Conservative activists, led by a local pastor and outspoken Israel advocate, pushed the district, Mission CISD, to excise books mostly about gender, sexuality and race. Their demands represented an extreme version of a nationwide culture war over books that has played out in recent years — and ensnared a number of books with Jewish themes.
In Mission, the long list of books on the chopping block includes a recent illustrated adaptation of Anne Frank’s diary; both volumes of Art Spiegelman’s Holocaust graphic memoir “Maus”; “The Fixer,” Bernard Malamud’s novel about a historical instance of antisemitic blood libel; and “Kasher in the Rye,” a ribald memoir by Jewish comedian Moshe Kasher.
What fucking year is it?
Wouldn’t want people learning from history, now would we? How else are we supposed to repeat it?
Fucking yikes
Texas full of whiny bitches seems like
Everything is bigger in Texas, especially the whining snowflakes.
All you non-prots better pay attention. You will be betrayed.
I’m interested in what their reasoning was for banning Maus - I certainly don’t recall any sex or amti-christian material.
Oh, I think you know
It hurts their feelings that Nazis are the bad guys.
IIRC there is a brief depiction of a (possibly human rather than mouse? It’s been a while since I read it) woman whose body is in a tub after committing suicide, which is what I’ve read other groups trying to get it banned object to. Because titty.
Are conservatives activists so concerned with information related to living under Nazism because they don’t want young people to be able to recognize the steps if those steps occur to young people today?
No no, that would require “reason”.
No this is all somehow related to Jeezus.
Not it’s 100% tied to the resurgence of white supremacy. These conservatives groups are backed by humongous PACs that fund groups that push their agenda. Just like with turningpointusa and groups like that. Don’t mistake careful planning masked by racist zealots as idiocy.
Fair enough. All the actual humans I know that vote for these numbnuts are some flava of misplaced Jeebus worshipper. They don’t agree with racists (do they vote for them? Every time - while explaining how the candidate isn’t really racist) but they try not to do and say racist things. They don’t really know what fascism is in this context. Still they willingly hand over political power to those that do.
The actual racist / fascist shitheel who supports this garbage will do the Wavy-Jesus-Hands when they pray ostentatiously, but don’t really believe that crap, it’s just an important part of the grift for “the weak-minded”.
The conservative groups are led by Pastor Luis Cabrera, who is active in Latino conservative circles in the state and whose Instagram profile picture is currently an upraised fist outlined with the Israeli flag. Originally from Guatemala, Cabrera is a member of several right-wing Christian activist organizations and has also posted numerous pieces of pro-Israel social media content.
The thing about Uncle Tom’s are they come in all shapes, races, ethnicities, and backgrounds. Ironically the things they all hate and fight against
Another thing is that Uncle Tom was eventually flogged to death by the people whose admiration he so desperately sought to win.
Fundamentalist only see things in measures of what helps them obtain what they want. Once the utility of someone is over, they have zero compunction with turning on the person that helped them and riving them to nothingness as demonstration.
Man, that’s horrible…better make sure “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” is on the list to get removed.
i did nazi that coming
An “outspoken Israel advocate” wants to get rid of books about the Holocaust and antisemitism in general? I am very confused. Usually right wing extremist demands make some kind of sense from within their twisted world view, but how does that fit together at all, in any world view?
You should give “Praying for Armageddon” a watch.
The TL;DW is that evangelical Christians are outspoken supporters of war in Israel, because they believe it will bring forth the second coming of Jesus.
Sounds straight up delusional and seems like people who believe that sort of stuff and then act on it should be institutionalized for the safety of our fellow citizens.
Aren’t most people who believe in invisible people and talk to thin air considered crazy?
Hard right folks don’t like teaching the history of the consequences of hard right political movements. Those histories never end with a country full of happy economically secure people just living their lives because the only thing fascists can do is destroy everything.
Because Israel is committing genocide?
Israel doesn’t mean Jewish.
“Outspoken Israel advocates” who are evangelical Christians don’t love Jews. Quite the opposite. They need Israel to exist so all Jews in the world can be forcibly deported to it, and then made to rebuild the Great Temple, so Jesus can come back and throw them all into Hell.
And a red cow comes into the picture as well.
None of that is sarcasm. That is really what they think.
