Censorship's topics - tribe.net

PRAVDA OR SALON.COM?

2008-03-02T22:16:46Z

my friend xanadu sent me this abou t her censored letter:

A.) SALON ARTICLE, My Beautiful, Drug Addicted Boy: http://www.salon.com/mwt/feature/2008/03/01/beautiful_boy/

B.) MY FIRST LETTER:

Oh, Pleeeze - Frickin' Blow Me

Another predictable feed to This Moldy Hell's Groundhog's Day on endless loop.

Not only have we all heard the same story a gazillion times - THERE IS ONLY ONE STORY.

Every simpy tale of substance abuse, from VH1's "Behind the Music", to "Intervention, The Series", to Jerry Stahl's self aggrandizing jack-offs, to Amy Winehouse to Baudelaire, to my ex-friend the prominent lawyer and union leader who jack-knifed into the pipe... ditto ditto ditto ditto and they're all made of narcissism and they all look just the same.

FORMULA:

1. Auspicious promise and talent... yet tortured somehow.

2. Innocently experiments with substance. "Everyone was doing it... It took away my a. shyness b. pain c. anger... It gave me a. confidence b. stamina c. coping skills

3. Drawn further and further to substance by forces he/she can't understand, then can't control.

4. Promising future dashed. Loses family and/or fame and/or money.

5. Near death 'wake-up call'

6. Article in Salon! Whoooo-hoo!
-- xanadu xero
[Read xanadu xero's other letters]

(Others echoed my POV, but here I was the first.)

C.) The next letter supports me:

If only us too Xanadu

Absolute agreement with Xero’s point of view. The story of Nic and his hard journey through drug addiction is so inspirational, it makes me wish I had been cool, edgy and artistic enough to take on a meth habit.

If only I could turn back time and say yes to more drugs. If only, then maybe I too could be intellectual enough to win a Hemingway (what’s that award look like? A plank of wood with a shotgun blast through it ?); or publish for Newsweek; or promote my book through the NY Times review, my face looking so edgy, artsy and Bukow-rific cool http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/26/books/26meth.html . What a dream. The young Nic Sheff could have only dreamed, I'm sure. What a message!

Do drugs kid. You really are the misunderstood hip genius you think you are, and someday you’ll show them all; just like Buko, Burroughs, Miller, Carroll and Sheff. Go on! You’ll be fine, and someday famous too.

Oh, if only…
-- The ungifted
[Read The ungifted's other lette

D.) An "Editor's Choice" letter:

Sometimes, little can be done but to wait

This is not a popular opinion, but I believe that oftentimes a parent of a young drug addict can do nothing but wait for the child to grow up and out of the addiction.

I was in a similar situation as Nic when I was in my early twenties in college. I was a drug addict, though not as extreme as he was. For years I was hooked on prescription medications pushed by a greedy doctor.

What got me out of it wasn't a revelation, a program, or a mentor. It was time. I just had to mature into my mid twenties before I had the intellectual abilities to break the addiction.

This seems to be more common in men. It has been proven time and again that boys mature slower than women, and some boys mature very slow indeed. Should any of these slowly maturing boys get sucked into the vortex of meth addiction, not much can be done but wait.
-- Tom3531
[Read Tom3531's other letters]
Permalink Friday, February 29, 2008 07:52 PM

E.) My response:

Tom3531! Dude!- Oy Vey Iz Mir! * (a.k.a. There Is No Spoon)

"Should any of these slowly maturing boys get sucked into the vortex of meth addiction, not much can be done but wait."

Tom. Dude! THERE IS NO VORTEX THE BOYS GET "SUCKED INTO".

THERE IS NO VORTEX THAT ANYONE GETS SUCKED INTO.

They have poor character, are self indulgent, and keep repeating a narcissistic choice.
-- xanadu xero
[Read xanadu xero's other letters]
Permalink Friday, February 29, 2008 11:26 PM

E.) My first letter DISAPPEARED!!!!!!!

F.) My third letter:

PARDONNEZ MOI, L'ARTISTE EDITRIX, MAIS...

Why the effing h did you censor/delete my first letter?

There was nothing conventionally offensive in it, save, perhaps, a threatening new angle on an old standard... and you didn't like the view.

Enlighten moi, por favor. Or 'nous', actually - I think people would be interested in blatant censorship around here. Well, I hope.

Please have an answer, O "Liberal Permissive Media." Because if that's really what you think you are - this is depressing me. Really.

Salaaming,

XX
-- xanadu xero
[Read xanadu xero's other letters]
Permalink Sunday, March 2, 2008 01:47 AM

G.) The next letter, a response to that:

Xanadu's first letter

Xanadu....I agree; your first letter was fine. Perhaps Salon is only accepting letters of rousing endorsement from readers of its headline stories.

Salon...where did it go?
-- jbhart1
[Read jbhart1's other letters]
Permalink Sunday, March 2, 2008 02:53 AM

H.) Where DID IT GO????? And WHY?

**************

posted in Censorship - 0 replies

A Call to Defend Academic Freedom

2007-10-24T17:54:29Z

Saying that they are fed up with "aggressive incursion of partisan
politics into universities´ hiring and tenure practices," five
prominent academics have issued a call to "defend the university" and gathered
dozens of backers in what they view as a new way to bolster academic
freedom.

The Ad Hoc Committee to Defend the University has issued a statement
and is asking professors and others to sign on.

"In recent years, universities across the country have been targeted
by outside groups seeking to influence what is taught and who can teach.
To achieve their political agendas, these groups have defamed scholars,
pressured administrators, and tried to bypass or subvert established
procedures of academic governance," the statement says. "As a
consequence, faculty have been denied jobs or tenure, and scholars
have been denied public platforms from which to share their viewpoints.
This violates an important principle of scholarship, the free exchange of
ideas, subjecting them to ideological and political tests. These
attacks threaten academic freedom and the core mission of institutions of
higher education in a democratic society."

While the statement identifies the problem as a broad one, it notes
that many of the recent incidents have involved the Middle East. "Many of
the most vociferous campaigns targeting universities and their faculty
have been launched by groups portraying themselves as defenders of Israel.

These groups have targeted scholars who have expressed perspectives
on Israeli policies and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict with which they
disagree. To silence those they consider their political enemies,
they have used a range of tactics," including "unfounded insinuations or
allegations" of anti-Semitism or anti-Americanism, the broadening of
the definition of anti-Semitism to include "teaching that is critical of
U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East and of Israel," and "pressures
on university administrations by threatening to withhold donations if
faculty they have targeted are hired or awarded tenure."

The statement goes on to call for professors to resist such outside
pressure. "Academic freedom means not only the right to pursue a
variety of interpretations, but the maintenance of standards of truth and
acceptability by one´s peers," the statement says. "It is university
faculty, not outside political groups with partisan political agenda,
who are best able to judge the quality of their peers´ research and
teaching. This is not just a question of academic autonomy, but of
the future of a democratic society. This is a time in which we need more
thoughtful reflection about the world, not less."

Signatories to the statement pledge, among other things, to "speak
out against those who attack our colleagues and our universities in order
to achieve their political goals" and to "urge university administrators
and trustees to defend academic freedom and the norms of academic
life, even if it means incurring the displeasure of non-scholarly groups,
the media among them."

The organizers of the effort are Joan W. Scott, a professor of social
science at the Institute for Advanced Study, in Princeton, N.J., and
former chair of the American Association of University Professors´
Committee A on Academic Freedom; Jeremy Adelman, chair of history at
Princeton University; Steve Caton, director of the Center for Middle
Eastern Studies at Harvard University; Edmund Burke III, director of
the Center for World History at the University of California at Santa
Cruz; and Jonathan R. Cole, provost emeritus of Columbia University.

The statement comes at a time of a series of high profile hiring or
tenure cases involving professors who work on the Middle East and
whose work has been subject to scrutiny by many non-academics during the
process they were under consideration. Among the cases are those of
Norman Finkelstein, who was denied tenure at DePaul University; Nadia
Abu El-Haj, an anthropologist up for tenure at Barnard College; and
Juan Cole, a professor of history at the University of Michigan who saw
his candidacy for a job at Yale University derailed.

And this week, David Horowitz and his campus allies are sponsoring
"Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week," a series of events that will among
other things say that women´s studies and other left-leaning scholars
aren´t doing enough to combat radical Islam - and these events are
already setting off controversies on many campuses, where students
and professors say that the week is a thinly disguised effort to scare
people about Muslims.

The new effort also comes at a time when many groups are trying to
find ways to bolster academic freedom. The American Association of
University Professors issued a new statement in September to counter certain
arguments used against professors (such as arguments that their
classes must all be balanced). The American Federation of Teachers is also
working on a new statement on academic freedom.

Scott, of the Institute for Advanced Study, said that the statement
came about because "a number of us were just fed up with the amount of
pressure that groups which claim to be defending Israel are
exerting." Citing such cases as the anthropologist at Barnard, Scott said
"outside political groups are trying to force the hand of university
administrators in ways we think are really dangerous."

The scholars in these cases deserve tough scrutiny, Scott said, but
it should come from scholars in their disciplines - their departments
and the outside experts recruited by their departments for evaluations -
not from the public or people in other fields. She said that critics of
these professors imply unfairly that their work is never reviewed,
when their books would never have been published without thorough peer
review and they never would have been hired without intense questioning
about their scholarship and teaching.

"It is the prerogative and responsibility of the members of the
discipline to make these judgments," she said. "It´s not as if people
get a free pass. It´s that at every stage, the review has to be
within the discipline."

She said, for instance, that it would not bother her if Alan
Dershowitz offered opinions on law professors, but that he should not have been
evaluating Finkelstein, a political scientist. As a general rule, she
said, "biologists shouldn´t tell historians how to interpret Middle
Eastern history and historians shouldn´t tell biologists what good
biology is."

