Banned books...
Jul. 3rd, 2005 07:11 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
felis_ultharusSo, lurking on the much-renowned SDMB boards, I stumbled on to this list of 100 books that have been banned or that people have tried to ban in Canada in the last 21 years.
Some were no surprise -- Christian fundamentalists objected both to Harry Potter and to Margaret Atwood's A Handmaid's Tale. The Lives of Girls and Women by Alice Munro wasn't surprising either, seeing as how it has an unflinching look at sexual abuse. Madonna's Sex, Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn, and Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye always make these lists.
But Laura Ingalls "Little House on the Prairie" Wilder? And the Goosebumps series for kids?
Some amused me. Four antigay passages from the Bible were officially declared "hate speech," when used in an advertisement in a newspaper in Saskatoon. The the paper and the guy who took out the ad were each forced $4,500 in fines.
Andrea Dworkin was also a funny one. This woman's attacks on pornography prevented Canada's "obscenity laws" from going the way of the dinosaur. Thanks to her, Catherine Mackinnon, and LEAF, the courts gave Canada Customs free reign to censor whatever the hell they felt like coming over the Canadian border.
Turns out Dworkin's books Pornography: Men Possessing Women and Woman Hating were themselves declared "obscene" by Canada Customs.
I'm also amused that my idiot creative writing teacher, W.D. Valgardson made the list. Maybe now, someone will read his work.
In other literary news, only 12 days, 4 hours, 25 minutes, and 50 seconds to Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.
Some were no surprise -- Christian fundamentalists objected both to Harry Potter and to Margaret Atwood's A Handmaid's Tale. The Lives of Girls and Women by Alice Munro wasn't surprising either, seeing as how it has an unflinching look at sexual abuse. Madonna's Sex, Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn, and Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye always make these lists.
But Laura Ingalls "Little House on the Prairie" Wilder? And the Goosebumps series for kids?
Some amused me. Four antigay passages from the Bible were officially declared "hate speech," when used in an advertisement in a newspaper in Saskatoon. The the paper and the guy who took out the ad were each forced $4,500 in fines.
Andrea Dworkin was also a funny one. This woman's attacks on pornography prevented Canada's "obscenity laws" from going the way of the dinosaur. Thanks to her, Catherine Mackinnon, and LEAF, the courts gave Canada Customs free reign to censor whatever the hell they felt like coming over the Canadian border.
Turns out Dworkin's books Pornography: Men Possessing Women and Woman Hating were themselves declared "obscene" by Canada Customs.
I'm also amused that my idiot creative writing teacher, W.D. Valgardson made the list. Maybe now, someone will read his work.
In other literary news, only 12 days, 4 hours, 25 minutes, and 50 seconds to Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.