I’m still proud of the copy of “Maus” that I donated to the library of my shitty little Texas town before I moved out of that hell-hole a few years back. I still check the online catalog from time to time to make sure it’s still in circulation.
As someone else who got out of a shitty little Texas town, I salute you.
I’m definitely not for banning books, but couldn’t you say the same thing about news media? Or Facebook memes? Those “get you to think”.
We should only be banning things that promote intolerance because there will never be an end to the bannings, there will always be some witch to hunt somewhere.
To answer your question, yes it is the saying the same thing, that is why banning books is so stupid. A book, movie, TV show, meme, or news report isn’t necessarily going to change my mind but it might make me think about something from a perspective I didn’t consider before.
I don’t support banning memes or the news either, but they aren’t under attack currently.
local pastor and outspoken Israel advocate
Anne Frank’s diary
Art Spiegelman’s Holocaust graphic memoir
…
Israel advocate
Anne Frank’s diary
Israel advocate
Anne Frank’s diary
You fucking disgrace
Get out of my country
For some reason this made me way more irrationally angry than just killing Palestinians. It’s killing Palestinians and running cover for the people who killed Anne Frank and Spiegelman’s brother, and doing it all at the exact same time with no sense of shame or embarrassment but, I’m sure, a smug sense of superiority like everyone else is the monster in this
This guy better really hope that there isn’t a hell
It’s not really surprising - historically, the creation Israel state was helped massively by antisemitists, who wanted to get rid of jews in their own country and having them a place to immigrate to would be the easiest option (the phenomena is often referred to as Zionist antisemitism).
So yeah, it does make sense - they can hate the jews, but also support Israel at the same time.
In fact, Zionism is built upon the antisemitic myth of “Jews and non-Jews cannot live together”.
From what I understand, a lot of Israelis are rather unkind towards Holocaust survivors. Which is fucking wild to me.
It’s only wild if you believe their fable that their nation represents all Jews.
If however you see them as just another bunch of ethno-Fascists, it actually makes sense that many of the victims of the other large ethno-Fascist group in the last century wouldn’t get along with them simply because they recognize many of the same signs.
I didn’t think that would happen in Armenia, but since it does - the way some Armenians act towards refugees from Artsakh is similar, I think.
It’s easier for Israelis (especially when being fascists) to think that they themselves are strong, and those survivors are not like them, they are weak. It’s as they wanted to identify with Nazis more.
With such Armenians too - it’s the worse part of them thinking they can be just like Turks if they suck up to Turks, and also because Artsakhtsis lost their homeland for being weak, and they are not weak.
A bit like ignorant and cowardly people abandon relatives with chronic diseases, when there’s no evidence of those diseases being transferable.
It’s just cowardice. Humans do it under pressure or when presented with dark events for their interpretation and self-identification. While good upbringing may reduce the risk of someone growing up a coward, it’s very human.
No, quite the contrary.
You’ve probably read that in the early days of the State there was a lot of resentment towards Holocaust survivors. They were counter to the national narrative of the “New Jew” who was strong, hard-working, and living off the land. Shoah survivors represented Jews as victims, who did not fight back against the Nazis, instead going like “lambs to the slaughter.”
This all changed after the Eichmann trial (1961), which is when most of the world first came to understand the true nature of how the Nazis operated. Many people did fight back, and many couldn’t.
Holocaust survivors are revered and honored in Israel, although the country suffers from poor social services with a lot of gaps. Shoah survivors often fall through those gaps, along with other elders.
Hey man. If it looks like a Nazi, walks like a Nazi and quacks like a Nazi, it’s probably a Nazi
If it quacks like a duck, walks like a duck, swims like a duck, and looks like a duck, then it’s…
A swan! It claims to be a swan, therefore it is a swan! Swans are beautiful, therefore if you’re against swans you’re a bad person! You see ducks everywhere and accuse everyone being a duck! The word “duck” lost its meaning. In fact, we defeated the ducks in 1945, therefore any “ducks” we might have today are just edgy teens cosplaying as such.
EDIT: If you ask me, I think conservatives are just “good cops” to the fascists “bad cops” (this gave me an idea for a potential video essay).
Idk, if it quacks it might be an undercover nazi-duck
The worst possible kind.
Nazi ducks Nazi ducks Nazi ducks
DUCK OFF!!
Is… that a DK reference??
