Opinion: Censorship is unlikely to have the desired effect – Des Moines Register

Marty Ryan| Guest columnist

Author Toni Morrison dies at age 88

Toni Morrison was the first African American woman to win the Nobel Prize for Literature. This is her legacy.

USA TODAY

Censorship: the suppression or prohibition of any parts of books, films, news, etc. that are considered obscene, politically unacceptable, or a threat to security.

What is so attractive about shutting down the ability of another to read, see, or hear what may be offensive to you but not to others?

I feel like were back in the 1980s when government attempted to shut down rap music, performance artists, photography by Robert Mapplethorpe, and books that had been banned in earlier decades.

President Ronald Reagans attorney general, Edwin Meese, established the Attorney Generals Commission on Pornography in 1986.It was commonly known as The Meese Commission. At the end, the commission issued a bulky two-volume report, much of it consisting of detailed narrations of the plots of pornographic movies dutifully set down by FBI agents whod been assigned to view them at taxpayers expense, of course.Not one of those FBI agents turned into a sexual predator. However, the commissioners believed dysfunctional predators who had testified to the commission that Porn made me do it. It was laughable.More laughable was the fact that former Attorney General John Ashcroft had blue drapes made to cover the bare breasts of Lady Justice.

Recently, Toni Morrisons book "Beloved"was the focus of a political advertisement in the campaign for governor in Virginia.The novel, a Pulitzer Prize winner, is an unflinchinglook into the abyss of slavery.A woman in the advertisement describes how her 17-year-old (white) son was traumatized by reading the book as it was assigned in a high school class. The boys mother wants the book banned from the Fairfax, Virginia, schools. Well, slavery wasnt exactly as honorable as you might think.It goes to show that not all books are banned because of sexual innuendo or content. But most books are banned because of embarrassing sexual information.

Waukee, Iowa, parents are upset that books found in a schools library are inappropriate for students of all ages because of explicit sexual content and graphic images. What ifthe books were in the reference section. And if you remember from high school, or even notice at public libraries, reference books are not available for check out. Books that depict graphic images, explicit sexual content, and violent passages should be considered for viewing with assistance from an adult who can intellectually serve as a guide to the adolescent.

There are many ways to deal with printed material, movies, and music that may raise an eyebrow. Adults are responsible for talking to their children about sex, their bodies, respect, and boundaries. Its not an easy task, but whoever said being a parent was a breeze? In my day, we had to learn everything on the street. And it wasnt always pretty, nor was it explained in terms that were educational, respectful, and honest. This matter is not like telling a kid theres no such thing as Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, and the Tooth Fairy. No, snickering was an essential cog of the street learning process.

Curiosity has been around since cats evolved. Adolescents should be able to bring questions to their parents without worrying about consequences.In the Register story on the Waukee matter, a parent found a book in his sons backpack about a boy who lives with his grandparents and is searching to discover the truth about his family.The parent said: I cannot write what I saw but found 33 different pages that contained sexual and or slanderous/vulgar content that if spoken in my house would be grounds for immediate discipline. [Emphasis added.] I pity that young man who lives in his fathers house and not his parents home.

When I was a young boy, a group of us (boys and girls) sat around a HiFi set and listened to a couple of LP albums found in a stack of a girls mothers records. One was recorded by Redd Foxx. If you grew up in the 1960s you know how dirty Foxx could be, but funny. Another album we listened to was Banned in Boston.Funny as hell. None of us had adverse reactions to the material in those LPs.

Supreme Court Associate Justice Potter Stewart is credited with saying: I know pornography when I see it, but I cannot define it. He didnt say that. It has been paraphrased to mean that, however.What he did say was I shall not today attempt further to define the kinds of material I understand to be embraced within that shorthand description /"hard-core pornography"), and perhaps I could never succeed in intelligibly doing so. But I know it when I see it, and the motion picture involved in this case is not that. (Themovie was "The Lovers," a 1958 French film by director Louis Malle.)

When books, music, and films are censored, they go underground. When anything goes underground, its impossible to control. Thats where the devil lives, isnt it?

I read "Catcher in the Rye" when I was young.I didnt think it was that great of a book. I read it again later in life to see what I missed because it had been banned so many times.I still didnt get it. Not only that, but once again, I didnt think it was that great a piece of literature. Im surprised no adult stopped me from reading "Wild in the Streets" around the same time.I loved that book, and it had more anti-authoritarian passages than "Catcher in the Rye."

Decades ago, if a book, play, movie, or music was banned in Boston it was an indication that the material was on its way to being a best seller.

Im sending my first book to Boston in hope that the Watch and Ward Society will recommend that it be banned.

Marty Ryan of Des Moines is retired after lobbying the Iowa Legislature for 27 years. This essay was originally posted on his blog.

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Opinion: Censorship is unlikely to have the desired effect - Des Moines Register