Banned Books Week Overlooks Real Censorship

The American Library Association has set aside the week October 1-7, 2023 as “Banned Books Week.” Various other groups, like Pen America and an organization aptly titled Banned Books Week, are getting in on the action with the goal, ostensibly, of defending people’s right to read whatever they want. “The American Library Association,” according to its website, “condemns censorship and works to defend each person’s right to read under the First Amendment and ensure free access to information.”

As an author myself who has suffered at the hands of Amazon’s anti-conservative bias, I know how hurtful book banning can be. My novel was published by a small-time Catholic publisher that saw its business shrivel up when Amazon changed its algorithm, making their books nearly impossible to find.

So when I heard about the ALA’s Banned Book Week, I was initially excited. That didn’t last long. A few pages into their website, I started to wonder if the ALA even knows what the word banned means.

All I can find is a list of 13 books that have been challenged for their appropriateness for children, not books that have been outright banned. They use the term banned to get your attention, but once you start digging, they switch from the word “banned” to “challenged.” The old bait and switch.

So what are these most challenged books? Well, the first one is titled Gender Queer. It comes in first because of a whopping 151 challenges. The second is All Boys aren’t Blue with a total of 86 challenges. The third is Toni Morrison’s (one of my favorite authors) The Bluest Eye. Apparently, 73 people felt offended enough by her book to ask their librarians to take it off the shelf. And finally, the fourth most challenged book, with a total of 62 challenges is called Flamer! I won’t bore you with the whole list. You can bore yourself with it.

Aside from the nasty equivocation with the terms banned and challenged, the ALA seems to think that when 62 people challenge a particular book, we have a crisis on our hands. Sixty two people? In fact, their entire list of the 13 most challenged (not banned) books had a total of only 830 challenges, and it is unclear whether the same people may have complained about more than one of the books on the list. It seems likely. According to Pen America, “Over 40 percent of all book bans occurred in school districts in Florida.”

So to sum up:
1. The list that leads off Banned Books Week does not contain a single banned book.
2. The books on the most-challenged list were challenged by a statistically insignificant number of people. Therefore, there is no real concern or need for a national “banned book week.” If there is, it should be called “challenged book week.”
3. The books on the list were only challenged by parents or concerned groups claiming that the books should be removed from school libraries. They were not banned from being sold in the marketplace, especially not banned on Amazon.
4. The list consists of books that target young readers with messages that either promote the LGBTQ+ worldview or contain violence that the challengers thought was in appropriate for young people. At the time of this writing, Americans still have a right to this form of free speech.

Now, if the ALA is truly concerned about censorship, there’s a whole bunch of books and authors that have been literally banned. Take for instance When Harry Became Sally or Irreversible Damage. The ALA could have called out Amazon’s history of censoring conservative books. But no. That won’t happen. For the ALA’s information, this is what a list of banned books looks like.

In college I wrote a publication history of DH Lawrence’s novel Lady Chatterly’s Lover. The book contained sexually explicit content that offended conservative sensibilities and was truly banned in most places in its unexpurgated form for most of the 1930s-60s. That was a banned book. The ALA is not talking about the same thing. Lady Chatterly’s Lover was not allowed on bookshelves. The books the ALA is talking about are on bookshelves and can all be purchased legally.

Times have changed since Lady Chatterly’s Lover. With more and more resources going digital, book banning isn’t done by limiting booksellers. And book burning isn’t done by Firemen as in Ray Bradbury’s novel Fahrenheit 451. It is done by software engineers in an Amazon office in downtown Seattle tweaking an algorithm. One small change and a book can disappear from the masses. That’s what so many conservative writers and commentators have faced, and that’s the real issue.

I had hoped maybe the ALA and its cronies were actually concerned about censorship. I thought maybe they had finally seen enough good people getting censored and de-platformed and demonetized in America. See Russel Brand’s saga, and follow him on Rumble. But no. Alas, the ALA’s BBW seems to be nothing more than a ploy to get kids to read and sympathize with LGBTQ+ issues.

If the ALA truly “condemns censorship and works to defend each person’s right to read under the First Amendment and ensure free access to information,” it would at least mention Amazon’s role in shadow banning books. It would bring attention to those who have been truly banned and silenced, like Steve Kirsch or presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

The ALA needs to be focused on the many ways that censorship of books occurs, and not just complain about parents who are wanting to protect their children from what they deem to be inappropriate content.

But I won’t hold my breath. And neither should you.

Since this Saturday is “Let Freedom Read” day, may I suggest we all celebrate it by reading the most banned book in the world? A book which can land you in jail or in the grave in 52 countries if you possess it illegally. The Bible. In honor of banned book week, I’ll be reading it in my public school classes.