her daughter and sex, such as the fact that I caught the girl giving a blowjob to her boyfriend under the table in the library one rainy day, but I didn't. With a batshit mother like that, the kid needs all the help she can get.

Jesus Christ. What the hell is so wrong with parents that they can't, you know, monitor what their children are reading?

Lady Anne wrote:

I cannot stand these people. They seem to think that their neuroses should apply to everyone. I've had parents tell me that there shouldn't be any non-Christian books in the library (hello! This is a public school!)

If you took all the "non-Christian" books out, what would you have remaining? The dictionary, the Bible and the Left Behind series?

Maximilia wrote:

Jesus Christ. What the hell is so wrong with parents that they can't, you know, monitor what their children are reading?

This. And why are some "elderly" people wanting to sue for emotional damage caused by reading a young adult book? As the fanbrats say, "Don't liek, don't read!"

Spotts1701 wrote:

Lady Anne wrote:

I cannot stand these people. They seem to think that their neuroses should apply to everyone. I've had parents tell me that there shouldn't be any non-Christian books in the library (hello! This is a public school!)

If you took all the "non-Christian" books out, what would you have remaining? The dictionary, the Bible and the Left Behind series?

And the three or four smarmy "Christian" series by Fuckus on the Family. :bible:

Spotts1701 wrote:

That's not common sense; that's censorship.

It makes perfect senseorship!

Sakurelf wrote:

Spotts1701 wrote:

That's not common sense; that's censorship.

It makes perfect senseorship!

*snerk*

Also, I'm gonna be the douche who repeats what everyone else says and that this, combined with that remote deletion of books by Amazon, has made my blood boil with book-nerd RAEG.

Oh, and, Lady Anne, you underestimate the extreme sexuality in guinea pig titties. I know they just get me goin'. I can't be the only one!









right?

Spotts1701 wrote:

If you took all the "non-Christian" books out, what would you have remaining? The dictionary, the Bible and the Left Behind series?

Only if the librarian went through the dictionary with a Sharpie and crossed out all the swears. And words like "penis" and "homosexual".

At least book-banning ALWAYS backfires, seeing as everyone runs to see what all the fuss is about.

Anyone have a list of specific titles they want taken out? Those are always good for a laugh and a scream.

You're shitting me right? These people are a special kind of stupid right here.

Well at least she only asked, hey, I don't think this is appropriate, can this be moved. I disagree, but that's a pretty down to earth request. It's when people move on to THIS IS INAPROPRIATE, CAN THIS BE BURNED that makes me go

Is it possible that the internet is a time machine? Maybe some rift has opened between us and... some undisclosed date in the past?

Sparrow wrote:

For anyone interested, here's Ginny Maziarka's blog.

Did you see her post trashing the ADL?

You'd also have the Chronicles of Narnia; the most blatant metaphor for the Bible EVER written. Although parents would probably manage to take offence to that too somehow, what with all the violence in it (because the REAL Bible is SO peaceful and loving you morons).

*whistles*

I've actually been pretty lucky, so far. I've had some complaints, but I just paraphrase our collection policy to them and give them a form to fill out.

Harley wrote:

You'd also have the Chronicles of Narnia

Except those books might lead kids to -- gasp! -- worship Aslan or something!





Allegory? Is that like a French thing?


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myeerah wrote:

*whistles*

To be fair, though, there's a very good reason why Cookbook isn't challenged more, and that's because it's not there to challenge. Seriously, what school library would ever carry it?

There is actually a school of thought in some extremist Christian circles that says CS Lewis was an occultist and that the Narnia books should be banned, burned, and forgotten. So don't think they'd be immune if the censors had their way.

Drabbler wrote:

Harley wrote:

You'd also have the Chronicles of Narnia

Except those books might lead kids to -- gasp! -- worship Aslan or something!





Allegory? Is that like a French thing?

Nah, it's that thing that makes you sneeze.

Chaltab wrote:

There is actually a school of thought in some extremist Christian circles that says CS Lewis was an occultist and that the Narnia books should be banned, burned, and forgotten. So don't think they'd be immune if the censors had their way.

Yeah... if those people had their way, no child would be able to read anything but the Bible.

My parents never censored my reading material. I'm one of the lucky ones.

Harley Quinn hyenaholic wrote:

Chaltab wrote:

There is actually a school of thought in some extremist Christian circles that says CS Lewis was an occultist and that the Narnia books should be banned, burned, and forgotten. So don't think they'd be immune if the censors had their way.

Yeah... if those people had their way, no child would be able to read anything but the Bible.

My parents never censored my reading material. I'm one of the lucky ones.

My mother tried to censor my reading material. Then she left the forbidden books in the bathroom.

Yeah, that didn't work too well.

InkWeaver wrote:

Oh, and, Lady Anne, you underestimate the extreme sexuality in guinea pig titties. I know they just get me goin'. I can't be the only one!

Oh, Hells yea!

Guinea pigs in general are the singular most erotic creatures in existance.
I see one of them, with their funny, little, fuzzy-potato bodys, and I Squeal with delight.
I just wanna ram their adorable little faces up my anus.
:mwahaha:

err.... I mean, No...You're the only one..

ON-TOPIC:
I'll just let a quote by Captain Jean-Luc Picard express my feelings:
:rant: "With the first link the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied... chains us all irrevocably."

While I agree that porn for porns sake should be kept out of the childrens/young-adults section, if the purpose is to educate, especially when the parents won't help educate [which even I doubt they will]

I mean, the intent maybe noble, but the method....rather lacking.

My parents were oddly lax about censoring things. Books were never really a problem since I really didn't read anything but Left Behind and Star Wars as a teen (which do have some pretty violent moments, but are something parents unknowingly assume 'safe')

But they let me play Mortal Kombat at 9 and my mom actually bought Risky Business and let me watch it when I was 12 or so.

Pfft. Ginny, get a life. Your kids can see stuff that's far worse than that on the internet at school.

Wow, some of the books they talk about sound great. I might just recommend for my brother's school library to stock 'em.

You know, I can really understand why they want to ban this one. That's a TERRIBLE diagram of the vagina. It doesn't even show the clitoris. Are we going to allow this misinformation to continue to poison our ficwriters' minds? Well? ARE WE?