Fuck Knight? Yes, it is. ;)
But an Israel advocate would try to hide the holocaust least someone relate it to what Israel is doing to Palestine.
Maybe you’re thinking of a Jewish advocate and not an Israel advocate?
In-Israel Israel advocacy, and American Judaism, are absolutely chock full of people who are disgusted with Netanyahu’s government and his “war,” in part because of how much he is doing to destroy Israel on the world stage and get Israelis killed for more or less no purpose, as well as the unfolding horror of the apartheid state and genocide he’s enacting in their name.
Zionist advocates and Israel advocates and Jewish advocates and human rights advocates are four sometimes overlapping but distinct categories.
A Zionist advocate and an Israel advocate are the same thing.
Human rights advocates never overlap with those.
I sense the morass of an ever widening pointless argument opening up beneath me.
I’ll say my feeling on it and be done, and you’re free to disagree: No one should be hated for where they were born, or for wanting a home or a safe place to be. Not a Palestinian, or a Russian, or an Israeli citizen, or someone who was born and grew up in Nazi Germany. If you got born in Israel and managed to penetrate through a significant haze of propaganda and groupthink to realize that what your country is doing on the world stage is a monstrous crime, what should you do?
Advocate for the destruction of your home?
Move away, never to return, renounce your citizenship and want nothing to do with your evil of a country? Yeah, maybe.
But I can also see someone who sees it as their duty to resist Netanyahu’s government, tries to set their country back on the right course, advocates for the ICC, and turns out for protests against the government and gets brutalized and arrested for it. That stuff happens too. “Pro Israel” isn’t really the right word for those people, no. I actually don’t fully disagree with what you’re saying, that in the modern world if you are “pro Israel” you’re probably a piece of shit (or just totally propagandized / misinformed about what’s actually going on, which there’s a lot of also). So maybe I shouldn’t have phrased it in those terms. But definitely, I think there is a type of Israeli person who is trying to support their home, the only place they’ve ever known to live, by resisting the Netanyahu government, and is ashamed of Israel but not like “against” them in the sense of, I hate my home and all the people here. You can love the town you grew up in, you can have friends and allies (hopefully, ones who are also horrified by the death and destruction in Gaza) there. You can be “pro” that part of it while still hoping that Netanyahu somehow gets what’s coming for him, soon, and all of the killing that’s being done in your name stops.
Like I say, I don’t think anyone should be hated for where they were born.
(Oh, and also the far ends of the scale have 0 overlap, yes. You cannot be a Zionist and a human rights advocate, if my way of saying it made it sound like I thought you could.)
No one in Israel is out there protesting the genocide.
All the protests have been because not enough was done to rescue hostages or some other dislike of Netanyahu.
Overall polling shows Israel supports what is happening to Palestine or thinks not enough has been done.
Yes they are. It’s the same groups that have been campaigning to end the occupation since before October 7th. It’s not a majority or even close to - two-thirds of Israelis support the continuation of the war. But saying “no one” is an absolute falsehood. And, I think propaganda and misunderstanding of the situation on the ground is also a large part (in addition to, yes, some large amount of pure racism and violent vindictiveness that says it’s okay if Palestinians are dying because they are bad.)
The wheel you’re currently cranking on, is the same wheel that was turning right at the beginning of Israel, and managed to turn its way from “all the Nazis are wrong and evil” around to “the Jews are always the victims about everything” and has now arrived itself at “Israel can do anything it decides to and will still be the victim” and now, on the other side, “all the Israelis are always wrong and evil” is emerging into view coming in the other direction. I am telling you that no matter how hard you crank that wheel, on whichever side, your activity will never crank you around to arrive at a world that is peaceful or just.
(I know I said I’d stop after saying my bit; I just wanted to say a little more on it and shoot down the absolutely false idea that no one in Israel opposes the war on humanitarian grounds.)
That whole article talks more about protestors pushing for returning hostages and other dislikes of Netanyahu far more than it does generic ‘anti-war’ protestors.
So thanks for that really, just further solidifies my point.
Likewise life is not a fucking wheel, it doesn’t travel in some predetermined path you’ve created. Let me tell you something, no matter how hard you centrist “don’t do anything at all” approach it, you will never arrive at a world that is peaceful or just.
Netanyahu is an evil fuck, but this isn’t his war, Israel has been doing slow and steady ethnic cleansing of the region for 50+ years.