Many colleges - and this was the case at DePaul with Finkelstein -
start tenure reviews at the departmental level, and then the review passes
to a university-wide committee. Scott said she saw this as appropriate
if the second committee was "looking at process, not at substance." It´s
important for a second body, she said, to be sure that procedures
were followed, but not to judge the scholarship.

And Scott said that she senses that the pressure from outside groups
- having nothing to do with the academy - is most intense when tenure
reviews leave the departmental level. The environment is especially
difficult right now, she said, when Horowitz and others are
orchestrating events designed to incorrectly define Middle Eastern
studies as anti-American. "This reminds me of nothing more than the
way fascist youth were mobilized to disrupt classes and to question the
authority of scholars," she said. (Via e-mail, Horowitz said that
"it´s the plans to disrupt and slander our events that reflect classic
fascist tactics.")

Adelman, the history chair at Princeton, said he joined the effort
out of concern over "the proliferation of cases." He said it was
inevitable that from time to time, a scholar might draw lots of outside
attention, but the apparent increase in such cases made him think it was time
for professors to take a more public stand.

Outside groups have every right to analyze and criticize scholars, he
said, but not to try to dictate tenure decisions. "I have no problem
with debate. But the critics of the university´s right to make
decisions about scholarship don´t understand that´s what we are doing."
Scholars need to be evaluated on the basis of their scholarship, he said, not
their views on the Middle East.

While the professors´ statement on academic freedom does not mention
groups by name, Campus Watch - which publishes information about
professors of Middle Eastern studies, with much of the analysis
critical - would appear to be one of the groups.

Winfield Myers, director of Campus Watch, said that the new group was
based on false assumptions. The professors believe, he wrote via e-
mail, that "academics, uniquely among all professionals, are beyond
criticism - that they make up a sacrosanct, privileged group that demands
protection from opinions with which they disagree. By implying that
criticism from external sources, such as Campus Watch, is
illegitimate, they seek to seal themselves off from the society that supports
them."
He said that he found irony that "ivory tower intellectuals who
regularly render harsh judgments against the practitioners of other
professions, from businessmen to clergy, and from politicians to the
members of the military - claim immunity from criticism when it is
directed toward themselves."

Myers went on to say of the professors´ effort: "Their desire to
declare themselves off-limits to external criticism is symptomatic of the
intellectual homogeneity that plagues academe. Were it not for
extra-university voices, there would be precious little debate within
academic Middle East studies, so uniform is opinion among professors
of that field."

- Scott Jaschik

posted in Censorship - 1 reply

Tripping Challenge Tripped Up

2007-10-22T17:35:36Z

After a challenge and three appeals, the York County (Va.) School Board has chosen to keep Tripping Over the Lunch Lady and Other Short Stories in the library at Magruder Elementary School in Williamsburg despite claims that it is offensive to children with loved ones serving in the military and inappropriate for elementary school students.

The book was given to students as part of an optional reading program in April. Parent Cyndi Treiber, whose husband is serving in Iraq, asked that the book be removed from the school library due to references to war, bombs, and soldier casualties in one of the short stories, the Newport News Daily Press reported October 18.

“We could hardly believe this content was in a children’s book . . . and had been passed out in a county with the largest military child percentage in Hampton Roads,” Treiber wrote in a letter to Superintendent Steven Staples, the paper reported October 5. Approximately 42% of students attending the school district have parents in the military.

Treiber also said the school should have followed publisher Dial Books’ recommendation that the book was suitable for students in 5th–7th grades. Her son was in 3rd grade when he read it.

The school board, however, upheld previous appeal decisions after reviewing the book, examining the makeup of the appeal committees, and contacting county residents and military families for their opinion. “We certainly considered [Treiber’s] concern and took it very seriously, but felt the school had addressed it and felt the book was appropriate to place in the Magruder Elementary library,” YCSB Chief Academic Officer Jennifer Parish said. She also noted that the district had considered the publisher’s age recommendations, but wanted to provide a book that could challenge students.

posted in Censorship - 1 reply

Citizen Lab releases guide to bypassing Internet censors

2007-10-19T15:28:22Z

Citizen Lab releases guide to bypassing Internet censors
October 15, 2007
Jacqui Cheng
ArsTechnica

"In fact, according to the University of Toronto's Citizen Lab, there are at least 25 countries worldwide that engage in Internet censorship practices. Some of them are extremely strict, such as Iran's practice of filtering out discussions of politics, gay and lesbian issues, women's rights, and the work of many bloggers. But even countries with few content restrictions have certain rules think of the Children's Internet Protection Act (CIPA) in the US, which requires all public institutions to block obscene content but has been repeatedly found to block much more than porn at places like public libraries, where people expect to be able to find information.

That's why the Canada-based Citizen Lab has published "Everyone's Guide to By-Passing Internet Censorship for Citizens Worldwide." The guide, which comes in the form of a 31-page PDF, addresses a very general, non-technical audience. It does a good job of introducing the topic to those who may not be familiar with the far-reaching effects of Internet censorship, and splits up sections of the guide to address the needs of a circumvention user versus a circumvention provider."

Full story at: http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20071015-citizen-lab-releases-guide-to-circumventing-internet-censors.html

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"Literature students should be exposed to controversial ideas"

2007-10-15T17:57:20Z

October 14, 2007 – Charleston Gazette
Denise Giardina

Literature students should be exposed to controversial ideas

When I was a 13-year-old student at DuPont Junior High, my English teacher suggested I read “The Lord of the Flies” by William Golding. Golding had won the Nobel Prize, largely on the strength of that extraordinary book. The novel also happens to be extremely violent. It is the story of English schoolboys marooned on an island after a nuclear war, and how they descend into savagery and cannibalism.

My mother took me to the library in Charleston to borrow the book, but the librarian on duty refused to let me check it out. It was 1964, and the library at that time had a policy that no one under 14 could check out “adult” books. Besides, the librarian informed us, the novel was not appropriate for me. It was too violent.

My mother was furious that her daughter was being denied a book. She promptly marched me around the corner to Major’s Book Store, the Taylor Books of its day, and bought me a paperback copy. By doing so, she taught me a number of valuable lessons: to despise censorship, to value literature even when it is uncomfortable, to stand up for my freedom to read, one of the basic rights human beings possess. She also furthered my education and helped me become what I am: a novelist.

Today we have the spectacle of two parents and two members of the Board of Education denying books to students. What will be their legacy? To leave students as ignorant as they are.

It would be bad enough if we were talking about denying books to English classes in general. But we are talking about Advanced Placement students. Advanced Placement classes are to be substituted for college credit and are to be taught using college-level material.

May I admit, my criticism of the selection of Pat Conroy’s novels for an AP English class would have nothing to do with violence. I consider Conroy an entertaining but secondary novelist. His work will not often be found in college-level courses, and I suspect other authors might better challenge AP students. But when I consider what might replace Conroy, it is clear that little will pass muster with the protesting parents and board members.

Perhaps Shakespeare’s “Hamlet”? But Hamlet kills his mother, stepfather, and several other characters as well. His girlfriend kills herself. “Romeo and Juliet”? More murders and suicides. How about the Bard’s first play, “Titus Andronicus”? In that one, a woman’s sons are killed, cut up, and served to her in a meat pie. (I also read that one, by the way, at age 13. Didn’t do me any harm that I can see.)

So what else is there? “War and Peace”? Well, without the war, maybe. “Anna Karenina”? No, she throws herself under a train. Ick. “Crime and Punishment”? No, the central character kills an old woman.

Turning to contemporary fiction, the book judged by many as the most important in the past 25 years is Toni Morrison’s “Beloved.” In that novel, a mother kills her baby to keep it from growing up a slave. Or, for my money, one of our greatest contemporary American novelists is Cormac McCarthy. His books are famous for their depiction of violence.

I don’t know if the parents in question allow their children to read the Bible. But they might think twice. There is the violent story of a strong man who destroys a building, killing all the people inside. There is the one about a woman who takes a tent peg and drives it through a man’s skull while he is sleeping. Ick, again. And then there’s someone brutally whipped, stabbed in the side with a spear, and nailed to a cross. But we mustn’t, of course, expose young people to such brutality.

Advanced Placement English students should absolutely be reading about violence. And also about sex and social injustice and other controversial subjects. They should, in other words, be reading literature. Since Pete Thaw and Bill Raglin feel a need to censor, perhaps they might offer, as substitutes, works from their own collections of books. If, that is, they have finished coloring in them.

Giardina is a Charleston novelist. She suspects that her books, if given a rating as some board members suggest, would receive an “R.”

posted in Censorship - 1 reply

Federal Prisons to Return Religious Books

2007-10-01T12:28:26Z

Following an outcry from civil libertarians and religious groups, the Federal Bureau of Prisons has authorized the return to chapel libraries of all appropriate religious materials that it had ordered removed as part of its new Standardized Chapel Library Project, an effort to restrict prison reading lists to 150 titles per denomination. In an e-mail quoted by the September 26 New York Times, the bureau reported that the only exceptions would be “any publications that have been found to be inappropriate, such as material that could be radicalizing or incite violence.”

Prison chaplains began removing books from chapel libraries in May as a belated response to an April 2004 Department of Justice report that recommended steps prisons should take to limit the spread of radical or militant Islamic materials. This prompted two inmates of the Federal Prison Camp in Otisville, New York—Orthodox Jew Moshe Milstein and Protestant John J. Okon—to file a class-action lawsuit against the bureau August 21 in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, claiming that their rights to free exercise of religion and due process of law were infringed.

