MetaFilter posts tagged with libraries and censorship

Celebrate freedom: Read a banned book!

orrnyereg — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 08:46:46 -0800

Banned Books Week, held annually on the last week of September, emphasizes the importance of intellectual freedom and the threat of censorship. Here's a helpful map of recent book bans and challenges in the Unites States. The American Library Association lets you search the most frequently banned books by year and author.

...515 to material with a homosexual theme or “promoting homosexuality,” ...

amberglow — Mon, 25 Sep 2006 21:52:44 -0800

Banned Books Week -- 25th anniversary year. How to deal with a challenge, what you can do generally, and of course, lists, and more lists. Captain Underpants is a more recent entry, i notice.

First Patriot Act Library Records Enforcement

ed — Fri, 26 Aug 2005 10:46:43 -0800

The FBI has issued the first demand for library records under the Patriot Act. The library in question is somewhere in Bridgeport, CT. The ACLU is seeking an emergency court order to lift the FBI gag order, but they've been instructed by the gag to keep the person whose library records being sought (i.e., their client) a secret. What the ACLU has revealed is that the client is a member of the American Library Association (clearly, a front for terrorism). If any MeFites are interested in digging up additional details on this and start making calls, here's a good place to start. What indeed would the FBI consider so threatening?

US v ALA

zedzebedia — Mon, 23 Jun 2003 13:45:52 -0800

The Children's Internet Protection Act is hunky dory, according to the Supreme Court. This means that public libraries are required by law to have web filters on public terminals. While it's great that children will now be forever protected from the evils on online pornography, the drawback is that most filters are so unreliable that just me mentioning the word "sex" in this post could get Metafilter blocked by a web filter.

Shane — Mon, 30 Sep 2002 10:22:43 -0800

The following is a [partial] list of the most frequently challenged books of 2001...
1. Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling
2. Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
3. The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier (the "Most Challenged" fiction book of 1998)
4. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
5. Summer of My German Soldier by Bette Greene
6. The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
(Last week was Banned Books Week. Sorry this is late. Did you remember to hug your favorite banned book? Does anyone really think children need to be "protected" from these books?)

Blake — Tue, 30 Jul 2002 04:15:42 -0800

It is not a crime to look at bomb-making websites... or so says Lieutenant Jason Ciaschini, police spokesman in Punta Gorda, where a Briton who was using a computer to look at bomb-making websites is now being held at Charlotte County Jail on immigration violations.
Florida police had evacuated the library and arrested him after he looked at bomb-making websites, and found suspicious liquids in his backpack.
"Looking up stuff on the Internet - everybody has freedom to do that," he also said.