Rabin was closer than anyone to ending it, and Netanyahu’s stochastic terrorism led directly to his death. And he’s been propping up Hamas ever since, to give Israel an enemy to hate and prevent peace from ever coming to the region.
Fuck him, he owns it now.
“No does more for Israel than I do”
“What about that time you killed a democratically elected Israeli leader who was doing good things for Israel”
“That’s what I said. He was doing more than me for Israel, and we can’t have that. No one does more for Israel than I do.”
True that. Netanyahu’s a little more extreme than the norm, but as I understand it, yes, Israeli politics is:
- A majority that wants full-on ethnic cleansing
- A minority party that wants oppression and murder but not in a way that’s explicitly genocidal or threatens their own security
- And maybe a tiny dissident faction that wants actual human rights for the Palestinians
I’m speaking well of the dissident faction and highlighting its existence in the first place; I’m not saying it’s anywhere near the mainstream.
Land of the free and freedom of speech are such hollow terms when Americans say them.
Fascism has a very strong foothold in half of USA.I just can’t understand how someone could think that banking books is a good idea.
So you think that all books should be available to all kids in public schools?
Yes
We have these people who go to college and get specialized degrees so that they can do things and work in school libraries and figure out what books are appropriate for the school.
You might have heard of them. They’re called librarians.
Deciding what books do and don’t belong in a library is literally part of their job. I know, because I’m married to one. She used to work in a school library, now she works in a public library. It was a Catholic school (she’s an atheist, they didn’t discriminate) and they trusted her to figure out which books were appropriate for their kids because of her degree. What does that tell you about librarians?
It tells me that they are obviously evil because they don’t blindly support a white Christian authoritarian regime.
/s
The funny thing is that I know for a fact that there are Trump supporters who work in the library where my wife works (one is a cis woman with a mustache who must be mistaken for trans regularly, which surprised me), and they also don’t approve of this shit. I mean yeah, they’re total hypocrites, but they still don’t support these book bans.
Which books do you believe shouldn’t be provided in a classroom setting?
No copouts. I don’t think anyone expects a bunch of 3rd graders to have a discussion on 50 Shades of Grey.
I think the opinion as to what shouldnt be in public schools is reasonable, and I am cool if we are overly restrictive if there is a reason that is good and is supported by enough people.
You didn’t answer my question. Let’s try a different one. Once again without copping out: Give us a couple good reasons for why a book should be restricted in education.
Books should be restricted from education if a significant portion of the adults dont think its appropriate for children. This could include any variety of reasons they dont think its appropriate.
Will each book be voted on individually? How does that work in your head? I doubt that people read minimally an excerpt of each book to decide and ban them.
Probably do it on a complaint basis. Each school district could have a diverse board and they could look at the books that people dont like and if X out of Y think it should be removed, then remove it. Does that work for you?
Yes, so 4 year olds can read mein kampf
If you put that book in a kindergarten library, I can guarantee none of the kids will read it.
The only two reasons not to have it are 1) budget and 2) space. Use the room and money for books the kids will read.
All books ever!!! The Necromomicon! Solomon’s Demonology! THE ANARCHIST’S NOTEBOOK!! PEPPA PIG GOES TO HELL!! !
No gods, no masters, no borders, no censors.
We had like everything, from childrens books to engineering stuff. It’s filed differently so your fragile mind won’t need to see “adult” books if you don’t want to I guess.
My fragile mind doesnt want minors to see things they shouldnt see till later. That should be a pretty obvious thing that everyone wants for children…
I like how this argument assumes schools are just regularly stocking school libraries with your Literotica history.
I didnt say they were. If its not happening very often why are you guys so against books being removed?
If it’s not happening often, why are you hellbent on banning books? They are edge case, but your ilk act like every school library is chuck full of inappropriate books.
I am hellbent on protecting children from adults that will do them harm. If its only edge cases then why are you hellbent on putting rules in place to remove questionable books?
So remove them entirely? It’s not like the kids are going read one by chance and if they are seeking them then they are ready
Get rid of anything that mentions rape, prostitution, genocide, or god forbid SODOMY?
Out goes the bible then. No one under 18 should read it.
The difference between the Bible and other more modern books is that the Bible is the most influential book in western civilization. If you want to have a censored on that removed those exact passages then that seems like a reasonable compromise.