After the Times provided links September 21 to the approved book lists for 19 different denominations, religious organizations began to object to the seemingly arbitrary nature of the choices. Marvin Olasky of World Magazine wrote, “The list includes Praying by J. I. Packer, but if a library had Packer’s Knowing God it would have to be purged.” The September 26 Roman Catholic Our Sunday Visitor pointed out that “Jesus of Nazareth, Pope Benedict’s new bestseller, is not on the approved Catholic list [but] C. S. Lewis, N. T. Wright, and Martin Marty—all non-Catholics—are.”

Bureau spokeswoman Traci Billingsley declined to give the Times the names of the religious experts who were compiling the lists, but said they included chaplains and scholars in seminaries and at the American Academy of Religion. Although the books are being returned to the prison chapels, the bureau has not abandoned the concept of maintaining lists. Bureau spokeswoman Judi Simon Garrett said the “review of all materials in chapel libraries will be completed by the end of January 2008.”

American Library Association President Loriene Roy issued a statement on the book removals September 24, saying “it is illogical that the Bureau of Prisons is removing the very resources that may help incarcerated persons change their lives for the better. The idea that removing religious books will create better citizens is ridiculous, and goes against the democratic fiber of our society.”

Even though the books are being returned, ALA Office of Intellectual Freedom Deputy Director Deborah Caldwell-Stone told American Libraries that the lawsuit by the Otisville inmates might not be rendered moot if the Bureau of Prisons new policy continues, because “it contends that limiting reading materials to government-approved religious texts burdens the inmates’ free exercise of religion and their right to read and access information.” She added that the federal guidelines do not affect state prisons in any way.

“It’s swatting a fly with a sledgehammer,” Mark Earley, president of the Prison Fellowship, a Christian group founded by ex-Watergate convict Chuck Colson, said in the September 10 Times. “There’s no need to get rid of literally hundreds of thousands of books that are fine simply because you have a problem with an isolated book or piece of literature that presents extremism.”

Bob Moore, director of the Jewish advocacy group Aleph, told the newspaper that the lack of transparency about how the lists are compiled troubled him. He added, “Our position is there should not be a list of what should be on the shelves, but what shouldn’t be.”

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Cartoon 'censorship' no laughing matter

2007-09-24T13:06:02Z

Cartoon 'censorship' no laughing matter
Timothy J. McNulty
September 21, 2007

Several readers are asking why the Tribune "censors" some comic strips and not others.

The immediate case is a "Get Fuzzy" comic that was scheduled to run Sept. 14 but was replaced along with a note that advised that the comic "did not meet the Tribune's standards for taste."

The deleted strip refers to mobsters as goons. One character is looking inside a kitchen cabinet for cereal and says, "Bucky, I just want my nut crunch." Bucky replies: "The goons will be happy to provide that."

Jeff Nowak of South Holland, Ill., wrote to the paper and said "that the only offense is a vague testicular injury joke" and so perhaps the newspaper should remove its TV listings for "America's Funniest Home Videos" because that appears to be the theme for such shows.

I didn't find the comic so offensive. I suspect I wouldn't even have thought twice about it, like most readers, until it was taken out.

On the very same day, Nowak noticed, the "Doonesbury" comic played off the arrest of U.S. Sen. Larry Craig of Idaho in a Minneapolis airport men's room and compared it with the treatment of U.S. Sen. David Vitter of Louisiana, whose phone number appeared in the records of a Washington madam. "There's an important lesson here, son," says the character Duke. "Stick to call girls." The son replies, "And always pay cash."

Isn't talk about prostitution offensive to some readers?

Let's add one more element: The following day's "Get Fuzzy" strip presented a presumably black rap-star character using the word "cracker" about a presumably white character. The paper does not use such racist labels in its news columns or elsewhere.

So where is the consistency? What standard did one comic violate but the others did not? It seems to me that no topic is out of bounds throughout the paper, but how it is presented is up for debate.

I asked Geoff Brown, associate managing editor for features, when and how often he decides to pull a comic strip.

Brown said he might determine that a particular comic's content is offensive once or twice a year. "Some people claim it's censorship, but I call it editing," he said. "We don't allow our own reporters to write vulgarities, double-entendres or untruths, even in jest." He thought the "nut-crunch" joke was just vulgar.

He didn't see any double standard compared with the "Doonesbury" comic because he thought the homosexual contact versus call-girl scandal made a valid point about political and social hypocrisy, using true incidents.

Use of the term "cracker," however, was one he missed. "I don't like that kind of name-calling. He could have just said 'yahoo' or something else. To me, that strays over the line."

Brown and comics editor Barbara Schaffner oversee the daily and Sunday comics pages. Knowing that replacing any comic will create complaints and possibly controversy, they routinely consult other editors before making their decision.

Recently, they asked me about two edgy "Opus" comics that referred to modest Muslim beachwear and talked of radical Islamists being the "hot new fad on the planet." I thought it was topical. The Tribune ran both strips and got barely a complaint.

The Washington Post decided to kill the strips and got more than 100 complaints, said my counterpart at the Post, Deborah Howell, who wrote about the controversy on Sunday.

Editors make daily decisions about everything that goes in the paper, stories, photos and, yes, comic strips. They never try to be gratuitously offensive. But, as reader Nowak acknowledged about comics, "The problem here is that you can't really determine which ones will be offensive to whom."

His solution would be to not "censor" any comics. Sorry, but that would be abdicating responsibility. Personally, I don't always agree, nor does any other editor I know, with all the decisions that are made, but ultimately someone needs to decide.

Newspaper articles are not written in stone and neither are comic strips. About the 'elderly'

Speaking about being offensive, Mary Anne Fowler of Lake Forest wrote the other day that the word she finds increasingly offensive in the newspaper is "elderly."

"The dictionary defines it as 'past middle age.' However it conveys more than that," she wrote. If a driver was in an accident, it suggests he shouldn't have been behind the wheel. Fowler said an acquaintance irritated her by saying her "elderly" mother still enjoyed going to dog shows, as if being of a certain age nullified enjoying this or that.

I checked with our research center, and during the last two years, the term elderly has appeared in stories and headlines 1,739 times.

Tribune researcher Lelia Arnheim said it certainly comes up in stories about drivers and accidents, and it's used regularly, along with the term "disabled," when writing about CTA riders.

All those references and yet the Tribune stylebook, our guide to consistency in writing, advises against it. "When possible, avoid words such as aged, aging, elderly, old, senior citizen, etc., because they are imprecise."

Basically, the message is to avoid meaningless labels.

----------

Timothy J. McNulty is the Tribune's public editor. His e-mail address is tmcnulty@tribune.com. The views expressed are his own.

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Maine Woman Quarantines Sex-Education Book

2007-09-24T12:49:03Z

A woman in Lewiston, Maine, has checked out copies of the oft-challenged It’s Perfectly Normal: Changing Bodies, Growing Up, Sex and Sexual Health by Robie H. Harris from the public libraries in Lewiston and Auburn and refuses to return them, citing the book’s frank content.

“Since I have been sufficiently horrified of the illustrations and the sexually graphic, amoral abnormal contents, I will not be returning the books,” JoAn Karkos wrote in August 11 letters to Rick Speer and Rosemary Waltos, the respective directors of the Lewiston and Auburn libraries. Karkos included a check for $20.95 to cover the cost of the book with each letter, the Lewiston Sun Journal reported September 18.

Speer returned the check, along with the library’s materials reconsideration form. However, Karkos reiterated at a September 19 Lewiston Public Library board meeting that she did not intend to return the book or fill out the form, challenging trustees to take It’s Perfectly Normal “out in the park and call some children over and show it to them.” If she does not return the book, she faces fines and a $25 penalty.

Karkos originally learned of the book, which both libraries shelve in the children’s section, from a newsletter of the American Life League. “I was horrified that it was in existence, and horrified that it was in my local library,” she said. “I would object to this book anywhere in the library, but these copies were in the children’s sections.”

“We have a policy of covering all the sides of controversial issues,” Speer said in the September 18 Sun Journal. “We don’t restrict what kids borrow. We can’t act in the role of a parent.”

In an August 22 letter to the editor of the Sun Journal, Karkos wrote that It’s Perfectly Normal “robs children of the natural progression of sexual investigation” and gives sexual predators a tool that “gets children past the stage of embarrassment, blush, and shame.” Speer told the paper the protest had increased interest in the book; both libraries ordered two additional copies apiece and have received offers to give the libraries more. “I turned them down,” Speer said. “Instead, I suggested they donate a copy to their local library.”

Acknowledging that her protest has increased interest in the book, Karkos predicted, “When people actually see what’s on the pages, what passes for a book in the public library, I think they’ll be upset.”

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School board rejects call to ban books on gays, atheism

2007-07-13T19:48:59Z

School board rejects call to ban books on gays, atheism
By LAURA GREEN
Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Thursday, July 12, 2007

The Palm Beach County School Board refused to pull 80 books referencing homosexuality, atheism and abortion from the library shelves of two high schools.

But the mother fighting since September to ban them refuses to give up.
Laura Lopez said she will start a church-to-church petition and reach out to a Christian law center to represent her.

"To me, it doesn't end here. This is just the beginning," said the West Palm Beach mom.
Two school committees and Superintendent Art Johnson had already shot down her request. On Wednesday, the board voted unanimously to back Johnson.

It was unclear whether Lopez had any challenges left.

Lopez had 15 minutes to make her case during a school board workshop. She listed a litany of sins that she says are promoted by books she found doing a simple key word search on the library computers at Dreyfoos School of the Arts and Royal Palm Beach High School. She acknowledged she hadn't read a single one of the books cover-to-cover.

Among the objectionable books were: Medical Ethics: Moral and Legal Conflicts in Health Care, Coping When a Parent is Gay and The Cider House Rules, a John Irving novel about a rural doctor who runs an orphanage and performs illegal abortions.

She also expanded her objections to include the curriculum taught in schools.

