Banned Books Week 2016

Banned Books Week ends tomorrow, so I'm getting this in just under the wire. Let's talk about the central issue with banned books, that even tho there are books we'd all like to ban -- we don't do it. Come on, you know there are some books that just shouldn't exist, like Mein Kampf or anything "written" by the Kardashians (how can you write a book if you can't ... ? Never mind.). For you Trump haters, how about the Art of the Deal (of course, they say Trump didn't write that either)? How about right-wing conspiracy books? Left-wing conspiracy books? Books that deny the Holocaust and books that blame 9/11 on Israel (of course some blame 9/11 on Saudi Arabia, so which is it?)? How about books that glorify rape and abuse of women? How about Twilight? There are a lot of evil books out there. Outlaw them! But in fact we don't try to forbid them.

Let me tell you about something shameful. I once read a biography of one of my favorite authors. The author of the bio was so obviously eaten up with jealousy (why was she famous and successful and I'm not?) that every page dripped with envy, bitterness, and hate. If there was anyway to twist facts to put the subject in a bad light, she did. I feel sorry for the author of the bio. How horrible it must've been to write an entire book about someone she despised. Accordingly, it was a horrible read. I didn't even review it because I didn't want to give the book the attention and I hate writing bad reviews. When I was finished reading the book, I threw it away. I usually sell my read books or give them to charity; this one I didn't. I banned the book. Now only this one copy of the book, and because it's so bad I'm sure the charity shops and used-book stores are full of copies. I owned the book, it was my right to do what I wanted with my property. But no matter how many excuses I make, I denied anyone else the opportunity to read this book. It's the only time I did this thing, and I'm not proud of it. But I did, and I hope I wouldn't do it again, because it was wrong.

And that's my point: it's wrong to ban books. So even tho there are books we may well believe should never see the light of day, we don't proscribe them, because it's better that all the ideas be out there in the great debate, than we should lose any good ideas along with the ideas of which we disapprove. That's why we have Banned Books Week, to draw attention. We don't have to buy all the books, or talk about all the books, or agree with all the books, but we don't have them removed from our libraries and we don't picket or boycott book shops that sell books we don't like, and we don't burn books. Freedom of thought is too important. Bad ideas get to coexist with good ideas. And we support the banned books themselves, so go buy a banned book, check one out from the library, read a banned book for your own enjoyment. It doesn't have to be this week, it can be, should be, must be, any week of the year. Every week of the year should be Banned Books Week.