Ban This Book?
I have discovered a book with A LOT of objectionable content. It is chock full of violence, sex, and all manner of depravity. While I am not one to usually support banning ANY book, if there is one that we should consider banning, it is this one. And look, that’s not just based on the content. People who read this book behave in bizarre, cult-like ways, often encouraging others to go along with them. It is downright dangerous. Here are a few examples from it…
Early on (within the first few pages) it features scenes in which a man has sex with his sister. Just a few paragraphs later there are multiple descriptions of bigamy and polygamy. In the next chapter, millions of people are killed, and has a scene that includes ritualistic animal sacrifice. Not long after that genital mutilation is highlighted. This is all in the FIRST 20 pages!
Talk about objectionable content! But there is so, so much more.
In that same chapter, there’s a scene where a man tries to avoid anal rape by offering up his underage daughters to be raped instead. But fear not, the rapes never took place. Instead, the entire city was burned up and all its inhabitants died painful deaths. Yikes. But the author wasn’t done with his depravity. The very next part of the book has the daughters (who had been offered up as sexual slaves) trying to get their father drunk so they can have sex with him. And it worked! They both had sex with their own father and became pregnant. Incest, date rape, and sex trafficking. Keep it in the family, indeed.
All of this is in the first chapter! Some other highlights from the opening pages: a group of brothers sells one of their own into slavery; a man tries to solicit his daughter-in-law for prostitution; lots of sex, including incest and adultery; murders left and right.
It doesn’t get much better. As the book progresses, there are multiple scenes of pedophilia, child rape, rape-rape, slavery, violence, and some truly insane rule enforcement. Take this passage from the third chapter. I am going to paraphrase it for clarity. If a man has sex with a woman on her period, they have to be cast out from society. And if you simply TOUCH a woman who has her period, you are considered “unclean” (and you do not want to be unclean in the world that this book takes place in). There are also some pretty strange and frankly, barbaric rules for childbirth.
Maybe you’re ok with a book that has all this in it. But what if I told you there was also PORN in it? Yup. Graphic descriptions of sexual activity. Fifty Shades of Gray it isn’t, but there are a lot of animalistic metaphors. And the author seems really obsessed with describing how the woman, uh, smells down there. There’s a part about cunnilingus and quite a bit of “blowing”. It’s a bit much but at least it's romantic! And seemingly consensual. Progress?
Almost every page of this tome is absolutely dripping with sex, violence, torture, lust, rape, and virtually every other thing that gets a book or movie or TV show banned. And yet, would it surprise you to know one of the most famous and widely-read books in history? If you haven’t figured it out by now, I am speaking about The Bible. You know, the thing that Christians always seem to be telling us to read more of.
Funny how the people who always seem to be up in arms about books with “bad” content, worship a book that is filled with loads of the same. Seems… what’s the word, hypocritical? And yet here we are.
The overlap between people trying to ban books in schools and public libraries and those who support the MAGA Trump movement is pretty much a circle. And why wouldn’t they? Donald Trump is truly a man of God. I mean, listen to how Evangelical Christians talk about him:
I mean, sure. The guy’s been married a bunch of times. And yeah, he’s raw dogged a pornstar. And bad a number of adulterous affairs. And alright, he’s had multiple children by multiple women. And OK, he’s maybe paid for as many as 8 abortions. And he bragged about grabbing women by the pussy against their will. But — BUT! the man knows his Bible!
Errrr, ahhh, OK so maybe he doesn’t.
Book banning has been in vogue now for the last couple of years and the people who want to prevent kids (and adults) from reading stories that are centered around LGBTQ or minority characters have always used “decency” and “protecting” their children from filth as the reasons behind their movement. But how many of them would agree that the Bible should be banned? Not many! In fact, they might even find that a little offensive.
So what’s really going on here? You know damn well what’s really going on here. White people are uncomfortable with non-whites being allowed to tell and share their perspectives. White supremacy has taught these people that the only viewpoint that matters is whiteness and heterosexuality. Anything that contradicts that or questions it makes them feel uncomfortable.
It is hardly a coincidence that the majority of the books white people are trying are centered around minority communities. But you know what book has yet to be included on a list of banned books? The Bible. Wonder why that is? Interestingly enough, if you really think about it, the Bible was probably written by several Black and Brown men in a foreign language (not English) that most of these people would never recognize, let alone speak. Then again, these are the same people who think a man who lived in the Middle East centuries ago looked like this:
So… Yeah. Not exactly starting with a full deck.
The reality of this situation is pretty simple. White people want to ban books that confront supremacy because they enjoy their status of false superiority and want to maintain it. This is harmful for a number of obvious reasons. Most importantly, it is harmful to the children of color who attend schools and read books from libraries. There is no reason why they should be denied representation by white parents. Heck, most of the parents who want to ban these books haven’t even read them!
It was one thing when people were trying to keep books from being in classrooms and school libraries. It’s ridiculous but at least the kids might have still been able to read them from their local public libraries. Not so! Public libraries are now facing attacks and book bans. Yup, the place where adults and kids alike are supposed to be able to find books of any kind is now being pressured to get rid of books. This is bad. Really bad.
This was always going to be the point in the laws that were passed. It was never going to stop at schools. You don’t think white parents have access to the same information as everyone else? They were always going to silence non-white voices. That was the point. Supremacy demands it.
We cannot allow this to happen. The stories of all Americans, whatever their race, sexual, or gender preference/identity have a right to be told. There are few things more un-American than banning books. Silencing our fellow citizens who have a story to tell is fascism and preventing our fellow citizens to read them is as well. We are headed to a dark place. Only the light of knowledge can save us.
And if we’re going to start banning books, let’s start with the Bible.