"They're teaching kids the Big Bang. They're teaching kids lies," she told the board. "The world was created 6,000 years ago. In my son's elementary school book, it says the world was created several million years ago."

Board members applauded Lopez's advocacy but found no grounds to support her.

Board member Monroe Benaim talked about students who struggle with their sexuality or contemplate suicide and might be afraid to talk to someone but could find some solace in a library book.

"As a school board member, I'm a school board member to all children whether they are heterosexual or homosexual, pregnant or not pregnant and no matter what they believe religiously," he said.

One of Lopez's two teenaged sons, Jesse, a sophomore at Royal Palm Beach, came to support his mother. Her oldest son, whom she did not name, does not agree with his mother's objections to the library books.

Jesse Lopez said he worries about his fellow classmates who turn to friends for information, who may consult books full of lies. "If their friends rely on them and if those books are teaching evil, that's just corrupt," he said.

Despite the controversial topic, Lopez's hearing drew only a few people to the daytime board workshop. She brought a friend and a youth pastor. Two members of the Atheists of Broward County also came, but did not testify.

"If you don't like a book, walk to the next aisle and find a different one," Ken Loukinen, president of the atheist organization, said after the meeting.

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Weekly’s Use of “F” Word Irks Missouri Patron

2007-07-02T16:10:32Z

from American Libraries
posted June 29

St. Louis area resident Richard Greathouse has called for Jefferson County (Mo.) Public Library to remove the free weekly Riverfront Times newspaper from distribution there, according to the June 24 suburban St. Louis Sunday Journal.

Greathouse saw the paper while he took his 13-year-old son to the library’s Northwest branch to research birds, and complained to Library Director Pam Klipsch. “The content of this thing really upset me,” Greathouse said. “They use the ‘F’ word in there.”

“We have many patrons who read the Riverfront Times for a variety of reasons,” Klipsch said. “I apologized to Mr. Greathouse and told him I was very sorry that he was offended. But [the RFT] is a legal publication and we live in a country where everyone is given a very wide latitude to pick and choose what we want to read or view and the question of taste is up to each individual to judge for himself or herself.” Klipsch told American Libraries that the library had received a few calls expressing support for her position and none in opposition. She also said that Greathouse had not taken any steps to have the paper removed beyond his verbal complaint.

“It’s kind of ironic that in a country where we can say what we want, someone would want to muzzle a voice because he thinks it doesn’t conform to what he thinks a proper publication is,” Riverfront Times Editor Tom Finkel told the Journal. “As director of the library, [Klipsch] is striking a blow for an open society.”

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Occult Concerns Jinx Teen Read Program

2007-06-21T07:09:48Z

Pickens County (S.C.) Library System officials have withdrawn the library’s participation in a nationwide teen reading program within days of its scheduled June 7 launch due to 11th-hour threats against the library, PCLS Director Marguerite Keenan told American Libraries. “My understanding is that it was announced at a church service that we were promoting witchcraft and teaching other religions in our young adult program,” Keenan explained, saying that the library received one call stating they were “going to get us” and threatening to picket. Faced with the prospect of “having children walk through pickets was just horrible, so from that perspective, we decided we would just cancel [the entire series].”
“We weren’t against the reading program itself at all,” asserted Pastor David Gallamore in the June 6 Greenville News. He acknowledged telling parishioners of the Rock Springs Baptist Church in Easley, South Carolina, about PCLS’s mystery-and-suspense-themed “You Never Know @ your library” summer series and his objections to horoscopes and Tarot cards being part of the June 14 “What’s Your Sign?” evening. “We just want our children being taught the right things,” he added.

The controversial activities were among those suggested by the Collaborative Summer Library Program for Highsmith’s prepackaged 2007 summer reading program, which has garnered participation from libraries in 40 states.

According to Keenan, the teen summer programming traditionally draws a few youngsters from Pickens County’s population of 110,000 overall. However, the 2007 program might have seen an upward spike: Media Specialist Christina Connell of the Gettys Middle School in Easley told American Libraries that she had “pitched it” to the 1,400 students at her campus, which is two blocks from PCLS’s Hampton branch, and that “they were really excited about it.” Connell went on to contend that the library is “sending the wrong message to teens, who will feel that they are not important enough to fight for, and to the church groups, who will only be empowered to launch further crusades against books.”

“Maybe I was taking a worst-case-scenario approach,” Keenan reflected, “but to me the safety of the children we invite in here to our summer programs—the elementary schoolchildren and the preschoolers—is very, very important.”

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Miami Appeals Court Hears Vamos Case

2007-06-11T15:05:12Z

A three-judge panel of the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals heard arguments June 6 in a lawsuit against the Miami–Dade County School Board for ordering the removal of the children’s book Vamos a Cuba and its English-language counterpart A Visit to Cuba from elementary school libraries. The board’s attorney, Richard Ovelmen, told the judges that “The books are rife with factual omissions, misrepresentations, and inaccuracies that render them educationally unsuitable,” adding that they fail to mention that Cuba is a dictatorship, the New York Times reported June 7.
However, ACLU of Florida Executive Director Howard Simon countered, “There’s a difference between a book not being complete and a book being inaccurate. All a publicly elected body has to do to ban a book is utter the word inaccurate? If that’s the case, every library administrator and library association in the country should be worried.”

U.S. District Judge Alan S. Gold upheld July 24, 2006, the ACLU of Florida’s request for an injunction against the school board’s decision on First Amendment grounds, but the board appealed the case, arguing that the book inaccurately portrayed life in Cuba.

The 2001 picture book by Alta Schreier sports a cover that shows smiling children wearing the uniforms of Cuba’s communist youth group, and one page claims that Cuban children “eat, work, and go to school like you do.” Circuit Judge Ed Carnes questioned the statement, saying “That’s simply not true.” Senior District Court Judge Donald E. Walter compared the book to a hypothetical one about Adolf Hitler that touted the invention of the Volkswagen but failed to mention the Holocaust.

JoNel Newman, an attorney for the ACLU, told the panel that Vamos a Cuba does not include political information, the June 7 Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel reported. “The political reality in Cuba is not part of what this book is about,” she said. “Books for 4- to 7-year-olds can’t tell everything.”

Will Weissert, a Havana correspondent for the Associated Press, wrote in a May 16 column that appeared in the Olympia (Wash.) Olympian that posters on the walls of the Cuban National Library show a picture of the book’s cover with the word “censored” across it. “In Miami, Cuban children’s smiles bother them,” a caption explains.

The court is expected to take several weeks to make its ruling.

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Harry Potter Foe Loses Fourth Challenge

2007-06-11T15:04:25Z

Harry Potter detractor Laura Mallory has lost yet another attempt to get the popular series removed from the Gwinnett County (Ga.) Public Schools. Georgia Superior Court Judge Ronnie Batchelor upheld May 29 a December 2006 decision by the state board of education to retain the series in the school system’s library media centers. The ruling came at the conclusion of the hearing, the May 30 Gwinnett Daily Post reported.

“This is not just fiction or fantasy,” Mallory said as part of her one-hour argument before the court. “Witchcraft is real. It’s been around for thousands of years, and we were warned of it from God.” Arguing that reading the series to schoolchildren is tantamount to indoctrinating them into the Wiccan religion, Mallory asserted, “We don’t want our children to be murderers, but we can’t teach that in our schools anymore. ‘Thou shalt not kill’ is out.”

“I’m not here to defend Harry Potter. I’m here to defend the right of the Gwinnett County Board of Education to make lawful decisions,” school board attorney Victoria Sweeny countered, going on to explain that the liberty at stake was freedom of expression and not the separation of church and state, as Mallory had contended.

Following Judge Batchelor’s decision, Mallory told the Daily Post, “Perhaps we need a whole new case built from the ground up” and filed in federal court. “I have to pray about the next step. I’ve been praying or I would have quit a long time ago,” she added.

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And Tango Makes Three" tops ALA's 2006 list of most challenged books

2007-05-10T12:47:45Z

(From the American Library Association - Office for Intellectual Freedom)

Justin Richardson and Peter Parnell's award-winning "And Tango Makes Three," about two male penguins parenting an egg from a mixed-sex penguin couple, tops the list of most challenged books in 2006, due to the issues of homosexuality.

The list also features two books by author Toni Morrison. "The Bluest Eye" and "Beloved" are on the list due to sexual content and offensive language.

The ALA Office for Intellectual Freedom (OIF) received a total of 546 challenges last year. A challenge is defined as a formal, written complaint, filed with a library or school, requesting that materials be removed because of content or appropriateness. Public libraries, schools and school libraries report the majority of challenges to OIF.

"The number of challenges reflects only incidents reported," said Judith F. Krug, director of the ALA Office for Intellectual Freedom. "For each reported challenge, four or five likely remain unreported."

The "10 Most Challenged Books of 2006" reflect a range of themes, and consist of the following titles:

"And Tango Makes Three" by Justin Richardson and Peter Parnell, for homosexuality, anti-family, and unsuited to age group;

"Gossip Girls" series by Cecily Von Ziegesar for homosexuality, sexual content, drugs, unsuited to age group, and offensive language;

"Alice" series by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor for sexual content and offensive language;

"The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big Round Things" by Carolyn Mackler for sexual content, anti-family, offensive language, and unsuited to age group;

"The Bluest Eye" by Toni Morrison for sexual content, offensive language, and unsuited to age group;

"Scary Stories" series by Alvin Schwartz for occult/Satanism, unsuited to age group, violence, and insensitivity;

"Athletic Shorts" by Chris Crutcher for homosexuality and offensive language;

"The Perks of Being a Wallflower" by Stephen Chbosky for homosexuality, sexually explicit, offensive language, and unsuited to age group;

"Beloved" by Toni Morrison for offensive language, sexual content, and unsuited to age group;

"The Chocolate War" by Robert Cormier for sexual content, offensive language, and violence.