Fuck that, the wretched thing doesn’t deserve special treatment. There is nothing about the contents of the bible that are worth granting exception for. You want to ban adult themes? I can think of nothing more deserving of such a ban than the oldest book to incorporate rape, divinely ordained murder (all over the place), instructions on how to perform an abortion, incest, and the severly mixed message of “god loves everyone, unless you don’t worship them, then you get tortured forever”.
Like it or not the Bible is the most influence book in western history, so yes it gets special treatment. But again, if you want to make a censored version for kids that takes out those parts, it seems like a reasonable compromise.
Just like all christians do, they just want to pick the ones that fit their agenda and ignore the rest.
What “the rest” are we ignoring?
Incest. Don’t forget incest.
Unironically yes.
the world is hard and kids need to be taught about us in a controlled environment like a school.
I’ve worked in school libraries.
The funny thing is that kids will only read things that are of interest to them, and if they’re interested in it, they’re old enough to read it. If they borrow it because they like the cover or all their friends have apparently read it or some such reason, you can be assured it’ll be returned after they get through the first page.
I understand, but there are literally millions of books, why do we have to have the few books with sexual material that a significant portion of parents object to?
It isn’t about them being available. Its about discussing the content and the deeper meaning. I would be totally fine with reading Adolf Hitlers - Mein Kampf in School, as long as the content gets discussed and why what he wrote wasn’t good.
Nothing is going to be discusses it would just be sitting on the shelf and available. So I think we should all agree that censorship of books in public schools makes sense. I personally am fine with siding on the side of being more cautious and having kids less able to get books people think are not acceptable, and catching books that probably should be available in schools.
You’re a fucking troglodyte.
If kids are only exposed to kid friendly stuff, then they will never learn anything and stay kids long into adulthood.
I guess so, but if kids are exposed to adult things their mind is not ready for it will harm them.
They already deal with the fact that someone can just go in and shoot them the middle the middle of class. Those books are nothing compared to that
Two different discussions.
Censoring books due to reasons like “these books provide a point of view I’m not comfortable exposing my kids too” is usually a bad reason to censor books.
Problem I see is its all a pendulum on these issues where the reaction swings wildly back and forth the more energy were putting into it rather than having it settle the fuck down.
For instance these books being removed aren’t produced in spite of this issue. But for sure if we dig into censorship topic then pro censorship groups start bringing out books to be edgy cunts and prove a point.
Every issue has edge cases and we live in a time where people are so willing to be right they will make every edge case the center of an issue. Like in order to keep Maus on shelves we will now need to have a copy of Bomb making 101 or a book were one of these people wrote FUCK a million times just so they can get anti censorship people to say “hey that isn’t cool guys”
What you are saying makes sense, I just dont see an issue if XX% of people dont want a book to be in PUBLIC schools, then I am okay with restricting it unless there is some kind of cultural significance, and within reason. I am probably okay with Maus from what I have heard, but I dont see it as an issue to take it off the shelf if people feel strongly and there is some level of logic.
You do realise that there’s a version of Mien Kampf that’s four times as long because there’s several experts annotating and debunking Hitler’s ideas right there on the page.
Thats fine, what would be so bad if a signficant part of the population dont think its appropriate so its not provided to kids at a public school?
History is uncomfortable. Revising it to tell lovely stories is all well and good for building a national identity.
However, sugar-coating, ignoring, or even flat-out erasing parts of history benefits no one. People started writing events down accurately because the orators of old never intended paint an accurate picture of the past. And therefore lessons learnt from the failures of humanity (lost causes, preventable catastrophies, perspectives of people on the wrong side, genocides, etc.) were also lost.
History should be uncomfortable, so we can collectively learn and have a chance to do better the next time.
You are believing the propaganda not what the real critique is.
A significant part of the population doesn’t think it’s appropriate for a picture book about two male penguins that adopt a chick to be in a public school.
In fact, a significant part of the population doesn’t think white kids and black kids should go to the same school. And have found ways to do things about it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Segregation_academy
Why should we cater to these significant parts of the population?
What would be so bad with…
…checks notes…
…informing young people about the most horrible decisions made throughout history, why they were flawed, and how not to repeat the same mistakes today?
Hmm…
Just take a look at the world around you. That’s a fucking start…
That is not what is happening…
Only if these books are inscribed on the side of a Glock
Like a library?
