Celebrating Gay Penguins and Other Banned Books

by Michael Jones · 2009-09-09 04:32:00 UTC
Topics:

And Tango Makes Three

You have to hand it to those gay penguins -- they really know how to rile up the right-wing.  This year marks the third straight year that And Tango Makes Three, the book about two male penguins who take in and raise a baby penguin, tops the list of the American Library Association's most banned books.

It's odd that a book about the power of love and family continues to be despised by very conservative forces.  But with each passing year, numerous right-wing parents object to the book because of its gay-friendly themes.  In fact, LGBT themes and/or sexual themes are the reason most books end up banned, at least according to Deborah Caldwell Stone, the Director of the American Library Association's Office of Intellectual Freedom.

As a means of responding to parents that go on book burning crusades, the American Library Association created a "Banned Books Week," which will take place at the end of September (September 26-October 3, 2009).  The goal is to promote the more than 1,000 books that have been banned since 1982 by the 'family values' crowd.  Books for this year include And Tango Makes Three, of course, as well as The Perks of Being a Wallflower and Uncle Bobby's Wedding, both of which touch on the subject of homosexuality.  Seven other books make up the top-ten this year, including the best-seller The Kite Runner.

Really?  The Kite Runner?  For goodness sake's...the book was sold in Starbucks it was that popular!

Guess that just goes to show the lengths some parents and folks will go to censor information from their communities.  And speaking of, the American Library Association has launched a fascinating interactive map that allows you to see where in the country folks are getting their pantaloons in a bunch over books.  You can see that in Coeur D'Alene, Idaho, wingnuts tried to ban The Great Gatsby and The Catcher in the Rye.  Or in Waltham, Massachusetts, The Lovely Bones was moved to the faculty-only section because folks thought it was too scary for middle-school students.  Or in Baxley, Georgia, where a minister objected to John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men.

It's almost embarrassing to think that all throughout the country, we're engaging in the type of book-banning that is popular in authoritarian countries.  But then it's also kind of sad to realize that many communities get deprived of some of the best literature of our day.

All the more reason to celebrate Banned Books Week later this month, and get these banned titles out in front of eyes that otherwise wouldn't be allowed to see them.

Michael Jones is a Change.org Editor. He has worked in the field of human rights communications for a decade, most recently for Harvard Law School.
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