Off the list this year, but on for several years past, are the "Catcher in the Rye" by J.D. Salinger, "Of Mice and Men" by John Steinbeck and "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" by Mark Twain.

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Book ban foes triumph

2007-05-03T13:27:27Z

April 18, 2007
BY KATE N. GROSSMAN, ESTHER J. CEPEDA AND SHAMUS TOOMEY
Chicago Sun-Times Staff Reporters

Somewhere, Kurt Vonnegut is smiling.

One of the state's most expensive school district board races, fueled by a proposed book ban in the district last May, ended Tuesday with apparent victory for three incumbents who opposed the ban.

The contest pitted the incumbents against three newcomers for three seats on the board of High School District 214, a high-achieving, six high school district based in Arlington Heights.
The incumbents raised a record-setting $67,000. A mere $500 per candidate is the norm in the district. Vonnegut, who died last week, wrote Slaughterhouse-Five, one of nine books a board member proposed dropping from classroom use last year.

Two of the challengers, Dennis Konczyk and Ken Frizane, joined forces and won big-name support from conservative icon Phyllis Schlafly and Jim Oberweis, a former Republican gubernatorial and U.S. Senate candidate.

But it wasn't enough. Incumbents Bill Dussling, Alva Kreutzer and Robert Zimmanck were the top three vote-getters, with 97 percent of the precincts in.

"The community is well satisfied with what the district is doing -- that's what this election said," said Dussling, the board president.

"They don't want people coming from the outside dictating what is going to be the curriculum and focus of this district."

The incumbents cast the race as a fight against conservative forces they claimed wanted to control the school board. Konczyk and Frizane dismissed the charges as outrageous and never endorsed the book ban, although many of their backers did.

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CHINA: Chief censor sacked after book ban row

2007-05-03T13:18:29Z

April 25, 2007
Jane Macartney in Beijing for the Times of London

China quietly removed its chief censor, who had provoked a furore on the internet this year with a ban on eight books, yesterday. At the same time it unveiled new rules aimed at ensuring greater government transparency as part of a campaign to eradicate corruption and misrule.

Given the silence surrounding the departure of Long Xinmin, head of the powerful General Administration of Press and Publication, it was unclear just how much transparency will sit comfortably with China’s traditionally secretive rulers.

Mr Long will retain his current rank but become a deputy director of the Central Party Literature Research Centre — a clear demotion. Officials declined to give a reason for his transfer, amid speculation about his possible involvement in a corrupt land deal or that the publicity triggered by his ban on the books had embarrassed party leaders.

The ban on eight books that examined sensitive events in recent Chinese history resulted in a wave of anger on the internet, prompting the authorities to allow the books to remain on sale until stocks ran out.

Related Links
Online rebellion forces book censors to back down
New print runs, however, have been prohibited and the publishing houses punished. Zhang Yihe, one of the most prominent authors, who applied to a Beijing court last week to overturn the ban on her book about stars of Peking Opera, told The Times she could not be sure that there was any link to Mr Long’s effective dismissal.

She said: “I hope the new chief will treat the spiritual fruits of China’s countless intellectuals with an attitude that is less rude and less dictatorial.”

The Government has sought to curb the flow of information to avoid social unrest threatening its rule.

Mr Long had said last month that he planned to tighten controls on China’s growing multitude of bloggers, a statement in line with policy but at odds with government efforts to cultivate a more liberal international image before the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

As part of that campaign, Wen Jiabao, the Prime Minister, has approved new regulations that empower citizens to demand information about government finances and economic plans, statistics, land development, environmental rules and many other policies.

All this is within strict limits. The Communist Party is far from ready for complete transparency, since the rules offer a broad opt-out for officials, saying that information released should not harm state security or social stability and giving the final say when in doubt to the state secrecy bureaux.

The new rules do not take effect until May 2008, three months before the Olympics.

They will ensure that people can ask for government information free, based on their needs for business, life or research. Areas where the Government should release information swiftly include “sudden public incidents” — a reference to accidents and epidemics such as the 2003 Sars outbreak, which the Government tried to cover up initially.

Information about land seizures and the demolition of housing — explosive issues in recent years often involving secret dealings between officials and developers — must also be provided. Citizens will have the right to appeal and ultimately take officials to court if legitimate requests are rebuffed.

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INDIA: Hindu fundamentalists want to burn book they claim defames Maratha history

2007-05-03T13:15:48Z

Hindu fundamentalists want to burn book they claim defames Maratha history
by Shahaji Adilshah

Mumbai’s main Hindu groups attack a book by an American writer who writes about an epic historical figure from India’s 17th century. Despite a High Court decision lifting a ban on the book, extremists have the order to burn every copy. Bookstores are threatened.

Mumbai (AsiaNews) – Some of Mumbai’s main Hindu groups have launched a campaign against an American writer and a book he wrote about a heroic Maratha figure, Shivaji, this despite a decision by the Bombay High Court to lift a ban against the book. For the extremists there is but one order: burn the book.

Titled Shivaji: Hindu King in Islamic India, the book looks at the greater-than-life figure who, according to popular lore, was able to restore Hindu hegemony against the overwhelming place taken by Muslims in the country. For many Hindu fundamentalists he is a hero and a ‘founding father’ figure.

The book, which was published in 2003, was banned in India. However, the High Court in Mumbai lifted the ban on April 26 of this year. Shiv Sainiks, members of the Hindu nationalist Shiv Sena party, received clear instructions from their chief Bal Thackeray not to allow any copy to reach bookshops.

“Balasaheb Thackeray has ordered us to burn all copies of James Laine’s book. He has asked us to make holi (bonfire) of this book and burn it to ashes,” said Sena spokesperson Sanjay Raut Shiv. For him Mr Laine was not the right person to comment on Shivaji.

“The court ruling highlights the fact that the state had failed in its duty,” he said.

James Laine, professor of religious studies at Macalester College in Minnesota, in the United States, said he wasn’t surprised with the Shiv Sena’s reaction. “I don’t think political instincts have changed. [. . .] I won’t be able to come to India now,” a disappointed Laine said.

Still, he defended his work, saying that the critics had not read his book.

“Unfortunately, the book has not been read carefully by those wishing to ban it,” said Laine. “I had no intention of getting into this controversy. In fact, I have been a critic of the Brahmin bias.”

In his book Laine contends that Shivaji was less interested in liberating Hindus than in building his own empire, less religiously-inclined than thought and willing to strike deals with the Muslim ‘invaders’.

Since Bal Thackeray’s announcement, book sellers have become apprehensive about stocking copies of the book.

According to sources, the Bharatiya Vidhyarthi Sena has warned bookshop owners not to keep copies of the book or face action.

“The book has many defaming statements against Shivaji. Even though the court has lifted the ban we won’t be selling it, especially after we heard that Shiv Sena has taken an aggressive stance on the issue,” said one bookstore owner.

Some Hindu fundamentalists have begun picketing one of Mumbai’s major bookstores, whilst members of the Sambhaji Brigade (named after Shivaji’s son Sambhaji) blackened the doors of the local Oxford University Press showroom and burnt an effigy of the American author.

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Vietnam: Writer Tran Khai Thanh Thuy Arrested

2007-04-25T13:44:44Z

Novelist and journalist Tran Khai Thanh Thuy, age 47, (pen names Nguyen Thai
Hoang and Nguyen Thi Hien)was arrested on Saturday (April 21) according to
Reporters Without Borders. Authorities say police caught her in the act of
disseminating "subversive" documents online and confiscated a portable USB
drive containing articles she had written. She is accused of violating Article
88 of Vietnam's Criminal Code, prohibiting the dissemination of anti-government
propaganda. She is also accused in Vietnam's official media of belonging to the
dissident 8406 bloc, organizing an independent trade union and supporting a
dissident human rights commission. Thuy is a recipient of Human Rights Watch's
Hellman/Hammett award, granted to dissident writers for showing "courage in the
face of political persecution."

PEN reported on Nov. 22, 2006 that Thuy "was briefly detained on 2 September
2006 for her Internet writings, followed by three weeks of daily interrogation
sessions. She was again briefly detained on 11 October and interrogated about
the essays 'The Grotto', 'Self-Narration' and 'Dialogue' written after her
detention in September. She was also reportedly brought to an open 'People's
Court', in which members of the public are forced to participate in the abuse
and humiliation of those accused. She is now believed to have been placed under
effective house arrest and has been banned from publishing her writings
on-line."

Sources: Reporters Without Borders April 23; Associated Press April 23. See
also PEN, Nov. 22, 2006.

- Steve Denney
Vietnam Human Rights Journal
http://vietnamlist.blogspot.com

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Arkansas Man Wants Library Fined over Lesbian Book

2007-04-23T15:30:06Z

In the dewey system - books on military science are in the 350s - books on Schools (ratings - admissions policies - strategies for getting in a good school etc.) are in the 370s - But books about Lesbians are way out in the 600s - and this guy thinks his 16 year old son accidentaly stumbled accross this book while researching military academies?
right . . .

Arkansas Man Wants Library Fined over Lesbian Book
The father of two teenage boys has asked city officials to fine the Bentonville (Ark.) Public Library for keeping The Whole Lesbian Sex Book by Felice Newman on the open shelves where his sons could find it. Earl Adams said his 14- and 16-year-old sons discovered the book in January while browsing for literature on military academies and were “greatly disturbed,” causing “many sleepless nights in our house.”
Adams wants the city to pay him $10,000 per child, the maximum allowed under Arkansas obscenity law. “God was speaking to my heart that day and helped me find the words that proved successful in removing this book from the shelf,” Adams said in the April 20 Springdale Morning News.

