Can it happen here? Stand against book banning. Support Libraries and Librarians.

This post contains additions to the original.

Also suport history and literature teachers; encourage your children to take these subjects seriously instead of "groan" subjects. Oh yes, way back in the Dark Ages when the world was fresh and new, Worried was once a student and well recall the groans of fellow students about these subjects. I reared a passle of children and heard their groans, then the groans of grand children. I am aware that children do not understand the importance of these subjects.
.......................................................
Censorship = loss of freedom of speech. Book banning = loss of freedom of speech and is the first step towards book burning. Book burning = loss of freedom of speech, loss of intellectual freedom and allows government control of knowledge. ........
Book Burning in the 20th Century—1933
"Where they have burned books, they will end in burning human beings." (German: "Dort, wo man Bücher verbrennt, verbrennt man am Ende auch Menschen.")—Heinrich Heine, from his play Almansor (1821)

Did it happen? Remember the Holocaust. The German people were a civilized, cultured race, and yet a psychotic leader led their country into horror and downfall. Many governments practised ethnic cleansing of one sort or another. We are too advanced, too civilized to allow such things to happen? Do we have a history of lynchings, burnings, and other atrocities committed against fellow citizens? Do we have a history of rounding up and imprisoning an entire race of fellow Americans who had ancestry of people deemed our enemies?


One way the Nazis cleansed the country of "un-German" thoughts was through censorship. A "brown shirt" ( member of the SA) throws more fuel --"un-German" books into a roaring fire on the Opernplatz in Berlin. May 10, 1933


Nazi burning of Jewish books and books deemed un-German.

Many of the books burned in Nazi Germany not only included all Jewish writings - literature, history and scientific works - but also many books by non-Jewish writers that are considered classics in America and much of the Western world.

In the post of 1/22/07, "Who Are The Terrorists", I pointed out that governments traditionally created a common enemy in order to instill fear in the citizens and to enlist their support in government policy and actions. The Nazis presented the Jews as the enemy, responsible for the financial quagmire Germany suffered post-WWI and all other ills of their society. Now our government presents another people of a different race and religion as our enemy. What does this have to do with book banning/ burning? Part and parcel of government control, control of knowledge, control of thinking and mental attitudes, especially of the young, and misdirection of citizen displeasure.