Banned Books Week: Sept. 21-27, 2014

Posted by | September 5, 2014 18:19 | Filed under: Contributors News Behaving Badly Opinion Politics Tengrain Top Stories

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Banned Books Week is coming up soon and that means not only will we have a chance to remember some touchstone moments on literary expression, we will learn about new efforts to ban contemporary books. In other words, Y’all Qaeda’s current obsessions will be made clear to us as they project their fears.

Leading the way we learn that Southern Poverty Law Center-designated hate group Illinois Family Institute’s “cultural analyst” Laurie Higgins is worried about the gay menace and how books about gay penguins parenting might normalize children to accept gay people (and penguins):

The [American Library Association] pursues its hysteria-fomenting goal chiefly by ridiculing parents who, for example, don’t want their six-year-olds seeing books about children or anthropomorphized animals being raised by parents in homoerotic relationships. (Scorn and woe to those parents who hold the now-censored belief that homoeroticism—even homoeroticism presented in whitewashed, water-colored images—doesn’t belong in the picture books section of public libraries).

White-washed, water-colored images? Metaphors are hard.

So sharpen your pencils, would-be authors, as Higgins helpfully presents some ideas about life-affirming books for children of gay parents that she would like to see:

Will they ask for young adult (YA) novels about teens who feel sadness and resentment about being intentionally deprived of a mother or father and who seek to find their missing biological parents?

Will they ask for dark, angsty novels about teens who are damaged by the promiscuity of their “gay” “fathers” who hold sexual monogamy in disdain?

Will they ask for novels about young adults who are consumed by a sense of loss and bitterness that their politically correct and foolish parents allowed them during the entirety of their childhood to cross-dress, change their names, and take medication to prevent puberty, thus deforming their bodies?

Will they ask for novels about teens who suffer because of the harrowing fights and serial “marriages” of their lesbian mothers?

Will they ask for picture books that show the joy a little birdie experiences when after the West Nile virus deaths of her two daddies, she’s finally adopted by a daddy and mommy?

Surely, there are some teens and children who will identify with such stories.

So there you have it: Laurie Higgins wants to have some heart-felt books about the joy children have when their (gay) parents die.

But wait! There’s more!

Mission America’s Linda Harvey not only wants some books banned, she wants other books to be made available:

“They suggested ‘Maybe He’s Not Gay’ to the libraries and the book was added to the collections, praise the Lord,” she said in today’s radio commentary.

Coincidentally, Linda Harvey is the author of Maybe He’s Not Gay. What are the odds?

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Copyright 2014 Liberaland
By: Tengrain

Fully caffeinated with twice the sugar, unabashedly liberal. Award-winning Americans United blogger, blogs at Mock Paper Scissors, and sometimes at Crooks and Liars.

You can follow @Tengrain on Twitter, or you might see him enjoying coffee somewhere in Seattle at any given moment of the day.

35 responses to Banned Books Week: Sept. 21-27, 2014

  1. Anomaly 100 September 5th, 2014 at 18:47

    “is worried about the gay menace ”

    Laughing!

  2. Anomaly 100 September 5th, 2014 at 18:47

    “is worried about the gay menace ”

    Laughing!

  3. Roctuna September 5th, 2014 at 18:53

    Sounds like a Phyllis Schlafly clone.

  4. Roctuna September 5th, 2014 at 18:53

    Sounds like a Phyllis Schlafly clone.

  5. neworleans878 September 5th, 2014 at 18:58

    These people scare me more than ISIS does.

    • M D Reese September 5th, 2014 at 22:28

      Me too. They live among us.

  6. nola878 September 5th, 2014 at 18:58

    These people scare me more than ISIS does.

    • M D Reese September 5th, 2014 at 22:28

      Me too. They live among us.

  7. fancypants September 5th, 2014 at 19:22

    Gay safari
    is a lot like watching fox news … you know how the story ends / objective each day.

    • Ron Luce September 5th, 2014 at 23:41

      Gay Safari — Family Values Coalition.

      Whats the difference?

      • fancypants September 6th, 2014 at 14:50

        every time a tv host disappears with a bearded man for the weekend you have to rethink the situation ?
        family values are indeed in jeopardy here

  8. fancypants September 5th, 2014 at 19:22

    Gay safari
    is a lot like watching fox news … you know how the story ends / objective each day.

    • Ron Luce September 5th, 2014 at 23:41

      Gay Safari — Family Values Coalition.

      Whats the difference?

      • fancypants September 6th, 2014 at 14:50

        every time a tv host disappears with a bearded man for the weekend you have to rethink the situation ?
        family values are indeed in jeopardy here

        • Larry Schmitt September 6th, 2014 at 15:51

          Whose family are you talking about? It’s my experience that whenever some politician starts yakking about family values, he’s from a different branch of the homo sapiens family tree than I am. If most of them were my relatives, they’d be the crazy uncle you see once a year at Thanksgiving.

          • fancypants September 6th, 2014 at 16:04

            who’s family ?
            don’t worry most if not all come out of the closet when the time is right. the important thing is to not take them seriously

  9. mfr4 September 5th, 2014 at 20:41

    At one time my librarian wife had a marvellous t-shirt that all the staff wore during freedom to read week. It said “There’s something to offend everyone in my library”.

  10. mfr4 September 5th, 2014 at 20:41

    At one time my librarian wife had a marvellous t-shirt that all the staff wore during freedom to read week. It said “There’s something to offend everyone in my library”.

  11. juicyfruityyy September 6th, 2014 at 00:54

    I think we need to just ban the Right Wing, for life.

    • fahvel September 6th, 2014 at 03:51

      it’s not the right wing -it is a mass collection of stupid frightened people who have placed the responsibility for their miserable existence in the hands of a spook who never crossed a threshold and who isn’t and never was.

      • Par4thecourse September 6th, 2014 at 04:38

        Let’s just say right wing extremist who do not have their tin foiled hats squarely on the dull point of their skull.. and the neurons are misfiring.

  12. juicyfruityyy September 6th, 2014 at 00:54

    I think we need to just ban the Right Wing, for life.

    • fahvel September 6th, 2014 at 03:51

      it’s not the right wing -it is a mass collection of stupid frightened people who have placed the responsibility for their miserable existence in the hands of a spook who never crossed a threshold and who isn’t and never was.

      • Par4thecourse September 6th, 2014 at 04:38

        Let’s just say right wing extremist who do not have their tin foiled hats squarely on the dull point of their skull.. and the neurons are misfiring.

  13. fancypants September 6th, 2014 at 16:04

    who’s family ?
    don’t worry most if not all come out of the closet when the time is right. the important thing is to not take them seriously

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