City Attorney Camille Thompson said the book was not pornographic and Adams has no “valid legal concern.” After receiving his original complaint, the library advisory board voted April 3 to remove the book from circulation and look for a similar, less graphic resource for the open stacks. “I thought we had a very intelligent—I almost want to say high-minded—discussion about the book,” said board member George Spence.

Library Director Cindy Suter told the paper that she disagreed with Adams’s conclusion that having Newman’s book in the library follows an “immoral social agenda,” adding, “My focus was to develop an inclusive collection and not an exclusive collection.”

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Arkansas Man Wants Library Fined over Lesbian Book

2007-04-23T15:25:40Z

Arkansas Man Wants Library Fined over Lesbian BooThe father of two teenage boys has asked city officials to fine the Bentonville (Ark.) Public Library for keeping The Whole Lesbian Sex Book by Felice Newman on the open shelves where his sons could find it. Earl Adams said his 14- and 16-year-old sons discovered the book in January while browsing for literature on military academies and were “greatly disturbed,” causing “many sleepless nights in our house.”
Adams wants the city to pay him $10,000 per child, the maximum allowed under Arkansas obscenity law. “God was speaking to my heart that day and helped me find the words that proved successful in removing this book from the shelf,” Adams said in the April 20 Springdale Morning News.

City Attorney Camille Thompson said the book was not pornographic and Adams has no “valid legal concern.” After receiving his original complaint, the library advisory board voted April 3 to remove the book from circulation and look for a similar, less graphic resource for the open stacks. “I thought we had a very intelligent—I almost want to say high-minded—discussion about the book,” said board member George Spence.

Library Director Cindy Suter told the paper that she disagreed with Adams’s conclusion that having Newman’s book in the library follows an “immoral social agenda,” adding, “My focus was to develop an inclusive collection and not an exclusive collection.”

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my tribe art project needs your comments

2007-04-23T01:19:43Z

I am starting an art project on my tribe page
creating art pieces and asking questions
and the comments that it receives will inspire the next question and art piece

so
would you like to join this art project??
feel free to hop on over to my tribe page and leave a comment or two
even become a new friend

thanks
bragitta

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Singapore bans film about former political prisoner,

2007-04-17T15:23:41Z

Associated Press Worldstream
April 10, 2007 Tuesday 12:51 PM GMT

Singapore bans film about former political prisoner, says it is "against
public interest"

BYLINE: By TANALEE SMITH, Associated Press Writer
DATELINE: SINGAPORE

Singapore said Tuesday it would ban a documentary about the 17-year
detention of a former leftist activist because its "distorted and
misleading" portrayal of the events could undermine confidence in the
government.

"Zahari's 17 Years" is a 49-minute interview with Said Zahari, who was
arrested in 1963 on suspicion of plotting violent acts and detained
without trial for 17 years. Said, 78, now lives in Malaysia.

The Ministry of Information, Communication and the Arts, which vets all
films before release, said in a statement that the film was an attempt to
clear Said of his involvement in activities against Singapore.

"The Government will not allow people who had posed a security threat to
the country in the past, to exploit the use of films to purvey a false and
distorted portrayal of their past actions and detention by the Government.
This could undermine public confidence in the Government."

Filmmaker Martyn See, who was under investigation last year for a
documentary about an opposition leader, said he was surprised by the ban.
He said the film, produced at the end of 2005, had been approved twice
last year with a PG rating. When it was not shown at the 2006 Singapore
International Film Festival, as he expected, See applied for an exhibition
license to screen it publicly.

"I don't know what changed. Maybe different people with different views
watched it this time," See told The Associated Press. "I based my
questions to Said on his first book, which is sold in Singapore. So what
is in the film is not something the government didn't know."

He said he had been ordered by the censorship board to surrender all
copies of the film by Wednesday afternoon.

Said, contacted by telephone at his home in Malaysia, was shocked to hear
of the ban. He said he had already accepted an invitation to come to
Singapore next month to give a speech at the film's screening by a
university film institute.

"This is very funny. I don't understand why they would ban it at all. What
I said in the movie I have already said in my book, and much, much more,"
he told AP. "That was 40 years ago. Is the government still afraid?"

"I feel sorry for Singaporeans who have not been given a chance to see the
other side of Singapore history, particularly the 1960s and '70s. It's not
fair," he said.

Said's detention came in the early years after British colonizers gave
self-government to Singapore in 1959. In the early 1960s, authorities
arrested left-wing politicians, trade unionists and Chinese students
involved in strikes and rallies, accusing them of being violent
subversives planning a communist state.

Said was detained on Feb. 2, 1963, hours after he was appointed president
of a left-wing party.

Singapore, which was planning a merger with what later became Malaysia,
said the swoop was aimed at individuals threatening to use violence to
sabotage the proposed amalgamation. The detainees were jailed under the
colonial-era Internal Security Act, which allows for arrest without charge
and indefinite detention without trial.

Said, who denied the accusations, was held for years, sometimes in
solitary confinement, after the merger failed in 1965 and Singapore became
independent.

He was released in 1979, at age 51. A stroke in 1992 left him reliant on a
walking stick and prompted his move to Malaysia, where his children had
relocated.

The banning of "Zahari's 17 Years" under the Film Act prohibits
exhibition, possession and distribution of the film.

The film's director, See, was investigated by police last year concerning
a documentary he made about an opposition leader. He was given a "stern
warning" but could have faced prison time or a fine if convicted of
knowingly producing and distributing a "party political film."

That film, "Singapore Rebel," was screened at film festivals in New
Zealand and the United States, but not in Singapore.

Amnesty International criticized Singapore for that case against See,
saying the city-state was stifling artistic freedom and preventing
citizens from expressing dissenting views.

Singapore authorities tightly restrict media and political speech, moves
that regularly draw criticism from international human rights groups.
Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong has acknowledged tensions over the
regulations but defended them as necessary to maintain order.

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Burlingame's book ban: 'Kaffir Boy' deemed unacceptable

2007-04-17T15:22:40Z

Sacramento Bee (California)
April 14, 2007 Saturday

EDITORIAL: Burlingame's book ban: 'Kaffir Boy' deemed
unacceptable

Apr. 14--A parent complained to an 8th-grade English teacher at Burlingame
Intermediate School, south of San Francisco, about a book the 13- and
14-year-old students were reading. That same day, reports the San
Francisco Chronicle, the district superintendent banned the book, "Kaffir
Boy: The True Story of a Black Youth's Coming of Age in Apartheid South
Africa."

That book won approval last year from the school district's core
literature committee, made up of parents, teachers, a librarian, a student
and a school board member. The school board discussed the issue Tuesday
but let the superintendent's decision stand. The superintendent said he
would allow an abridged version in which the offending material was
removed. That's not good enough.

The proper course of action is to allow the child to read an alternative
selection -- not to ban or abridge the book.

Mark Mathabane's 1990 book spares no detail in describing the harsh life
in one of South Africa's worst ghettos during the apartheid era. Mathabane
had a childhood marked by brutal police raids, grinding poverty, his
father's struggles to earn a dignified living and his mother's sacrifices
for his education.

Among the details is the offending scene, on page 72. It describes a day
when the Mathabanes had no food, and Mark tagged along with a group of 5-,
6- and 7-year-old boys on their way to migrant workers' living quarters. A
teenager promised the boys would get money and food for playing "a little
game" with the men who lived there. Mark fled when he saw what that was.
He says that scene marked a crucial turning point in the book and in his
life.

The parent complains that the scene is "pornographic." It is certainly
disturbing, but it does no good to pretend such things don't happen or to
sugarcoat life.

Mathabane, himself the father of three, wrote in 1999, "Should my children
bring home a book I find objectionable, the responsible thing for me to do
would be to request my child be assigned a different one."

But if students do read "Kaffir Boy," he wants them to "read it the way I
wrote it."

This is a good time for the Burlingame school district and its community
to discuss what parents may do if they don't want their child reading a
particular work. Residents should reject the decision to use an abridged
version of Mathabane's book.

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BOOK-BANNING DECISION DEFENDED

2007-04-17T15:21:09Z

The Baltimore Sun
April 11, 2007 Wednesday

BOOK-BANNING DECISION DEFENDED; BUT HARFORD OFFICIAL TELLS SCHOOL BOARD
SHE IS WILLING TO REVISIT `CHOCOLATE WAR' ISSUE

BYLINE: Mary Gail Hare, Sun Reporter

The Harford County schools superintendent defended her decision to ban a
teen-oriented novel about bullying from high school classes, but she told
the school board last night that she is willing to take another look at
the issue next year.

"This is not the definitive, forever decision," Superintendent Jacqueline
C. Haas said of her decision to ban The Chocolate War from the social
studies curriculum for county ninth-graders. "We are discontinuing this
book's use as a literary connection at this time and forming a new work
group that takes us back to the original vetting for this curriculum."

The committee, which could include administrators, parents and some
students, will review several books on bullying and harassment that might
be appropriate to the "Living in a Contemporary World" curriculum for high
school freshmen and report to Haas by May 2008. Haas said the group may
very well recommend using The Chocolate War, a 1974 novel that tells the
story of a boy who is bullied because he refuses to participate in his
school's chocolate-selling fundraiser.

In August, teachers sent home a syllabus for the new class, created to
help students with the transition from middle school to high school. The
class on stress management and decision-making centered on the novel.

"This unit was developed in a short period of time with no time to examine
multiple books," Haas said, adding she was concerned that no other
literary works were considered. "I had to decide whether this book was
appropriate to this unit."

Several parents had complained that vulgar language, including homophobic
slurs, overshadowed the book's message on the dangers of bullying. Haas
removed the book last fall and deferred her decision on its fate until a
committee of educators and parents could review the book. That committee
unanimously recommended the book.

