Banned Book Club

The owner of the Book Punch store Pong Yat-ming and three staff were accused of selling copies of "The ‌Troublemaker", a biography of Lai by one of his former business directors, Mark Clifford, TVB reported.

The Troublemaker | Book by Mark L. Clifford | Official Publisher Page | Simon & Schuster

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/44548314

School book banning escalates in the UK as Greater Manchester secondary school censors scores of books - Index on Censorship

Interesting choices...

I'm sure this will bubble up to SCOTUS and they'll decide that all libraries are illegal or some shit, but still maybe a little good??? For now??

Ouch.

Ouch.

"State has ordered books by 13 authors, 12 of them women, to be removed from every public school, classroom and library"

Banned Books, Keelatud Kirjandus, is a museum in Tallinn, Estonia that preserves banned, censored, and burned books from around the world. We tell the stories of our books and their authors, and provide resources for learning about the history of censorship, contemporary challenges, and the free exchange of ideas.

Our Story

A few words about us

We believe that the topic of literary censorship is highly relevant and important at this moment in time. Around the world many nations, institutions, and movements restrict access to written material for a wide variety of reasons. Our museum explores the thin lines and grey areas in each one of these cases by presenting the stories of restricted books and engaging the public in a dialogue about the free exchange of ideas.

Our goal is to study the phenomenon of free speech. We do not take a political stance, but rather we enable the public to learn about the topic for themselves by telling stories, educating about history, and providing free access to relevant research and journalistic material.

Mission
It's all about preserving books and liberating people.

The impact we create with our experience is as transcending as our books are concrete and physical. We aim to expand and develop consciousness as a whole by starting on the individual level. We do this through our museum, events, discussion groups, bookclub, podcast, and educational programme.

Vision
We dream of a world in which people can freely share, challenge, and refine their ideas.

The value and skill of self-expression strengthens the public and makes it more robust against outside influence. If there is one country that understands the importance of this freedom and has experienced what it takes, it is Estonia. Our initiative will continue this journey and help others along the way.

The American Library Association's Office for Intellectual Freedom (OIF) has released new data documenting book challenges throughout the United States, finding that challenges of unique titles surged 65% in 2023 compared to 2022 numbers, reaching the highest level ever documented by ALA. Read the full announcement.

OIF documented 4,240 unique book titles targeted for censorship, more than the previous two years combined (2,571 in 2022; 1,651 in 2021), as well as 1,247 demands to censor library books, materials, and resources in 2023. Four key trends emerged from the data gathered from 2023 censorship reports:

• Pressure groups in 2023 focused on public libraries in addition to targeting school libraries. The number of titles targeted for censorship at public libraries increased by 92% over the previous year, accounting for about 46% of all book challenges in 2023; school libraries saw an 11% increase over 2022 numbers.

• Groups and individuals demanding the censorship of multiple titles, often dozens or hundreds at a time, drove this surge.

• Titles representing the voices and lived experiences of LGBTQIA+ and BIPOC individuals made up 47% of those targeted in censorship attempts.

• There were attempts to censor more than 100 titles in each of these 17 states: Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Idaho, Illinois, Iowa, Kentucky, Maryland, Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, and Wisconsin.

Creators who have at least one book banned in the prison system of the u.s. state of texas for "security" reasons as of september 2022. (The list of books banned by the state for any reason, available here, is much longer.)

• Justin Seitz

• Supreme Understanding

• Tim Hindle

• Kre Kre ( 1970 )

• George L. Jackson ( 1941 - 1971 )

• Ajamu Niamke Kamara ( 1953 - 2005 )

• Helen Fouché Gaines

• Abbie Hoffman

• Reginald Major ( 1926 - 2011 )

• Robert Goldwire

• Cureton Steven

• Nyeem Mitchell

• Kevin Salt Rocc Lewis

• Michael Sims

• Gary Clark ( 1943 )

• Crystal Lacey Winslow

• Sanyika Shakur ( 1964 - 2021 )

• Neil, Theresa

• Sagar Rahalkar

• Marshall “Eddie” Conway ( 1946 - 2023 )

• Richard Mansfield ( 1945 )

• PaPa Sak

• Jamonz Ross

• Roger Morris ( 1938 )

• Rob Whitaker

• Koffi Hallman ( 1970 )

• Ian Neil

• Josh Lospinoso

• Al-Saadiq Banks

• Dave Ebert

• James R. Payne

• Brandon Whitting

• Samrat BHOOPLI

• Mike Meyers ( 1961 )

• Bryace Todd Jones

• Roger Gastman ( 1977 )

• Kevin 'Rashid' Johnson

• Kevin D. Mitnick ( 6 August 1963 - 2023 )

• Jennifer Niederst Robbins

• Andrew MacDonald ( 1933 - 2002 )

• David Carmack

• Tegan Broadwater

• Robert Greene ( 14 May 1959 )

• Abraham Lee

• Vickie Li

• David F. Walker ( 1968 )

• Soma Halder

• Jack C. Stanley

• Katie Hafner

• John Lee Brook

• Luc Gesell

• Barbara Casey

• Lance Henderson

• Rob Percival

• Tony Stacy

• James "Jinx" O'Connor

• Damen "Mr. C" Corrado

• Rachel Pearson ( 1983 )

• Pavel Yosifovich

• Nikhil Abraham

• Gus Khawaja

• Ric Messier

• OccupyTheWeb

• Brian Messenlehner

• Paul O'Donnell ( 1961 )

• Wendel Withrow

• Chad Orzel

• Edward A. Kutac

• Joey Green

• Julitta Korol

• Erick S. Gray

• Herbert C. Covey

• Ralph Morrison

• Thomas Petruzzellis

• Eric Stover

• Danny Korem

• Lance J. Hoffman

• T. Jeff Williams

• Craig Berg

• Art Blajos

• Chris Blatchford

• Luke Wroblewski

Dear Authors and lllustrators,

I want to update you regarding the Book Fairs Share Every Story/Celebrate Every Voice case.

First, I want to apologize on behalf of Scholastic. Even if the decision was made with good intention, we understand now that it was a mistake to segregate diverse books in an elective case. We sincerely apologize to every author, illustrator, licensor, educator, librarian, parent, and reader who was hurt by our action. We recognize and acknowledge the pain caused, and that we have broken the trust of some of our publishing community, customers, friends, trusted partners, and staff, and we also recognize that we will now need to regain that trust.

This case will be discontinued starting with our next season in January. For the remaining fairs in the fall, Book Fairs is working on a pivot plan as we speak. We will find an alternate way to get a greater range of books into the hands of children. We remain committed to the books in this collection and support their sale throughout our distribution channels.

Our commitment to BIPOC and LGBTQIA+ authors and stories remains foundational for our company. Scholastic believes in the basic freedoms of all individuals. We oppose discrimination of any kind on the basis of age, race, creed, color, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity and expression, or national origin. We are committed to providing access and choice, and to helping young readers develop critical skills needed to exercise democracy and build a society free of prejudice and hate. Equally important, we pledge to stand with you as we redouble our efforts to combat the laws restricting children's access to books. This will not be our last communication on the matter, but we wanted to get this initial Word out. We look forward to working to create a better and more just future together.

Sincerely,

Ellie Berger

President

Scholastic Trade Publishing

Hi! Does anybody know of any online book clubs for banned books?

Or does anybody wanna…start one?

I’m looking a comfy group to join that doesn’t cost money or conflict with my busy schedule of being sick all the time.

(if this isn’t the right community to post this is, let me know)