Three speakers last night criticized Haas for bowing to the opinion of
about 40 parents who were concerned about profanity, sexual content and
references to homosexuality.

"I value intellectual freedom for my children," said Laura Krebs. "Young
readers are the real losers here."

Board of Education members all said they had their own views about the
matter but refrained from expressing them because they said they did not
want to prejudice a possible appeal to them of the superintendent's
decision.

The Chocolate War, which is on the American Library Association's list of
the top 10 challenged books, is still included among collections in
Harford's school and public libraries.

mary.gail.hare@baltsun.com

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Bloggers Who Criticize Government May Face Prison

2007-01-23T19:09:30Z

http://infowars.net/articles/january2007/180107Bloggers_Prison.htm

Bloggers Who Criticize Government May Face Prison
Bill would allow rounding up and imprisoning of non-registered political writers

Steve Watson
Infowars.net
Thursday, January 18, 2007

You'd be forgiven for thinking that it was some new restriction on free speech in Communist China. But it isn't. The U.S. Government wants to force bloggers and online grassroots activists to register and regularly report their activities to Congress in the latest astounding attack on the internet and the First Amendment.

Richard A. Viguerie, Chairman of GrassrootsFreedom.com, a website dedicated to fighting efforts to silence grassroots movements, states:

"Section 220 of S. 1, the lobbying reform bill currently before the Senate, would require grassroots causes, even bloggers, who communicate to 500 or more members of the public on policy matters, to register and report quarterly to Congress the same as the big K Street lobbyists. Section 220 would amend existing lobbying reporting law by creating the most expansive intrusion on First Amendment rights ever. For the first time in history, critics of Congress will need to register and report with Congress itself."

In other words Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats may redefine the meaning of lobbying in order that political communications to and even between citizens falls under the same legislation.

Under current law any 'lobbyist" who 'knowingly and willingly fails to file or report." quarterly to the government faces criminal charges including a possible jail term of up to one year.

The amendment is currently on hold.

This latest attack on bloggers comes hot on the heels of Republican Senator John McCain's proposal to introduce legislation that would fine blogs up to $300,000 for offensive statements, photos and videos posted by visitors on comment boards.

McCain's proposal is presented under the banner of saving children from sexual predators and encourages informants to shop website owners to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, who then pass the information on to the relevant police authorities.

Despite a total lack of any evidence that children are being victimized en mass by bloggers or people who leave comments on blog sites, it seems likely that the proposal will become legislation in some form. It is well known that McCain has a distaste for his blogosphere critics, causing a definite conflict of interest where any proposal to restrict blogs on his part is concerned.

In recent months, a chorus of propaganda intended to demonize the Internet and further lead it down a path of strict control has spewed forth from numerous establishment organs:

During an appearance with his wife Barbara on Fox News last November, George Bush senior slammed Internet bloggers for creating an "adversarial and ugly climate."

- The White House's own recently de-classified strategy for "winning the war on terror" targets Internet conspiracy theories as a recruiting ground for terrorists and threatens to "diminish" their influence.

- The Pentagon recently announced its effort to infiltrate the Internet and propagandize for the war on terror.

- In a speech last month, Homeland Security director Michael Chertoff identified the web as a "terror training camp," through which "disaffected people living in the United States" are developing "radical ideologies and potentially violent skills." Chertoff pledged to dispatch Homeland Security agents to local police departments in order to aid in the apprehension of domestic terrorists who use the Internet as a political tool.

- A landmark legal case on behalf of the Recording Industry Association of America and other global trade organizations seeks to criminalize all Internet file sharing of any kind as copyright infringement, effectively shutting down the world wide web - and their argument is supported by the U.S. government.

- A landmark legal ruling in Sydney goes further than ever before in setting the trap door for the destruction of the Internet as we know it and the end of alternative news websites and blogs by creating the precedent that simply linking to other websites is breach of copyright and piracy.

- The European Union, led by former Stalinist and potential future British Prime Minister John Reid, has also vowed to shut down "terrorists" who use the Internet to spread propaganda.

- The EU also recently proposed legislation that would prevent users from uploading any form of video without a license.

- We have also previously exposed how moves are afoot to clamp down on internet neutrality and even to designate a highly restricted new form of the internet known as Internet 2.

Make no mistake, the internet, one of the greatest outposts of free speech ever created is under constant attack by powerful people who cannot operate within a society where information flows freely and unhindered. All these moves mimic stories we hear every week out of State Controlled Communist China, where the internet is strictly regulated and virtually exists as its own entity away from the rest of the web.

The phrases "Chinese government" and "Mao Zedong" have even been censored on China's official Web sites because they are "Sensitive phrases". Are we to allow our supposedly Democratic governments to implement the same type of restrictive policies here?

Under section 220 of the lobbying reform bill, Infowars.net could be required to seek a license in order to bring this information to you. IF we were granted a license we would then have to report our activities to the government four times per year in order to bring you this information. Does that sound more like free speech or more like totalitarianism?

***********

Take action:

As well as calling the Senate you should go to GrassrootsFreedom.com which has a petition that you can sign against Section 220 of S. 1, the lobbying reform bill.

posted in Censorship - 1 reply

Warrantless mail search

2007-01-08T22:18:50Z

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16472777/

Warrantless mail searches may be allowed
Civil libertarians alarmed; White House says stance is no change in policy

WASHINGTON - A statement attached to postal legislation by President Bush last month may have opened the way for the government to open mail without a warrant.

The White House denies any change in policy, but civil libertarians are alarmed, saying the government has never publicly claimed that power before.

Federal law has long required a search warrant to open first class mail unless postal inspectors suspect it contains something dangerous, like a bomb or a hazardous chemical, reports NBC News' Pete Williams.

But in signing a postal bill just before Christmas, President Bush said federal law also gives the government authority to open the mail "for foreign intelligence collection."

White House spokesman Tony Snow said that's nothing new. “All this is saying is that there are provisions at law for — in exigent circumstances — for such inspections. It has been thus. This is not a change in law, this is not new.”

"What the signing statement indicates is what present law allows, in making it clear what the provisions are," Snow said Thursday in his daily briefing.

But members of Congress — Republicans and Democrats alike — say that's not what they intended the law to do. And they call it another example of a president claiming new legal authority while signing a bill into law.

“I was really surprised. There was absolutely nothing in the Postal Reform bill that in any way diminished or changed the privacy protections for domestic sealed mail,” Sen. Susan Collins of Maine said.

The law requires government agents to get warrants to open first-class letters.

But when Bush signed the Postal Reform act, he added a statement saying that his administration would construe that provision “in a manner consistent, to the maximum extent permissible, with the need to conduct searches in exigent circumstances. ...”

“The signing statement raises serious questions whether he is authorizing opening of mail contrary to the Constitution and to laws enacted by Congress,” said Ann Beeson, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union. “What is the purpose of the signing statement if it isn’t that?”

She said the group is planning to file request for information on how this exception will be used and also asking whether it has already been used to open mail.

Schumer critical of action
Sen. Charles E. Schumer, D-N.Y., also criticized Bush’s action.

“Every American wants foolproof protection against terrorism. But history has shown it can and should be done within the confines of the Constitution. This last-minute, irregular and unauthorized reinterpretation of a duly passed law is the exact type of maneuver that voters so resoundingly rejected in November,” Schumer said.

The ACLU’s Beeson noted that there has been an exception allowing postal inspectors to open items they believe might contain a bomb.

“His signing statement uses language that’s broader than that exception,” she said.

Bush uses the phrase “exigent circumstances”: “The question is what does that mean and why has he suddenly putting this in writing if this isn’t a change in policy,” Beeson said.

In addition to suspecting a bomb or getting a warrant, the law allows postal officials to open letters that can’t be delivered as addressed — but only to determine if they can find a correct address or a return address.

Bush has issued at least 750 signing statements during his presidency, more than all other presidents combined, according to the American Bar Association.

Reserving the right to make changes
Typically, presidents have used signing statements for such purposes as instructing executive agencies how to carry out new laws.

Bush’s statements often reserve the right to revise, interpret or disregard laws on national security and constitutional grounds.

“That non-veto hamstrings Congress because Congress cannot respond to a signing statement,” ABA president Michael Greco has said. The practice, he added, “is harming the separation of powers.”

The president’s action was first reported by the New York Daily News.

The full signing statement said:

“The executive branch shall construe subsection 404(c) of title 39, as enacted by subsection 1010(e) of the act, which provides for opening of an item of a class of mail otherwise sealed against inspection, in a manner consistent, to the maximum extent permissible, with the need to conduct searches in exigent circumstances, such as to protect human life and safety against hazardous materials, and the need for physical searches specifically authorized by law for foreign intelligence collection.”
NBC News and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Gingrich raises alarm at event honoring those who stand up for freedom of speech

2006-11-29T13:13:54Z

Gingrich raises alarm at event honoring those who stand up for freedom of speech
By RILEY YATES
Union Leader Staff
Tuesday, Nov. 28, 2006

MANCHESTER – Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich yesterday said the country will be forced to reexamine freedom of speech to meet the threat of terrorism.

Gingrich, speaking at a Manchester awards banquet, said a "different set of rules" may be needed to reduce terrorists' ability to use the Internet and free speech to recruit and get out their message.

"We need to get ahead of the curve before we actually lose a city, which I think could happen in the next decade," said Gingrich, a Republican who helped engineer the GOP's takeover of Congress in 1994.

Gingrich spoke to about 400 state and local power brokers last night at the annual Nackey S. Loeb First Amendment award dinner, which fetes people and organizations that stand up for freedom of speech.

Gingrich sharply criticized campaign finance laws he charged were reducing free speech and doing little to fight attack advertising. He also said court rulings over separation of church and state have hurt citizens' ability to express themselves and their faith.

Last night's event, held at the Radisson Hotel-Center of New Hampshire, honored a Lakes Region newspaper and a former speaker of the House for work in favor of free expression.

The Citizen of Laconia was given the Nackey S. Loeb First Amendment Award, which is named after the longtime President and Publisher of the Union Leader Corporation, owner of New Hampshire's statewide newspaper.

The Citizen scrutinized the Newfound Area School Board beginning last year over a series of e-mail discussions held before public meetings. It also used the right-to-know law to uncover costly decisions by the town of Tilton this year.

Executive Editor John Howe said the decision to pursue the stories led to at least one advertiser canceling its business with the paper.

"We try to practice what we preach, even if it costs us business," Howe said. "And it has and it will in the future.

Also honored was Marshall Cobleigh, former House speaker and a longtime aide to former Gov. Meldrim Thomson.

Cobleigh introduced an amendment to the state Constitution defending free speech. He also helped shepherd the state's 1967 right-to-know law through the Legislature.

Gingrich's speech focused on the First Amendment, but in an interview beforehand, he also hit upon wide-ranging topics.

Gingrich said America has "failed" in Iraq over the past three years and urged a new approach to winning the conflict. The U.S. needs to engage Syria and Iran and increase investment to train the Iraqi army and a national police force, he said. "How does a defeat for America make us safer?" Gingrich said. "I would look at an entirely new strategy." He added: "We have clearly failed in the last three years to achieve the kind of outcome we want."

Political parties in Presidential primary states should host events that invite candidates from both parties to discuss issues, said Gingrich, who criticized the sharpness of today's politics.

Gingrich said voters unhappy with the war, the response to Hurricane Katrina and pork barrel spending were the main drive behind the GOP's rejection at the polls. But he argued Republicans would have retained the Senate and just narrowly lost the House if President Bush had announced the departure of embattled Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld before, instead of after, the election.

Gingrich said he will not decide whether he is running for President until September 2007.

The event last night was sponsored by the Nackey S. Loeb School of Communications. The school was founded in 1999 to promote journalism and other forms of communication.

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Systematic Interference with Science at Interior Department Exposed

2006-11-02T21:34:15Z

Systematic Interference with Science at Interior Department Exposed
Author: Union of Concerned Scientists
Published on Oct 30, 2006, 06:54

High-ranking political appointees within the Department of the Interior have rewritten numerous scientific documents to prevent the protection of several highly imperiled species under the Endangered Species Act. Deputy Assistant Secretary for Fish and Wildlife and Parks Julie MacDonald personally reversed scientific findings, changed scientific conclusions to prevent endangered species from receiving protection, removed relevant information from a scientific document, and ordered the Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) to adopt her edits. All of these actions show a blatant disregard for the Endangered Species Act provision that requires species protection decisions to be based on the best available science.

"It's crucial that Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne create explicit policies that promote scientific openness, allow scientists to do their jobs, and punish those who inappropriately interfere with the scientific process," said Dr. Francesca Grifo, Senior Scientist and Director of the Union of Concerned Scientists' (UCS) Scientific Integrity Program. "Secretary Kempthorne should ensure that previous and future Endangered Species Act decisions are based on the best available science. And he should make adequate resources available to allow appropriate, science-based protection decisions under the Endangered Species Act."

Documents recently obtained by several conservation organizations show that MacDonald, an engineer with no training in biology, and other Interior officials personally edited scientific documents to change the conclusions of wildlife biologists with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service regarding what species are eligible for Endangered Species Act protection. Affected species include the greater sage grouse, the Gunnison sage grouse, the white-tailed prairie dog, the Gunnison's prairie dog, a fish known as the roundtail chub, and a tree found in the Mariana Islands.

These examples of the manipulation and distortion of scientific information are the tip of the iceberg. The abuse of science at Interior has been reported previously on issues as diverse as mountaintop removal mining, cattle grazing, and the protection of rare trumpeter swans. In a survey of FWS scientists published just last year, 84 scientists reported having been directed to inappropriately exclude or alter technical information from FWS scientific documents. Furthermore, 303 scientists, or two thirds of those who responded to the survey, knew of cases where Interior Department political appointees had interfered with scientific determinations.

"This is not business as usual. When hundreds of scientists report political interference in government science, our nation's biological diversity is at risk," said Dr. Grifo. "Species diversity has provided humankind with food, fiber, medicines, clean water, and numerous other services that many of us take for granted. When we lose species, we lose the potential to solve critical problems."

The documents were obtained by conservation groups including Forest Guardians, Center for Native Ecosystems, Center for Biological Diversity, and Sagebrush Sea. To see the documents, read other examples of political interference in science at the Interior Department, and view results from the FWS scientist survey, visit www.ucsusa.org/scientific_integrity.

Formed in 1969, the Union of Concerned Scientists is the leading science-based nonprofit working for a healthy environment and a safer world.

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Do I Support Censorship?

2006-10-31T16:35:26Z

The guy who runs the Myrtle Beach Film Fest thinks so -
Here is our recent e-mail exchange -

From: me
To: mbfilmfestival@***.com
Subject - Festival Comment -

I'm in post production on a dramatic short right now -
My partners and I are seeking film festivals around
the country for the 2007 season to submit to.

I just wanted to drop you a line to say the we
have decided NOT to submit our film to your
festival do to your awarding of a prize to
white supremacists "Prussian blue" and Neo-Nazi
promoter Michael Murrey.

His response
From: mbfilmfestival@***.com
To: me

That is ashamed, we like to think that our fellow film makers do not support sensor ship, but there are many narrow minded people in the world.
As our Festival states, we restrict "No" genre, as long as it is legal.That is the true meaning of art.
Remember, the Nazi's first banned certain content and was heavy into sensor ship.
So if you are into sensor ship of "Any kind" I would look into the mirror, before I started to call anyone a Nazi.
If you are into any sort of sensor ship, basically your into Nazism yourself.
I respect all other opinions as long as there my own, Right.
Do you see the hypocritical double standard.
It was simply the best music video we received. Maybe more people should have submitted music videos. We are not an agenda based group, we look at all the material we get and select the best one. Not because it has a message that we do not agree with, that would be like a communist.

I wonder if you would feel the same way if we would have had a gangster rap video with lyrics about rape or murder, or killing all white people what you would think. Probably nothing. Once again hypocritical double standard.

Opening your mind, will open your mind. Narrowing your mind, will also narrow your mind!
Good Luck, and we hope that you see we are a true freedom of speech without limits film festival. No group think found here!
A little shocked:
Jerry

My reply -
From: me
To: mbfilmfestival@***.com

If you think it's a matter of censorship you are sadly mistaken.
My not participating in your festival censors no one - You are free to award prizes to whoever you wish. It is a matter of free association and I chose not to associate with those who give prizes to Neo-Nazis -
You ask me to "look into the mirror, before I started to call anyone a Nazi." But, they ARE NEO-NAZIS - I've been familiar with Prussian Blue and Michael Murrey and their agenda of White Supremicism for years so I stand by what I said.
Are you denying they are White Supremecists Neo-Nazis?
I have never tried to censor them - I have only tried to inform people about their agenda.

As a true believer in free speech - I believe the solution to harmful speech is not to silence it - but to confront it with more speech - Hence me writing this letter.

Your statement about me where you say - "I wonder if you would feel the same way if we would have had a gangster rap video with lyrics about rape or murder, or killing all white people what you would think. Probably nothing. Once again hypocritical double standard."
Without any actual knowledge about me shows YOU are the one who is close minded and misinformed.

You letter shows a poor understanding of freedom of speech and censorship - you say
"I respect all other opinions as long as there my own, Right."
What has this got to do with anything? I can believe in freedom of speech and not respect the opinion of the one speaking - and I will go on the record as saying I DO NOT respect the opinion of Prussian Blue and Michael Murrey - this does not mean I am trying to censor them.

Your response has only strengthened my resolve to encourage my fellow filmmakers to avoid your festival.
And by the way - the word is censorship not "sensor ship" get a dictionary.

So . . .
Is this guy right? Do i have to respect all opinions to not be a "nazi" who supports "sensor ship" (ignoring my snide last line . . . )
Would it have been wrong (or "like a communist." like this guy says) for them to not award the Prussian Blue video a prize because they and the producer are white supremicists?

posted in Censorship - 1 reply

Arrest over Cheney barb triggers lawsuit

2006-10-04T12:50:42Z

Arrest over Cheney barb triggers lawsuit
By Charlie Brennan, Rocky Mountain News
October 3, 2006
A Denver-area man filed a lawsuit today against a member of the Secret Service for causing him to be arrested after he approached Vice President Dick Cheney in Beaver Creek this summer and criticized him for his policies concerning Iraq.
Attorney David Lane said that on June 16, Steve Howards was walking his 7-year-old son to a piano practice, when he saw Cheney surrounded by a group of people in an outdoor mall area, shaking hands and posing for pictures with several people.

According to the lawsuit filed at U.S. District Court in Denver, Howards and his son walked to about two-to-three feet from where Cheney was standing, and said to the vice president, "I think your policies in Iraq are reprehensible," or words to that effect, then walked on.

Ten minutes later, according to Howards' lawsuit, he and his son were walking back through the same area, when they were approached by Secret Service agent Virgil D. "Gus" Reichle Jr., who asked Howards if he had "assaulted" the vice president. Howards denied doing so, but was nonetheless placed in handcuffs and taken to the Eagle County Jail.

The lawsuit states that the Secret Service agent instructed that Howards should be issued a summons for harassment, but that on July 6 the Eagle County District Attorney's Office dismissed all charges against Howards.

The lawsuit filed today alleges that Howards was arrested in retaliation for having exercised his First Amendment right of free speech, and that his arrest violated his Fourth Amendment protection against unlawful seizure.

posted in Censorship - 0 replies